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Rally from Home

To Support baby Mario Viera

I wish I was in Miami to support Mario and his mom.

The use of a scalpel is a medical privilege based on beneficence.

To lend the medical blade to any other service is... is...

....it's an abuse of trust... You have no right to do this with your tools...

This was no accident...not like a spilled cup of coffee...

Your clamp doesn't just wind up attached to someone's penis by accident.

This is not a part of our American culture!

This was imposed on our fathers and grandfathers in a time

when every hospital circumcision was done

without even considering the consent of the parents.

This is hospital culture.

It doesn't make sense.

Every baby, every person, should be safe from genital cutting.

There is no need to quantify harm or question other people's intent...

just don't cut other people's genitals-

it seems like a simple policy to keep...

Don't you think it would be easy?

Baby Mario Viera was born in Miami 2 days after my own baby Eva was born. He was in intensive care for 10 days due to an infection. On the 8th day of his life he was circumcised in the hospital without the permission or consent of his parents... not just in the absence of their consent- but against the clear communication from his mother who was was asked repeatedly if she wanted him circumcised. Is this badgering? Harassment? Why did she even need to be asked AT ALL... let alone- asked over and over after she repeatedly said NO! For all the busy important things a hospital staff must do- you would think harassing a mother of and infant in intensive care for some elective unnecessary cosmetic genital surgery would be pretty low on the priority list!

The hospital has apologized for their "mistake" and says that they "misread" the consent form... Excuse me? How do you misread a consent form for a procedure that no child needs and this one specifically is absolutely no-way no -how is supposed to get!? Just how exactly is this consent form thing supposed to work? I would think that kids who are going to be circumcised would HAVE consent forms... and kids who are NOT going to be circumcised- would NOT have consent forms... so there is no question of how you read it- there is not way to misread a consent form that does not exist!

So anyway... yes, this is my activist sore spot, of course I'm infuriated... but the mom has an energetic, positive lawyer and an airtight case, they are approaching it a little bit differently because it's not like it's a botched circumcision or a case of malpractice- they are actually calling this a battery and have filed a report with the Miami Police. I pray that the settlement is large enough to cause ALL hospitals to question the risks and benefits of circumcision. In addition to the lawsuit against the hospital, it looks like they may press for some additional legislation - a "Mario's Law" which would move all elective circumcisions out of hospitals - that would be a pretty awesome thing!

The Biggest Let Down- An Open Letter to Jillian Michaels

This post is a response to the latest buzz about a Jillian Micheals interview in Women's Health in which she stated, "I'm going to adopt. I can't handle doing that to my body .... Also, when you rescue something, it's like rescuing a part of yourself."

Dear Jillian,

A few years ago I weighed over 215 pounds. I had given birth to three children and really let myself go. As my 40th birthday loomed on the horizon I decided that I had to take action and make a change in my life or risk becoming less and less active and less and less able or willing to do anything about it. I didn't have money for a trainer or a fancy diet plan. I took a low-buck self motivated approach that included a YMCA membership, two books- your- "Master Your Metabolism" and Lou Schuler's "The New Rules of Lifting for Women" and an iPod. Over the course of a year of hard work and lots of sweat, encouragement from my husband and Advil- I totally transformed my body and was a new woman by the time I celebrated my 40th birthday last summer.

Late this fall I discovered that I was pregnant with our fourth child. This was not planned and I'll freely confess that I have been thrown for a loop. I was already struggling with depression, but I'm ashamed to admit this took me to an even darker place. For the first time in my life, I had to turn to anti-depressants- and somehow made it through this gloomy grey winter- watching the scale go back to numbers I swore I'd never see again. I grew back out of jeans in sizes I'd so recently celebrated achieving. As I struggled to find positive feelings in my heart for the sake of this sweet little baby I could not help but feel worse and worse for the lost me I worked so hard to find again. With springtime here- my mood is on the rise, and as I get rounder and rounder, approaching my late July due-date- my conviction that I will find the strength to sweat it off all over again some time down the road (I don't know if I will try for it while nursing- if my milk supply would tolerate weight loss or if I'll wait till after I wean) I know I can do this- and I will... and you know what's funny? This time around- I won't hold you up as a inspiration. Oh trust me- you WILL BE motivation... but not because of your success- I will push myself the extra mile, lift the extra set- because I am a strong woman, and a mother, because I can do it! I will smile when I cradle my beautiful new baby up with my strong arms.


I would like to make myself a role model to all the mothers out there who are working for a fitness goal. Motherhood is one of the most common reasons why a woman finds herself looking at fitness and diet to make a change in her life, health and body. If you don't think you can do it... you obviously don't believe we can do it. No matter how loud you yell like a drill instructor- your enthusiasm is just hollow Hollywood marketing.

I wouldn't care if you had stretch marks, or if you wound up with a c section scar like mine on your belly, if your thighs touch or you got some dimples on your butt and I really wouldn't have cared if you had no interest in being a mother at all- I wouldn't have thought any less of you... but the fact that you just admitted that you are too scared to tackle in your own life, with the best resources that money can buy- what your fans, without nearly the advantage, look up to you to help us overcome- makes me just turn away from you sad and dissapointed.

My son and I, exhausted, celebrate the finish of a 5K together

I think pressure on celebrities to be role models is often misplaced... but only when the public disappointment is about some aspect of the celebrities personal life that has nothing to do with their professional ability. Your skill is not just being a pretty and fit woman- your skill, your trade, is being an inspiration and a motivation- and your attitude about pregnancy hangs on you like a fat suit.

Signed- A former fan

P.S. I just read the article Fox news posted that had a quote from you I hadn't seen yet.

“I’m not going to be wearing spandex in a [workout] DVD at 40! If I am, shoot me,” she also told Women’s Health. “I want to empower people to find happiness via a healthy lifestyle, and when I say healthy, I don’t just mean diet and exercise. Those are just tools.”

Gee- I didn't realize that 40 was the cut off point. As for those tools, it takes one to know one.

Pain is the topic of today’s post. I’ll begin by saying that I do not plan to measure or quantify the lasting effects of infant trauma, or discuss the various methods of pain relief available, or the frequency or willingness of circumcisers to employ them- although I may mention these things- that is not the theme of today’s blog. Today I am going to cast off the burden of providing scientific evidence for everything I want to say, and simply discuss some of my personal thoughts on our commonly held beliefs about the pain circumcised infants endure.

A great place to find articles on pain research: The CIRP Library

The idea that infancy is the best time to circumcise a boy is one of the most common justifications we find held by today’s parents. The main reason they believe infancy is best, is because they would like to exploit infant amnesia; that pain which will be forgotten is the best kind of pain to endure if one has to endure it. This relies on so many beliefs that I do not share, I will break them down as best I can.

The first is the belief is that the pain of circumcision is a pain that a man will endure at some point in his lifetime. This is false. In non-circumcising cultures, the chances that a man will need to be circumcised at some point in his life are extremely low. Therefore, parents do not need to choose the best time for their son to endure circumcision pain. By leaving his body alone, they have made a choice with fantastic odds, and the only choice that gives their son the opportunity to possibly live his entire life without ever enduring the pain of circumcision.

Next is the belief that forgotten pain is the best kind of pain. This is a field that is very tricky to study in a scientific way- if you are willing to listen to experts who have a more wholistic approach to the human body and experience- you will find lots of backing- but the medical world does not feel a need- nor do they have ethical permission to perform studies that would give us concrete answers. One of the more famous studies was done by Anna Taddio and it involved the pain responses of infants when they were vaccinated at several months old. The research revealed that infants who were circumcised, even the ones who had some pain relief for the circumcision, had a heightened pain response to the shots four and six months later. So the pain of the circumcision did not inoculate their body to pain- it actually worked more like the first exposure to an allergen- making them hyper sensitive to the next exposure.

Last is the belief that adult men should never have to suffer the pain of circumcision. That they should be protected from enduring elective or necessary pain by moving the experience forward in time to the point that it is both unnecessary and non-consensual. I offer the common phrase, “Take it like a man.” Although that’s also loaded with lots of cultural baggage that makes me uncomfortable- how can we believe that there is such a thing as taking it like a man, if we feel that newborn babies are better equipped to take it than men are?

Many parents (and Doctors and maternity nurses) also repeat dismissive apologist comments about the infant’s experience. They say things like, “He slept through it.” “He was so brave.” “What a trooper.” and “He only cried because he didn’t like being strapped to that board.”

Over twenty years ago I was raped, and part of that experience included being pinned, and then tied in a spread eagle position. I have a lot of personal empathy for a person who is crying because they have been strapped down. The violation of the rape did not begin with penetration or beating, it began with the fear I felt when I no longer had the liberty to protect myself. The terror and betrayal I felt over being tied, was just as much a part of the horror of the experience as any other aspect of it. I do not think that babies who cry from the moment of being tied are not experiencing true and deep distress. The spread eagle circumstraint position (did you know that the pelvic area of the board is slightly elevated- so even the spine is flexed backward?) is the opposite of the fetal position! Imagine how alien it would feel to have your limbs extended so unnaturally, all of them at the same time, when they had never been asked to open so far!



The question of a baby sleeping through a circumcision is in my opinion, not a matter of his experience, but a matter of our desire to define his experience. In this video, you will hear two people describe the lasting effects of the trauma- but you can also witness a circumcision- at first the infant screams and fights very hard- but at a certain point he becomes silent and his tear filled stare, vacant. As Marilyn Milos says so poignantly- “He has left his body.”

Link to the video

Circumcision is quick! Babies heal fast! True- typically it does not take very long. Do you remember how long your summer vacations were as a child? – and now those summers fly by. I often think about time- relative to the infant’s life. If you are one day old, 15 minutes is 1% of your life. Proportionally, if you were 50 years old- that experience would take six months. If a circumcision wound takes a week to heal- that is the only week of their life. The first week with their penis- their penis hurts!

I think of the nerve pathway that travels between the receptors in the baby’s genitals deep into the core of their body and finally to the special zone of their brain designed to receive sexual pleasure. I think of the miracle of those delicate nerve pathways and the synapses, miniaturized in this beautiful new person for whom the world is just unfolding. I think of those nerves like virgins…clean and pure, a new leaf. I cringe to think that the very first transmission through those wires, like when Alexander Graham Bell said, “Mr. Watson come here!”… How can we rationalize the first message through those most beautiful wires of love and intimacy to be a story of the most excruciating searing pain? This was not meant to be!



I wonder how our society would take it, if I was to suggest- “Wait- before you desecrate that pathway with a story of pain- would you pause for a minute to teach your infant about sexual pleasure first? So that at least his brain would know what sweetness was possible before it learned this trauma? Of course this is unacceptable! We can not morally sexually pleasure a little infant… that’s WRONG! …and so I ask- if it’s wrong to touch them with the intension to give pleasure? How can it be right to touch them with the knowledge that it will inflict pain?

I really need to wrap this up, but I am going to touch on one last item which is a bit of crossover activism- with breastfeeding, and it concerns the use of the sucrose pacifier for circumcisions and the fact that it has been shown to actually help reduce pain responses during a circumcision. I have nursed three children so far, and with the birth of each child I am always overwhelmed by the amazing miracle of the rooting and suck reflex infants are born with. It is the key to their survival and a blessing from God. Without it, no amount of milk could help an infant who did not have the instinct to help himself- he would just waste away quietly without putting in the work he needs to ensure his survival. When I first learned about the sucrose pacifier, something deep in me felt that this was wrong- but it took me a little while to dissect and reconstruct what it was that I found so disturbing.

When a baby is hungry, he will cry in response to the pain in his belly. When he is put to the breast, the infant must calm himself and stop crying in order to nurse effectively and resolve his problem. The pain is his belly is not gone, his hunger is not satisfied- but the correct answer has been offered and he must have faith that sucking at the breast is the solution to make the pain go away. I feel that there is something sacred here, in this gift, in this order. To give a sucrose pacifier to an infant being circumcised is an abuse in his trust that sucking will resolve his pain. Yes it may work, but it works by deceit. To take that most precious maternal association- and exploit in order to silence him- is a lie and betrayal of both mother and baby in the highest order.

My parents are both artists, and I grew up in a home with no TV, and a well stocked library- most conspicuous were two enormous volumes that always sat out because they could not fit on a shelf, one Michelangelo and one Leonardo. When I was not pouring through a ravaged pile of unshelved red World Book encyclopedias, I would sometimes browse through those works of those renaissance masters, the grandiose biblical scenes of Michelangelo, and the exacting draftsmanship of Leonardo’s scientific sketches. I don’t remember being sexually curious at that time, but it must have been there that I first saw and began to understand a little more about how men are put together.

When I was 11, my mother left my father and the two of us moved to Vienna Austria; where she studied sculpture. I used to visit her at the art academy after school and I got to see first hand how sculptors work, the charcoal sketches, live models, dusty studios, buckets of clay, stone chisels and the wonderful camaraderie of the students and the leisurely way they conversed, sharing bread, wine, cheese and hand rolled cigarettes.


Some of the time in Austria we lived in the country

When her year of auditing was up, she decided to continue her studies in Pietrasanta Italy. I was sent back to New Jersey to live with my father for the year of 8th grade… and then I enrolled in a boarding school in Massachusetts for high school. During those years I was back and forth to Europe several times. My sister married a man from the Canary Islands, a windsurfing instructor at a beach resort frequented by German tourists (bathing suits optional, sunburn- inevitable) It was in Italy that I had my first sexual experience.


I worked as an artist's model in Italy
This sculpture is now in Oslo Norway

During that time, I do not remember ever being introduced to anything about circumcision, the reasons why it is done, or any prejudices about it one way or the other. There were European vacation flings, and I also had my fair share of American boyfriends in high school. I remained indifferent to any variation I might have observed from one side of the ocean to the other.

I decided to follow my mother’s example and majored in sculpture in college, focusing on figure and anatomy. Interestingly, even at the school where the famous social critic and dissident feminist Camille Paglia was teaching, the topic of circumcision and the portrayal of the phallus in Western art (we did cover fertility objects some in African art history class) were ignored in my required and elective courses. My mentoring professor avoided the issue almost all together by only hiring female models for anatomy class.

This was a long story to get to the first lightbulb moment. I was friends with a European man who was living in the US and I happened to say something about how most American men are circumcised and his jaw dropped. He turned as white as a sheet and gasped. He seemed ready to faint. Finally, he stammered, “What are they all Jews?”

This was my first encounter with, what I now consider to be, the proper reaction to circumcision. Shock. Disbelief. Disgust. Horror. Confusion. I remember back in high school I had a radical feminist religion teacher (she was really quite a man-hater) who took it upon herself to tell us about female circumcision in Africa. In gory detail, she spoke of the cutting… I remember her raised hand carving an arc in the air holding an imaginary piece of broken glass. There were rusty razor blades, herbal coagulants and village dogs to eat the scraps. Sewing girls up with thorns and the horrors of the misogynist oppression these women suffered. How after marriage their scars would be cut open again with a knife so their husband could penetrate them. We squirmed in our seats, boys and girls alike. This friend of mine sitting before me, from a culture of genital integrity, reflected all the same horror over my revelation as I remember feeling that day- and suddenly, what we do here to infant boys… it didn’t seem so normal anymore.

So by the time that I was married and expecting my first child, you can imagine the strength of my conviction in regards to my own decision about circumcision. It was not a question, given my life experience that I could in my right mind entertain.

The second light bulb moment happened when I mentioned my feelings to my husband. He hates it when I tell this story. He wishes that he could take this all back and I’d forget it and never tell a soul about what happened to us… but this was really an important moment for me and my understanding of what is going on in our culture. I’m sorry honey, I just have to tell the whole thing. He flipped. He became enraged and totally irrational. He insisted that it must be done, that it would be done. He didn’t want to do any research and didn’t want to talk about it with me. He acted in a way I had never before or since seen him behave. He insisted that a boy had to look like his father. I have since learned that this actually has a name, Ronald Goldman calls it “the adamant father syndrome” and my goodness- it’s real and it’s very intimidating. Lucky for us (remember Mama Grizzly) This was not up for debate. I wasn’t asking his permission to not cut our baby… I was stating a fact- that no one was going to be cutting our baby. I now know, after many years hearing other people’s stories, that this was not the best tactical approach, in fact it was probably the worst approach I could have taken- but I had no idea what I was going to be up against until it all blew up in my face.

He did wind up eventually researching on his own, with the privacy to work through his feelings and come to terms with something he’d never let himself think about before, free from defensiveness. He quietly conceded without seeming too enthusiastic about the idea… until the night our son was born by emergency C section 5 weeks early. We had a really close call and my husband did an amazing job getting us to the hospital in the nick of time. When he was handed that newborn baby to hold while the surgeons put me back together- the beauty of the child and his personhood, his miniature perfection so new and tender, all those perfect parts, the eyelashes and fingernails finally revealed… the miracle, the gift, the blessing, the ‘get down on my knees with gratitude you, my son, are alive’- it all became crystal clear. So when the surgeon asked my husband while I was still under general anesthesia, “When are you going to tell me the bad news about the circumcision?” Pappa bear was ready with the answer. “We aren’t.”



It doesn’t end here. You see, now I understood what most of my female peers were up against, only they did not have the same foundation as I did when they finally had their turn to discuss this with their husband. Maybe they learned about what naked men look like from seeing porn. Maybe they never knew an intact man in their life. It’s possible that their sex ed book was illustrated with circumcised penises. Maybe the thought of whole continents of men going about their life with their anatomy intact, never having a problem or giving it a second thought, seems like a distant impossible abstraction, utterly unrelated to their American reality. All those myths being passed around and going unchallenged. Trusting in the men we know, who for their own peace of mind, accept the myths without wanting to break them down. The cloak of shame and silence, our sexual inhibition, our pride, and arrogance and the social pressure to conform… all these circumstances come crushing down on a vulnerable new mother and leave her unprepared to question or speak up for her child. In her wildest nightmare, no mother would invent this on her own for her newborn. If circumcision was not something already firmly entrenched in our culture, how else can we explain that she feels she must comply?

How did this become the standard in our culture? Today’s mothers may believe that circumcision is their family choice, the parent’s right… just one of the many decisions that parents must make on their child’s behalf. They may assume that the circumcision tradition in their family is the end result of lots of careful decisions by loving family members- but the fact is- only one or two generations ago- circumcision was not a choice given to mothers or fathers. It was just done. I have talked with some grandmothers who said they were given the impression that it was illegal to not circumcise- that it had to be done before you were allowed to leave the hospital.



I remember shortly after our son was born, while changing his diaper, my mother in law noted with some curiosity that we did not circumcise him. “Oh, here it comes.” I thought. Nope. She didn’t say another word. Years later my husband discovered that his father was intact. Remember how he’d insisted that a boy had to look like his father!? His own father was not circumcised and when my husband finally did discuss this with his mother he found out that the doctor in the hospital had just circumcised him as a matter of routine- that his parents had not requested it- and had they been asked- they would have said no! His family is of Native American heritage- so in his case this wasn’t just a violation of his own body- but went against his cultural heritage! But what’s done is done… and babies don’t remember it, right? His mother saw no sense in upsetting a little boy with the story of what had happened. So he, with his peers who were also routinely circumcised, grew up unquestioning, assured that circumcision was normal and just what was done.

I am an activist today because I am lucky to have had certain life experiences that left me trusting the beauty and the science of the human form, not fearing it. I was raised to stand up for what you believe, and defend the helpless. Even before I understood the circumcision situation in the USA for what it is, I was practiced as a rebel, willing to say “F-you!” to the status quo… I may not still outwardly look it, but that sparky punk rocker is still in me.


My children and I in our festival costumes

“Why do you care so much about our circumcision decision?
Why don’t you respect my right to do what is best for my child- just as I do for you?”

The answer is that I just don’t think American men and women are being given a fair chance to overcome this. When an “unbiased” trusted resource (like the Mayo Clinic) outlines the potential benefits of circumcision- and suggests we should balance them against the possible risks of surgery… but fails to enter the value or purpose of the anatomy which is lost in every case- If we don’t even have the correct equation in front of us- how can we possibly find the correct answer? I love this country, and I love the people who live here, but I feel humiliated to think that my peers accept infant genital cutting as cultural practice- an expectation even. Don’t we all have a duty to let our peers know that we do not expect them to do this? If we keep silent- they may operate on assumptions, just like the assumption that all circumcised men are happy and thankful to be circumcised. Many people have a very hard time accepting this information- it’s difficult stuff to stomach! I understand that- but that doesn’t mean that silence is the answer.

Today’s genital integrity post is going to focus on doctors. Several years ago I was able to join many other intactivists at the annual convention of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists in Philadelphia. I was able to speak to hundreds of doctors in just a few days as I handed out a flyer that I had written.

Here I am with Marilyn Milos, co-founder of NOCIRC

It was very interesting to be able to be able to speak to the people right on the front lines of circumcision in America. There was one comment that was repeated over and over by the doctors:

“The parents demand it.”

That was so interesting to me because in my interactions with parents, they typically seemed to point to medical reasons for doing it. In speaking with doctors, a large portion of them freely admitted that there was no medical benefit to the surgery and they were simply performing a cultural service at the request of parents. They also tried to shrug off their own responsibility as if their hands were tied when they were faced with a parental request that they circumcise the baby. A vicious cycle with each player pointing to the other to justify what they do.

There were many doctors from foreign countries who were openly embarrassed for what their American peers were doing. Many others said that they refuse to participate in circumcisions. There were also doctors who were very enthusiastic about circumcision and mocked the Genital Integrity rhetoric. I can say that doctors are not immune to peer pressure, and many of the obstetricians, when passing by with a group of peers, would refuse to acknowledge the Genital Integrity protesters, but some individuals would return alone, to thank us for speaking up, and to express their hope that routine infant circumcision would one day end.

There were two doctors in particular who made such a lasting impression on me with what they said. One, a fit, petite woman with short curly grey hair and fashionable prescription glasses was crossing the street during the lunch hour. I offered her my flyer and without glancing at it- she took it and threw it on the ground. She snapped at me with a pride and arrogance that I have never encountered before and said,

“I have circumcised over 5000 babies and the ONLY ones I felt bad about were the Jews… because I was taking the money away from the mohel!”

I was stunned. I reached in my purse for a pen and with a shaking hand I wrote it down word for word.



For today’s blog entry I though it would be interesting to illustrate what 5000 people looks like. I did a google image search and had to laugh that I had forgotten about the artist Spencer Tunick who poses crowds of nudes in urban environments. I found a picture (I have blurred it out some) which contains 75 people, men and women. I used photoshop to patch that picture over and over till I had 5000 represented. Several years have passed, so I assume that her number has grown considerably since then.

click the picture to view larger

Now, I would like you to imagine that grey haired 130 pound woman, with a megaphone, standing in front of a group of 5000 men, whose genitals she had altered with her knife, and to hear her say it one more time:

“I circumcised every single one of you and the ONLY ones I felt bad about were the Jews… because I took the money away from a mohel!”

The other doctor was a man, at the peak of middle aged attractiveness, and I’ll confess as a 6 foot tall woman, he was even more attractive to me because he was about 6’4”. Protesters with banners and signs had been told to stay on one side of the street, but because I only had my flyer- I was able to stand close to the entrance, and slip my paper to people rushing by, many not even suspecting that I was part of the protest across the street. I saw this tall man coming, and I think he saw me too- I gave him my flyer and he paused to read the title. He became enraged and got even taller- leaned forward and backed me up against the wall. He took a tone with me like I was a belligerent little girl and he was a school principal, he snapped:

“You don’t even know what you are talking about! Have you ever seen one!!??”

I tried to imagine what sort of objective rational counseling a pregnant woman could expect to get from that arrogant (obviously) circumcised man. As an artist, a world traveler, a sexually experienced woman, a student of anatomy and a mother of a son, of course I had “seen one”… but I know that many American women have not.

In this world of activism, the fact that many- if not most of this generation of our male doctors in America is circumcised is a major consideration. Many of these doctors have no idea how to care for an intact child, and many children are harmed by bad advice coming from them. Many other children who have minor easily treatable problems are circumcised because their doctors see their foreskin, not the pathology, as what ails them. This interaction was my proof that even medical professionals are not immune to the loss of not only their foreskin, but the loss of objectivity that infant circumcision inflicts.

There is a movement to end routine infant circumcision from within the medical community you can read more about them here:
Doctors Opposing Circumcision Website

Here is the text of my flyer if your are curious:

Ten great reasons for Obstetricians to quit circumcising babies

1.To comply with ACOG guidelines of informed consent.
Being born with a normal male sex organ is not an emergency. A male can make this decision for himself if he chooses. ACOG makes a great effort to protect the physical integrity of female patients and to secure consent for all procedures, the willingness to ignore these guidelines in order to circumcise infant males highlights a sexist double standard. Males should also be respected as whole and embodied persons.

2. Circumcision violates the Hippocratic Oath. Participation in an invasive non-medical procedure is an indicator of a physician’s professionalism.

3. American circumcision is a global embarrassment.
Callis Osaghae bled to death after a home circumcision in Ireland. Many Irish doctors were incensed when it was suggested that they should preform circumcisions for the immigrants who requested them. They felt this was an abuse of their medical training and a clear ethical broach. American doctors are protected by law, from pressure to circumcise females, yet no such legislation protects doctors from the pressure to circumcise males. Their inability to stand up to that pressure, in the absence of state mandated legislation, reflects poorly on their ability to comply with internationally accepted medical standards.

4. Obstetricians are specialists.
Despite this, obstetricians have cornered a market outside their specialty by popularizing the circumcision of male neonates. High pressure tactics in the hospital and a service industry conveyor belt give indifferent or reluctant parents the opportunity to secure a circumcision without having to do anything. A circumcising OB will rarely do any followup and will also not encounter any of the common long term pediatric or adult issues of circumcision damage. This confusion of the role of an obstetrician as child circumciser reflects poorly on the obstetric profession and abusively forces maternity nurses to cooperate.

5. Soliciting elective surgery from women in labor is abusive and unethical.
There is an implied medical endorsement when hospital staff solicits in the course of admitting patients. The AMA circumcision policy states that a lack of information and deferral of the decision until after the birth contribute to the high rate of circumcision in America. This means that if parents were given more time and more information, fewer would circumcise their son.

6. Unnecessary surgery exposes a circumciser to avoidable liability.

7. The refusal to treat infant pain is well documented. The obstetrician circumciser is the worst offender of any medical specialty; with the most appalling record right here in the northeastern US. Despite the AAP admonition that children not be exposed to the pain of circumcision, many medical schools still teach circumcision without pain relief. (using living human children)
Circumcision Practice Patterns in the United States
Stang HJ, Snellman LW Pediatrics. 1998 Jun;101(6):E5
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/101/6/e5

8. Circumcision in America did not spring from our culture, it came from our doctors.
Circumcision is now known to have no medical value, yet doctors inexplicably offer it as a cultural service, maneuvering consent from fathers circumcised in an era predating modern respect for patient autonomy.

9. Circumcision gains public acceptance at the expense of a physician’s professional integrity.
As long as physicians are willing to involve themselves in non-medical surgery, parents will be confused about the intended purpose of such surgery.

10. The best reason to say, "NO!" is your own.

This message to obstetricians comes respectfully to you from a survivor of Placenta Previa

Today’s Genital Integrity post is about mothers. I’d like to start with an assignment for you. The next time you are in a bookstore, go to the pregnancy books and pick up a copy of “From the Hips” by Rebecca Odes and Ceridwin Morris. It’s a popular new book with edgy illustrations and snazzy graphics. You don’t have to buy it, just find the section on circumcision and at the end – there is a green word balloon with a mother’s quote. How do you feel reading her words? As always, I look forward to reading your comments.

I hope that you find the graphics I’m designing for these posts to be thought provoking and amusing. If I could take all my own words, ideas and feelings and express them with a single picture, today’s would sum it up for me. I did not become an “intactivist” overnight. I feel that various life experiences laid a perfect groundwork so that when the final light bulb moments occurred, I could not help but be changed.

"The biblical injunction to circumcise speaks to a man about men. But circumcision is also a woman's issue, for on a subtle, but very potent level it is, like the akedah, about the primary disempowerment of the mother. At no other time is a woman so in touch with her most elemental and powerful mammalian instincts as after a birth, When, her culture tells her that in order for this male baby to be a man, to be part of the masculine community and bond with the male God, the men must cut her male baby on his most sensitive male organ, this mother is inevitably in conflict with her entire life-giving feminine biology. And if a woman is made to distrust her most basic instinct to protect her newborn child, what feelings can she ever trust?"
- Miriam Pollack from Jewish Women Speak Out

Circumcision is not just a men’s issue, nor is it just a parenting issue. You don’t need to be pregnant, have a medical degree or have a penis to develop your own opinion. Unfortunately, I feel that many women allow their thoughts, feelings and instincts to be disregarded - even by themselves. I feel a deep sadness to think of the number of women who in their very first moments as a mother- feel they must submit to something that goes against a very deep instinct. I understand that not all mothers feel this way, and many have a deep conviction that circumcision is the right thing to do and reasonably they do not have many, if any, negative feelings about it. In my experience as an intactivist, when mothers are given a compassionate listening audience, free of the burden to defend circumcision or past history that can't be changed... a large portion of mothers do describe feelings that are not compatible with empowerment and peace.

This link will take you to a page of mother’s stories about circumcision, it will take some courage to get through more than just a few of these. Circumcision doesn’t just hurt babies. Circumcision hurts mothers too.

Mother's Stories

Reading stories is one thing, but I always find videos so compelling, to hear someone's voice and see their face. I've chosen two videos from youtube which show two different women, the first speaks of something long in the past and the second speaks of something only hours before.

Why don’t you take a walk?




Liz talks about her son’s circumcision that day.

I hope that one day soon, mothers can look forward to the birth of their baby without this anxiety; that when baby girls were wished for, that it wasn't just because that was the only way her mother thought she could avoid a baby circumcision.

To celebrate Genital Integrity Awareness Week, I will be writing a few blog posts about the subject, specifically infant male circumcision in the USA. I will be linking my blog posts from my Facebook page, and I welcome you comments here on Blogger or back at Facebook.

Yesterday I changed my profile picture at Facebook to the pink and blue Genital Integrity ribbon, and shortly after a female friend from Europe contacted me in a chat… astonished to learn that Americans frequently circumcise their sons. She had no idea. I feel happy that such a simple action could so quickly have such a positive effect on “awareness.” …but I will also confess that I have a lot of concern that some of the things I may say may upset some people. I have heard many stories about people who have been “de-friended” for making their feelings known, and have always found it curious that for something so allegedly socially acceptable, we have a lot of trouble bringing up the subject and discussing this openly and honestly with each other. I feel that an open discourse, regardless if it’s agreeable or not, is the first big step we have to take in understanding what is going on.

Today I am going to tackle the subject of hygiene. I will begin with this disclaimer: I don’t have a penis! Yes, that’s right, I have a vagina and I’ve been taking care of it for 40 years. Oh goodness… is my vagina 40 years old already? Where has the time flown?

Well, let me tell you- when I hear women say that they think male circumcision is a good idea because “it’s cleaner” I have to wonder if they would ever consider female circumcision for the same reason. I have urine, other fluids (including menstrual blood), folds of skin that are moist, hair (which I usually make an effort to remove) and just an inch or so away from that- there is my anus… and all of this is positioned on the underside of my pelvis so that if I bend myself around in my greatest contortion- I can only see about half of it. Yet I have been able to manage and no one assumes that I needed any surgical help to tidy up my anatomy and make my hygienic routine any easier. In fact, it would be illegal for anyone to make my genitals “cleaner” with surgery.

Well, “you know how boys are…” they say.

STOP. Hold the phone. Say what? This comment is nothing but sexism pure and simple. Men are perfectly capable and willing to groom themselves. I feel saddened to know that many circumcised men have found solace in this extremely common train of thought so insulting to men. They must feel comforted by the idea that they are considered “cleaner” by women. I think when the cleaner comment comes up, it’s probably a lot easier to feel a slight lift to the ego- than it is to take a step back and consider- “Why you sexist woman! How dare you even begin to pick about the cleanliness of a man as if I don’t know what you are up against in your own feminine hygiene routine? Don’t you know that my penis is hanging right there next to my hand in plain sight every time I take a shower, every time I take a leak? How lazy do you think I’d have to be to forget to wash my very favorite part of my body? Don’t you know it’s FUN to wash!? Don’t you talk to me about cleaner!”

Which brings me to the next thing; the qualifier. “Well, I guess it’s OK for boys to be uncircumcised as long as they are taught to wash properly.” Ugh. I hate that word “properly” … but I have more to say on this. This satetment is like saying, “Well, I guess breastfeeding is OK as long as you remember to change their diapers a few times a day.” One thing has nothing to do with the other! One thing (washing) has to be done regardless if the child is circumcised or not! And many people don’t know, but caring for an intact infant or child is actually easier than caring for a circumcised child. I won’t go into the specifics of this because there is already plenty of information available about how to care for babies- but I do want to take this one step further.

It’s this idea that maybe circumcision is obsolete in this day and age because we do have indoor plumbing and soap. To illustrate this misconception I offer this youtube video of Dan and Jenn who have a little Q&A series on sex matters. At the 2:07 mark pay attention to what Dan says.

Dan, I’m sorry- but you are wrong. The human body has had this design much longer than we have had soap and running water. Humans do not need to bathe the way we do today in order to keep our bodies from imploding- it’s a social nicety, it’s refreshing and relaxing to bathe. But it’s not necessary. How many centuries have hominids walked the Earth before we figured out germ theory? If the theory of evolution is correct, how is it that the very organ of reproduction could have evolved to this point with such a fatal flaw? I’m certainly not suggesting that we shouldn’t bathe- I’m simply saying, that the human right to genital integrity is not contingent on a person’s ability or willingness to wash themselves. I’ll stick my neck out an say it without a qualifier- A man has the right to be as stinking dirty as he darn well pleases and no one has a right to cut a piece of him off.