Other purely elective surgery

Just thinking… In the Western world, is there any other purely elective surgery than male circumcision that parents can legally impose on children without a medical need, just out of custom or personal beliefs?

Piercing of the ears, on girls, is the only one I can think of but it does not count as surgery.

This fell out of practice a few decades ago, but they used to preemptively remove healthy tonsils and the appendix in children. (The only reason to preemptively remove the latter nowadays is if you're going to go somewhere where you'd just die if it ruptured.)

Cosmetic surgery for birth defects, abnormalities etc. on children can be considered “elective” surgery. “Many types of congenital skin lesions and birthmarks can affect a child from birth. Hemangioma is caused by a buildup of blood vessels that create a red birthmark on the face. Arterial and venous malformations are abnormally formed blood vessels that appear as port wine stains and can result from Klippel-Trenaunay syndrome.”

@gwhap or “correction” of intersex genitals, which is a kind of mutilation. But it's often strongly advocated for by physicians.

Well I always say I had the “optional extras” done during childhood. Circumcision and tonsils out.

@arika @kiwibloke You are right, removing tonsils and appendix preventively, in case they create infections, is very much like removing the foreskin for the rare case when it sticks and it results in balanitis (my aunt's fear of “terrible infections”).

@arika @kiwibloke You are right, removing tonsils and appendix preventively, in case they create infections, is very much like removing the foreskin for the rare case when it sticks and it results in balanitis (my aunt's fear of “terrible infections”).

Surgery of course being severely overkill when, like, antibiotics exist. While the human body is a mess design-wise, most parts still serve a purpose, and even if you don't explode from having them removed, it's pointless and just raises the odds that something will go wrong.

Also tonsils can regenerate if there's any tissue left. Though that would be an interestingly complex solution to someone having tonsils that are too big, since they generally don't return to their previous size.

@arika Right. Certainly, balanitis in a developed country is not a life-threatening issue, and it can be easily fixed with extant medicine. Arguing that one should remove the foreskin in case balanitis occurs seems quite far-fetched.

(This is a different issue if, say, the child already has had repeat balanitis. I've heard of that happen, and I think circumcision is reasonable in this case. And also a very different issue from people going to, say, Antartica, where appendicitis could be fatal.)