With a handful of my friends having children, I find myself revisiting the debate about whether to circumcise.
After years of waffling, I think I've finally settled my position on this issue.
I am going to go out on a limb and say that doctors with knives should not, well, go out on a limb.
A quick disclaimer: I'm not addressing circumcision performed for religious or cultural reasons.
So assuming it bears no spiritual meaning, then why do it?
The procedure isn't medically necessary, much less recommended. The American Academy of Pediatrics says that the medical benefits of circumcision "aren't compelling enough to warrant the AAP to recommend routine newborn circumcision." While circumcision may have some potential minor medical benefits, the procedure also has significant complication rates of infection, hemorrhage and even death.
The hilarious history of circumcision in America speaks for itself. Non-religious infant circumcision didn't become routine in the United States until the late 19th century. The procedure became popular only because it was thought to control masturbation, which everyone considered to be a sinful act that engendered illnesses ranging from blindness to epilepsy to death. By restricting movement of the penile shaft, circumcision was thought to reduce the propensity for males to shake hands with their governor. (Source: CIRP.)
A flip side of this argument is that those with circumcised penises experience a loss of sexual sensation. (Of course, a loss of stimulation sounds like it could be a potential benefit, but I won't comment any further.)
Another oft-cited reason for male circumcision relates to cleanliness. But the purported risk of dirty uncircumcised penises was announced at a time when we didn't have all the modern cleaning tools that most families now have at their disposal: Biore Foreskin Wash, Smegma Oil of Olay, etc.
So the only reasonable remaining consideration is an aesthetic one. Since most men in the United States are circumcised, there is the possibility that uncircumcised males will feel embarrassed because theirs are 'different.' But why conform if everyone else's appendage looks like a cross between Darth Vader and Dick Cheney?
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Eric Olsen
J, you're a riot, very clever. We have gone round on this one a few times. I would say the comparison-to-others angle isn't as minor as you present it - there is gym much of the way through school, there is the "why do we look different, Daddy" angle, and there is the "what do doctors do in real life when they aren't spouting multiculti PC crap" angle. What they do, according to a study I found when discussing this on a previous thread (we have a 9-month old boy - this isn't hypothetical) is that the vast majority of American doctors have their boys circumcised, even accounting for religious/cultural factors.
What our doctor told us was that the more active a boy is, the more sweaty, stinky and grimy they get on a regular basis - for example playing any kind of organized sport, especially after puberty rears its mighty head - then the more the cleanliness factor comes into play, that it is significantly more effort to keep an uncircumcised penis appropriately clean than circumcised.
I vote snipped all the way - the only downside is the pain to the newborn, which is part of all the bewildering new sensory input as far as I can tell and heals in about a week. The little dude won't hold it against you, swear, but they may hold it against you to be called an aardvark their entire life.
2 - bhw
Junichi, an enjoyable read and I agree with you 100%. We spoke with a pediatric urologist from Boston's Children's Hospital about this subject, and he assured us that teaching a young boy proper cleaning of the foreskin will solve all the usual problems that an uncircumcised boy or man might encounter.
The basic jist is this: if you want to keep your foreskin and all the benefits that go with it, you're just going to have to put up with cleaning yourself twice a day. It seems like a fair price to pay to keep the gazillion nerve endings intact.
As for the "Daddy, why do I look different question," my husband had a good answer: You look different because I chose not to have done to you what was done to me without my permission.
The Boston doc also told us that a great bulk of his "business" is fixing bad circumcisions. Ow!
In the end, it's a personal decision for every family. In our family, we couldn't see past the fact that it was an unnecessary surgery that would take away so much and give so little in return. So we will have to deal with my son's questions as he gets older. Hopefully, he'll understand why we chose what we chose.
3 - Distorted Angel
I've always assumed that the parts people come into the world with are there for a reason, and never have understood the bizarre practice of removing something that's obviously supposed to be there. This seems to me a case where the supposed benefits (and I'm not sure I see any) are most certainly outweighed by the risk, however small it might be, of doing permanent damage.
4 - Eric Olsen
women (smile)
5 - Eric Olsen
actually, more specifically:
mothers
6 - Distorted Angel
Actually, Eric, I'm surprised that fathers aren't more squeamish in regard to possibly injuring their offspring in this regard -- safeguarding the family legacy, as it were ;-)
7 - Distorted Angel
One too many uses of the word "regard" in that sentence, but I'm multitasking here...
8 - Eric Olsen
The possibility of injury is a tiny percentage, and there is a possibility of injury with literally every action in life. I don't see that as significant.
For me the deciding factors are: both doctors who delivered my sons - 16 years apart - when you cut through the PC doctors have been encouraged to spout, both recommended it and both said they had it done for their boys, and would have it done on any future male offspring of their own.
They said the same things: no father/son/brother/cultural discrepancies, improved hygiene, purely subjective aesthetic concerns.
9 - bhw
The argument that circumcision is a good think because kids will look like their fathers doesn't sit well with me. Nobody seemed to care about that when circumcision first became routine in the past 40 years. What did all those kids think when their penises looked different from their fathers' and grandfathers'? How did they survive the shame?
At least then you could honestly say it was done to keep them healthier. The belief was that it would cut down on the chance of penile cancer. That has been shown to be false, though. So now the reason is: I wanted your penis to look like my penis? Ick.
when you cut through the PC doctors have been encouraged to spout,
How is it PC to use medical research to draw a conclusion that circumcision offers no proven medical benefit and therefore does not need to be performed for medical reasons? If you had many years of research on any other routine medical procedure -- that it was being done for no solid medical reason -- wouldn't you want to stop doing it? Shouldn't the medical community want to stop doing it? in fact, if it was any other medical procedure, insurance companies would have stopped paying for it a long time ago. That's what happened with women's annual ob/gyn exams, for example: many insurance companies no longer pay for a urinalysis as part of the exam because medical research has shown it to not find problems often enough when woman is coming in just for a check-up and is otherwise asymptomatic. And when the insurance companies stop paying, the doctors stop performing the test. That's a very inexpensive, non-invasive lab test, and it has been stopped for many women because it's been shown to be unnecessary in the vast majority of cases.
I personally could care less about what is or isn't done in other countries, except for the fact that the men in those countries provide lots of data points. The research on the men in those countries and in the US has consistently shown that they suffer no long-term ill effects of having been left intact. All they have to do is wash themselves to stay healthy. Seems like a fair trade.
My guess about the doctors who have their own kids circumcised is this: they're simply uncomfortable with their kids looking different from them (if they're men) or their fathers (if they're women). That may be a valid point, but it's not a medical point. In fact, *that's* what sounds PC to me, getting your kid circumcised, even when you're a doctor and know it's not necessary, just so he looks like all the other kids in the locker room. I mean, how fixated on being like the other kids can we get in this country?
To me, the lack of medical reasons for getting my son circumcised was the key. It's unnecessary surgery and it takes something away. And when my husband starting reading about the issue when I was pregnant with our son, he suddenly felt like he had been mutilated, to quote him, and he wasn't going to do that to his son if it wasn't required.
And if my son grows up and gives me shit about not having the procedure done because he looks different, I'll first tell him he's acting like a jerk, second tell him that he's free to go have it done now, and third remind him that when he jerks off, it feels better for him than it does for his friends when they jerk off.
I have to say, though, that the flacid intact penis does indeed look like an aardvark! But when it's erect, it looks like an uncircumcised penis, and that's all most women will care about.
10 - Mark Saleski
...remind him that when he jerks off, it feels better for him than it does for his friends when they jerk off.
geezuz!!!! you wanna ruin him for life?!!
that's all a kid needs is to hear stuff like that from his mom.
;-)
11 - bhw
Good point!
I'll have my husband tell him that one.
8-)
12 - Eric Olsen
re the social issue, check this out from a previous discussion - comment #2
13 - bhw
lol! Red hot chili pepper!
My 6-year-old daughter recently saw one of her male friends in the buff when they were getting changed to go swimming. She told me later that his penis looked different than my son's. I told her that not everything looks the same on everyone.
Discussion over -- for that day. It may come up again. If it does, and it probably will, we'll deal with it.
Still better in my book than dealing with, "Why did you cut off my foreskin?"
14 - Distorted Angel
According to statistics compiled by WebMD, in 1999 (which was the year that the American Academy of Pediatrics decided that the benefits of circumcision were not sufficient for them to recommend the procedure as routine), 65% of the male infants born in US hospitals were circumcised. So while little Johnny, left intact, might be a minority in the locker room, he more than likely won't be the only kid in school with a foreskin. Pediatricians these days seem to recommend the procedure or not depending on their own personal preference.
I love the chili pepper story :-)
15 - bhw
Pediatricians these days seem to recommend the procedure or not depending on their own personal preference.
And I think that's a bad idea. I don't really think it's appropriate for a pediatrician to tell parents what they did or would do with their own kids. I think they should lay out the pros and cons and let the parents decide without their influence. At that point, they're selling their personal opinion as a parent and not as a doctor, but it carries the weight of the doctor's opinion.
16 - Distorted Angel
I would agree with you entirely, bhw.
17 - Eric Olsen
The doctor didn't offer his own personal opinion and experience until we expressly asked him to - he was definitely not trying to influence us one way or the other. When we said, as a parent what did you do and why, then he told us.
And my point about the chili story is not to embarrass my poor sensitive nephew, but to point out that boys are sensitive to being seen as different in that regard.
And I am also not trying to foist my opinion on anyone - let the aardvarks flourish - but I am also pretty sure no actual human ever asked "Why did you cut off my foreskin?"
18 - bhw
Well, my husband is wondering why his was cut off, although I doubt he'll ever ask his reserved mid-western parents directly. [But, MAN, would I love to be a fly on the wall if he did! Just to watch them react to the word "foreskin"!] We might find that more kids start asking the question as more and more of their friends have been left intact -- they'll start realizing that they once looked different.
I do understand the sensitive nature of being different "down there." But honestly, kids are fucking mean little creatures sometimes, and they don't need to see each other's genitals to find something to mock or humiliate someone about. And puberty is the time they really zone in on each other, too. Girls deal with that crap all the time, since their developing breasts [or lack thereof] are there for the world to observe. At least for boys, they're differences are hidden most of the time.
I sincerely hope that my son doesn't get teased when he's older and changing for gym or a sport, because I obviously don't want him to be hurt. But I do think that in the long run he'll be happy with our decision, and come to appreciate that his difference is natural and was meant to be that way. And like I said, if he doesn't, he can always opt for circumcision on his own.
As far as the doctor waiting until you asked about what he did, I think that's better than just offering it outright. But honestly, I still think he would have done better to just say that his personal decision was personal and not relevant to yours. I wouldn't expect my ob/gyn to tell me what she decided to do about a certain procedure or treatment because that would obviously influence my choice. I'd expect her to just tell me what my options were, what the pros and cons were, and then let me decide.
19 - bhw
At least for boys, they're differences are hidden most of the time.
Oh jesus H. Make that "their" differences.
20 - boomcrashbaby
When we first started having to take showers in gym class (7th grade), the biggest concern about looking 'different' wasn't if it was cut or not. It was those who were just beginning to go through puberty were extremely intimidated by those who were much more fully developed.
I don't understand the need for body modification for religious purposes, so I won't touch that, but it's my understanding that the primary reason most people get their boys circumsized is for hygiene. Which, again, I don't understand. I think it might stem from the parents discomfort at having to talk to their boy about penile hygiene. It's easier to cut it off than it is to explain about bacteria, foreskin, sensitivity, etc. Like I said, makes no sense, we don't cut off kids ears so they don't get a wax buildup, because we aren't afraid of talking to kids about cleaning ears.
That's my opinion, no facts to back that up. Just tell the boys to clean out the inside or it will rot off. Trust me, they'll clean it often. :-)
21 - bhw
lol, Boom.
22 - Eric Olsen
I think the reality is actually the reverse: hygiene is the excuse, aesthetics the real underlying reason. We do all kinds of modifications for aesthetic purposes - hair (in many ways), nails, cosmetic surgery of all kinds - circumcision just happens to have a plausible medical excuse with the hygiene angle.
23 - boomcrashbaby
Well that could very well be true, Eric. It was my opinion, devoid of research. But given our puritan past, I find it odd that people were so concerned about how something looks, when they went all the way to hell and back to make sure nobody saw it, touched it, played with it, etc. It's kind of odd that they would then be so concerned about how it looks. But people have done stranger things.
24 - Mark Saleski
and of course, we all want to know if women have a preference...
(ok, maybe we don't all care....i'm just bored as all get out this morning)
25 - Distorted Angel
But given our puritan past, I find it odd that people were so concerned about how something looks, when they went all the way to hell and back to make sure nobody saw it, touched it, played with it, etc. It's kind of odd that they would then be so concerned about how it looks. But people have done stranger things.
Boom, you're right. I don't for a minute think it was done for appearances sake -- it was done because of a puritanical mindset. If you leave a child intact, and you teach him proper hygiene, you are giving him explicit permission to touch himself; if you look at the time period in which the practice flourished in the US, it makes sense. Circumcision rates have been declining steadily in the US, the reason being that there is simply no medical reason to do it routinely. The fact that a child might not resemble his dad in that regard ought not to be, in my opinion, a factor. But then again, I've never been a teenaged boy. My sources tell me that kids these days see less of each other in the locker room than they did when I was a kid, but that might vary from region to region.