There is a controversy raging in the United States right now over circumcision. “To cut or not to cut?” is the question on the minds of many expecting parents. Each side of the controversy will cite plenty of “evidence” to back up their beliefs. The simple fact is that 82% of the world’s male population is uncircumcised. Yet in the USA, 63% of males are circumcised. The USA represents 1/20th of the world’s population, yet we perform well over 50% of the world’s circumcisions. According to the Mothers Against Circumcision website (www.mothersagainstcirc.org), there are roughly 79 million American infant circumcisions compared to 40 million throughout the rest of the world, out of a world population of over 2.5 billion males. The United States is the only medically advanced nation to routinely subject its infant males to genital mutilation. It is an unheard of practice in Europe, non-Muslim Asia, and South America. Yet we have celebrities raging on against female genital mutilation in some Muslim countries; where is the outcry for the male babies right here at home?

Western (civilized) nations have no history of circumcision. It was not until the Greek and Roman empires expanded into Muslim countries that genital mutilation was discovered. Both ancient Rome and Greece passed laws prohibiting circumcision to be practiced. Circumcision was not a common practice in the USA until the Victorian era, when doctors would circumcise infants to curb male masturbation. Older boys were circumcised as a punishment for being caught masturbating. Circumcision was still listed in American medical books until the 1970’s as a way to prevent boys from masturbating. During the cold war era, as women began to stray away from home birth to hospital birth, hospitals began to routinely circumcise infants without parental consent. They continued this until a number of lawsuits in the 1970’s required them to receive parental consent. Suddenly and miraculously, circumcision then became the answer to many medical problems such as penile cancer. Over the years, as these medical theories have been disproved, aesthetic excuses such as “I want him to look like his father,” “it’s easier to clean,” and “he’ll be made fun of in the locker room,” have come into disgusting play.

The simple fact is that there are no valid, medical reasons to have your infant son mutilated. If you are considering circumcising your son, I suggest you go to your local library or find a video of the procedure being done online and watch it. The theory that an infant “doesn’t feel pain” is total bull. If it doesn’t crush you to watch a helpless, trusting, hours-old infant strapped down onto a restraint board and have the tip of his penis hacked off, then perhaps you should rethink having a child at all. There are still those doctors that still, in this day and age, will tell a questioning mother that her infant will not feel any pain. They will boast that some infants even sleep during the procedure, though passing out from the pain is more likely. Only 14% of doctors use any anesthetic during the procedure. A common anesthetic used is a topical cream, EMLA. It has been proven that the cream does not penetrate deeply enough and only lasts through roughly 1/3 of the procedure. Injectible anesthetics are not used as they cause the penis to swell, making the surgery more difficult.

It is also relatively unknown what happens to the foreskin after the procedure is done. Very few people know that there is a great demand for human foreskins in the pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries. It is a multi-million dollar a year venture. Companies such as Advanced Tissue Sciences and Bio-Surface Technology purchase human foreskins to advance their research for both cosmetics and things such as the breathable bandage. Ask your doctor if your hospital is in the business of selling spare body parts.

When I was interviewing doctors to see who would be given the pleasure of delivering my children, I asked them two questions over the phone, before ever scheduling an appointment: “Do you do abortions, and do you perform circumcisions?” If the answer to either of those questions was yes- that was the end of the conversation.

Anne NJ