An Apparently Controversial Non-Controversy

So, my kids are going to kill me for this when they read it later on, but I'm officially announcing to all the world that my kids are not circumcised, and I don't care what you think.

I just didn't see the point.

"First, do no harm," is the doctors' mantra and should be the mothers' too. Now I understand that there are religious traditions about this that I know nothing about and couldn't even comment on them in any educated manner. I don't carry any of these religious beliefs, and even if I did, I don't know that I could impose them on my 3 day old child. But nevertheless, I'm not addressing this to people who circumcise their sons out of religious tradition, this is for all those people who have said things like the following to me (and its not like I even brought it up!):

"But your kids will get infections."

Actually, this is a myth that has never been proven. The American Academy of Pediatric Medicine no longer recommends circumcision. The baby is more likely to get an infection from the circumcision surgery itself than from being left intact. I actually read somewhere that doctors started routinely circumcising boys to discourage masturbation! Didn't work, though.

"But it leads to poor hygiene and you are going to have to get up in there and do all kinds of special cleaning all the time. Your boy won't know how to do it himself."

When I was pregnant, I got HUNDREDS of brochures and packets from different sources about things like "Back to Sleep," "Don't Shake Your Baby," "Don't smoke, drink or use drugs," "Breastfeeding is Best," "Care and Feeding of your Newborn," etc.  I got NO information on circumcision or the care of the male genitalia, circumcised or not. Having never owned a penis myself, and D being of the snipped variety, I finally had to look it up on line. You know what special care I have to do to my sons parts? Nothing! No folding back the foreskin (It actually won't fold back for several years) no extra cleansing for infection. I am supposed to gently rinse with soapy warm water when bathing. There is more care involved when taking care of the newly circumcised penis. When the kids are older, they will have to pull back the foreskin and gently rinse with soapy warm water. Why do we assume that boys cannot handle their own hygiene when girls, with I dare say more complicated anatomy--not to mention menstruation, are not thought to be incompetent in this department?

"But all the other boys will be circumcised and he will be made fun of in gym class."

Actually, not all the other boys are circumcised. Eighty-five percent of the male population of the world are not circumcised. It is a North American custom. And in North America, it is decreasing. Maiming your child's natural anatomy seems like a lame excuse to get him out of being teased in gym class. Should I not get him glasses if he would be called 'four-eyes'?  There are better ways to handle childhood teasing. Take it from someone called "six-eyes" all through school.

"But I had to circumcise my kid so he would look like his father."

Huh? Did you give him plastic surgery so he would also have his father's nose? Did you dye and perm his hair so he would have his father's hair? I don't get it. I know this doesn't apply to me because my kids don't look like their father much. They are not biologically related. And D had no hang-up with having their penises look different. In fact, when D read about circumcision, he kind of started feeling sorry for himself for being circumcised. What is this looking like your father stuff all about, anyway? It's not like fathers and sons routinely whip it out in public for comparisons sake. At some point in history, the first men to be circumcised didn't look like their fathers and I don't think we had a lot of father's casting off their sons because of it.

"Women prefer circumcised men."

Damn that Sex and the City! I have to admit, I always thought penises looked like the circumcised variety. Even in sex ed and anatomy textbooks, they were circumcised. All of the whole handful or two I had ever seen were circumcised. Then (embarrassingly funny confessional alert!) I dated this guy from Europe. We became intimate. For three days and nights I wondered, "What is WRONG with him? Does he have some kind of deformity?" Then on the fourth day, at the exact most comprising moment...it dawned on me (sometimes, I'm slow...) "He's not circumcised. OoooKaaay." And being mature and sensitive about the whole matter...I blurted out, "So THAT'S what's wrong with it!" He proceeded to tell me all the advantages of being intact. That thar foreskin is good for something, apparently. Lots of pleasure cells there. Lotsa lube. Good mechanics for the whole sex thing. Who am I to deny my kids their full sexual experience? A college friend of mine who moved to Europe even thinks that is why Europeans are rumored to be better lovers. She says the things not all calloused up from having nothing to protect it so they don't have to be so desperate and bullish about it. I couldn't say, I think its all what you're used to. But I don't think I'd want my kids to go for a woman where it was a deal-breaker anyway.

"But it prevents the spread of HIV/AIDS."

These stories started coming out after my kids were a few months old. I don't know much about it. To me, it seems like a weird way to prevent a disease. Why don't we just cut of women's breasts at birth to prevent breast cancer? Or go take out the prostate as well to prevent diseases of the prostate. I don't know. I figure that if this information turns out to be a major way to prevent the spread of AIDS, I would educate my kids about it along with other ways to prevent the disease. When they are 18, they can, of course, decide for themselves if they would like to be circumcised. You can take it off anytime, but you can't put it back on.

I really never thought this would be such a big thing. There was a question on my hospital preregistration about it, and I kind of had no opinion, so I did some research and this is what I decided. I actually saw a circumcision being performed on line (in still shots) and it looked like absolute torture to me. I didn't care if my babies won't remember it, I couldn't stand the thought of them getting taken away from me in the hospital for that. For the life of me, I don't understand why we condemn female circumcision and genital mutilation in other countries, but act like male circumcision is no big deal. That, along with nearly no medical benefit or good reason to do it, made me opt out. When I did, my OB nurse and my perinatalogist congratulated me on making an educated decision. They say most mothers come in not knowing a thing about it and just checking the "yes" box because they think they are supposed to.

I wouldn't judge a mother who got her son circumcised, especially mothers from past generations. But I do wish that women would at least check into it and make an informed decision. (A good place to start...The UN sponsored site: National Organization of Circumcision Information Centers.) For If you are going to do it, at least know why and know all the facts and have a good reason. I also wish that OB's and pediatricians would educate people about it. Bring it up, have a brochure available, offer to answer questions. Because it seems almost taboo to talk about in the medical field.

But certainly it is not too taboo for some of my relatives to comment about!?!?

Comments

[gawdessness]

First I totally support the right of anyone to choose to do this, particularly for religious reasons. But, also frankly if it is really something that they feel very psychologically tied into.
(My favourite is when someone is in favour of it, solely so the child will look like Daddy. Oh.)
I don't like it and truly do not see a medical basis for it (as you point out so well). I do want people to be informed and frankly if someone does choose this as an option for their baby, I want them to be there to comfort the child while it happens.
I had to leave the "common" nursery area at the hospital where one of my kids was born because they were just strapping an infant to the body board in order to show a nursing class how circs were done. The parents weren't there and didn't want to be there.
That was much worse, to me, than opting for it in the first place.

[Jeri]

I didn't have my son circumcised, either. But when we were in the hospital after he was born, a nurse came in and said, "he's going to be circumcised now"! I said, "No he's not!" And she was very surprised, said baby boys were always circumcised. I'm just glad I was there to prevent it from happening--even after I'd signed all the papers saying I didn't want it done and everything, it was such a matter of course that they just assumed he was scheduled for it.

[shannon]

I was sort of glad Nat was a girl, because before she came I "educated myself" about it along the lines you did and decided against it (we have no religious reasons for doing it, either). I think it would have been a fight with Cole, though, because I think she would have wanted it.

[cluttergirl]

Thanks for a great post. I think it is rather silly to circumcise, if we can call lobbing off parts of the genitalia of defenseless infants silly. I think it is a little talked about but important topic. ps, one of the things they are doing in muslim Africa is showing fathers a video of a little girl being circumcised, and apparently many many many fathers are saying no, because they had never thought about it before, never realized the pain and horror of the child, and once they actually see it with their eyes and imagine their own daughter, they are likely to opt out.

[Kristin H.]

Thanks, great post! There is a 50% chance this will be something I need to decide on in the near future, and I am glad to have read this beforehand! I am leaning heavily towards your side, I think your decision made a while lotta sense!

[anonymous]

Your post is one of the very best I have ever read on why an American mother should opt out of routine infant circumcision. BTW, mothers are a good deal more sensible than men when writing on this tender topic.

Reader, are you a woman who is curious about what it is like to be male and circumcised? Here are two little daydreams. First imagine that the hood of your clitoris has been cut off. For several months, you would be irritated every time you wore trousers, especially jeans. Eventually your glans would toughen up and the sensitivity would fade.

Another daydream. Imagine that your inner lips had been mostly cut off.
Your pee stream would be thinner and straighter, and you would lose some sensation during intercourse. Both operations, while minor, would be quite painful, of course, if performed without local anesthetic, which was always the case for baby boys in the last century, and is still often the case now. Most of all, if these daydreams outrage your feminine dignity, and your desire to have your sexuality and bodily integrity respected, rest assured I am with you all the way and you are entirely normal!

I am a rare bird: an intact American Baby Boomer. I come from an innocent world: I heard the word "circumcision" once before senior high health class. I am not sure if I ever heard the word "foreskin" before meeting my spouse. I have never had any problems with infections or mechanics. Being intact was socially awkward in my younger days, but is no issue at all now and I value my foreskin. Yet no woman ever told me that I was an unusually satisfying lover! It is lips and tongue, not foreskin, that makes for great sex.

Circumcision may reduce STDs and cervical cancer, but only for men who reject traditional sex lives and refuse to use condoms. And never forget that AIDS is far more serious in the circumcised USA than in intact Europe.

I really wish it were universally understood that, if you want to Walk on the Wild Side, to throw Biblical morality overboard, the man has to wear a condom. Sex without a condom should be reserved for marriage. Incidentally, condoms make it impossible for the foreskin to play much of any role in intercourse. Them's the breaks. It does not bother me that some pleasures are rightly reserved for marriage.

I completely agree with what you've said here.I'm a teen and its things like this that are really talked about in my daily.to be honest,I'm circumsized.it really somethimes sucks to think there is like nothing you can really do about it.I asked my mother why she did it and she said that the doctors recommended it because it would be easier for me my "first time".I told her "so you scar me for life over the first time?"any circumsized man would say that they would rather be uncircumsized than circumsized.the fact that parents are stupid enough to get talked into this is pathetic.to all mothers out there-dont circumsize your baby boys,think about how they would feel knowing that they have the chance to fully pleasure a woman and they lost it 3 days after their birth.these are one of the things not meant to be done.you dont go off and change parts of a human being.to me its almost considered a sin.