The draft law passed by the cabinet of the Federal Government to regulate the circumcision of boys will cause serious damage to the law of the Federal Republic of Germany. This was stated by Frieder Otto Wolf, President of the Humanist Association of Germany, on Wednesday evening in Berlin. It must shock level-headed and informed people in Germany how compliantly the CDU/CSU and FDP government has subordinated itself to the demands of some representatives of religious communities and ignored the arguments of countless defenders of children’s rights and the secular constitutional state. “It is one thing to recognize that a practice that has hardly been questioned to date and that creates cultural identity cannot be convincingly countered with abrupt bans,” says Wolf. “However, the new problem posed by the circumcision of boys cannot be adequately resolved by the government and legislators simply bowing to pressure from religious representatives in our country.” Frieder Otto Wolf emphasized that the members of the German Bundestag should not approve the planned law. “If the Bundestag actually waves the law through as uncritically as the government has done, decades of cultural and legislative progress will be abandoned.” There is not one good reason why this law has to be passed now. “For decades it has not been necessary and for the new controversy that has arisen, it is not a solution that the majority of people in our country want. They don’t need this law.” Voters who respect the fundamental individual rights of children and the right of parents to raise them, and who have developed an understanding for the controversy surrounding the circumcision of boys, should now campaign directly to the members of the Bundestag to reject the law and to continue a scientifically based dialogue involving members of affected communities and children’s rights organizations before it is passed. Wolf also pleaded once again for an end to the shrill rhetoric that has been heard on all sides in the months since the Cologne Regional Court ruling became public. “It must always be unmistakably clear that the question of the justification of circumcision of boys raises a fundamental dilemma between its religious practice and our understanding of the law, which we are not prepared to avoid a rational, careful and respectful discourse.”
Further information
1. press release of the Federal Association dated June 28, 2012: HVD welcomes new debate on fundamental issues 2. press release of the Federal Association dated July 18, 2012: “Creating opportunities for honest discussion” 3. press release of the Federal Association dated September 27, 2012: Key issues paper not suitable for defusing the debate
