Barbara Amiel

Barbara Amiel

Barbara Joan Estelle Amiel, Baroness Black of Crossharbour (born 4 December 1940) is a British-Canadian journalist, writer, and socialite. She is also the wife of former media baron and convicted felon Conrad Black.

In "Circumcision is not about the rights of the child" Barbara Amiel makes the case that the Ruling in Cologne is not Anti-Semitic, but a display of statism, government attacking individual liberty (in this case individual family unit) (ignoring the fact that the minors are not at liberty to decline circumcision). Mrs. Amiel (who is documented to be atheist) admits that "I personally carry out certain rituals associated with my faith as a Jew, even knowing them to be utterly illogical. They are my tribe’s rituals. Had I a male child, I feel certain I would have had him circumcised."

She also calls the debate about circumcision a "battle over the centimetres of foreskin".

While she states that "to make an anti-circumcision law based on the child’s inability to choose is insanity: a child by definition cannot choose anything—whether breastfeeding or tonsillectomy", she also considers that "as for getting consent for circumcision—after reading what is involved in doing it to an adult male, I cannot believe that any man would be mad enough to consent".

The article is illustrated with a photo of a Mohel performing metzitzah b'peh on a crying baby who was just circumcised. Metzitzah b'peh is the ritual of oral suction of the blood of the penis, performed by ultra-orthodox Jews, and recently responsible for several cases of babies contracting genital herpes in NYC, in 2012. At least 2 babies died.