2003-08-04 - 12:48 p.m. - Cycle day: 36 weeks, 1 day

Now I'm just depressed. We talked briefly about circumcision in our last class, and I was amazed to hear that all three of the other couples there, all of whom know they're having boys, are planning to circumcise. Our instructor, who has three uncut boys and feels very emotionally attached to the subject, spoke very objectively about it, but you could tell she was upset. I almost started to cry. Not just because I feel bad for these little infant boys, but because if these women - the ones who want natural, non-violent childbirth - aren't adamantly opposed to the routine surgical removal of male sexual organs, who will be? How far away are we from getting people to understand everything that's wrong with this harmful cultural practice?

I then made the mistake of picking up "What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Circumcision: Untold Facts on America's Most Widely Performed-and Most Unnecessary Surgery" by Paul Fleiss while we were browsing the bookstore. I flipped open to the chapter on the under-reporting of circimcision-related deaths. The first quote I read was "A male is more likely to die from complications of circumcision than from penile cancer." Are you going to find that information in any of the mainstream parenting books? No. Even the Sears series talks about circumcision as "a personal choice" and says there are some possible benefits. It makes me want to scream. The misinformation given to parents is criminal, and our sons are paying for it.

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