Next Time Boychick, We Take the Whole Thing
Yesterday, Darwin turned eight days old. Darwin is my second grandson. You know what that means if you're Jewish. The briss, the brit mila, the covenant of circumcision. Or as I like to think of it: Next time boychick, we take the whole thing!
Ever wonder why Jewish boys are so fucked up about sex? Ever wonder why they fall for mile-high models from Slovenia who wear those big cold crosses? Ever wonder why they like Chinese girls, Chinese-American girls, Blonde shiksa cheerleaders from Kansas? Or those cool black models who dance like Beyonce?
It's because of the Covenant with Jahwah or G-d: I take this piece of your pecker, with your mother, father, grandfathers and grandmothers looking on, teary eyed. And you think of nothing but your pecker for the rest of your life!
You think female circumcision is bad? (It's hideous, health destroying and horrible -- and inflicted on women by other women). But at least women have other things to think about than their pussies -- like children, like politics, like writing. At least women don't focus nonstop on their vaginas (or as Oprah says, their vajayjays). Men think about their pricks for the rest of their lives. Don't get me wrong, they think about them whether or not they're circumcised. But circumcision bumps it up to a whole other level.
Health reasons, my ass. It's the health of the old impotent grandpas they're thinking of, not you, little boy. You could learn to push the skin back and wash. We're not in the desert any more. We have Jacuzzis and steam showers and redwood hot tubs from Californicate. No, folks, it's the grandpas who love this ritual. The mothers usually run in the other room crying. But they get blamed for it anyway. And Jewish women bear the brunt ever after. Either they marry you and run around with Diana Ross or Beyonce or Naomi Campbell -- or they marry Sandra Oh or Lucy Liu or Yoko Ono and she converts.
In the old days, your mother used to threaten suicide. Now we're more liberal, so your mother embraces Ms. Hung, Ms. Jong, Ms. Ono, Ms. Liu, Ms. Hoe, Ms. Loe, Ms. Cho, Ms. Choi, Ms. Loi. And guess what, the next little boy goes through it anyway!
In my parents' youth, there was a show that ran forever called: Abie's Irish Rose. That was the forbidden fruit in 1920s, 1930s New York. If you updated it, you'd have to call it Abie's Swahili Sweetie or Abie's Chinese Lotus. Nowadays it might be Abie's Tantric Tootsie. The idea would be the same: brilliant Jewish boy flees his mother and hightails it for India or China or Japan. (And you can find India, Africa and China right here in New York City. You don't even have to take a jet).
OK. Call me an anti-Semite. (I'm secretly a pro-Semite). But I do have misgivings about circumcision. And I have met (and married) a lot of Jewish men. And one Chinese-American who is an M.D. but still doesn't speak Chinese. And who was circumcised. Probably still is.
The altacockers (loosely translated as old shitters) have every explanation under the sun. Explanations, after all, are all altacockers can do. It's healthy. It prevents the clap.
You won't get those nasty new viruses around today, G-d forbid. (A secret warning about gayness, I think). But how can you ever forget the pain, the fear, the confusion of being eight days old and having your pecker snipped? They don't remember, say the altacockers. They don't feel it, say the bubbies. We did it in the hospital, say the parents. He didn't feel a thing, says the mother (who was in the other room crying her eyes out).
And here comes the mohel, with his beard, his tallis, his yarmulke, with his red wine and his gauze pads, and his shiny snipper and his old jokes.
What did the mohel put in the window of his shop? Bonsai trees? Why? What else should he put in the window?
If this is the covenant with G-d, then G-d is a sadist. But we knew that already. He descends from Ba'al and all those other mean old gods. Not that the goddesses are any better. Think of Kali, after all, with her necklace of skulls. Life and death are always close as twins. Even Jesus was circumcised and we know that Jesus was chaste -- especially since we have demoted Mary Magdalen from disciple to whore, from wife to mistress, from wise woman to bimbo.
In the older Christianity -- the one Jesus the Jew actually practiced -- women were revered for their wisdom and spirituality. But that didn't suit St. Paul nor apocalyptic St. John the Evangelist who was doing LSD on Patmos (I visited his cave) where he wrote about the four horsemen and the blazing fires in the sky. (It could have been the Patmos sunset seen by a stoner emerging from a cave -- or the Patmos sunrise -- equally bewitching).
But whatever the old guys say, circumcision must hurt -- even to a baby eight days old who then gets his first taste of wine -- pain and alcoholism going hand in rubber glove.
It killed me to see my grandsons marked like this so future Nazis can identify them. What is wrong with the chosen people? Chosen for pain? All the psychological troubles of Jewish men -- from Sigmund Freud to Lenny Bernstein to Philip Roth -- must stem from this dubious ritual. I want to tell my adorable grandson, Max, who is four: Just make sure you never make pee pee in front of a skinhead. But he doesn't know what a skinhead is.
Don't mark him! I wanted to shout, but instead I laughed hysterically at all the mohel's jokes.
"What a great audience!" he said. And was off to the next snip.
1/30/08 8:12 AM
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Let's keep this in perspective: circumcision is a religious ritual, pure and simple. It has no beneficial effects for the child, and, as noted, may have deleterious effects. Data suggesting a slightly reduced susceptibility to HIV and penile cancer are intriguing, but certainly no excuse to mutilate every male child. The foreskin evolved for a reason, just like the appendix, and no culture recommends arbitrarily removing that.
thank you. brave post, and true. its a barbaric tradition, and it is declining in great rates since the 80s.
When I think of the reason we had our sons circumcised, it makes no sense at all. It was so they would look like their Daddy, but they never saw Daddy's penis because he is so shy! Ironic, isn't it?
I had to look up boychick in an online dictionary. At first it seemed like you were talking about a hermaphrodyte. Well, one less thing I'm ignorant about.
Hey, all you people who criticised this article... can't you just enjoy it for what it is... a joke? Erica, keep up the good work, you gave me my first good laugh of the day. I'm not Jewish,Oriental or circumcised but will you marry me anyway? That way I'd get a good belly laugh every morning!
Erica got it right and she should extend this commentary to Islamic males. They snip as well. It is barbaric. I say if G_d intended for men to be circumcised, why wouldn't HE have designed the package differently. I believe all of those PRE-Christian Goddess devotees had it right. While I am at it, I would also like to note, in my liberal, feminist fashion, that sex with an uncircumcised male is different from sex with a circumcised male. I prefer the latter. Thanks for the honest blog with lack of political correctness. It finally had to be said.
Funny post but you leave out all the goyim who are also circumcised. Don't know what the stats are, but I think the majority of American male infants get the snip regardless of their religion. So, using your logic, all guys are neurotic and attracted to Asian women? Sorry to disappoint. And I don't remember a thing, no pain, no memory, nothing. Can't say I really miss "it" since I never knew it was there to begin with! At least Jewish boys have a ceremony and it's all special--although having my teeny baby privates exposed for the entire family seems kinda creepy.
Having been an avid fan of Erica Jong's books for many years, I deeply appreciated her critique of her grandson's bris and circumcision in general. The only problem with her article was the humor. As the Jewish mother of 2 sons who trusted my tradition instinctively to define all that is sacred and facilitated their ritual circumcisions, I was profoundly shaken by the trauma inflicted on them and then further devastated when years later discovered the critical protective, immunological and sexual functions of the foreskin which comprises up to half of erect penile tissue and is replete with 20,000 nerve endings whose sole function is touch sensitivity. This is not extraneous skin. It is the most highly developed sexual tissue in the male and greatly affects a man's ability to sensitively control orgasm. When the foreskin is removed, the glans, which is designed to be a moist, internal organ, much like the clitoris, becomes dried out and loses its sensitivity over time. In order to gain adequate sensation, many circumcised men are obliged to resort to very rigorous thrusting, which can be difficult for many women especially as they approach menopause. Circumcision is not funny. It is not holy and neither is it healthful. If mohels are to be truthful, then they should be telling parents, "This is the mitzvah: to create profound trauma in your infant, and to remove functioning sexual tissue. All of this will affect your child for the rest of his life." If we are really committed to continuing the legacy of Judaism, we will raise our children in Jewish homes and provide a decent Jewish education. This is what counts--not cutting a helpless baby's genitals. It's time to get honest about this and stop it!
Erica, I love ya, but you know gazillions of us men who are NOT Jewish were circumcised when we were babies (as my folks were Southern Baptists I was not allowed any wine afterward, alas).Alth
Bon
I'm a little stunned by how casually racist this article is.
Did I miss the part about discouraging mastrubation (at least in those tentholds where olive oil was a luxury and lamb fat often rancid).?
... Please spare us the the brainy cultural anthroplogy analysis on this issue and take it from this very happily married to a Goy, sexually and emotionally satisifed proudly Jewish guy that the reason we Jewish men turn to warm, affectionate sexy shiksas is the preponderance of rigid, sexually cold and neurotic, controlling, ultra-materialistic over make-uped, emotionally fragile whiny Jewish American Frincesses that predominate the large east coast cities, florida and the west coast.
Of course we're hot. Tell me something I don't know.
And if you think what I just wrote was serious, then you're probably thinking what Ms. Jong wrote is totally on the ball.
The title really explains it all, doesn't it?
(I mean why Jewish men prefer Asian women.)
Here we go again.....
Why are we talking about "Sigmund Freud to Lenny Bernstein to Philip Roth?"
All of these men have significant accomplishments, too many to list.
I do have to comment on Roth. He creates characters, not to be confused with the creator. He displays comic and serious imagination, like any great writer. In truth, we don't know what kind of person he is; he hasn't written about himself that much.
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