Circumcision

[muma19]

DP wants DS circumcised however I don't. I also have MIL getting involved and pressuring me. What do I do? I want to be fair to my partner but I really don't want him veg for circumcised. HELP!!!!

JAPAB said:

If it's all the same to you I'd rather have the full whack of everything I am naturally capable of.

Again I am not trying to convince you personally to get this procedure.

Rather than having a reduction to it made on my behalf because someone else does not see this as a big deal.

The community as a whole does not see it as a big deal. Your attitude reflects a Western individualistic perspective whereby the freedom, choices and personal decisions of the individual are seen as paramount, even when they significantly differ from each other within the same society.

In my community, such ideas are less influential. There is a stronger sense of community and of having a shared religion which is also a complete way of life. Look at the stats on circumcision in Muslim countries, most are more than 90% with many countries being more than 99%.

Bibijayne you said
In the UK, unless you have medical grounds for it, circumsicion can only be carried out by a registered rabbi or Iman.

My BIL and his wife (currently TTC) were having the same debate. She's anti, he's pro because it's easier to keep clean. When he realised it cannot be done by a doctor in the UK unless there's medical need, he changed his mind and they now won't circumcise.

May I ask who told you this? This is untrue. In some areas of the UK you can get a referral from your GP for boys to be circumcised in an NHS hospital under GA at around 1 year old, even without medical need.

There are also private clinics where the practitioners are trained doctors/surgeons and the procedure is done under LA. In the one we used a letter was sent to our GP from the clinic so medical records could be updated. Some clinics specify only infants under 3-4 months old, others will do it for toddlers. It depends on the surgical technique used.

Both NHS hospitals and private clinics will carry out assessment to ensure the child is fit to undergo the procedure and that it is in their best interests.

I think you should check this online and let your BIL and his wife know so that they make a fully informed decision. However, if she is firmly against it, then neither the NHS nor most clinics(if any) will perform the procedure without both parents present to sign a consent form.

I'm not sure about the exact situation in the Jewish community but I have not heard anything about Muslim imams getting trained to do circumcision. An imam is someone who leads prayers, some of them might be trained but from my experience in the Muslim community it is usually done by doctors/surgeons who are not imams.

I'll keep saying it til I'm blue in the face because you arent responding to me: IT IS NOT YOUR PENIS. Therefore it should not be your call to make.

And again when asked about mutilation our culture doesn't define it thus that is irrelevant. It IS mutilation. You are permanently mutilating a body. What you mean is 'but we think its ok'. Your arguments could be used to condone all sorts of practises- FGM, foot binding, breast binding etc etc. Just because you think it's ok it doesn't mean it is. If it is such a clearly sensible thing to do then you would let adult males decide for themselves.

I'm currently rocking my 6mnth old DS as he has a tummy bug and is sad. I'm trying to imagine how I could condone chopping bits off him.

breeze this paragraph you wrote, The community as a whole does not see it as a big deal. Your attitude reflects a Western individualistic perspective whereby the freedom, choices and personal decisions of the individual are seen as paramount, even when they significantly differ from each other within the same society.

Is quite sinister. You make it sound like the 'western perspective' of freedom, choices and personal decisions of the individual, bodily autonomy being paramount, is a negative.

Mississippilessly you said:

I'll keep saying it til I'm blue in the face because you arent responding to me: IT IS NOT YOUR PENIS. Therefore it should not be your call to make.

I'm fully aware that it is not my penis. Please re-read my response above to JAPAB and to Smother where I have covered this.

To recap, as parents we take all kinds of decisions on behalf of our children when they are too young to consent, based on what we believe to be in their best interests. The difference here is that you don't see the benefits of circumcision and so don't class it as being in their best interests. We do.

Leaving it up until the child is old enough to express a preference means a higher risk and a more difficult recovery. I told you about the NHS doctor who told me about horrendous difficulties during recovery including the penis swelling to twice its size. Any parent would want to avoid that for their children, in the knowledge that if they grow up uncircumcised in a community which routinely circumcises, they will be the odd ones out and wish they had been circumcised. We have to take that high likelihood into account.

Again, if you try to understand this issue from within the perspectives and priorities of a community with a focus on individual choice, and in which circumcision is not routinely done, you are not going to be able to understand this.

We have to take decisions on behalf of children who are going to grow up in a community with a different mindset, and make assessments of what is in their best interests within that context.

Cutting off a perfectly healthy body part isnt in their best interests.

It just isnt. You can pretend to justify it all you like.

'Mutilation' is a value judgement. Some people see organ donation as mutilation. Others don't.

Presumably you cut your child's fingernails? You will say it's not permanent. But as soon as they grow back, you cut them again. In Western society, would anyone who had, say, five inch long fingernails be able to live a normal life? Then in societal terms, it has the same effect as cutting them off permanently.

Mississippilessly 'it just isn't' is not a persuasive argument and I'm not pretending anything. This is the reality of how people who are different from you live their lives and grow up to want the same for their own children.

My DGM and DGD are/were Jewish and neither of them would circumcise my Uncle or Dad. Kind of liberal for the 1960s really but they just wouldn’t have it. It’s completely unnecessary and causes more harm than good.

"Your attitude reflects a Western individualistic perspective whereby the freedom, choices and personal decisions of the individual are seen as paramount, even when they significantly differ from each other within the same society."

So if I said I wouldn't want to needlessly lose some of my sense of taste or sight or anything else that represents an individualistic Western attitude.

I think it just represents not wanting to needlessly miss out.

No-one wants to stop people having a shared community or religion in common. They just want adults to be able to choose to not be a part of it, and for permanent physical alterings to be delayed until the person being altered is in a position to accept or reject it.

Breeze I'm not trying to persuade you. You've made the decision. And the fact you keep banging on about fingernails shows that all the reasoning in the world wont do anything.

Its really sad. I hope this loke so many other practises does out.

I don't see how this one individual experience outweighs the experience of those men who have been circumcised as infants and now have a positive view of it, in terms of being a compelling argument within communities who do routinely circumcise.

I don't see how the experience of men who have been circumcised as infants comes into it at all, given that they have no memory of the event and have never known anything different.

Any parent would want to avoid that for their children, in the knowledge that if they grow up uncircumcised in a community which routinely circumcises, they will be the odd ones out and wish they had been circumcised.

That's a very stifling point of view. No parent has to bring their child up within such a limited community, and refusing to let your child mix with and grow up with children outside the community is in itself contentious. Fitting in with a community you have chosen to restrict yourself to, when your child may well make different life choices, is simply not an excuse for mutilating your child.

We have to take decisions on behalf of children who are going to grow up in a community with a different mindset, and make assessments of what is in their best interests within that context.

Saying "fuck the community's mindset" and not mutilating your child is probaby a good place to start.

Hell, docking dogs tails has been banned (with a "necessity" exemption for working dogs) for more than a decade.

Bibijayne- there is no such thing as a registered rabbi, as it not a state organised thing. There are a group of people who do circs for the Jewish community in the UK, most of whom are doctors. We used a doctor for one DS, and a dentist for another.

Outpinked - the way you have worded it, it seems your DGM and DGD didn't bring up their kids as Jewish. So your anecdote supports Breeze's and my argument that it is an integral part of being in a community.

You allowed a dentist to cut off your sons foreskin?

Right. So fucking glad I'm not expected to do any of this shit.

You can Mississippilessly and I have heard some horror stories about it too.

Mississipi - I hope your DS feels better.

I should add it was done by a dentist in the presence of about 8 GPs and 10 hospital doctors, including the heads of paediatrics and the ICU at the local hospital. So I think we had the bases covered!

Thankyou SamG76.
Does that amount of people not ring alarm bells about the risks though?

In some areas of the UK you can get a referral from your GP for boys to be circumcised in an NHS hospital under GA at around 1 year old, even without medical need.

Only on a private basis. The NHS won't fund for surgery on children where there is no medical need.

No, Miss - they weren't there in official capacity - just friends and family.

I don't see how what I said is sinister. Maybe I have not worded it clearly?

Perhaps you think I was espousing a principle whereby parents have the absolute right to control over their child's body and can get any procedure done that they wish? No, that's not the case at all. The only procedures we can consent to on behalf of our child are circumcision or non-harmful and permissible procedures which is agreed by trustworthy doctors to be medically beneficial e.g. vaccination.

Maybe you mean that not adhering to a belief in full individual freedom and choice is sinister? Ok, let me give you an example to try and show it's not sinister. Let's say I'm at work, and I have an hour for my lunch break. My colleague, who is not religious, feels that they have complete freedom to do what they want with that free hour; they can go to a restaurant, they can go for a walk, they can go and do some shopping. Nothing influences their decision other than their own preference and choice. As for me, I don't feel that I have complete freedom and choice to do what I want because I know it is the time of the mid-day prayer, and so I have to spend at least 15 minutes or so of my lunch break to do wudoo' and pray. For me this is obligatory. I can't just decide that today I will go and sit in the park for a full hour instead.
As long as I am not compelling my colleague to pray alongside me (and why would I or how could I?) I don't understand why that would be seen as problematic for anyone. In fact, non-Muslim people in the UK are usually quite supportive of using break times to pray.

Or maybe the problem here is the mere existence in Western society of people with different beliefs and attitudes. You put 'western perspective' in quotation marks as if to suggest that the values you mentioned are actually universal when this is not the case. It amazes me that so many people are shocked to learn that not everyone thinks as they do.
I live in the West. I'm not here to attack anyone's freedoms, or to try and force my beliefs on them. I live here in peace, don't break the law, and interact with people from outside of my community. But it would be naïve for anyone to think that everyone who comes here automatically adopts mainstream secular values. The reality of multiculturalism is that people have different beliefs from the mainstream society. As long as they are not forcing it on others or breaking the law, why is that sinister?

I don't think anyone is really trying to "persuade" anyone else or change anyone's mind (apart from the OP's originally, and she's long gone now). It's just a discussion. It's perfectly ok to talk about something without necessarily trying or expecting to change the other person's opinion. Especially when it's a hot topic like this where people are very set in their own beliefs.

The conversation has become a bit circular though. I think a lot of people initially took issue because some people tried to claim they did it because of the tiny, debatable, minor health benefits. Now you and Sam are saying you do it just because everyone else in your community does it. Fine. That probably won't go down well with a lot of people either but at least you admit that's the primary reason.

I also don't think anyone can argue that circumcision for infants is contrary to British culture because it is not just relatively recently established communities like Muslims who do it. As well as the long established Jewish community the British aristocracy used to practice it as standard.

Now you and Sam are saying you do it just because everyone else in your community does it. Fine. That probably won't go down well with a lot of people either but at least you admit that's the primary reason.

I think the primary reason is that God said it should be done, part of the covenant.
Being part of a community, the same as everybody else is secondary.

(Cue 10 pages of God/sky fairy is evil, mutilating babies etc......)

Nuno I think some of my posts about health benefits and cleanliness may have been taken as my main reasons for circumcision when actually I was just mentioning them as advantages and trying to explain why the arguments of 'just teach them to wash' etc. are not really convincing for me.

I'm not saying we do it just because everyone else does in the community, it's primarily for religious reasons. But the effect of everyone in a religious community doing something is that it becomes the norm.