Should we have our (non-infant) son circumcised? (HIV related)

In My Humble Opinion
1

Recent findings strongly indicate that circumcision can lessen the chance of HIV transmission.

Our son will be nine year olds early next year. One presumes he will eventually become sexually active, most likely sometime between the ages of 12 and 25. We don’t yet know which sexual practices he will engage in.

Pro: We immunize our children against many different diseases that they may not be exposed to as a sort of group prophylactic process. This would not be much different.
Pro: Theoretically this might be less painful and traumatic now then it will be later.
Con: Children should have some say in what happens to their bodies, and it’s certainly more difficult to explain to a child of his age than an adolescent or adult.
Con: This might be a totally unnecessary procedure, as their theoretically could be a vaccine at some time and/or he might not engage in behaviors that would put him at risk.
Con: It’s not even close to 100% efficient.

2

All rights and wrongs - real and imaginary - of circumcision aside, I think nine years old is the wrong age to be considering this; if he was an infant, he’d grow up with no memory of it; if he was an adult or even a teenager, he could make a more informed decision for himself. Why now?

3

I agree that 9 is too old. If he wants it, he can make that decision when he’s a little older.

4

I agree with the above posters. If we were talking about a baby then I’d encourage you to get the it done if you and weighted all the pro’s and con’s and felt it a good thing (all my son’s are circumcised FTR, as am I). But at 9 years old I would definitely not make that decision for your son…let him decide when he’s old enough to do so.

JMHO there.

-XT

5

This looks much more like a poll than a more neutral discussion of post-infancy circumcision, so it’s off to IMHO.

(If it turns into a genuine debate, those Mods can send it back.)

[ /Moderating ]

6

I concur. 9 years is old enough to fear/remember the operation and recovery, but too young to give informed consent. Wait until he’s at least 13/14. Plus what would to do if your son objects? Force it on him? That would cause severe mental problems later in life.

7

He would be much better served if you taught him about what HIV is and what he should do to avoid getting infected. The fact is, an uncircumcised man who doesn’t have unprotected anal sex with other men and doesn’t do IV drugs has pretty much the same chance of becoming HIV+ as a circumcised man who doesn’t do those things - that is to say, almost no chance at all. If he does end up engaging in those behaviors, he still has a good chance of ending up HIV+ whether circumcised or not.

8

Let him keep the tip intact. At this point the best thing you can do is educate him about the dangers of casual unprotected sex. Have open and honest discussions with him about sex being something reserved for people who care a great deal for each other, and that they should always use a condom. Certainly he could become a man-whore anyway, but I think that is all you can do.

Lopping off part of his anatomy at this point is going to be too traumatic. It is not difficult to avoid AIDS and other STDs even if you are sexually active.

9

I am a circumcised male and I have always resented that this procedure was done to me without my consent. BTW I am not Muslim or Jewish, so there was no religious reason. It was just done as a matter of course in North American hospitals when I was born. To my knowledge, my parents did not even sign their consent. If I could find who did it to me I would sue them, but there is a good chance they are dead (I am 58 years old).

And even if there were a religious reason, I still oppose it. It is nothing less than child genital mutilation. Just because Yaweh or Allah tells you to engage in this barbaric practice is no justification. Allah also tells Muslims to stone women found in adultery and to lash and execute gays, but that is also barbaric and ignorant and based on the sickness and supersitition that is religion.

Removal of the foreskin enormously reduces sensitivity and capacity for sexual pleasure. In this sense, it is the male equivalent of removal of the clitoris, in that it is designed to make people “good” by desentisizing them. While this may be a very attractive idea for those who subscribe to the sex-is-dirty doctrines preached by most religions, it is nothing less than assault on an innocent child.

As to the medical reasons, or should I say excuses, for circumcision, none of them really stand up to scrutiny.

  1. HIV prevention: If circumcision is only 50% effective in preventing HIV, then all it would serve to do is give a false sense of security that actually could lead to LESS use of safe sex and MORE danger of infection. Everyone, circumcised or not, should be practising safe sex.

  2. Circumcision makes you “cleaner”. Have you people never heard of soap and water? It is true that areas of the human body where skin covers skin allow for bacterial growth, and unpleasant odours. So it is with armpits, your butt crack and the fork of your legs. That is why I make a point of washing those areas well every day. Or would you prefer to cut off my arms at the shoulder to allow my armpits to breathe freely and remain clean. How about amputating my buttocks so that I no longer have an ass crack?

Over 150 years ago in the Victorian era, some doctors would even approve of castration of boys who refused to stop masturbating, fully convinced that they were helping to save the lives of these young patients, who, they had learned in medical school, could be made insane and fatlly ill by this vice.

Whenever religion joins medicine in attacking human sexual pleasure, alarm bells go off in my head.

10

Any argument that advances itself by using a smelly buttcrack for illustrative effect, well that is an argument I can get behind!

:smiley:

11

While I feel very strongly that routine infant circumcision is wrong, I don’t want to turn this into an argument. So here is my opinion.

The trials you mention are not large enough to warant scientific validation. (as far as I know)

The trials were conducted in a culture where many men think that using a condom is unmanly. Condom use there is extremely low. Many don’t even get the connection between sex and AIDS and why protection might be important.

I agree that 9 yo is an age that does not warant circumcision. He is not sexually active yet so there is no rush. It is also to young to really understand what any benefits might be or to really give consent about a lifelong body changing event. Plus, I bet his reaction would be… “YOU WANT TO CUT WHAT OFF!?! HELL NO!”

I am not circumcised and holy cow, I don’t have AIDS! It can be done. In fact, if you are mature enough to have sex, you are mature enough to make decisions about sexual protection.

At a certain age in a few years, your son will be able to make a circumcision decision for himself. If he is not mature enough to make that choice himself, then he is not mature enough to have sex.

Circumcision is a one way street (we’ll ignore the Tug Ahoy for now). If you decide for your son, he will never get to make the decision for himself. Many folks on both sides of the procedure are unhappy with their status, but only one group can actually change their status. I am glad to be uncircumcised because I get to make the decision myself… and I think that I will get circumcised soon, when I get the money and nerves together (for my own personal reasons - but at least I can choose).

Circumcision is not the best way to prevent AIDS, education is.

And if the AIDS rates were 50% higher for uncircumcised folks in America or England for instance, a simple survey would have revealed this long ago. I am not aware of any such monumental discovery.

Also, may I advise that you tell your son what circumcision is? I didn’t know anything about it and for the longest time growing up in the midwest, I thought I was a little misshappen :slight_smile: Now-a-days, circumcision is less common than it used to be, so this probably isn’t as much of a problem for kids these days.

12

Is there any reason you think your child would be unable to use a condom when grown up?

13

Please don’t do it. I have nothing further to add to what’s already been said.

14

If you were circumcised when you were born how do you know it reduces sensitivity and capacity for sexual pleasure?

The results seem to be mixed at best:

15

[Eddie Murphy]“C’mon now, Captain, Y’all have a Little ass left…” [/Eddie Murphy] :smiley:

16

Hell, sign me up! Maybe I can finally realize my dream of being the assless wonder!

17

Why? Do you live in Africa?

18

Umm… wouldn’t you rather get behind a clean one?

19

Farbeit from me as a woman to get in an argument with men about the value of circumcision, but allow me to point out that this isn’t accurate. First, the finding was not that “circumcision is 50% effective in preventing HIV,” but that circumcision cut the rate of infection by 50%. Second, yes, the study groups were rather small, but the findings were so overwhelming and unequivocal that the trials were actually halted on the grounds that it was unethical to not allow the control group (uncircumcised) to be circumcised if they chose. One of many cites. Third, it is faulty reasoning to argue that because one method prevents X optimally, all other methods to prevent X should be disallowed – even if the optimal prevention is less likely to be used. This is the same reason people argue kids should not be taught about safe sex (because really they shouldn’t be having sex at all), and the same reason people argue that girls should not be immunized against HPV, even though it can cause cancer (because, again, they should be practicing safe sex or not having sex at all). It’s also the rationale used by the Catholic Church to justify not providing condoms in Africa – that there will be MORE sex if people can have safe sex, so you shouldn’t make safe sex an option. You, similarly, are arguing against SAFER sex, in the faint hope that people will opt for safe sex if the only other option is dangerous sex.

But that doesn’t appear to be true. To date, the only options have be safe sex or dangerous sex, and yet the fact is that most African men, and a great many American men, do not practice safe sex as it is. Denying them the option of reducing their HIV risk by 50% is not going to make them more likely to practice safe sex if they’re not practicing safe sex in the first place. This is a way to make unsafe sex SAFER; it’s not an argument against also doing other things to make sex safer still.

All that being said, I agree with the majority of others who say that nine is either too old or too young to be circumcising. Now that the boy is old enough to know and remember what’s going on, he should have the right to decide for himself if he believes it’s in his best interest to have this or any other non-essential surgery done. I know I probably would have been rather traumatized by any surgery done on my girly bits at that age.

  1. Circumcision makes you “cleaner”. Have you people never heard of soap and water? It is true that areas of the human body where skin covers skin allow for bacterial growth, and unpleasant odours. So it is with armpits, your butt crack and the fork of your legs. That is why I make a point of washing those areas well every day. Or would you prefer to cut off my arms at the shoulder to allow my armpits to breathe freely and remain clean. How about amputating my buttocks so that I no longer have an ass crack?

Over 150 years ago in the Victorian era, some doctors would even approve of castration of boys who refused to stop masturbating, fully convinced that they were helping to save the lives of these young patients, who, they had learned in medical school, could be made insane and fatlly ill by this vice.

Whenever religion joins medicine in attacking human sexual pleasure, alarm bells go off in my head.
[/QUOTE]

20

I’d personally prefer to remain upwind.