After the circumcision judgment I mentioned about two weeks ago, the federal government has now announced it is committed to keep religious circumcision possible and restore the security of law rapidly and is presently investigating ways to to that including legislative solutions.
In plain language and accounting for some face-saving for our secularist minister of justice who had previously been dragging her feet, that means they are now writing the bill. The major opposition parties have announced they too would support such a bill. So it’s now virtually certain there will be a legislative fix.
I’m not quite happy yet, because some politicians are using the word “straffrei” (non-punishable). This is consistent with full legalization, but it could also mean the weird hybrid state we presently have for abortion, which is nominally illegal but the prohibition doesn’t carry any legal consequences. Often the state even pays for it and most Germans don’t even know it’s technically illegal. The distinction doesn’t have any practical consequences and I think of it as a sham on abortion, but symbolically I would strongly prefer making circumcision strictly legal. I guess I’ll have to wait for the actual bill to see where it’s going.
I think it is very unlikely anyone will be prosecuted before the new law goes into effect. The case would have to be dropped when it does and prosecutors know that too.
So, while there still is a risk of highly questionable symbolism, I’m happy to tell you the immediate danger for Jews and Muslims in Germany is over.
How did this law get as far as it has? Who was behind it and was it meant to be anti-semetic? I have always heard that in Europe circumcision is already very rare, so what was it that sparked all this anyway?
It wasn’t about a law, it was a judicial judgment. I wrote it up in the original post this one follows up to.