Jewish ritual of Metzitzah B'peh

You’d think that in any context a man putting his mouth over a baby’s penis and sucking would be seen as outrageous by each and every person with sound mind, right?

Wrong. The below image is of one of the most disgusting religious practices I can think of aside from female circumcision and child brides.

It’s called Metzitzah B’peh, a circumcision ritual practiced by some Orthodox Jews whereby the baby is circumcised in front of an audience containing its family, and then has the remaining blood sucked from its penis by a Jewish practitioner, or Mohel. So these are literally ‘cock-sucking’ Jews! Sorry I couldn’t help myself. All jokes aside, it has lead to many babies around the world contracting diseases such as herpes, syphilis and gonorrhoea. In some cases such diseases can lead to the permanent brain damage or even death of the infant.

This is the kind of thing that makes me so angry with religion. In no other area of our society could we allow this to occur under any circumstances, but for when it’s done under the banner of ‘religion’. It’s archaic, disgusting, redundant and inexcusable in today’s societies. Yet, I’m sure many religion apologist would brush something off, even this horrendous, while offering up the feeble argument that ‘it’s their culture and customs, how can we complain?’

We can complain because we know the consequences of such actions, we can recognise how useless and old-fashioned such practices are, and societal morality should dictate that we protect the freedoms of all individuals, including babies, and including protecting them from religion. Especially when it can directly endanger their lives.

When are we going to be able to stop, look at our cultures, at our practices and rituals and say, “hey, this is no longer relevant, no longer useful, no longer practical, it’s time to reassess things and evolve in order to increase the well-being of everyone”?

I never understand the attitude people have when it comes to things like religion, and even more recently the crap relating to 2012 apocalypse because the Mayan calendar is ending, that the older something is, the longer it has been practiced, the more legitimate it must be. I often hear arguments like, “but the Bible is so old, why wouldn’t it be true?”, “but these people have practiced *insert ritual* for 2000 years, how can we say they should stop?”, “but these people have believed *insert superstition* for 200 years, how can we tell them they’re wrong”.

I’m sorry, but the age of something, or the length of time it has been practiced, isn’t sufficient evidence as to it’s legitimacy or justification. People 2000 years ago were a shit load more ignorant to the ways of the world than probably the average 10 year old. How on earth would any of their writings, traditions and rituals be absolute and relevant to today’s societies and people? Why can we move on from things like believe the world was flat, that the Sun revolves around the Earth, that animals spontaneously generate out of nothing, that disease and illness were caused by the devil or evil spirits, but we still allow children to be mentally, and sometimes physically, abused as a result of ancient and redundant ideology?

There is no honour or dignity in holding onto the past. If we can’t learn and evolve then we’re the ones who ultimately suffer. As an atheist, scientist and compassionate humanist this sort of shit I cannot and will not tolerate. It is our obligation as members of such an advanced and aware species to work towards increasing the well-being of all other humans and sentient beings, and remove as much needless suffering and death as we can.

Rant over.