Society of Danish Medical Students’ policy paper on ritual circumcision of boys.
Please note, this policy is outdated. New to be expected shortly.
The ritual circumcision of boys removes healthy and functional tissue from a healthy minor. Therefore, the question of rituel circumcision of boys is not in its essence a question of health. The question of whether or not ritual circumcision of boys should be legal rather becomes a question of ethics and rights. Thus, medical doctors and medical students must make up their own minds in the same manner as any other member of the society as to whether or not the individual persons right to master their own bodies must be accorded more weight than that of religious and cultural traditions or not.
FADL is of the opinion that the individual has a personal right to make decisions regarding ritual circumcision and that the right to an intact body must be independent of a persons sex. As girls are already legally protected from ritual circumcision in Denmark, boys should be afforded equal rights.
With this resolution FADL wishes to express respect for children’s – boys as well as girls – to bodily integrity as ensured by conventions. And to appeal to medicial doctors and health care professionals to actively make up their minds as to whether to respect children’s, including boys, right to an intact body as protected by conventions by asserting their right to decline to participate in the ritual circumcision of boys.
FADL would like to stress, at our opinion regarding ritual circumcision is not rooted in neither anti-Semitism nor Islamophobia. Having reached the age of majority, men may choose for themselves whether or not to be circumcised for religious or cultural reasons, if they so wish.
FADL policy is not about whether or not to circumcise. Our policy is that each individul person must be allowed to make the choice themselves.
– Kasper Gasbjerg, former Chair of the Society of Danish Medical Students
Translated by Intact Denmark
A number of other Danish medical and health organisations have published policy papers on non-therapeutic circumcision.