I didn’t even know I was circumcised at birth until like halfway through highschool and I didn’t really care after finding out. And having now seen penises that are uncircumcised, I’m kinda glad I was. From my perspective, it didn’t hurt and I didn’t even know until 17ish years later. Everything works perfectly normally.
All of that was a buildup to a genuine question of why do you feel so upset by it? I don’t mean to be argumentative or dismissive, just want to see the point of view from someone else
we all have our own feelings about it. I’m not trying to say that the way you feel about your own circumcision is right or wrong, or how any man who decides - on their own, as an informed adult - is right or wrong to do so.
but I would vehemently argue that it is an adult man’s decision to make, not a parent’s decision to make for their infant son-- unless some medical condition makes it necessary to do so at that time (which are quite rare). and, yes, I understand that there are religious considerations, but, as an atheist, I’m not so sympathetic to that, either, as I classify all genital mutilation in the same category, regardless of age or gender: it is a decision to be made by the subject of the procedure, and only when they are a consenting, informed adult.
If we were a couple of dudes negging on each other in a bar over whiskey shots, I’d put up with this, because we’d end up hooking up in the end, but online? There’s no goddamn point.
No, I don’t think so. Not me and my friends. And not where we drink.
I mean, I have no direct experimental evidence for that assertion because I don’t think I’ve ever discussed circumcision in a bar, but I’m really very confident that none of my drinking pals are ever going to whip out their todger at the pub. And I’m not going to either. Nope.
Really just need to give it a try to know. At the bar would be an atypical place to do the whipping out I agree, but invite the cutest one over afterwards and see where it goes!
As someone who was circumcised for the ‘medical hygiene’ reasons when it was more popular I am sick and tired of seeing all circumcision lumped together as mutilation. Sure it was probably unnecessary as I am not aware of having a condition that made it necessary in my case, but it was well done and everything has been positive for me. Those that get it done for medical reasons being called mutilation would be offensive.
It certainly should end as a practice, especially as a religious practice done by non-medically trained people, but stigmatizing people who had it done as being mutilated is insulting.
Edit: your downvotes won’t convince me that I am a victim of mutilation because doctors were wrong about the hygiene benefits five decades ago
I was circumcized as an infant without my consent, and my mutilated dick wants you to stop downplaying the severity of its fate.
A piece of me is literally missing, and you want to say I’m not mutilated because that would offend you? Why, do you have uncomfortable feelings about your own situation that you refuse to examine?
Circumcision is and should only be a medically necessary procedure. I’ve never heard anyone say medically necessary circumcision is mutilation, but I’m from Europe where most men aren’t circumcised, so there’s that. Whoever says it’s mutilation when it’s medically justified is ignorant.
I think the question is: who’s deciding what is medically necessary or justified? Because as far as I am aware there are health benefits associated with a circumcision, from reduced risk of AIDS infection to the reduced risk of infections.
Is that enough to justify it? Some doctors will say yes, and some will say no. Some people will suffer negative consequences and some won’t.
I think most of the negativity around it is because it’s being done on infants, and often for religious reasons. But to the intentions matter, when the action is in line with medicine?
Mastectomy reduces the risk of breast cancer. That’s clearly not a valid medical reason to perform it on everyone. The medical necessity that people are talking about here is obvious–a specific condition like phimosis that is directly harmful to the patient. The “risk of AIDS” bullshit can be totally mitigated by… washing up.
This is true. I was circumcized as an infant, and when I started having sex around 19, I wondered why it didn’t feel as good as it was supposed to. I thought I was doing something wrong.
So I tried harder and harder, inexperienced as I was, and didn’t learn how to make sweet, gentle love until much later. Even then, it was more for my partner’s pleasure, because my dick just isn’t that sensitive.
It caused a lot of problems in my relationships early on. Frustration and feelings of inadequacy on both sides, because I was “hard to satisfy” literally unable to feel satisfactory pleasure…
Without arguing either for or against the practice, losing feeling is an outdated idea. It’s been studied and shown that circumcised men are just as sensitive as uncircumcised
Nerve endings in the foreskin are not that sensitive to sexual stimuli, I would consider that as much loss of sensitivity as amputating a leg is loss of sensitivity.
Even the glans loses sensitivity. On an uncircumcised penis, that whole area is basically a mucus membrane. On a circumcised penis, it becomes dry an rougher, like the skin on your knuckle. It absolutely does reduce sensitivity.
Also,
I would consider that as much loss of sensitivity as amputating a leg is loss of sensitivity.
You wouldn’t say doctors should amputate babies’ legs to reduce risk of gangrene, would you? How is that even an argument? “Oh, those nerve endings don’t matter cause it’s just like losing a leg, nbd.” What the fuck?
On a circumcised penis, it becomes dry an rougher, like the skin on your knuckle. It absolutely does reduce sensitivity.
Anecdotal evidence, I know, but I didn’t notice loss in sensitivity since my circumcision. Healing was a bit of a pain, but other than that I experience just as much pleasure as before.
How is that even an argument? “Oh, those nerve endings don’t matter cause it’s just like losing a leg, nbd.” What the fuck?
The point is: it’s a bit facetious to call nerve loss from removing a part of a body a loss of sensitivity. You got a piece of skin removed, of course it’s not sensitive, it’s gone. As for the skin under the foreskin, it didn’t got removed, why would it lose nerve endings?
From what I experienced, again anecdotal so not a study, I highly doubt loss of sensitivity argument. Just to be clear, I don’t think babies should get circumcised, but I wouldn’t use an argument I feel is weak to argue against it.
The brain is weird and whacky the way it works. It has a sort of auto-gain. The less nerve stimulus over time leads to a higher sensitivity of remaining nerves. Often when people lose a limb, they still feel pain in it - the lack of nerve signals causes the remaining nerve endings to be amplified so much that despite not even having pain receptors, the noise signals are perceived as pain. So a human growing up with a cut forskin simply adapts and the brain perceives more sensitivity from the other nerves to produce the same levels of sensation.
So a human growing up with a cut foreskin simply adapts and the brain perceives more sensitivity from the other nerves to produce the same levels of sensation.
That is just false. You sound like someone who isn’t circumcised.
Without the foreskin intact, the glans is subject to friction throughout the day as it’s in contact with the inside of one’s clothes. This reduces sensitivity over time and builds thicker, drier, and rougher layers of skin. Whereas the glans of an uncircumcised penis is basically a mucus membrane, on a circumcised penis it’s more like the skin of a knuckle, but thicker.
Yeah that sounds bad. But it’s completely untrue. Like the skin on a knuckle? Haha. If you have to make up stuff why even bother? Conversly, if your dick is really like a knuckle, you should really see a doctor about that.
That, uhh, sounds nice and all, but I don’t believe it. This doesn’t even make sense on the face of it: Why does removing one body part lead to phantom pain signals, but removing another body part lead to improved sensation? Do people who lose fingers develop better sensation in their remaining fingers to compensate? Wouldn’t it stand to reason then that some men would get phantom foreskin pain?
There’s plenty of signals coming from the nerve bundles in the area. Phantom pain seems to need larger sets of nerve bundles removed/unstimulated. Is s not fully understood, but that seems to be how it works. People who lose fingers often do get increased sensitivity on other fingers and they can also get phantom pain.
Those that get it done for medical reasons being called mutilation would be offensive.
Right, because they weren’t mutilated, they had to have a procedure done for a medical reason.
Any non-medically necessary surgery to a child’s genitals is mutilation. They have no way to consent, and anything short of a medical necessity is the parent making massive changes to their child’s life based on their preferences. To make the point crystal clear:
If I have a kid and the arm ends up gangrenous, we would remove it as it would be medically necessary for the child’s well-being
If I have a kid and think it’s cool to have one arm, I would be trying to mutilate my child by removing it for no reason
How is performing a medically unnecessary surgery on a child’s genitals not mutilation? Again, you’re changing their body surgically without their consent for no reason aside from ignorant beliefs.
I dislike the ‘mutilated’ label being applied and take it as an insult because of the negative connotations despite not personally having any downsides. It is like claiming that everyone who is overweight based on BMI is unhealthy despite many athletes having a high BMI due to having a lot of muscle.
Plus the person I was responding to said adults who voluntarily chose to get circumcised are mutilated themselves. With that logic ear piercings and voluntarily removing annoying, but not medically probematic moles is mutilation. My point is that you can’t just ignore the negative connotations and use a broad brush to describe people while claiming it is technically accurate.
No, it should not be done to babies without a medical necessity. That doesn’t mean calling everyone who has been circumcised mutilated won’t come across as insulting.
How do you feel about female infants getting their ears pierced?
Also, removing an arm and removing some skin is really not the same. Specially considering that removing that skin has proven health benefits for the baby.
I am sick and tired of seeing all circumcision lumped together as mutilation
it’s the definition of the word. sure, it carries a lot of negative connotations that may not have affected you the same way, and you may have, personally, appreciated your circumcision, but that doesn’t invalidate the feelings of others. this isn’t some zero-sum situation where other people being upset about it somehow invalidated your experience.
Many people can feel different ways about things. That’s called society. A key part of civilization is our ability to all live together with many different people feeling different ways about things. In fact, a huge advance in civilization - no shit - is that, several thousand years ago, we stop killing each other over this very issue. REALLY.
In a much more contemporary context, it’s just not necessary. Most recently, as recently as the late 1970s and early 1980s, a now-debunked study pushed the idea that it was, at least “more hygienic” to circumcise males, but that was based on shaky and now-debunked studies. In modern medicine, circumcision is no longer recommended at birth except in rare cases of medical necessity of urinary or other birth defects. Exceptions also exist in some religions, Judaism most prominently, not for medical necessity, but as an alignment with a belief based on ancient mythology, not unlike the genital mutilations some women undergo in Islam — also widely/globally denounced.
So the problem is a lot of Americans/Catholics think a circumcision is something responsible adults do to their children to help them avoid potential health problems. They also erroneously believe the foreskin serves no purpose and is one of those we evolved with it, but it is useless kind of things.
They dont know the truth that it actually has a large number of nerve endings and its removal was originally pushed for to reduce the pleasure boys felt from masturbation, in the hope they would not masturbate. Because sex should only be for reproduction according to those who originally pushed for circumcision… It is like what is done to some women in muslim communities. Difference being woman have even more nerve endings in the clitoris and men can still experience some pleasure without the foreskin, but much less. This is why circumcision is often considered mutilation, except for those rare medical exceptions. Parents are unknowingly removing their childs right to sexual pleasure under the guise it is for their health.
It really needs to end as simple hygiene is all that is needed for the health reasons.
As a circumcised man, who was once a teenage boy, I’m surprised that generation after generation of men who’d also been circumcised teenage boys never acknowledged “ya know, this doesn’t do a goddamn thing to keep’em from beatin’ their dicks”. But science and logic has never been religion’s strong suit.
Well, we don’t do it the way Dr. Kellogg first subscribed it. You’re supposed to do it as a punishment the first time you catch them in the act. It probably only stops them while they heal, but it will stop them.
You probably don’t want to know what he subscribed for girls in the same situation.
There are several possible reasons why other men might be upset, although your own equipment still works perfectly normally:
Just like women’s sexual responses differ, men’s sexual responses may differ, as well. I’ve learned from a friend, who’s had many male partners, that some men get intense pleasure from manipulation of their foreskin. Some can even reach orgasm that way. I’ve learned from several (intact) men on Reddit and Lemmy that their primary source of sexual sensation is their foreskin, rather than their glans. Losing a major source of pleasure could be upsetting.
This same friend also reports that, in his experience, intact men have better awareness of their own state of arousal, and better control of it. In brief, they can “last longer.” This is anecdotal, of course, but I seem to recall reading some research to back that up. That’s part of the reason why he’s upset by his being circumcised.
“Circumcision” is not just one thing. It ranges from the traditional bris (a small snip at the tip of the penis, so that the tip of the glans just peeks out) to amputation of the entire mobile skin system of the penis (about 15 sq. in. of adult tissue gone). I would imagine that men who have drum-tight skin on their penises, and must use lube to facilitate penetration or masturbation, might not like it, whereas a man whose glans was still covered when his penis was flaccid might not notice much difference.
The dorsal nerve of the penis can be severed during the procedure, removing sensation from the glans almost entirely, leading to erectile and performance issues, as well as greatly reduced enjoyment of sex.
The healing of the circumcision wound can go not-quite-perfectly, leading to adhesions, assymetry, tight frenulums, phantom pain, and scarring. Journalist Gary Shteyngart wrote an essay about the odyssey of pain that he was thrown into when a skin bridge (an adhesion) on his penis became infected. Worse, I recall a letter published in Savage Love from a man whose circumcision scar was so thick and inelastic that it caused the end of his penis to go ischemic, then necrotic, and then fall off when he was an infant. He’s left with a stub of a penis, and a pretty good reason to be upset about circumcision, I’d say.
ETA: I did not think of this, but @[email protected] pointed out that removal of the foreskin complicates bottom surgery for trans women, I would guess because it gives the surgeon less tissue to work with.
I mean, you lost a significant amount of your sensory nerves in your penis, but you do you.
Anyway, I fucking didn’t do it to my kids because it is unconscionable to mutilate a child’s (possibly) completely functional penis for aesthetic reasons.
BTW, You are bragging that you happened to be lucky. Many are not.
Obviously most circumsised people have no issues with their dicks. And a lot probably sees it as a positive. I have heard a people claim that they look better.
Doing plastic surgery on babies is still a bit weird to me.
In my country, most men I know of feel satisfied with the form of their tools, just there is more emphasis on having the length and being potent on bed. Likewise, local anti-circumcision activists are also a very small minority.
But here in this largely Western-progressive dominated fora where individual rights and personal consent are paramount, male circumcision is met with very strong if not violent negative reaction.
Its removing pieces of your child for no damned good reason. You’re not as ok as you think you are if the mere sight of a natural penis grosses you out.
Never said it grosses me out, just that I think my penis looks nicer than others. Thanks for forming my opinions and diagnosing my mental health for me though
I didn’t even know I was circumcised at birth until like halfway through highschool and I didn’t really care after finding out. And having now seen penises that are uncircumcised, I’m kinda glad I was. From my perspective, it didn’t hurt and I didn’t even know until 17ish years later. Everything works perfectly normally.
All of that was a buildup to a genuine question of why do you feel so upset by it? I don’t mean to be argumentative or dismissive, just want to see the point of view from someone else
How can you know that everything works perfectly normally if you’ve never experienced life with a foreskin?
we all have our own feelings about it. I’m not trying to say that the way you feel about your own circumcision is right or wrong, or how any man who decides - on their own, as an informed adult - is right or wrong to do so.
but I would vehemently argue that it is an adult man’s decision to make, not a parent’s decision to make for their infant son-- unless some medical condition makes it necessary to do so at that time (which are quite rare). and, yes, I understand that there are religious considerations, but, as an atheist, I’m not so sympathetic to that, either, as I classify all genital mutilation in the same category, regardless of age or gender: it is a decision to be made by the subject of the procedure, and only when they are a consenting, informed adult.
As a follow on, is your username supposed to be “Holmes” but you decided to wing it on the spelling test?
I’m also circumcised and find getting bent out of shape over it 18 years later to be… an unusual response.
Edit: Hey Lemmy Weiner police! Be sure to bitch out your parents if you haven’t, it will definitely be helpful in some way!
sybau
aww, did that sound good before you posted it?
Yep! After too!
You were wrong, unfortunately
It’s like that sometimes 🤷
If we were a couple of dudes negging on each other in a bar over whiskey shots, I’d put up with this, because we’d end up hooking up in the end, but online? There’s no goddamn point.
Later
It’s true. Chatting about circumcision in a bar most often ends in showing each other your dicks.
No, I don’t think so. Not me and my friends. And not where we drink.
I mean, I have no direct experimental evidence for that assertion because I don’t think I’ve ever discussed circumcision in a bar, but I’m really very confident that none of my drinking pals are ever going to whip out their todger at the pub. And I’m not going to either. Nope.
Really just need to give it a try to know. At the bar would be an atypical place to do the whipping out I agree, but invite the cutest one over afterwards and see where it goes!
too bad we’re not in a bar 😁
Cya.
What a fucking weird opener. “Your username is a common usage word im gonna claim you meant something else and accuse you of mispelling”
🤷 it got you talking didn’t it?
As someone who was circumcised for the ‘medical hygiene’ reasons when it was more popular I am sick and tired of seeing all circumcision lumped together as mutilation. Sure it was probably unnecessary as I am not aware of having a condition that made it necessary in my case, but it was well done and everything has been positive for me. Those that get it done for medical reasons being called mutilation would be offensive.
It certainly should end as a practice, especially as a religious practice done by non-medically trained people, but stigmatizing people who had it done as being mutilated is insulting.
Edit: your downvotes won’t convince me that I am a victim of mutilation because doctors were wrong about the hygiene benefits five decades ago
I was circumcized as an infant without my consent, and my mutilated dick wants you to stop downplaying the severity of its fate.
A piece of me is literally missing, and you want to say I’m not mutilated because that would offend you? Why, do you have uncomfortable feelings about your own situation that you refuse to examine?
Me not wanting to be labeled as mutilated doesn’t invalidate your identification as mutilated.
If you consider yourself mutilated, then yes, you are mutilated. I am not mutilated because we see our personal experiences differently.
Yes but it shouldn’t be done to infants because they did not and cannot consent.
You can’t know whether the infant will come to see it as mutilation. And it is irreversible.
I have already expressed 100% support of banning non-medically necessary circumcisions.
Circumcision is and should only be a medically necessary procedure. I’ve never heard anyone say medically necessary circumcision is mutilation, but I’m from Europe where most men aren’t circumcised, so there’s that. Whoever says it’s mutilation when it’s medically justified is ignorant.
I think the question is: who’s deciding what is medically necessary or justified? Because as far as I am aware there are health benefits associated with a circumcision, from reduced risk of AIDS infection to the reduced risk of infections.
Is that enough to justify it? Some doctors will say yes, and some will say no. Some people will suffer negative consequences and some won’t.
I think most of the negativity around it is because it’s being done on infants, and often for religious reasons. But to the intentions matter, when the action is in line with medicine?
Mastectomy reduces the risk of breast cancer. That’s clearly not a valid medical reason to perform it on everyone. The medical necessity that people are talking about here is obvious–a specific condition like phimosis that is directly harmful to the patient. The “risk of AIDS” bullshit can be totally mitigated by… washing up.
Even if it was ‘well done’, you have literally lost nerves and sensitivity in the region leading to an objectively worse experience.
The solution is obvious, don’t chop kids genitals for no legitimate reason. Doesn’t matter if you came out okay or whatever nonsense.
As a man that got circumcised in adulthood, I can’t confirm any loss of sensitivity.
This is true. I was circumcized as an infant, and when I started having sex around 19, I wondered why it didn’t feel as good as it was supposed to. I thought I was doing something wrong.
So I tried harder and harder, inexperienced as I was, and didn’t learn how to make sweet, gentle love until much later. Even then, it was more for my partner’s pleasure, because my dick just isn’t that sensitive.
It caused a lot of problems in my relationships early on. Frustration and feelings of inadequacy on both sides, because I was “
hard to satisfy” literally unable to feel satisfactory pleasure…Religion is not an excuse for child abuse
Without arguing either for or against the practice, losing feeling is an outdated idea. It’s been studied and shown that circumcised men are just as sensitive as uncircumcised
Source?
That is non-figuratively impossible. You can’t feel anything with nerve endings that have been removed.
Nerve endings in the foreskin are not that sensitive to sexual stimuli, I would consider that as much loss of sensitivity as amputating a leg is loss of sensitivity.
Even the glans loses sensitivity. On an uncircumcised penis, that whole area is basically a mucus membrane. On a circumcised penis, it becomes dry an rougher, like the skin on your knuckle. It absolutely does reduce sensitivity.
Also,
You wouldn’t say doctors should amputate babies’ legs to reduce risk of gangrene, would you? How is that even an argument? “Oh, those nerve endings don’t matter cause it’s just like losing a leg, nbd.” What the fuck?
Anecdotal evidence, I know, but I didn’t notice loss in sensitivity since my circumcision. Healing was a bit of a pain, but other than that I experience just as much pleasure as before.
The point is: it’s a bit facetious to call nerve loss from removing a part of a body a loss of sensitivity. You got a piece of skin removed, of course it’s not sensitive, it’s gone. As for the skin under the foreskin, it didn’t got removed, why would it lose nerve endings?
From what I experienced, again anecdotal so not a study, I highly doubt loss of sensitivity argument. Just to be clear, I don’t think babies should get circumcised, but I wouldn’t use an argument I feel is weak to argue against it.
The brain is weird and whacky the way it works. It has a sort of auto-gain. The less nerve stimulus over time leads to a higher sensitivity of remaining nerves. Often when people lose a limb, they still feel pain in it - the lack of nerve signals causes the remaining nerve endings to be amplified so much that despite not even having pain receptors, the noise signals are perceived as pain. So a human growing up with a cut forskin simply adapts and the brain perceives more sensitivity from the other nerves to produce the same levels of sensation.
That is just false. You sound like someone who isn’t circumcised.
Without the foreskin intact, the glans is subject to friction throughout the day as it’s in contact with the inside of one’s clothes. This reduces sensitivity over time and builds thicker, drier, and rougher layers of skin. Whereas the glans of an uncircumcised penis is basically a mucus membrane, on a circumcised penis it’s more like the skin of a knuckle, but thicker.
Yeah that sounds bad. But it’s completely untrue. Like the skin on a knuckle? Haha. If you have to make up stuff why even bother? Conversly, if your dick is really like a knuckle, you should really see a doctor about that.
That, uhh, sounds nice and all, but I don’t believe it. This doesn’t even make sense on the face of it: Why does removing one body part lead to phantom pain signals, but removing another body part lead to improved sensation? Do people who lose fingers develop better sensation in their remaining fingers to compensate? Wouldn’t it stand to reason then that some men would get phantom foreskin pain?
There’s plenty of signals coming from the nerve bundles in the area. Phantom pain seems to need larger sets of nerve bundles removed/unstimulated. Is s not fully understood, but that seems to be how it works. People who lose fingers often do get increased sensitivity on other fingers and they can also get phantom pain.
How does that even make sense?
Right, because they weren’t mutilated, they had to have a procedure done for a medical reason.
Any non-medically necessary surgery to a child’s genitals is mutilation. They have no way to consent, and anything short of a medical necessity is the parent making massive changes to their child’s life based on their preferences. To make the point crystal clear:
How is performing a medically unnecessary surgery on a child’s genitals not mutilation? Again, you’re changing their body surgically without their consent for no reason aside from ignorant beliefs.
I dislike the ‘mutilated’ label being applied and take it as an insult because of the negative connotations despite not personally having any downsides. It is like claiming that everyone who is overweight based on BMI is unhealthy despite many athletes having a high BMI due to having a lot of muscle.
Plus the person I was responding to said adults who voluntarily chose to get circumcised are mutilated themselves. With that logic ear piercings and voluntarily removing annoying, but not medically probematic moles is mutilation. My point is that you can’t just ignore the negative connotations and use a broad brush to describe people while claiming it is technically accurate.
No, it should not be done to babies without a medical necessity. That doesn’t mean calling everyone who has been circumcised mutilated won’t come across as insulting.
The negitive connotations are justified in this case
How do you feel about female infants getting their ears pierced?
Also, removing an arm and removing some skin is really not the same. Specially considering that removing that skin has proven health benefits for the baby.
it’s the definition of the word. sure, it carries a lot of negative connotations that may not have affected you the same way, and you may have, personally, appreciated your circumcision, but that doesn’t invalidate the feelings of others. this isn’t some zero-sum situation where other people being upset about it somehow invalidated your experience.
Many people can feel different ways about things. That’s called society. A key part of civilization is our ability to all live together with many different people feeling different ways about things. In fact, a huge advance in civilization - no shit - is that, several thousand years ago, we stop killing each other over this very issue. REALLY.
In a much more contemporary context, it’s just not necessary. Most recently, as recently as the late 1970s and early 1980s, a now-debunked study pushed the idea that it was, at least “more hygienic” to circumcise males, but that was based on shaky and now-debunked studies. In modern medicine, circumcision is no longer recommended at birth except in rare cases of medical necessity of urinary or other birth defects. Exceptions also exist in some religions, Judaism most prominently, not for medical necessity, but as an alignment with a belief based on ancient mythology, not unlike the genital mutilations some women undergo in Islam — also widely/globally denounced.
Uh, no kidding dude.
I get a mutilated finger lopped off its a procedure to save my life / improve its quality.
But cutting off a healthy one because religion / aesthetics is just fucking bananas
So the problem is a lot of Americans/Catholics think a circumcision is something responsible adults do to their children to help them avoid potential health problems. They also erroneously believe the foreskin serves no purpose and is one of those we evolved with it, but it is useless kind of things.
They dont know the truth that it actually has a large number of nerve endings and its removal was originally pushed for to reduce the pleasure boys felt from masturbation, in the hope they would not masturbate. Because sex should only be for reproduction according to those who originally pushed for circumcision… It is like what is done to some women in muslim communities. Difference being woman have even more nerve endings in the clitoris and men can still experience some pleasure without the foreskin, but much less. This is why circumcision is often considered mutilation, except for those rare medical exceptions. Parents are unknowingly removing their childs right to sexual pleasure under the guise it is for their health.
It really needs to end as simple hygiene is all that is needed for the health reasons.
What? I live in a traditionally Catholic region and I haven’t heard of anyone getting circumcized, now or in the past.
Guess it depends where. It is extremely common here amongst catholics in Texas.
As a circumcised man, who was once a teenage boy, I’m surprised that generation after generation of men who’d also been circumcised teenage boys never acknowledged “ya know, this doesn’t do a goddamn thing to keep’em from beatin’ their dicks”. But science and logic has never been religion’s strong suit.
Well, we don’t do it the way Dr. Kellogg first subscribed it. You’re supposed to do it as a punishment the first time you catch them in the act. It probably only stops them while they heal, but it will stop them.
You probably don’t want to know what he subscribed for girls in the same situation.
They only really stopped mutilating girls in the 1930’s, with holdouts doing it as last as the 40’s
You mean in the west, right? Because female genital mutilation is absolutely still a thing in parts of the world.
There are several possible reasons why other men might be upset, although your own equipment still works perfectly normally:
Just like women’s sexual responses differ, men’s sexual responses may differ, as well. I’ve learned from a friend, who’s had many male partners, that some men get intense pleasure from manipulation of their foreskin. Some can even reach orgasm that way. I’ve learned from several (intact) men on Reddit and Lemmy that their primary source of sexual sensation is their foreskin, rather than their glans. Losing a major source of pleasure could be upsetting.
This same friend also reports that, in his experience, intact men have better awareness of their own state of arousal, and better control of it. In brief, they can “last longer.” This is anecdotal, of course, but I seem to recall reading some research to back that up. That’s part of the reason why he’s upset by his being circumcised.
“Circumcision” is not just one thing. It ranges from the traditional bris (a small snip at the tip of the penis, so that the tip of the glans just peeks out) to amputation of the entire mobile skin system of the penis (about 15 sq. in. of adult tissue gone). I would imagine that men who have drum-tight skin on their penises, and must use lube to facilitate penetration or masturbation, might not like it, whereas a man whose glans was still covered when his penis was flaccid might not notice much difference.
The dorsal nerve of the penis can be severed during the procedure, removing sensation from the glans almost entirely, leading to erectile and performance issues, as well as greatly reduced enjoyment of sex.
The healing of the circumcision wound can go not-quite-perfectly, leading to adhesions, assymetry, tight frenulums, phantom pain, and scarring. Journalist Gary Shteyngart wrote an essay about the odyssey of pain that he was thrown into when a skin bridge (an adhesion) on his penis became infected. Worse, I recall a letter published in Savage Love from a man whose circumcision scar was so thick and inelastic that it caused the end of his penis to go ischemic, then necrotic, and then fall off when he was an infant. He’s left with a stub of a penis, and a pretty good reason to be upset about circumcision, I’d say.
ETA: I did not think of this, but @[email protected] pointed out that removal of the foreskin complicates bottom surgery for trans women, I would guess because it gives the surgeon less tissue to work with.
I mean, you lost a significant amount of your sensory nerves in your penis, but you do you.
Anyway, I fucking didn’t do it to my kids because it is unconscionable to mutilate a child’s (possibly) completely functional penis for aesthetic reasons.
BTW, You are bragging that you happened to be lucky. Many are not.
Obviously most circumsised people have no issues with their dicks. And a lot probably sees it as a positive. I have heard a people claim that they look better.
Doing plastic surgery on babies is still a bit weird to me.
In my country, most men I know of feel satisfied with the form of their tools, just there is more emphasis on having the length and being potent on bed. Likewise, local anti-circumcision activists are also a very small minority.
But here in this largely Western-progressive dominated fora where individual rights and personal consent are paramount, male circumcision is met with very strong if not violent negative reaction.
Because sometimes there are scars. Sometimes they cut WAY too much and the skin left is too thin.
Nature designed that weiner, no need for cosmetic customization.
Its removing pieces of your child for no damned good reason. You’re not as ok as you think you are if the mere sight of a natural penis grosses you out.
Never said it grosses me out, just that I think my penis looks nicer than others. Thanks for forming my opinions and diagnosing my mental health for me though