Appeal unlikely for S.F. circumcision ban ballot measure
Time appears to have run out for the proponents of a San Francisco ballot measure that would have banned circumcision of any boy under 18 in the city.
Time appears to have run out for the proponents of a San Francisco ballot measure that would have banned circumcision of any boy under 18 in the city.
There is nothing esthetically appealing about a Brit Milah, the circumcision procedure performed on an 8 day old Jewish baby boy. To witness a barely one week old child strapped down with Velcro to a “Circ Board” in sight of everyone gathered is visually unappealing, if not spiritually uninspiring. If that were not enough, some officiants still engage in Metzitzah—the oral suction of blood from the circumcision. If not done by mouth directly, a pipette is used.
According to the proponent of a ballot initiative to prohibit the act of surgically removing a male baby’s foreskin, the term “circumcision” is nothing but a euphemism. “Having your foreskin amputated is probably more like it,” said Jena Troutman, a doula and mother of two sons, who initiated the process of petitioning Santa Monica to include the initiative on a future ballot.
San Francisco’s Catholic archbishop expressed his opposition to a city ballot initiative that would ban circumcision for minors. Archbishop George Niederauer condemned the initiative in a May 23 letter sent to the San Francisco Chronicle, his archdiocese’s newspaper reported.
If you were circumcised as an adult and have experienced sexual relations both before and afterward, then Emily Bazelon wants to know about it. Why that concerns me — and may concern you — takes a little explaining.