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I typed “CIRCUMCISION” on my computer. I was not prepared for what I saw next. Website design By BotEap.comA screaming baby. Contorted face. Rigid body. Website design By BotEap.comA small, tender, vulnerable newborn baby who had been curled up for nine months in the womb, stretched out and bound with her legs spread. erect penis clamps. Razor sharp scalpel. Blood. Website design By BotEap.comI turned around. I closed the eyes. One moment and he had seen more than enough to last a lifetime. Website design By BotEap.comKnives and blood? Genitals and screams? Is this what is euphemistically called “circumcision”? Website design By BotEap.comIt was just a picture, but my whole life was there in that moment with that baby: heart racing, adrenaline pumping, every muscle tensing, fighting, writhing, fighting, screaming, crying, trying with all my might to get away from that knife. . . Website design By BotEap.comKnowing from my work in mental health that trauma imprinted a mind, I saw a disaster in the making: an innocent consciousness welded to feelings of helplessness, hopelessness, powerlessness, loneliness, isolation, terror, panic, anger, sex. and violence. Website design By BotEap.comI couldn’t help but wonder, where is that baby now?… and how is his life today? Is he happy and at peace? Or have you lived your entire life kicking and screaming in reaction to this long-forgotten trauma? Do you avoid people? push them? Flee? So you wonder why? Does it leave disaster in its wake? Website design By BotEap.comDo you scream out loud or cry inside: “You don’t really love me. Leave me alone! Don’t touch me! Go away! I hate you!” Is he one of the many men who commit suicide four times as often as women? Website design By BotEap.comFrankly, honestly and simply, in that photo I saw rape. Website design By BotEap.comIf the victim had been an adult, a child, or even an animal, the abuser would be jailed and newspapers around the world would riot about it. If people knew what the practice entailed, they would no longer use the sterilized word, circumcision, but instead call it what it is: inhumane, rape, torture, sexual mutilation, assault, and assault. Website design By BotEap.comI wondered: How can we be so seemingly oblivious to the harm this practice causes? Website design By BotEap.comMaybe because, like me, very few people are really aware of what circumcision really is. They have given us the bleached version. And then I read that this baby is just one of over a million baby boys who are circumcised each year in the United States. One every 26 seconds. Website design By BotEap.comNo wonder, I sighed. No wonder there are so many lonely, unhappy, desperate, confused, frustrated and angry men. Website design By BotEap.comIt would be hard to imagine a more insidious wound to the body and psyche than this common practice: routine infant circumcision, but here it is, made public on the Internet, and now on my computer screen. Website design By BotEap.comPhysically restraining a baby. Manipulation of his genitals. Cutting into her tender skin. Altering its form, structure and function. Changing your relationship with your body and your sexuality forever. Website design By BotEap.comIf we could view circumcision from a rational and objective perspective, we would surely have to classify it as the most extreme form of child sexual abuse: infant rape. And if we were honest with ourselves, we would have to stop and shake our heads at the ignorance of our ancestors. Website design By BotEap.comWhy the hell would someone do this to a baby? There has to be a very emotional and irrational element to circumcision. Website design By BotEap.comViolence. Court! An irreversible mutilation! Website design By BotEap.comFrom my crisis counseling work, I knew that abuse is especially devastating when it happens to children before they have words to describe it. Terror is welded to every cell of children’s bodies, and as adults, they have difficult times in life. Circumcision leaves both physical and psychological scars. Website design By BotEap.comI could only guess what the world would look like today if the United States had not been eliminating most of its baby boys for the past 60 years. Common sense says that if we had been kinder to our babies, they might have grown up to be kinder, gentler, happier, healthier adults. Earth could be a kinder, gentler, happier and healthier planet. Website design By BotEap.comThe implications of this terror, intentionally inflicted on babies by human hands, instantly dwarf almost any other concern I’ve ever had about my life and the world at large. Website design By BotEap.comCould circumcision be the root of man’s inhumanity to man? Website design By BotEap.comNo matter how cruel, every perpetrator has been a victim first and here we are, manufacturing potential perpetrators every time we cut up a baby. Website design By BotEap.comIs it just a coincidence that the only three cultures that circumcise their young men are at war in the Middle East? Yes, Jews, English-speaking Christians, and Muslims are the only three cultures that circumcise their young men. Website design By BotEap.comI had no idea what would happen when I typed “CIRCUMCISION” on my computer. That was a long and deep journey in a very short space of time. A quick lesson on a shocking truth. I sat on my meat. Website design By BotEap.comThat’s all. A clue to exponentially improve the quality of life on this planet, to take a small step towards healing what I have always called “man’s inhumanity towards man”. Website design By BotEap.comHow the hell did such a strange and horrible practice start? Going back to my computer, I began to read… and read and read… For years I read and researched on this topic, until I finally found out what had happened to me. Suddenly my men made sense, my life made sense… and then I wrote my book.