By Andrea Nemerson

Recap

DEAR ANDREA: Why the hateful response to the woman whose boyfriend was upset at being circumcised? I was gratified that you acknowledged some damage: "He's missing nerves, which sucks." You clearly missed the "G-spot" point, which was just an analogy. Likewise, I believe that calling the frenulum a "bundle of nerves" was shorthand.

You could have said something helpful (and entertaining), like "Circumcision does affect relationships. Maybe a joint trip to a therapist might help." Or suggest she acknowledge the validity of his anger but seek to prove that his penis still has plenty of pleasure to give. If he's resistant, tell him he's dealing with it selfishly.

Ask her, what if someone had surgically taken even a tiny bit of your clitoris or labia without your permission or knowledge? Even if the sexual experience was little changed, would you as a woman feel violated anyway? Of course you would. Lighten up.

I'm sure you'll receive much hate mail for this. Please don't consider this hate mail. I just think you missed the point and a great opportunity to acknowledge that men, just like women, have valid gripes about the medical profession. Most egregious, I believe, is that you utterly failed to realize and point out that circumcision can and does affect relationships negatively.

Please do better next time by putting some thought into complex issues you seek to address or choose simpler problems.

Love,
Concerned Penis Owner

Dear Owner: Actually, I didn't get any hate mail. I heard from nobody but you, and given the highly emotional, not to say hysterical, tenor of much of the discourse around circumcision, I think you expressed yourself with admirable restraint. I really must, however, disagree with your characterization of your suggested alternate answers as "helpful (and entertaining)." Validating people's anger and prescribing a "joint trip to a therapist" may be safe advice, but it can't by any stretch be considered entertainment. I'm willing – happy, even – to address your points one by one, but do leave the stand-up to the professionals. Now have a seat.

I'll have you (and everyone else) know that I've actually put a great deal of consideration into my stance on circumcision, or rather, my lack of one. Growing up Jewish among Jews, plus growing up American in an era in which American boys were just sort of automatically clipped, like Dobermans, I never really gave it much thought. Then I became a sex educator and a huge advocate of consensuality in all things. I learned about female genital mutilation and forced surgeries on intersexed children and developed a fairly militant opposition to cutting off healthy parts. Then I talked and talked and talked with men and men and men, plus got around a bit, if you know what I mean, plus attended my nephew's bris, which was lovely, and by the end I was all, "Huh. Well, this is problematic, but I think people are making too much of a fuss."

There's no question the procedure is both unnecessary and nonconsensual, and it's obvious the nerve-rich, self-lubricating, and glans-protective foreskin is meant to be there. But most men get along just fine without theirs, and while they may choose, knowing what we now know, not to circumcise their sons, they also get plenty of pleasure out of what they do have and are able to leave behind whatever grievances they might have against their parents and the medical establishment. Except among certain Peoples of the Book, circumcision is on its way out. Let's let it go. But people who were cut while it was still the thing to do need to let it go too. You'd think it was the source of all evil, a virtual hellmouth in the pants, to hear some people go on.

I don't enjoy perpetual victims who wield their scars, real or imagined, as weapons against anyone who balks at satisfying the self-defined victim's every need. The boyfriend in the letter was not your typical fellow who wonders idly what it might be like to have a prepuce, or even your typical anticirc activist. He was a sulky, whiny withholder who could not maintain a normal, mutually enjoyable sex life with his girlfriend and blamed it on something he shares with the vast preponderance of adult male Americans. Clearly there was something going on there besides the loss of an admittedly sexually sensitive part of a part. Like, he was a jerk. Hence my lack of sympathy. Nothing to do with circumcision, really.

And finally, you may think I misunderstood the shorthand and metaphors in play ("male G-spot," "bundle of nerves,"), but I assure you I did not. People exposed to just a little information, say, by reading some random Web site, can be staggeringly literal. If I'm not ruthless about accuracy, I too can end up as literal-idiot fodder. I don't want to see "But Andrea called it a male-G-spot" anywhere, ever.

Love,
Andrea

E-mail Andrea Nemerson at andrea@altsexcolumn.com.