S.F. circumcision ban should be rejected

It wouldn’t be a San Francisco election without at least one wacky measure on the ballot. For this November, the threshold has already been met: Voters will be asked to ban male circumcision.

Male circumcision is a medical and religious act with thousands of years of history. Medical data show that boys who have the procedure in infancy have fewer urinary tract infections, and it may offer some protection to adult men and their partners from sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV.

Rather than allowing families to make their own private decisions about this act, bill proponent Lloyd Schofield believes it should be banned because “there’s no benefit to it.”

He’s not concerned about those who would choose to circumcise for religious reasons because, he says, “A lot of Jews have been turned away from their culture and their religion just because of this issue.”

Nor is he worried about the wobbly constitutionality of the ban: “We have the 14th Amendment and its equal protection clause.”

A judge might feel differently, but San Francisco voters can do their part to make sure that this case doesn’t get to court.

Originally published here: https://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/05/23/ED8M1JIUGM.DTL