MEDICAL FRAUD and the criminal assault of boys
Letter to the New Zealand Parliament
Ethics of Circumcision
KEN A. McGRATH M.D.
It is clear that no baby in history, female or male, has ever consented to their genital mutilation. "Informed consent" is a meaningless term for children and by their screams and agony they tell us eloquently as they can to stop it.
Some people have trouble with "ethics" beyond what they have learnt in Sunday School. But most people can recognize certain values when they hear them. When the mind and reality do not match up, the psychologists describe the dichotomy as Cognitive Dissonance. Some examples of this state with respect to circumcision are listed below; nearly everybody will be able to relate to ethical principles involved whilst understanding that it is what happens in real life that violates the principles.
'We hope our baby doesn't have birth defects' ...except for aposthia (lack of a foreskin) which we would sort of like.
'We'd never submit our child to a surgical procedure without a diagnosis' ...except for circumcision, which doctors let us decide about.
'It is not acceptable to hurt children' ...except when they 'have' to be circumcised.
'We would never unnecessarily place our child at risk of infections or injury'...except to get them circumcised.
'We would never permit healthy tissue to be removed from our child' ...unless it is his foreskin.
'It is our duty to protect our children from pain'...except from the pain of circumcision.
'We must aid and comfort our child when he is injured' ...except during his circumcision which we'll pretend doesn't hurt.
'We would never take the easy way out of caring for our child'...unless it's a boy. Then we will have his penis altered so we will not have to take care of the unmentionable part - his foreskin.
'We would never allow anything to impair our baby's bonding with his mother'...except for the pain of his circumcision.
'We want our boy to grow up happy with his body'...but we will jeopardize his self esteem by cutting the center of his male image - his penis.
'We would never place our boy at a disadvantage where he could be ridiculed' ...except we will alter his penis so it does not look like or function like the vast majority in the world.
'We would never impose our will on our child against his future wishes'...except we will rush to have him circumcised before he can even start to formulate his wishes.
'We will never compromise our child's future happiness'...but we remove an erogenous part of his body.
'We would never make a decision to irreversibility alter our child's appearance in a way that he may one day regret such as tattooing'...unless it is to alter the appearance of his penis in a way we want.
'We want our son to grow up a full human being' ...but we will teach him, by circumcising him, that human rights do not amount too much.
'We will love our child in all his glory'...except for his foreskin which we will have cut off and thrown into the trash.
'God made our child perfect with love, care and wisdom'...except his penis which needs to be "fixed".
'We believe that all parts of our child's body are sacred'...except for his foreskin which is ours to destroy as we will.
'We believe it is wrong to deprive someone of a healthy part of their body'...unless it is the male foreskin, or in North Africa, a girl's clitoris and labia minor.
Dr. K. A. McGrath M.D.
Anatomist, Histologist and lecturing Pathologist
Reprinted from Intact Network Newsletter Volume 1:6 March 1966