The National Health service in the UK stopped covering the procedure in the 1940’s after finding that an average of 16 baby boys died each year from it.
It might be safer now, but we also have rampant MRSA and Cdiff now.
I have many, but this is mostly about my interest in the complete statement.
They appear to have very deliberately decided not to recommend universal circumcision while still pointing out that in their opinion “the health benefits of newborn male circumcision outweigh the risks”. As a comparison, I don’t recommend universal college attendance, but I still think that the “educational benefits of attending college generally outweigh the costs”.
No, “this is a good thing” is not the reverse of “we don’t think everyone needs to do it.”
Because you are insisting enough for both of us?
Honestly, I don’t care one way or the other whether or not any given kid gets circumcised. Not my kid, not my problem. Not a big enough issue for me to consider it abuse if it is done OR withheld. But I also don’t think that this woman’s criminal acts and child-meddling are justified by her beliefs.
Funny, I was going to say the same thing!
Anyone else want to weigh in on this one?
I see this as a purely legal matter, one where I don’t know enough details to understand the Court’s orders.
As to circumcision, I have 3 issues with the general discussion of it in society:
- There's a ton of absolute nonsense, as in assertions that it causes sexual problems or lack of feeling. There has been no objective study about this and, having listened to people talk about this (in person), I'm pretty comfortable saying their subjective issues are their subjective issues. That they need to impose their subjective beliefs is typical of the way people are.
- The relation of male circumcision to female genital mutilation. The latter is not "circumcision" and people use the words "female circumcision" sometimes to hide the awful reality of what it is and sometimes to tar male circumcision as being an equivalent mutilation. They are not the same.
- The way this topic becomes a cover for Jew-hatred and, sometimes, for more general anti-semitism (which involves Muslims). An example: a relatively large newspaper in Norway ran a piece about the evils of Jewish ritual circumcision, repeating all the nonsense and going further to imply a sort of barbarism. Norway has maybe 800 Jews so in a year how many circumcisions occur? But Norway has a few hundred thousand Muslims and they practice circumcision ... not mentioned, not even once. And further, a number of Muslim traditions circumcise when the child is up to 10 years old (and some at 7 days). My relatively educated guess is you're far more likely to remember being circumcised later than when you're 8 days old. I think that because I tend to remember things from my childhood but nothing from when I was 8 days old. I've seen similar things in other places where there are few Jews and more Muslims, with people decrying the barbarism of the Jews while ...
What aggravates me is that this mom agreed to circumcision, it was ordered again by Court in 2013, and still noncompliance. By now, the boy is aware, and the pain more substantial than in first few months. I don’t know know that i would put a 4 y.o. thru this. but what does all this say about the mom?
It says that she’s afraid something bad will happen to him as a result of an elective, unnecessary procedure.
What does it say about the dad?
Look, I can see why some people choose to do it at birth, or shortly thereafter, and why some people don’t. What I can’t understand is why this guy is insisting this be done NOW. And BTW, as far as one can tell from these articles, he didn’t start pushing for it until age 3.
And that by itself isn’t unreasonable. What is unreasonable is when the actions to prevent the procedure are more damaging than the procedure itself. And that is where she took this.
He sounds like a jerk but then we really have only heard her side of things. Sad to say it, but circumcising your child is not a crime even if you are insisting on it to spite your ex. Conversely, defying a court order and interfering with parental rights is a crime.
Suppose both parents had agreed to raise the child in religion X. Now one has changed his/ her mind. What does a judge do? Is the legal issue around the " goodness" of the religion, or about a contract that was agreed upon being broken?
a contract before birth was one thing. by now, the boy is 4. different viewpoint.
The contract appeared to be after the boy was born.
Pizzagirl, your question about changing religions is not all that rare. It happens, especially if the parents agreed to raise the child in one religion and the custodial parent is not of that religion. Should the non-Catholic custodial parent be required to make sure the child is raised in that religion or merely allow the father to take the child to religious education and church?
My daughter’s friend was being raised catholic as agreed. Father had converted, but then started living as a gay man and wasn’t interested in taking his DD to church on his weekends, if he had a holy day (they shared even custody), when they were on vacation. They worked it out but didn’t really agree.
Another couple I know adopted a child and one of the parents found religion and decided she wasn’t gay anymore. She not only wanted to raise her daughter in a religious home, she didn’t want the daughter around the other mother or the gay lifestyle any more. It was much more of a legal mess.