If there is one dead horse that I will beat over and over again it's the don't circumcise your son horse.
I get it. You have your reasons for circumcising and you think they are completely valid. In my eyes the only valid reason for circumcision is religious purposes, I still don't understand it but they are doing it for their faith. I do not understand the reasons such as wanting your son to look like his father (do they really spend that much time together naked? If your son asks why his penis is different can't you just explain that some men have a foreskin and some do not? It's like telling your child that that person is black and that person is white because people come in all colors, shapes and sizes. Like penises!), or that they are "cleaner" (they aren't, and last time I checked cleaning with plain water as not hard,no retraction required!), or the countless other reasons that have been proven untrue in the past few years.
I've written an anti-circumcision post before, but I am really heated right now because I have read so many articles today on the subject that have made me cry and wonder, WHY DO YOU DO THIS TO YOUR SONS!?
I made the mistake of watching a circumcision video when I as pregnant. I was anti-circ then, I'm not sure why I watched it, but it was so heart wrenching and emotional, just awful. Today I made the same mistake again, I watched a video that was on Peaceful Parenting. It made me cry, it made me feel sick, I had to stop not even halfway through. If you are thinking about circumcising your son then watch the video for yourself (I urge you, in fact, I think all parents that choose to circumcise should have to watch a video prior to the procedure) and tell me that it doesn't break your heart.
Baby boys die from circumcision. According to the Peaceful Parenting article I just read, it only takes 2oz. of blood for your baby to die. The baby of these people died from this procedure, they couldn't even tell anything was wrong with him or that he was bleeding too much. This sick thing is that they would do it again.
Hospitals are not required to report deaths due to circumcision.
Yup, you read that right. No one can really be sure how many babies die per year due to circumcision since it doesn't have to be reported. The current statistics are that 230 baby boys die every year from this unnecessary procedure. It is believed (and I sure do believe it) that the real number is at least double. That's a HUGE amount of babies that don't need to die.
If someone amputated your arm or another part of your body, or performed surgery without your permission for no medical reason, would you be upset? Don't even say no because no person in their right mind would be ok with that. Stop cutting of a part of someones body that is not yours. Just because you are a parent does not give you the right to deform their body, and yes it's deformation. If the foreskin wasn't meant to be there then no one would be born with one.
LEAVE NATURE ALONE PEOPLE!
12 comments:
I debated whether or not to do it for my son...but then I couldn't bear to hurt him especially when he's only a few days old. How could I do that to a baby? So I didn't. I figured he was born with it so there must be a reason why it's there.
I'm Jewish and still couldn't do that to my son.
:(
I just don't get why people think this is okay to do.
I was adamant against it with my son but my hubby was the other way and we wound up getting it done I'm still mad about it!
Great post! We decided that no one was going to CUT our beautiful baby boy!
I don't understand how they could say they would do it again. Was loosing one child not enough for them ? As terrible it is for any baby to pass, it seems like they care more about their "beliefs" than the welfare of their future sons..
@The Green Bird: Mazel Tov! Contacts for celebrants of Brit Shalom (Brit B'li Milah) are here.
@CricketSaunders: We call this the "Adamant Father Syndrome". It underlies that circumcision is about power and control. If you're tempted to say "He's the one with the penis," you can say "But I'm the one with the intact genitals" (but perhaps best just say that to yourself). Circumcised men don't know what they're missing, and that gives them no right to make their sons miss it too. As for looking like dad...
"If your son asks why his penis is different can't you just explain that some men have a foreskin and some do not? It's like telling your child that that person is black and that person is white because people come in all colors, shapes and sizes."
The trouble is, that isn't completely true. Circumcision status isn't inevitable like those traits. While not saddling a son with the whole catastrophe, I think they should be told something closer to the truth, like "Well, when daddy was born, they used to do a little operation to babies to make them look like that, but now they don't so much, and we didn't see any need to do it to you." (Here is a story for intact boys about the difference.)
One thing that makse Intactivism an uphill job is that circumcision status is treated as just another fact of life, rather than the outcome of something someone consciously decided to do to them. I don't think we should be instilling that idea in children.
We did not circumcise for the plain reason that it is not my penis nor is it necessary. I would not want to put my son through that pain days after birth, or ever! I can't believe those parents would do it again after they already lost a child because of it! People are stupid...
I don't know how ANYONE can mutilate a boy! It's just not right. It's a basic human rights violation. You WOULDN'T circumcise your daughter, so why think *any* less of your son?!
The function of the foreskin:
http://www.drmomma.org/2009/09/functions-of-foreskin-purposes-of.html
Top Ten (10) Ways Circumcised Male Sex Hurts Men AND Women:
http://www.sexasnatureintendedit.com/
There's no wishy-washy "we weighed the pros and cons". THERE ARE NO ADVANTAGES to doing it! But if HE wants it done, he can do it himself when he's 18! Sorry for the excessive Caps, but this is a VITAL issue for me and it p***ses me off to nooooooooo end that it's LEGAL! http://www.mgmbill.org/
I know some parents say they do it now because they won't remember, or when their son is older they won't want to do it.
If its for religious reasons, its between the SON and GOD, not the parents and God, and it needs to be his conscious decision. And people with high faith make it. I have a relative who went through a spiritual awakening when he was 16 and he underwent the procedure when he was 17. If thats not balls, I don't know what is.
I agree so much with you on all your points. I have a girl but would would never circ. a boy if I had one!
I do not get it at all in this day and age where there is so much information to prove that all the medical reasons for doing it are total b.s. and the only reason left is pure selfishness and vanity or because 'everyone else is.'
They want their son to look more like the ideal so they are willing to have him tied down and put through torture, have part of his genitals ripped off and risk infection, deformation and possibly death to do it. I am sorry no one in the world can justify that to me.
Circumcision IS NOT a bad thing. The genitals are NOT ripped off and as far as I am aware in my career, there have been NO cases of death reported OR reports of deformation. There are just some people who take subjects and topics and blow them out of proportion. I saw my nephew have the procedure and he is a happy, healthy, albeit rambunctious three year old.
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