Hubby, 34, uncut.
2 sons - almost 5 yrs, and almost 10 months, both uncut.
Any further boys, also uncut.
I did my research independantly (read the journal articles and the peer reviews), and came to the same conclusion the AAP came to - that there are minor benefits in some cases, plus about the same degree of risks, but the risks of being uncirc’d are moderated by proper hygeine and care and safer sexual practices (including the HIV risk - you are more likely to get HIV if you have another active infection going and you are not using condoms, and the other infection is more likely if you don’t keep yourself clean… and so, since behavioral changes mediate the risks, surgery is not appropriate). The risks of surgery are not moderated by anthing but a superior surgeon and chance biological development. The AAP does NOT recommend routine infant circumcision.
I also checked in on the social issues, and found in my informal survey of parents of kids who would be his peers and family that there were more uncut than cut. Of those, one had the interesting experience of having his super-cool uncircumcized penis be the envy of the other (cut) boys in his play group… I imagine the other parents weren’t expecting their boys to complain that their circumcized penises weren’t ‘cool’.
I also felt that his body was made that way for a reason, and I’d like to leave it that way unless there was a specific medical need otherwise. Individual medical history is valid, personal preference on an aesthetic basis bothers me, though if you use good anesthesia, I am less likely to be bothered enough to mention it.
As for ‘like father, like son’, our sons’ penises are more like their dad’s than unlike, IMHO. Pull back the foreskin and they look identical - that plus saying they used to think it was necessary to remove the foreskin and now they don’t, and that’s all the explanation needed. As hubby said, if we can’t explain THAT, how the heck are we going to explain SEX? I personally don’t understand the ‘like father like son’ preference - there are so many ways kids are both like and unlike their parents, forcing one specific item to be identical seems, well, just pointless. Like dying their hair to be the same color, or something. There are so many other areas where dads and sons can bond, can relate, can be the same, why use surgery to enforce one area of similarity, one that you won’t usually even be comfortable talking about?
The ‘like-their-peers’ issue makes more sense to me, but at this point, most places in the US are mixed, so it is becoming less of an issue, and even then, what makes a kid cool is not up to the parents to decide - cool kids will be cool, and uncool kids will be picked on, regardless of their respective circumcision status (as discovered by my friend’s son). Circumcising them won’t protect them from the risk of emotional harm. If it did, then I think a lot of parents would go for it in a hot minute, regardless of the medical issues.
