So, yeah, we’re getting the boy’s little wee-wee snipped. In the most holy and appropriate of ways, of course! But there’s no way around it. I, the dad, am going to hire someone to remove a part of my son’s little baby penis.
The best part of it, or maybe the worst, is that he’s only going to be eight days old when it happens. Because that’s how things are done in Judaism. The little dude comes out, gets a week under his belt with his unit intact, and then we remove part of it. If we didn’t do that he couldn’t be considered part of the Jewish religion, which is a pretty big deal. Seeing as how, you know, we’re Jewish. But I have mixed feelings about circumcision.
On the pro side he gets to be Jewish, which is good. I’m proud of my people. Our success, our compassion, our domination of the Nobel Prizes for Medicine and Physics. (Seriously, we’re like the friggin New York Yankees on those.)
But the ritual upsets me a bit. One, the kid is losing part of his penis. Can’t get around that. For a dude this is major. Certainly this guy is peeved about it.
Second, maybe, maybe he’s going to lose some of the feeling associated with sex. Although this has been debated, back and forth.
Third, why is this still even all that important to the religion? Whereas once upon a time you could argue that foreskins got dirty, you know, 2000 thousand years ago. Now there are modern advances in technology to make sure that doesn’t happen. Like soap.
But the religion says to do it, and I want him to be part of the religion, so do it we shall. The odd part is that I’m not even particularly religious, and I’m not a big fan of simply doing something because a religion says so. That leads to all kinds of terrible things, including terrorism, Crusades, the Neil Diamond version of the Jazz Singer, the list is endless.
Nonetheless, it shall be done, and afterwards he shall officially join the Jewish religion. He won’t know this because, thankfully, he’ll be out cold. But, I imagine, he might have some questions for me later.
Do you think it's right to circumcise a baby boy?
Image via Peter Dutton/Flickr