November was World Vasectomy Month
And I put my balls on the line accordingly
For over ten years now World Vasectomy Day, have been holding annual events, this time it fell on the 18th of November. It began with founders, director Jonathan Stack and urologist Dr Doug Stein and their film on Stein’s work in providing vasectomies; The Vasectomist. Ten years ago in an episode of my radio show The Species Barrier entitled Balls (it also featured the first professional vegan footballer Neil Robinson!) I spoke to Stack about his film. Ten years later I now mark the occasion by taking part personally. Suffice to say it was all very straight forward and problem free.
The film description reads:
Dr. Doug Stein is an urologist from a small town in Florida. ‘The Vasectomist’ follows his controversial mission to save the planet by “spreading the gospel of vasectomy”. It’s a journey through difficult and divisive issues, crossing cultural, religious and political taboos. Through this quixotic character, and his highly personal encounters with men as they exit the gene pool, the film provokes a new conversation about over-population, over-consumption and the planet’s environmental tipping point.
It is 200 years exactly since the first vasectomy was carried out on a dog, a now long proven and tested concept. Advocating for the procedure and male sterility, in 2023 the WVD target nation was Bolivia. Previous host countries have ranged across Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas. Sadly not enough men are getting it done.
On average, less than 0.1% of men have had vasectomies in the world’s 69 least developed countries. This rate increases to 10% in the Global North, reaching up to 20% in a small number of countries. Obviously, cultural attitudes vary but the message is clear that it is less invasive and cheaper to access than the alternatives in women and highly reliable as a form of contraception.
WVD dispel myths such as testosterone levels being impacted or that their need be any lasting pain. Scalpel vasectomies are the most commonly performed but where available the non-scalpel variety seem even more hassle-free with faster recovery times etc. Literally a matter of snip and go.
Why get a vasectomy? This too will vary, it is possibly most common in fathers who have had the number of offspring they prefer and wish to create no more. For many it is a symbolic or rejectionist act against the living conditions we endure, the inbuilt decay, suffering, loss, bullying etc.
Personally I have never much enjoyed the experience and as such wanted no part of putting anyone else through a similar existence. Getting exercise, philosophy and self-help might mitigate against our anguish once we’re here but why create such need in the first place? Norwegian philosopher Peter Wessel Zapffe very fittingly compared reproduction to adding wood to a burning house.
For we impose the world on a child and the child on the world. A common reason given nowadays for opting out is the harms we cause through climate change and other ecological harms. Harming the planet and the other animals on it through our demands was another huge concern for me. No way did I want to multiply my own impacts, assuming responsibility for a lineage of descendants.
This also applies in the opposite direction, the new person will have to live through the collapsing conditions of civilization and the reports are ever more grim in what waits ahead. The growing human population is burning through tipping points and various overshoot boundaries. Hardly suitable living conditions to cast a new person (that you would naturally love most) into.
Nick Demediuk, a prolific vasectomist in Australia told The Guardian that he estimates that about 200 of the 4,000 patients his clinic sees each year are younger men without kids. About 130 of them say they are doing it for the planet.
“In the old days, it was purely lifestyle,” Demediuk says of his younger, childless patients. “They wanted to travel the world, work hard and not be stuck with a kid. And that has shifted, probably over the past three or four years, to where the environment is the dominant reason.”
David Benatar, professor of philosophy at The University of Cape Town is the author of Better Never to Have Been and states:
It is curious that while good people go to great lengths to spare their children from suffering, few of them seem to notice that the one (and only) guaranteed way to prevent all the suffering of their children is not to bring those children into existence in the first place.
Many doctors are ardently pro-natalist and skeptical about offering sterilisation procedures to men and women, particularly if they are young/childfree. Make sure you apply armed with your list of reasons, and resolute in your demands. There is even a list online of childfree-friendly surgeons around the world who are more apt to give approval and less fearful of any possible regret or calls for reversal.
