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Comment by nsxwolf | Hacker News Reader

A few years back there was a movement on Facebook with groups called "Survivors of Narcissistic Parents" and similar that encouraged people to cut off their parents. It seemed wildly popular and had tons of engagement. People would diagnose their parents with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, discuss how every problem in their lives could be traced to their parents, and that was that.

I've also saw more than one person disown their parents after being sucked in to the anticircumcision movement - men who had until that moment seemingly normal lives but were then convinced their sex lives would never reach their potential because of a decision their parents had made.

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> A few years back there was a movement on Facebook with groups called "Survivors of Narcissistic Parents" and similar that encouraged people to cut off their parents....

> I've also saw more than one person disown their parents after being sucked in to the anticircumcision movement - men who had until that moment seemingly normal lives but were then convinced their sex lives would never reach their potential because of a decision their parents had made....

That's a really good point. Before the internet, and especially social media, people had weird and arguable toxic ideas, but it was almost always impossible to form a geographically-based community around them, so they'd almost always peter out and their effect was limited. The internet broke geographical limits, allowing intense purely ideological communities to form around almost every idea and validate them, no matter how wrong and misguided. In our very online times that can have serious social consequences, sometimes for good but often for ill.

What's weird is some of these communities aren't even wrong, a lot of people do have parents with personality problems or whatever, it's just their nature to go off the rails and have unpleasant real world effects.

Also their congregation creates the conditions for other similar types of thinking and cross pollination of other niche ideas which explains Q-like, super-conspiracy groups that are like a rotating prix fixe menu of paranoid nativist memes and fit neatly adjacent to neo-nazi, sovereign citizen, and even incel movements.

> anticircumcision movement

This is one of those things that is specific to the Jewish religion, in which it serves as an irreversible symbol of membership and has done for about three thousand years ... and also a subset of Americans, who do it for reasons which they suddenly find difficult to explain to their adult children.

If it's important for adult life, but not actually urgent, leave it until the child is old enough to be asked for their meaningful consent.

It is very much not specific to the Jewish religion. Jews make up 0.2% of the world population while ~33% of the worlds males are circumcised. Its very much a part of the Islamic religion as well; being nearly universal in the middle east. In addition ~80% of American men are circumcised.

That doesn't happen in Europe, Japan or China.

True but 78% of South Korean 20 year old men are circumcised, a relatively new phenomenon in the country but something that has clearly taken hold and appears to be a new normal. 90% of the Philippine's are circumcised so its not a strictly non Asian tradition.

> and also a subset of Americans

I think you're underestimating just how many American men are circumcised. The WHO puts it at between 76 and 92%.

What is even weirder is that there are "estranged parents' forums". A good read on that rabbit hole is here (see "contents" on the right hand side for more links): http://www.issendai.com/psychology/estrangement/index.html

> after being sucked in to the anticircumcision movement

Did it take a lot of sucking into considering that they've been subjected to genital mutilation?

Considering that I'm circumcised and every male I know is, and none of us even give it a second thought or feel that our genitals have been "mutilated", I would say it requires a bit of sucking. There has to be some existing dissatisfaction or disorder for someone to get so up in arms about that.

Anyway, it was an example I saw, I had intended to remain neutral on the subject.

> There has to be some existing dissatisfaction or disorder for someone to get so up in arms about that.

How about undergoing a non-essential and medically unnecessary surgery without your consent? Doesn't that bother you at least a little bit?

I was baptised as an infant and most of the people I know were as well, but I recognize it for what it is - roping me into a membership in an organisation which requires me to jump through many hoops to leave, because it needs the numbers (at least on paper) to maintain power.

Fortunately this is reversible, but circumcision isn't.

> How about undergoing a non-essential and medically unnecessary surgery without your consent? Doesn't that bother you at least a little bit?

Nope. My parents were 20 and 21. Family, their Priest and Doctor all pushed them to do it. I have no recollection of any of this. My dick looks like most of the dicks I've seen in the change room and in porn. Why would this bother me? It's so abstract as to be ludicrous.

All sorts of things were done without my consent that have had a much larger impact in my happiness and well being: being raised Catholic for instance, something you brush off as "reversible".

I've really always thought of it as akin to cutting my nails. Its never bothered me and while a small benefit, I appreciate the cleanliness aspect of it; although, that can of course be mitigated by proper washing by those that are uncircumcised. My parents made the decision they thought was right and I am pretty happy with the results.

The fact that other people went through it too is a horrible, horrible metric for something being okay, and I think buying into that is its own form of sucking.

I am circumcised and pretty happy with it, has nothing to do with it happening to other people. It is not a horrible thing that happened to me, its just my penis and me and everyone else that has encountered it seem to like it. The fact that you are determined to think that I and others like me (the majority of American, middle eastern, south korean and other men) should feel assaulted or upset about it is an issue in and of itself. You appear to have a narrative you are trying to push.

I haven't determined as much, just poked a hole in your argument.

You can't really know how bad it was if you were too young to remember and can never have any bearings. The only way we can really know is from empirical analysis or people that went through it at an older age.

come on, your argument boils down to "you are circumcised so you are not qualified to comment on circumcised people".

Agreed, add to that because something didn't bother me or bothers me less than something else means it's okay is also a horrible metric.

Circumcision can be delayed until a man can consent, but it's much more traumatic if done after infancy.

I'm one of those people that people just feel comfortable opening up to.

In college, one friend told me his dad was asking him if he resented his father's decision to circumcise him. His father had to get a medical circumcision due to recurring infection due to difficult sanitary conditions in mandatory military service in his country of origin (where circumcision is uncommon). The father's experience was terrible, decided his son should never go through that, and circumcised his son. Years later, he was second-guessing the decision. My friend wasn't sure how to respond to his father, since it was clearly weighing heavily on his father, but it was totally a non-issue for the circumcised son.

Another friend told me that he was circumcised at 12 due to recurring infections (in a first-world G10 country), and is a big advocate for infant male circumcision.

Anyway, there are statistically significant benefits from male circumcision, though they are often over stated. On the other hand, the downsides to circumcision are also minor for most men. For the average male in a G10 nation, circumcision seems to be low-risk low-reward procedure, though with large fat-tail distribution on both the risks and rewards.

That sounds terrible.

It's fine to disagree with decisions someone (shouldn't have) made on your behalf, but learning to judge people by intent, not result, is part of adulthood.

Punishing someone who loves you for doing the best they knew to do is one of the most cruel things I can imagine.

In other words, disliking someone for something they did to you does not automatically mean they deserve punishment and you should hurt them return. Especially since causing harm to a loved one also already hurts oneself.

It sounds like a lot of those people are cutting those parenta off to make their own lives better. Not to punish parents.

They have choice of being estraged and happier, under less stress and less pressure. Or keep contact and have to deal with manipulation, stress and so on.

Finally, adulthood also means that you know that not just intent matter. The people are affected by consequences of your actions regardless if intent. Too many people write about this as if once you have good goal, you dont have to learn more or think what you are doing. As long as you dont care to check whether you might cause harm, you dont get any responsibility dor what you do.

Continuing to let someone degrade you because “they’re doing the best they can do” is equally cruel. All relationships take work, if one party isn’t willing to work on it then thats not a relationship worth putting energy into.

I would take any post on a "Survivors of Narcissistic Parents" or similar group with a grain of salt. While many of the stories are true, sometimes the speaker is the narcissist.

If someone tells you that everybody around them is always lying they are usually the liar. The same way some people who can't seem to work anywhere without having constant drama are the source of the conflict.

There's a Christian book called "Wild at Heart" which had a whole chapter on wounds from fathers. I bought into it for years. In hindsight I think books like that can lead people into exaggerating imagined or downplaying real problems. IME it's best to talk to a professional, or at least get a variety of other perspectives before passing judgement.

They have a point, since the foreskin has many nerve endings.

You are not doing your sons any favors if you circumcise them when it's not necessary.

I doubt there's much science behind this. Only adult males can really A/B test this, and circumcision of an adult penis may very well risk damage. There's no reason to think uncircumcised males enjoy sex more than those circumcised in infancy.

In parent it was about the "potential", which you can't reach anymore if you are circumcised. Whatever "potential" means. Could just be not having to use lube.

It remains genital mutilation though.

As the saying goes:

The apple never falls far from the tree.

The statistical apple can only fall so far from the statistical tree. Some apples may roll down hillsides or into rivers but it's unwise to bet on any one apple doing so.

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