Religious Special Pleading

The bottom line is whether or not you believe that society itself should override parental consent and authority. I say that in most cases it should not.

I'd say the bottom line is under what conditions should a parent be permitted to consent to surgical procedures with a lifelong impact. I'd suggest the answer should be 'only when its necessary for the welfare of the individual affected'. Purely cosmetic surgery is, in every case but male circumcision, generally considered something nobody can consent to on another person's behalf.I think we can agree there is a long list of things a parent cannot consent to on behalf of a child on top of that. An easy (and unfortunately too common example) would be sex.

I would think that being a bone fide member of the Jewish community ought to qualify as "necessary for the welfare of the individual affected."

There are members of the Jewish community who are uncircumcised. Their welfare is not impaired.

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An informal online survey conducted in 2006 by the Israeli parenting portal Mamy found that of 1,418 parents of boys, 4.8 percent did not have them circumcised. The reasons given: 1.6 percent were not Jews; 2 percent objected to disfiguring the body; and 1.2 percent refrained because the act is painful.

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My mother says, and I agree with her, that she gave me the choice whether to be like everyone else or not. When you have a child circumcised its a one-way ticket, but when you dont, its a two-way ticket with which you can return if you want. I have never wanted to return. I am glad I was not circumcised. I feel wholly in harmony with myself.

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My main feeling was that I was giving my son the option to decide for himself, Ayelet says. It is his body and I didnt want to do anything to his body that he would not be able to restore.

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Ayelet, who works with children, has come across other uncircumcised children and has seen that neither they nor their playmates make a fuss about it. I was present when they showed themselves to one another, as children do, and didnt see anyone being treated differently.

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That is likely only true for the nominal or merely ethnic Jews who don't believe in their religious heritage anyway.

Likely. But it's also true of religious Jews who do believe in their religious heritage.

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Galit, from the parenting forum, says her decision not to have her children circumcised actually helped her crystallize her Jewish identity. I did not arrive at that decision from an anti-religious posture: I am against the act itself. After the decision was made I started to think more deeply about what Jewishness means to me. I discovered to my happiness that the ability to stand fully behind my traditional choices, in terms of my relations with Judaism, had deepened.

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Ido recalls that when the rabbi came to teach him the weekly Torah portion ahead of his bar mitzvah, he explained to me about who a Jew is. One of the things he mentioned was that a Jew is someone who has undergone circumcision. I was 12 and a half at the time, and I remember smiling to myself and thinking that he didnt have a clue. Already then I understood that being a Jew goes far deeper than what the rabbi thought regarding me that a slice of the body is not a guarantee that I will feel true identity with Jewish culture.

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Rabbis can say whatever they want, he continues. I know that my Judaism cannot be taken from me, because I am part of a particular cultural history. I am a Jew who believes in precepts such as Love thy neighbor as thyself; Do unto others as you would have them do unto you; and Remember the stranger, because you too were a stranger in Egypt.

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Well, that's a modern revisionist idea there because the Torah itself says circumcision is the mark by which a Jew is known as a Jew. Whether one personally "feels" one's Jewishness or not does not enter into it. The idea would be laughed to death in ancient Israel, and the person saying it probsably cast out of the community.

Regardless, they follow Judaism, live in Israel, are ethnically Jewish, uncircumcised and their welfare has not been compromised.

Hooray for them, but they aren't the standard. It's the orthodox Torah-following Jews who set the standard.

Why? It is obviously possible to be a Jew without having a lump cut out of your dick. In fact the only requirement is that you're born of a Jewish mother.The formal position of the religion though is that male babies must be circumcised. If we accept that this process causes harm to the baby - and it's impossible not to given the evidence - how can it be 'necessary for the welfare of the indivdual affected'?Are you implying that the uncircumcised child will be ostracised by the Jewish community?

What's irrelevant is why Jews are circumcised. As long as circumcision is practiced in a secular context, you can not call it a religious practice. That is not what I asked. I asked if you want to ban ONLY religious circumcisions. Because that would be blatant religious discrimination. Doctors. I haven't avoided anything. We've already been through the difference between circumcision and murder. Hint: death. Well, no, not really. "Deliberate murder" is defined by law and there are a fair number of exceptions. So it is not absolute. There you go again. You think it's an absolute except for the exceptions: non-modern, non-Western, non-democracies, etc. Ironically, it's the modern Western democracies that are trampling on a woman's right to choose. History has slipped in that direction sometimes but it's hardly a historical trend.

So Prohibition of alcohol worked just fine? Everybody stopped drinking alcohol? You're just fine with the rise of organized bootlegging?So prohibition of drugs is working just fine? Nobody is using non-medicinal drugs? You're just fine with the rise of organized drug-dealing?So prohibition of abortion worked just fine? No abortions were performed by unqualified hacks? You're just fine with women dying from botched abortions? And you think that's inconsistent? It isn't an either-or situation you know. We don't have to decide that either the majority tramples on the minority or we don't consider majority opinions at all. We are (sometimes) capable of compromise. And sometimes compromise comes in the form of letting individuals make their own decisions and everybody else keeping their noses the hell out of it. Yes, sometimes things are prohibited and sometimes things are un-prohibited. It isn't a one-way street. Indeed. And in some cases, maybe they should be allowed to.

Watch my lips, it's not me saying it's a religious practice, it's the head of the Jewish religion. I want to ban all non-medical circumcision of children. We happen to be talking here about Jews. My example was shooting a neighbour in the head for fun. Can you obfuscate that? Nope I think it's absolute and so do modern Western democracies. As we learn more, we get to understand that harming people for no sensible reason is wrong. You and some less developed countries think it's ok. History shows their errors. Women are able to choose to mutilate themselves when they are actually women.Edited by Tangle, : No reason given.

There is no head of the Jewish religion but if there was, his opinion is irrelevant. If the Pope thinks wearing his hat is a religious activity, that doesn't make every hat religious. Why distinguish between medical and non-medical? Clearly not, since they all define it differently. But we don't agree on what is "harm" and what is a "sensible reason". Most of your precious modern Western democracies consider religious freedom to be a sensible reason - and they're unlikely to change.

The Chief Rabbinate of Israel (Hebrew: הרבנות הראשית לישראל‬, Ha-Rabanut Ha-Rashit Li-Yisra'el) is recognized by law[1] as the supreme rabbinic and spiritual authority for Judaism in Israel.Here in the UK, we have our own Chief Rabbi, and he tells me that according to his book, the circumcision of male babies is a religious act. So, I guess I'll go with his view over yours thanks. 'Cos, you know, one is necessary in order to function properly and the other isn't. Forgotten shooting your neighbour in the head so soon? How convenient.