In answer to the article's question — a religious obligation or the‘cruellest of cuts’? — neither.1 No-one is obliged to be religious, and if they choose to be, there are plenty of religions where non-therapeutic amputation of the foreskin is not obligatory.
It was disappointing to see this one-sided article which appears to suggest the taxpayer should support this barbaric and inhumane practice. The two articles in the BMJ last year were far better.2,3
I look forward to eventually seeing a legal case against this affront on the right of a child to bodily integrity.
And please — call it what it is.‘Circumcision’ sounds so euphemistically innocuous.
- © British Journal of General Practice, 2010.