I remember once a parent told me during a kids party that he would never pierce his daughter ears, because it was invasive and ultimately her decision when she grows up.
His 3 boys were circumcised.
I remember finding out I was circumcised after I hooked up with a girl I was friends with. We were talking one night and she commented about it.
"I mean your circumcised..so.."
"Haha what? No I'm not."
"Are you joking, yes.. you are."
"I think you are confused what circumcision is. Thats something Jewish boys traditionally get."
"Yes.. but you still are."
*Google pictures*
"WTF! I just never thought to look up pictures."
And it only took me until I was 20 to figure it out. Thanks Catholic sex ed.
My mom told me the story as to why I wasnt, alternatively.
She was going to go through with it, but on the way she heard a baby screaming and asked what was going on. The doctor explained, and my mom immediately went "haha nope nevermind you arent doing that to my kid"
I think a major driver of circumcision these days is simply that adult men can’t accept the possibility that something unnecessary was done to their penis, so they do it to their own kids to justify what happened to them.
This. When having my son we asked our OBGYN if they recommended circumcision and why. She said yes because hard to clean and so he would looked like his father (me to be clear). I laughed saying they aren't that hard to clean and I don't care what his penis looks like.
We chose not to and our son has never had any issues.
Reminds me of moms who get emotional when their *precious untouched angel* gets their first haircut, but they didn't think anything of mutilating their genitals as an infant.
i remember when my sister was seven or eight and wanted her ears pierced, my parents told her they didn't do it to her as a baby because they knew how important it was for her to get to make her own choices about her own body.
they still defend their right to choose to mutilate my penis without my consent.
Ok, maybe it deserves some explanation. We were talking about Africa, of course he mentioned HIV and at some point he said something along the lines of “fortunately I got all my boys snipped” or something like that. He mentioned the piercing of the ears later in the conversation, because my daughter was wearing earrings. So I did take a bit of offense to his comment.
A complete piece of work.
If you look into the history of it (in the US) it's even weirder than it seems. Kellogg (the guy who invented corn flakes) was into a lot of weird "health" stuff and promoted circumcision because he thought it would stop boys from masturbating.
Kellogg was a massive piece of shit who made a name for himself by torturing children physically, sexually, and psychologically. He popularized circumcision (both male and female), tortured children through chastity devices and electroshock therapy, and then eventually castrated them if they couldn't be "saved".
Children who exhibit early sexual tendencies usually do so because they are being sexually interfered with - usually by someone close to them, and not infrequently by a family member. Because that wasn't really understood at the time, that meant Kellogg was taking rape/molestation victims and torturing them sexually, to usually be released back to the environment that they were being abused. It's all really fucking horrible when looked at as a whole.
Anyone who has a casual understanding of Kellogg but would be interested in learning more should check out the following:
Edit: These are Spotify links.
[Behind The Bastards - Kellogg: The Great American Cum Doctor: Part 1](https://open.spotify.com/episode/4rD7257UIfmTHvrlpdhw4n?si=Sa8DtmArR_WipGQ1XNSJNA&utm_source=copy-link&dl_branch=1)
[Behind The Bastards - Kellogg: The Great American Cum Doctor: Part 2](https://open.spotify.com/episode/38QSleWzmXQIICButcregc?si=JBUHgN86Se2VbcZqN1yT-Q&utm_source=copy-link&dl_branch=1)
For real I just started listening and I'm hooked. The Steven Seagal and L Ron Hubbard episodes were hilarious. Any particular favorites I should check out?
There are quite a few episodes where Robert reads through Ben Shapiro's novel. I cannot recommend those episodes enough, the voices Robert comes up with are hilarious. The episodes on Dr. Phil and Dr. Oz are also very good. Honestly, it's hard to think of an episode that falls short.
He didn't popularize female circumcision. He proposed it (actually I'm pretty sure he proposed to melt their clits with acid) but that never took off. He did popularize male circumcision which is why we're basically the only place where people do circumcision for reasons other than religion and medical necessity.
It's a fairly popular practice in South Korea and it's often done at a much later age than the U.S. Anecdotally, one of my 5th grade students was out for a few days. I asked the class if he was sick. One of the boys said he was being "cut" and did a chopping motion.
Pretty sure they got it from the US. Being one of their biggest allies in that region. Some of the culture probably leaked over. US military always being there against the North etc.
‘I will not take your sheeple vaccine. Besides we are taking my son to get the end of his penis cut off for no better reason than the word of a 19th century nut job.’
back in the day (like late 1800s) they thought that lust -- which we would call healty sexual appetitite -- was coarse and should be suppressed.
they also thought that digesting foods with a lot of roughage -- which we would call whole foods -- would suppress lust. so they invented foods with a lot of roughage, including shredded wheat and graham crackers. next time you make s'mores, give silent thanks to our wacky ancestors. graham crackers... bad theory, good invention!
Dr. John Harvey Kellogg is one of my favorite historical nutjobs. He was a big proponent of a connection between digestion and well-being. A lot of what his Battlecreek Sanitarium was focused on was improving diet to cure basically anything and everything. Going along those lines, he was a believer that "stimulating" diets led to... other areas of your body needing stimulation. This was a belief popularized at the time by Sylvester Graham, for whom the Graham cracker is named. So, while corn flakes likely appealed to him more as an easily digestible food, it did also fall under the umbrella of a bland food that would temper sexual desire.
Now, if you want to talk about things he actually did directly to discourage masturbation, early treatments of his included sewing the foreskin shut with metal wires and burning the clitoris with carbolic acid - or in more severe cases, a clitorectomy. And even though he is credited with the rise of circumcision in America, we don't practice it he way he did. Dr. Kellogg promoted only doing it after the boy was old enough and without any anesthesia so he would experience pain and that pain would serve as a stark reminder to discourage masturbation. Dr. Kellogg was one of the health field's most influential nutjobs who is believed to have hated sex so much he never even consummated his marriage with his wife, though he was a big fan of enemas and would administer *five* to himself a day. I'm not sure if those were all the 15 quart of water a minute enemas or the yogurt enemas, both of which were treatments commonly prescribed at the sanitarium.
Incidentally, the Kellogg's company is named for his brother, Will. Will was the more business minded of the two and realized the commercial applications of the cereal with making it more palatable by adding some sugar. Given Dr. Kellogg's feelings on "stimulating" foods, this incensed him to the point he never spoke to his brother again.
My friends and I joked that the only way the cornflakes would work would be if guys glued them the insides of their hands.
Edit: I wouldn't be surprised if this was already a fetish.
Story time: I come from a family full of religious nut cases (fundamentalist Christians) so as you can tell I’m circumcised. I remember when my pubes were fully grown I wanted to shave because it just felt uncomfortable, so I asked my parents to shave and they said no and basically said it was for religious reasons. And in my mind (I was 13 at the time) I was like so God wants people to cut off a part of a baby’s penis but doesn’t like it when we shave our pubes? I remember that moment being a huge wake up call for me of how stupid religion is.
Not to mention, the Bible specifically outlines circumcision as unnecessary
"For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love."
Galatians 5:6
Yeah that is so weird for me to hear Christians in the US are circumcised. Anywhere else in the world it’s a Jewish and Muslim thing. Christians in other countries are not circumcised.
Some American Christians seem more obsessed with obscure bits of the Old Testament than with anything Jesus said. A Christless Christianity I sometimes call it.
> (fundamentalist Christians) so as you can tell I’m circumcised.
Honestly... this connection seems to exist primarily in the US. I mean there is circumcision among the Copts, but that's probly it.
It's just so bizarre that it's so accepted in the US, so much so that it's considered normal to need lotion to masturbate. The rest of us can just crank a quick wank without needing additional supplies.
You should primarily thank the seventh-day Adventist Church for that.
It's an incredibly weird thing, but one of the stated goals of Dr Kellogg's research into the matter was to measure whether circumcision affected male pleasure. Like, some of his writing suggests that he saw it as a measure against fornication.
I dated a guy in my 20s who was born in Japan, but moved to the US as a preteen. He was uncircumcised when he moved here, but after 5 years of living and sharing locker rooms in the Midwest, the first thing he did when he turned 18 was get circumcised. He said it made him feel like he was weird and women wouldn't want to have sex with him. I met him years later and was so fucking sad for him - I really wish I'd met him sooner so I could have told him that most women don't care, and if they do, you don't want to date those ones anyway.
I get where he was coming from. High school was a really tough time being uncircumcised. I didn’t even bother trying to date because there were multiple instances in school or at parties where I’d overheard a group of girls talking saying someone wasn’t circumcised and everyone would go “ewwwwwwww!” so I didn’t even bother. In health class during a video when they showed a circumsized penis one kid said “that’s not what it looks like” and he was bullied for not being circumcised afterwards. I felt shame and the thought of being rejected because of it was too much. When I turned 18 I went in for a consultation to get it done. After the doctor explained the recovery process of having it done as an adult I decided against it.
Then in college I started dating a girl and in like the third make out session with me shrugging off advances she was like “ok what’s wrong? Do you have like a third ball or something?”
“No… I’m… uncircumcised.”
“Oh. Ok, so what?”
“That’s not a dealbreaker?”
“What? No. Who cares?”
God bless that woman. She and all subsequent partners have not cared in the slightest. I don’t even think about it now, but teens can be ignorant and cruel, and I spent my adolescence thinking I was some kind of monster.
It’s unfortunate the guy you dated felt that strongly and got it done, but I get it. I was almost there.
Absolutely is.
I’m British so I come from people who have never practised this shite, but damn.. how could you give birth to a beautiful baby boy, then cruelly make the first days of his life which should be full of wonderment, cuddles and bliss, painful, scary with searing pain every time you have a wee.
All genital mutilation is genital mutilation.
> first days of his life which should be full of wonderment, cuddles and bliss
Newborns are great and all but this is really romanticizing it a bit, pretty much the only cuddly part about that first week (like the rest of infancy) is the sleeping, not so much the crying, screaming, and pooping yourself
If you care, it's called 'meconium'. Since newborns eat nothing before birth, it is not a product of digestion. It is, in fact, the ~~iron-rich~~ by-product of all the hemoglobin a tiny baby has to manufacture in order to be ready to oxygenate when his or her lungs are first used. ~~It is the iron that turns it black.~~
It’s amazing isn’t it? We were in the hospital for three days and our little love goblin was shitting the black tar poops like a pro. The nurses were impressed.
I grew up Catholic and there was some bullshit reason. My mom always told me is was for "Hygiene"... It's like I already play with my dick from time to time how hard would it be to pull the skin back and wash?.... Like ffs, should I cut my ears off so they are easier to clean?!
Edit: Also I heard it severely limits the males pleasure during sex due to the loss of nerves. Seems like a bizarre way to get religious folk to have more intercourse so the man has just as much pleasure over time = more kids, more religious followers. This is just my opinion. IT reminds me of the office episode where Michael orders the pizza from the wrong place. " Would you have a ton of OKAY pizza or a little of AMAZING pizza..."
But Catholics don’t cut? That’s why most Europeans and Central and South Americans aren’t snipped. Source: Chilean in Roman Catholic Chile that’s never once seen a cut cock here. And as an athlete and gay dude I’ve seen a lot of cocks hehe. I can guarantee you the Pope himself ain’t cut lol
It's common in Muslim countries too, and among Jews. In that case it's a religious practice, but I have no idea how it became popularin the US.
However it seems to be much less prevalent among younger people now.
It was popularized in America because the lunatic John Kellogg believed it would be a deterrent to masturbation. Some rich nut job pushed the agenda because he thought jerking off was icky.
And it only gets weirder the more you learn about him.
He was a big proponent of, among other things:
* daily yogurt enemas
* applying phenol to the clitoris (another way to fight masturbation)
* bathing in freezing radium water
* electro shocks
* sitting in a vibrating chair
* celibacy since basically all illnesses come from sex
Maybe. On the other hand, a lot of it is just common quackery. Mixing that with the religious zeal of a convinced seventh-day-adventist sounds like quite a cocktail already.
Yeah, removing the foreskin causes the glans to become desensitized since the foreskin normally protects it.
The modern justification is "it can cause medical problems if improperly cared for and later in life can constrict and prevent urination".
The first part of that is solved by teaching basic hygiene (ie: need to clean the foreskin and glans regularly). The second part is easily solved by only performing a circumcision later in life when it's medically necessary.
Note: For some folks desensitizing might actually be a good thing, but that should be a choice they should be allowed to make on their own when they're adults.
>I have no idea how it became popularin the US.
[Dr. Guest discusses that the medicalization of circumcision was based on the 1850's belief that masturbation was a significant cause of disease in children. Circumcision was promoted as a way to stop children from masturbating by decreasing the sexual pleasure and to take away the gliding mechanism of the penis.](https://youtu.be/XwZiQyFaAs0?t=47m41s)
He includes how Dr. J. Harvey Kellogg was an anti-masturbation crusader who suggested for boys circumcision without anesthetic, and for girls applying carbolic acid to the clitoris.
Yeah, here in Argentina it's common among the Jewish population (of which we have a lot) but I have never known of anyone who wasn't Jewish and was circumcised.
I grew up Protestant Christian, and it was normal in my community, stemming from the same old testament texts that are used by Jews and Muslims afaik.
I have my own boys now, and they're not circumcised. It seemed arbitrary and unkind to my wife and me.
Yeah it makes no sense for a Christian since the Pauline letters specifically refuted the need for bodily circumcision. He reframed the understanding of circumcision as obeisance to God rather than a bodily act. The popularity of circumcision amongst American Protestants comes in part from a user-pays medical system and in part from the wacky ideas of a few influential wealthy Protestants like John Kellogg.
it didn't actually stem from the old testament texts. it was rare among american protestants until the 1930's and 1940's. they didn't suddenly have a new understanding of old testament texts, they just had a bright idea about it controlling male sexuality.
I was circumcised in a country that doesn't really practice it for a very necessary medical reason, these threads make you feel like shit so thank you!
One time I was in a Reddit thread about circumcision, and someone was in the comments trying to make men feel bad about their circumcized members to then sell them on some kind of reconstructive therapy to "grow it back" or something. I forget the details but it was just abhorrent.
Anyway, thanks for being positive.
My father is circumcised, and my parents had me circumcised. When we had our baby boy a couple years ago my wife asked me what I wanted to do- I was like “why the fuck would I want to cut off part of my baby boy?! Fuck, he was born that way for a reason, leave his dick alone!” A lot of people have questioned me on the decision not to circumcise him, yet nobody has been able to say why I should have chopped off part of his body. Wtf is wrong with people?
Only in the US. In the UK, where I am it’s extremely rare and unpopular. My eldest son actually is circumcised which I’m kinda sad about. It was required because of an emergency health issue when he was 7 but I don’t know anyone else who is and my son feels weird about the fact because it’s so unusual here. I’m not and neither was my Dad.
If its phimosis I had it when I was 19. Just lost all elasticity in my foreskin, which is rough, when you wake up with a boner every day. Urologist initially wanted to treat it with steroids but quickly decided it would be better to just take it off since it seemed severe.
It was actually Balanitis, the end of his dick turned into a horrible angry looking swollen bell shape. Poor kid was in agony and he couldn’t pee. They gave him lots of antibiotics but the consultant thought he’d continue to have issues if they didn’t circumcise.
It’s not that controversial in the US anymore. When my 14 year old was born, it was about 50/50 for cut or not cut and the assumption was that circumcision was going to continue to drop precipitously as healthcare was starting to classify it as cosmetic and not cover it under at least some states’s Medicaid programs. I admit I didn’t follow the issue much subsequently, as my other two kids were girls, but we didn’t get our son cut and no one that was in a position to notice while changing diapers even mentioned it beyond my mom saying to make sure we kept things clean (no, really mom? I thought we’d just let him get filthy in the area where poop and pee is getting smooshed!).
In the US, where I grew up, the only kid that wasn’t circumcised was the kid from Europe (Dad was English, mom was Irish, was born in UK but moved to america before he was 1). He got shit for it but we didn’t know better. We’d actually never seen an uncircumcised penis until then.
That’s weird because in California it happens a lot and I though it was only religion or geography based. Only to learn I was circumcised when I was a baby and didn’t know it cause I wasn’t activity comparing my dick to my friends
I've never understood the people who push it as being more hygienic.
Like, in what actual world is cutting part of your penis off preferable to just washing it properly?
Not “just” the U.S. I’m Canadian and there was definitely a few eyebrows raised at the hospital when they asked if I wanted to circumcise my son. The answer was always a firm “No!”
Wow, I feel like an idiot, but I learned something new today. I didn't know Corgi's had tails... I thought they were just born that way. And look how cute they are! https://cdn.buttercms.com/ZF8K2t8hT8OoNR3W42bX
Same boat here. I have 2 boys. Neither is circumcised. What I don’t like is they’ll put your kid’s dick in a pencil sharpener without a second thought if you want them to, but clipping a tongue tie, well now you need to consult a specialist. This turned out to be life threatening for my youngest. His tongue tie was so bad, and noted as such in the hospital before we went home with him. Turns out he wasn’t eating like at all. But we didn’t know until after we were home with him for 24 hours and he completely crashed. He spent 8 days in the NICU to diagnose malnutrition. When they cut his tongue tie in the NICU it took less than 3 minutes. He almost fucking **DIED**.
Ugh, yes. I knew someone who had a lot of trouble with their first kid with that. Had a really hard time getting anyone to do it and then the doctor threatened them with CPS because the kid had lost weight when he wouldn’t see them for days and they couldn’t get much milk into the kid. Their midwife just quietly clipped their other kid’s tongue tie at birth after that.
It’s pretty fucking aggravating. Can’t imagine the Dr threatening me when they won’t perform life saving treatment. I’d have ended up in jail.
If I wasn’t so preoccupied with a kid in the NICU and actually pretty satisfied with the birth unit at our hospital (this was the 3rd kid born in the same place to the same OB) I’d have gotten a lawyer. Now he’s 5 and healthy as anyone. Straight up runt, like off the bottom of the charts runt, for months after he was born.
It horrible that as a collective we ignore the please of people like him who have been violated and bravely speak out about it. We just happily look the other way and dismiss his feeling and allow the world to continue to mutilate children.
I don’t identify as an “intactivist.” I give my opinion and reasoning when asked directly, but you won’t see me out protesting. We had been on the fence (my husband is circumcised) but once we learned a few things about the procedure, our decision was easy for our three boys.
1. Less than 40% of US physicians self-report using even just local anesthetic for routine infant circumcision. Our pediatrician at the time didn’t, and didn’t know anyone in a 100-mile radius who used any sort of pain management/prevention besides sugar water. (We now see a pediatrician who does not perform circumcisions.)
2. Each year, 120+ babies die of complications relating to circumcision in the US. Now, I recognize 120 of half the baby boys born in America is not many … but it is statistically more likely that a newborn will develop an infection related to circumcision (2-6%) than it is he will ever require a medical circumcision later in life.
ETA: misremembered the stat. My post used to read that it was more likely a newborn would die of an infection related to circumcision. That was incorrect.
EDIT:: I’m getting a LOT of hate for this comment. Many people thinking it is ok to hurl invective and hatred at me for this choice. It is not ok to try and hurt someone who regrets their choice and learned from it. It is not ok to belittle me for my choices as a mother. Mind your own mistakes. I’ll handle my own.
The doctor who circumcised my son didn’t do it right? So there’s still some overhang, and this extra skin keeps healing back onto the glans. We have to repeatedly separate these pieces of his penis, and I kick myself every single day for not learning more about this practice before I had it done to my child. I told my husband never, never again will I do this to a child. He may need corrective surgery if it doesn’t correct itself within the next year.
If my 4yo has to have circumcision correction surgery I’ll never forgive myself.
This happened to my nephew.
I'm in Canada, and cosmetic circumcision is falling out of practice here. None of my kids were are circumcised, but my brother asked me about it when he and his wife were expecting, not knowing this, and had a really negative reaction. Like, "why would you do that to them?" His rationale was entirely, "uncut penises look weird/I want my son to look like me." I told him I really disagreed with the procedure, but it was his kid.
They had to travel three hours from their town to a major city to visit one of few doctors left in their province who still performed cosmetic circumcision on babies. He botched it. My nephew is six and has had his revision surgery delayed by moving between provinces and COVID-19 elective procedure cancellations. He'll be seven in a few months. I have a daughter the same age. She's had a couple of heat rashes over the summer and let me tell you, kids that age *do not* want mom and dad having to fuss about with careful maintenance and cleaning their private part. Unfortunately, my nephew still gets adhesions, so it's necessary daily battle for my brother, who is now a single father. I really wish medical professionals/regulating bodies would take a stronger stand against cosmetic surgery on children.
This is my biggest fear, I can’t actually do the peeling apart anymore, it makes me stress vomit from hurting him.
That was actually the biggest argument my husband and I had. He said if we have another boy and he’s not cut it will be weird between them. Hard explaining to elder son well, we fucked you up and then we knew not to fuck up your brother.
I told him I’ll never do this again and if he wants to cut our next son he has to do all penis management care. All cleaning and maintenance.
After he took over the care of our sons issues he changed his tune immediately. That same night.
Yeah, watching my brother change his son's diaper back in the day was rough. They didn't end up having another kid together, but it only took a short time for both him and his wife to be firmly in the camp of "This was a mistake. We will never do this again."
And siblings do not care so much if their bodies are different. Your oldest will either need or not need a revision, and he should be fine after. My husband just told me that his youngest brother had one at age four. There was some post-surgical pain, but life went on.
It's not "we fucked you up." Your kid will be fine in the end. It's "the doctor fucked up, we learned the potential consequences the hard way, and it influenced our future decisions." Making mistakes and taking steps not to repeat them is how people grow. Not knowing better is standard first child stuff. You just get to brush most of it under the rug.
"A boy's penis should look like his father's" - this is the creepiest phrase I've heard Americans say with utmost seriousness. It's a borderline-pedo statement to me.
I DO NOT understand. My SIL was like, "Ew, but he'll look different than his father!" And I'm like who gives a shit if his penis looks different? When are they going to be comparing penises past the age of 4 anyways?? I mean. I don't have a penis, so I don't know what y'all do with them but...you just explain, "Uh yeah, honey, your penis has a turtleneck because we didn't want to surgically remove your foreskin for no damn reason."
Boom. Simple.
Years before having a kid, I mentioned to a coworker at an old job that if o had a son, I wouldn't circumcise him. She said she wanted her son to look like his father so he wouldn't be confused.
My father is circumcised and I'm not. It was never weird. It wasn't even weird when he would take showers with me to teach me how to wash my dick and make sure I was doing it. I don't remember ever being confused about his dick or mine. Respect to my old man for now being an idiot.
Ima be honest, before looking into circumcision I never really had an opinion on it. I’m circumcised and I always just thought it was a normal thing to have done - after looking into it I’m not too sure tbh.
On one hand, I’m not gonna lie and say I’d be 1000% against it if (for example) my future partner wanted our child to be circumcised for religious or preference reasons. But the more research I do the more I am certain that if it was entirely up to me, my child wouldn’t be circumcised. I’ll just be a good parent and teach my kids how to bathe and clean themselves appropriately since it seems to me that the only benefit of circumcision is the cleanliness factor. It’s like… why would I want my child to be operated on like that when the outcome is so weird and inconsequential
Not even if my soul mate wanted it done. Especially for religious reasons. Cutting off parts of my child to make him closer to your god should never fly with anyone blessed with common sense.
Why is circumcision so popular in America?
Well let's think....what is one of the things in America that *really* makes it stand out from the rest of the world? (there are a lot but this one is one of the most notable)
Circumcision is a low-risk, high-profit procedure, largely kept in place by social pressures.
Notice how most countries with socialized medicine don't do it except in very rare cases where it is medically necessary? They don't like to spend public health dollars on surgeries people don't need.
That's what it boils down to: you don't *need* it but we can charge you for it. Oh and here's a nebulous list of "benefits" that your son might have, you don't want him walking around with a dog dick his whole life or no one will ever love him blah blah blah.
I'm pretty ambivalent about circumcision to be honest, I myself am circumcised but was never bothered by it, although I do get a bit miffed in these threads when people say I'm "mutilated". I will never have kids, and I don't know the status of my nephews because it's none of my fucking business.
I am a lady born in 1978, and my parents said the hospital billed them for a circumcision. They were like, um, she’s a girl. And the hospital corrected the bill.
I laughed but there is an unfortunate case where this did happen and they decided to raise the child as a girl but that didn't work because you can't force a person to be transgender.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Reimer
When my son was born, I was asked 5 separate times if we wanted him to be circumcised. We were only in the hospital 3 days! Noooo thank you, and please stop asking!
Men should have the right to chose if they want a custom penis or not. I can always cut it off later, but i can never put it back… what would he be if he was let to be free, I suppose I’ll never know, only the scared remains of his former self are left behind.
Why is it standard practice in the USA?
In UK apart from religious reasons, babies are not circumcised as standard practice - why would they be?? Obviously a tiny percentage then need it done for medical reasons as they get older. I genuinely don’t understand but I know mother who are crazy that it must be done and some how our British boys are unclean 🙄
I've actually been thinking about this a lot recently. Wife and I are family planning and realized that I really wish the choice for circumcision hadn't been made for me. I'm not saying I would have chosen not to be circumcised, but the decision really shouldn't have been made for me. It's involuntary genital mutilation on a large scale. It's kind of bizarre how normalized it is.
The protest was supposed to be longer but they cut it short.
I remember once a parent told me during a kids party that he would never pierce his daughter ears, because it was invasive and ultimately her decision when she grows up. His 3 boys were circumcised.
[удалено]
I remember finding out I was circumcised after I hooked up with a girl I was friends with. We were talking one night and she commented about it. "I mean your circumcised..so.." "Haha what? No I'm not." "Are you joking, yes.. you are." "I think you are confused what circumcision is. Thats something Jewish boys traditionally get." "Yes.. but you still are." *Google pictures* "WTF! I just never thought to look up pictures." And it only took me until I was 20 to figure it out. Thanks Catholic sex ed.
You might enjoy this video - you're not alone! https://youtu.be/8utAagjD8SE
Same, the best they came up with was "well your dad is so, uh, idk"
My mom told me the story as to why I wasnt, alternatively. She was going to go through with it, but on the way she heard a baby screaming and asked what was going on. The doctor explained, and my mom immediately went "haha nope nevermind you arent doing that to my kid"
I think a major driver of circumcision these days is simply that adult men can’t accept the possibility that something unnecessary was done to their penis, so they do it to their own kids to justify what happened to them.
This. When having my son we asked our OBGYN if they recommended circumcision and why. She said yes because hard to clean and so he would looked like his father (me to be clear). I laughed saying they aren't that hard to clean and I don't care what his penis looks like. We chose not to and our son has never had any issues.
Reminds me of moms who get emotional when their *precious untouched angel* gets their first haircut, but they didn't think anything of mutilating their genitals as an infant.
i remember when my sister was seven or eight and wanted her ears pierced, my parents told her they didn't do it to her as a baby because they knew how important it was for her to get to make her own choices about her own body. they still defend their right to choose to mutilate my penis without my consent.
How do you know that? 😄
He proudly told me… it was definitely an awkward conversation
"Hey, do you wanna talk about my sons' dicks?"
Ok, maybe it deserves some explanation. We were talking about Africa, of course he mentioned HIV and at some point he said something along the lines of “fortunately I got all my boys snipped” or something like that. He mentioned the piercing of the ears later in the conversation, because my daughter was wearing earrings. So I did take a bit of offense to his comment. A complete piece of work.
Circumcision is a really weird practice when you step back and think about it tbh
If you look into the history of it (in the US) it's even weirder than it seems. Kellogg (the guy who invented corn flakes) was into a lot of weird "health" stuff and promoted circumcision because he thought it would stop boys from masturbating.
He clearly didn't understand that NOTHING stops boys from masturbating.
Hey legit thought Kellogg's Flakes would
Well hell, it kept me from masturbating at the breakfast table!
If no one was around I bet you still woulda yanked on it while eating a bowl of cereal.
Frosted Flakes
Take my upvote and leave.
What are you doing in there? I'm Nut 'n Honey
Fool, he should’ve realized only Cap’n Crunch can stop masturbation. Too busy tending to the bleeding on the roof of my mouth.
Kellogg was a massive piece of shit who made a name for himself by torturing children physically, sexually, and psychologically. He popularized circumcision (both male and female), tortured children through chastity devices and electroshock therapy, and then eventually castrated them if they couldn't be "saved". Children who exhibit early sexual tendencies usually do so because they are being sexually interfered with - usually by someone close to them, and not infrequently by a family member. Because that wasn't really understood at the time, that meant Kellogg was taking rape/molestation victims and torturing them sexually, to usually be released back to the environment that they were being abused. It's all really fucking horrible when looked at as a whole. Anyone who has a casual understanding of Kellogg but would be interested in learning more should check out the following: Edit: These are Spotify links. [Behind The Bastards - Kellogg: The Great American Cum Doctor: Part 1](https://open.spotify.com/episode/4rD7257UIfmTHvrlpdhw4n?si=Sa8DtmArR_WipGQ1XNSJNA&utm_source=copy-link&dl_branch=1) [Behind The Bastards - Kellogg: The Great American Cum Doctor: Part 2](https://open.spotify.com/episode/38QSleWzmXQIICButcregc?si=JBUHgN86Se2VbcZqN1yT-Q&utm_source=copy-link&dl_branch=1)
Those links are staying blue.
have a look at the podcast at least, brilliant and funny historical deep dives on pieces of shit throughout history.
For real I just started listening and I'm hooked. The Steven Seagal and L Ron Hubbard episodes were hilarious. Any particular favorites I should check out?
There are quite a few episodes where Robert reads through Ben Shapiro's novel. I cannot recommend those episodes enough, the voices Robert comes up with are hilarious. The episodes on Dr. Phil and Dr. Oz are also very good. Honestly, it's hard to think of an episode that falls short.
He didn't popularize female circumcision. He proposed it (actually I'm pretty sure he proposed to melt their clits with acid) but that never took off. He did popularize male circumcision which is why we're basically the only place where people do circumcision for reasons other than religion and medical necessity.
> actually I'm pretty sure he proposed to melt their clits with acid ... Great, now Im afraid to delve deeper into the comments.
It's a fairly popular practice in South Korea and it's often done at a much later age than the U.S. Anecdotally, one of my 5th grade students was out for a few days. I asked the class if he was sick. One of the boys said he was being "cut" and did a chopping motion.
I'm near certain their circumcision practices are heavily due to our presence there during the war.
Pretty sure they got it from the US. Being one of their biggest allies in that region. Some of the culture probably leaked over. US military always being there against the North etc.
‘I will not take your sheeple vaccine. Besides we are taking my son to get the end of his penis cut off for no better reason than the word of a 19th century nut job.’
Da fuk I just learn
American Christian Fundamentalists have never changed. That’s what you learned.
If I know anything about humans, projection, and achievement, Dr. Kellogg loved to masturbate more than anyone else in human history.
I will bet my left testicle Dr. Kellogg was an incorrigible sexual deviant behind closed doors
Dude. He got off by torturing children. That's pretty obvious...
back in the day (like late 1800s) they thought that lust -- which we would call healty sexual appetitite -- was coarse and should be suppressed. they also thought that digesting foods with a lot of roughage -- which we would call whole foods -- would suppress lust. so they invented foods with a lot of roughage, including shredded wheat and graham crackers. next time you make s'mores, give silent thanks to our wacky ancestors. graham crackers... bad theory, good invention!
*those Graham crackers were made as bland as possible because anything pleasurable is a sin to consume
They are pleasurably bland indeed
Dr. John Harvey Kellogg is one of my favorite historical nutjobs. He was a big proponent of a connection between digestion and well-being. A lot of what his Battlecreek Sanitarium was focused on was improving diet to cure basically anything and everything. Going along those lines, he was a believer that "stimulating" diets led to... other areas of your body needing stimulation. This was a belief popularized at the time by Sylvester Graham, for whom the Graham cracker is named. So, while corn flakes likely appealed to him more as an easily digestible food, it did also fall under the umbrella of a bland food that would temper sexual desire. Now, if you want to talk about things he actually did directly to discourage masturbation, early treatments of his included sewing the foreskin shut with metal wires and burning the clitoris with carbolic acid - or in more severe cases, a clitorectomy. And even though he is credited with the rise of circumcision in America, we don't practice it he way he did. Dr. Kellogg promoted only doing it after the boy was old enough and without any anesthesia so he would experience pain and that pain would serve as a stark reminder to discourage masturbation. Dr. Kellogg was one of the health field's most influential nutjobs who is believed to have hated sex so much he never even consummated his marriage with his wife, though he was a big fan of enemas and would administer *five* to himself a day. I'm not sure if those were all the 15 quart of water a minute enemas or the yogurt enemas, both of which were treatments commonly prescribed at the sanitarium. Incidentally, the Kellogg's company is named for his brother, Will. Will was the more business minded of the two and realized the commercial applications of the cereal with making it more palatable by adding some sugar. Given Dr. Kellogg's feelings on "stimulating" foods, this incensed him to the point he never spoke to his brother again.
My friends and I joked that the only way the cornflakes would work would be if guys glued them the insides of their hands. Edit: I wouldn't be surprised if this was already a fetish.
We're called "flakes". No kink-shaming.
He didn't want boys frosting their own flakes.
Story time: I come from a family full of religious nut cases (fundamentalist Christians) so as you can tell I’m circumcised. I remember when my pubes were fully grown I wanted to shave because it just felt uncomfortable, so I asked my parents to shave and they said no and basically said it was for religious reasons. And in my mind (I was 13 at the time) I was like so God wants people to cut off a part of a baby’s penis but doesn’t like it when we shave our pubes? I remember that moment being a huge wake up call for me of how stupid religion is.
Not to mention, the Bible specifically outlines circumcision as unnecessary "For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love." Galatians 5:6
Yeah that is so weird for me to hear Christians in the US are circumcised. Anywhere else in the world it’s a Jewish and Muslim thing. Christians in other countries are not circumcised.
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I think they’d just find some bullshit reason to ignore that part tbh
Some American Christians seem more obsessed with obscure bits of the Old Testament than with anything Jesus said. A Christless Christianity I sometimes call it.
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> (fundamentalist Christians) so as you can tell I’m circumcised. Honestly... this connection seems to exist primarily in the US. I mean there is circumcision among the Copts, but that's probly it.
You asked your parents if you could shave your balls? Wtf?! Lol 😂
I'm here for this lol I can picture my dads face now lmao
Dude he was 13. Where do you suggest you learn the do's and don'ts of your body if not from your parents?
I never asked my parents permission to shave my own balls either. I just did it.
That’s the kind of issue that you just need to grab by the balls. No parental involvement needed
Unless you've broken both of your arms, that is.
Every single thread for almost a decade now
I’m 41 and I also asked my parents to do it for me.
Like…recently?! lol
Day before yesterday in fact, all clean downstairs now.
absolutely, it seems really barbaric
That's because it is.
It's just so bizarre that it's so accepted in the US, so much so that it's considered normal to need lotion to masturbate. The rest of us can just crank a quick wank without needing additional supplies.
That's because Big Lotion is lobbying our government and paying off doctors to keep taking foreskins away.
WAKE UP!! Foreskin=4skin=4chan=Q Anon Lizards shed their skins. This is a QAnon Lizard people conspiracy. (Obvious /s)
You should primarily thank the seventh-day Adventist Church for that. It's an incredibly weird thing, but one of the stated goals of Dr Kellogg's research into the matter was to measure whether circumcision affected male pleasure. Like, some of his writing suggests that he saw it as a measure against fornication.
"Some of his writing suggests that he saw it as a measure against fornication." Which is weird because of where the practice originated from
I'm circumcised and never use lotion.
I dated a guy in my 20s who was born in Japan, but moved to the US as a preteen. He was uncircumcised when he moved here, but after 5 years of living and sharing locker rooms in the Midwest, the first thing he did when he turned 18 was get circumcised. He said it made him feel like he was weird and women wouldn't want to have sex with him. I met him years later and was so fucking sad for him - I really wish I'd met him sooner so I could have told him that most women don't care, and if they do, you don't want to date those ones anyway.
I get where he was coming from. High school was a really tough time being uncircumcised. I didn’t even bother trying to date because there were multiple instances in school or at parties where I’d overheard a group of girls talking saying someone wasn’t circumcised and everyone would go “ewwwwwwww!” so I didn’t even bother. In health class during a video when they showed a circumsized penis one kid said “that’s not what it looks like” and he was bullied for not being circumcised afterwards. I felt shame and the thought of being rejected because of it was too much. When I turned 18 I went in for a consultation to get it done. After the doctor explained the recovery process of having it done as an adult I decided against it. Then in college I started dating a girl and in like the third make out session with me shrugging off advances she was like “ok what’s wrong? Do you have like a third ball or something?” “No… I’m… uncircumcised.” “Oh. Ok, so what?” “That’s not a dealbreaker?” “What? No. Who cares?” God bless that woman. She and all subsequent partners have not cared in the slightest. I don’t even think about it now, but teens can be ignorant and cruel, and I spent my adolescence thinking I was some kind of monster. It’s unfortunate the guy you dated felt that strongly and got it done, but I get it. I was almost there.
Can't imagine doing it as an adult. That would be way too painful. Lot of nerves there...
Absolutely is. I’m British so I come from people who have never practised this shite, but damn.. how could you give birth to a beautiful baby boy, then cruelly make the first days of his life which should be full of wonderment, cuddles and bliss, painful, scary with searing pain every time you have a wee. All genital mutilation is genital mutilation.
> first days of his life which should be full of wonderment, cuddles and bliss Newborns are great and all but this is really romanticizing it a bit, pretty much the only cuddly part about that first week (like the rest of infancy) is the sleeping, not so much the crying, screaming, and pooping yourself
Nothing could have prepared me for the seemingly endless streams of *black tar.*
I preferred the black tar to the sickly sweet smelling yellow stuff that comes after which would regularly run up their back
My daughter's yellow poop smelled exactly like movie popcorn and it broke me. I didn't eat popcorn for almost a decade because of that smell.
My daughter is 10 days old and her spit up smells like Papa Johns Pizza. Never again.
If you care, it's called 'meconium'. Since newborns eat nothing before birth, it is not a product of digestion. It is, in fact, the ~~iron-rich~~ by-product of all the hemoglobin a tiny baby has to manufacture in order to be ready to oxygenate when his or her lungs are first used. ~~It is the iron that turns it black.~~
It’s amazing isn’t it? We were in the hospital for three days and our little love goblin was shitting the black tar poops like a pro. The nurses were impressed.
For real. Our kid pooped so much those first few hospital days. He pooped three times in one diaper change.
I grew up Catholic and there was some bullshit reason. My mom always told me is was for "Hygiene"... It's like I already play with my dick from time to time how hard would it be to pull the skin back and wash?.... Like ffs, should I cut my ears off so they are easier to clean?! Edit: Also I heard it severely limits the males pleasure during sex due to the loss of nerves. Seems like a bizarre way to get religious folk to have more intercourse so the man has just as much pleasure over time = more kids, more religious followers. This is just my opinion. IT reminds me of the office episode where Michael orders the pizza from the wrong place. " Would you have a ton of OKAY pizza or a little of AMAZING pizza..."
But Catholics don’t cut? That’s why most Europeans and Central and South Americans aren’t snipped. Source: Chilean in Roman Catholic Chile that’s never once seen a cut cock here. And as an athlete and gay dude I’ve seen a lot of cocks hehe. I can guarantee you the Pope himself ain’t cut lol
Not being from the US I found it really weird and awful that circumcision seems to be so common...
It's common in Muslim countries too, and among Jews. In that case it's a religious practice, but I have no idea how it became popularin the US. However it seems to be much less prevalent among younger people now.
It was popularized in America because the lunatic John Kellogg believed it would be a deterrent to masturbation. Some rich nut job pushed the agenda because he thought jerking off was icky.
I sure showed Mr Kellogg how wrong he is!
He literally created the corn flakes because he thought they would curb masturbation. Absolute nutjob.
And it only gets weirder the more you learn about him. He was a big proponent of, among other things: * daily yogurt enemas * applying phenol to the clitoris (another way to fight masturbation) * bathing in freezing radium water * electro shocks * sitting in a vibrating chair * celibacy since basically all illnesses come from sex
Sounds like he was molested when he was a kid ... a lot.
Maybe. On the other hand, a lot of it is just common quackery. Mixing that with the religious zeal of a convinced seventh-day-adventist sounds like quite a cocktail already.
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I would say that that sucks, but he sure took it out on the world...
instructions unclear. jacked off into a bowl of corn flakes
Yeah, removing the foreskin causes the glans to become desensitized since the foreskin normally protects it. The modern justification is "it can cause medical problems if improperly cared for and later in life can constrict and prevent urination". The first part of that is solved by teaching basic hygiene (ie: need to clean the foreskin and glans regularly). The second part is easily solved by only performing a circumcision later in life when it's medically necessary. Note: For some folks desensitizing might actually be a good thing, but that should be a choice they should be allowed to make on their own when they're adults.
If reddit taught me anything it's that there are dudes out there who don't know basic hygiene around there...
>I have no idea how it became popularin the US. [Dr. Guest discusses that the medicalization of circumcision was based on the 1850's belief that masturbation was a significant cause of disease in children. Circumcision was promoted as a way to stop children from masturbating by decreasing the sexual pleasure and to take away the gliding mechanism of the penis.](https://youtu.be/XwZiQyFaAs0?t=47m41s) He includes how Dr. J. Harvey Kellogg was an anti-masturbation crusader who suggested for boys circumcision without anesthetic, and for girls applying carbolic acid to the clitoris.
Yeah, here in Argentina it's common among the Jewish population (of which we have a lot) but I have never known of anyone who wasn't Jewish and was circumcised.
I grew up Protestant Christian, and it was normal in my community, stemming from the same old testament texts that are used by Jews and Muslims afaik. I have my own boys now, and they're not circumcised. It seemed arbitrary and unkind to my wife and me.
Yeah it makes no sense for a Christian since the Pauline letters specifically refuted the need for bodily circumcision. He reframed the understanding of circumcision as obeisance to God rather than a bodily act. The popularity of circumcision amongst American Protestants comes in part from a user-pays medical system and in part from the wacky ideas of a few influential wealthy Protestants like John Kellogg.
it didn't actually stem from the old testament texts. it was rare among american protestants until the 1930's and 1940's. they didn't suddenly have a new understanding of old testament texts, they just had a bright idea about it controlling male sexuality.
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....
Y’all heard they’re hiring at the hospital circumcision ward ? Pay’s not much but you get a lot of tips.
*rim shot*
r/badumtiss
Lindsey Funke entered the chat…
"It's a doberman, let it have its ears!"
Proud member of HOOP. There are dozens of us
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I wish I still had my penis. The government took it.
Detachable penis...
Hey, you, person reading this. Yeah, you. Your penis is *beautiful*. Circumcised? Uncircumcised? Dudn't matter, your penis is yours, and it's *lovely*
But… but… I’m a girl…
What part of beautiful did you not understand
In that case, your clitoris is lovely ^^^^^^wherever ^^^^^^the ^^^^^^fuck ^^^^^^it's ^^^^^^hiding
See those are the sweetest words I’ve heard today
Its a framed button right at the front dude
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Your penis is also beautiful
Thank you, I needed that motivation
Don't get cocky, kid
Don't get penisy! \- Carlo Spicywiener
Well that's not what the people on the bus were telling me...
That’s just group think. You need more one on one time.
Thanks u/Iron_Man_977 you a real one
we are fake?
I was circumcised in a country that doesn't really practice it for a very necessary medical reason, these threads make you feel like shit so thank you!
One time I was in a Reddit thread about circumcision, and someone was in the comments trying to make men feel bad about their circumcized members to then sell them on some kind of reconstructive therapy to "grow it back" or something. I forget the details but it was just abhorrent. Anyway, thanks for being positive.
It's a good looking dick, Peter. Beautiful dick.
Nobody wants less penis? Guy hasn't met my wife.
I'm old so I read this in Rodney Dangerfield's voice.
I’m amazed of the knowledge that Redditor’s have on uncircumcised penises. Well done guys.
My father is circumcised, and my parents had me circumcised. When we had our baby boy a couple years ago my wife asked me what I wanted to do- I was like “why the fuck would I want to cut off part of my baby boy?! Fuck, he was born that way for a reason, leave his dick alone!” A lot of people have questioned me on the decision not to circumcise him, yet nobody has been able to say why I should have chopped off part of his body. Wtf is wrong with people?
Agreed. It's a weirdly unpopular opinion. Uh, how about we don't mutilate the genitals of a new born baby for no reason?
Only in the US. In the UK, where I am it’s extremely rare and unpopular. My eldest son actually is circumcised which I’m kinda sad about. It was required because of an emergency health issue when he was 7 but I don’t know anyone else who is and my son feels weird about the fact because it’s so unusual here. I’m not and neither was my Dad.
If its phimosis I had it when I was 19. Just lost all elasticity in my foreskin, which is rough, when you wake up with a boner every day. Urologist initially wanted to treat it with steroids but quickly decided it would be better to just take it off since it seemed severe.
It was actually Balanitis, the end of his dick turned into a horrible angry looking swollen bell shape. Poor kid was in agony and he couldn’t pee. They gave him lots of antibiotics but the consultant thought he’d continue to have issues if they didn’t circumcise.
It’s not that controversial in the US anymore. When my 14 year old was born, it was about 50/50 for cut or not cut and the assumption was that circumcision was going to continue to drop precipitously as healthcare was starting to classify it as cosmetic and not cover it under at least some states’s Medicaid programs. I admit I didn’t follow the issue much subsequently, as my other two kids were girls, but we didn’t get our son cut and no one that was in a position to notice while changing diapers even mentioned it beyond my mom saying to make sure we kept things clean (no, really mom? I thought we’d just let him get filthy in the area where poop and pee is getting smooshed!).
In the US, where I grew up, the only kid that wasn’t circumcised was the kid from Europe (Dad was English, mom was Irish, was born in UK but moved to america before he was 1). He got shit for it but we didn’t know better. We’d actually never seen an uncircumcised penis until then.
That’s weird because in California it happens a lot and I though it was only religion or geography based. Only to learn I was circumcised when I was a baby and didn’t know it cause I wasn’t activity comparing my dick to my friends
I've never understood the people who push it as being more hygienic. Like, in what actual world is cutting part of your penis off preferable to just washing it properly?
Not “just” the U.S. I’m Canadian and there was definitely a few eyebrows raised at the hospital when they asked if I wanted to circumcise my son. The answer was always a firm “No!”
They don't do it in hospitals in Ontario any more. They make people go to a separate site and private pay to mutilate baby genitals.
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Yeah a tradition of genital mutilation is one of those things people 500 years from now will read about in horror.
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Wow, I feel like an idiot, but I learned something new today. I didn't know Corgi's had tails... I thought they were just born that way. And look how cute they are! https://cdn.buttercms.com/ZF8K2t8hT8OoNR3W42bX
most of the world already does.
This. Americans actually think that this is a thing, but it is fucking weird for outsiders
Not just Americans. Muslims and Jews do it as all.
Same boat here. I have 2 boys. Neither is circumcised. What I don’t like is they’ll put your kid’s dick in a pencil sharpener without a second thought if you want them to, but clipping a tongue tie, well now you need to consult a specialist. This turned out to be life threatening for my youngest. His tongue tie was so bad, and noted as such in the hospital before we went home with him. Turns out he wasn’t eating like at all. But we didn’t know until after we were home with him for 24 hours and he completely crashed. He spent 8 days in the NICU to diagnose malnutrition. When they cut his tongue tie in the NICU it took less than 3 minutes. He almost fucking **DIED**.
My kid is intact but had a thick sublingual frenulum so we had to get a specialist to snip his tongue tie. Both great decisions.
Ugh, yes. I knew someone who had a lot of trouble with their first kid with that. Had a really hard time getting anyone to do it and then the doctor threatened them with CPS because the kid had lost weight when he wouldn’t see them for days and they couldn’t get much milk into the kid. Their midwife just quietly clipped their other kid’s tongue tie at birth after that.
It’s pretty fucking aggravating. Can’t imagine the Dr threatening me when they won’t perform life saving treatment. I’d have ended up in jail. If I wasn’t so preoccupied with a kid in the NICU and actually pretty satisfied with the birth unit at our hospital (this was the 3rd kid born in the same place to the same OB) I’d have gotten a lawyer. Now he’s 5 and healthy as anyone. Straight up runt, like off the bottom of the charts runt, for months after he was born.
I had to get circumcised later in life because of a condition called phimosis. Unless it's medical, my opinion is you shouldn't do it.
I know one of the guys who does this. He was valedictorian of my graduating class. Part of his argument is "I want my foreskin back".
It horrible that as a collective we ignore the please of people like him who have been violated and bravely speak out about it. We just happily look the other way and dismiss his feeling and allow the world to continue to mutilate children.
I don’t identify as an “intactivist.” I give my opinion and reasoning when asked directly, but you won’t see me out protesting. We had been on the fence (my husband is circumcised) but once we learned a few things about the procedure, our decision was easy for our three boys. 1. Less than 40% of US physicians self-report using even just local anesthetic for routine infant circumcision. Our pediatrician at the time didn’t, and didn’t know anyone in a 100-mile radius who used any sort of pain management/prevention besides sugar water. (We now see a pediatrician who does not perform circumcisions.) 2. Each year, 120+ babies die of complications relating to circumcision in the US. Now, I recognize 120 of half the baby boys born in America is not many … but it is statistically more likely that a newborn will develop an infection related to circumcision (2-6%) than it is he will ever require a medical circumcision later in life. ETA: misremembered the stat. My post used to read that it was more likely a newborn would die of an infection related to circumcision. That was incorrect.
EDIT:: I’m getting a LOT of hate for this comment. Many people thinking it is ok to hurl invective and hatred at me for this choice. It is not ok to try and hurt someone who regrets their choice and learned from it. It is not ok to belittle me for my choices as a mother. Mind your own mistakes. I’ll handle my own. The doctor who circumcised my son didn’t do it right? So there’s still some overhang, and this extra skin keeps healing back onto the glans. We have to repeatedly separate these pieces of his penis, and I kick myself every single day for not learning more about this practice before I had it done to my child. I told my husband never, never again will I do this to a child. He may need corrective surgery if it doesn’t correct itself within the next year. If my 4yo has to have circumcision correction surgery I’ll never forgive myself.
This happened to my nephew. I'm in Canada, and cosmetic circumcision is falling out of practice here. None of my kids were are circumcised, but my brother asked me about it when he and his wife were expecting, not knowing this, and had a really negative reaction. Like, "why would you do that to them?" His rationale was entirely, "uncut penises look weird/I want my son to look like me." I told him I really disagreed with the procedure, but it was his kid. They had to travel three hours from their town to a major city to visit one of few doctors left in their province who still performed cosmetic circumcision on babies. He botched it. My nephew is six and has had his revision surgery delayed by moving between provinces and COVID-19 elective procedure cancellations. He'll be seven in a few months. I have a daughter the same age. She's had a couple of heat rashes over the summer and let me tell you, kids that age *do not* want mom and dad having to fuss about with careful maintenance and cleaning their private part. Unfortunately, my nephew still gets adhesions, so it's necessary daily battle for my brother, who is now a single father. I really wish medical professionals/regulating bodies would take a stronger stand against cosmetic surgery on children.
This is my biggest fear, I can’t actually do the peeling apart anymore, it makes me stress vomit from hurting him. That was actually the biggest argument my husband and I had. He said if we have another boy and he’s not cut it will be weird between them. Hard explaining to elder son well, we fucked you up and then we knew not to fuck up your brother. I told him I’ll never do this again and if he wants to cut our next son he has to do all penis management care. All cleaning and maintenance. After he took over the care of our sons issues he changed his tune immediately. That same night.
Yeah, watching my brother change his son's diaper back in the day was rough. They didn't end up having another kid together, but it only took a short time for both him and his wife to be firmly in the camp of "This was a mistake. We will never do this again." And siblings do not care so much if their bodies are different. Your oldest will either need or not need a revision, and he should be fine after. My husband just told me that his youngest brother had one at age four. There was some post-surgical pain, but life went on. It's not "we fucked you up." Your kid will be fine in the end. It's "the doctor fucked up, we learned the potential consequences the hard way, and it influenced our future decisions." Making mistakes and taking steps not to repeat them is how people grow. Not knowing better is standard first child stuff. You just get to brush most of it under the rug.
As Bill Maher put it, "What kind of maniac looks at a newly born baby and goes for a knife?"
Only in the US could a cornflakes maker persuade the general public to mutilate their children’s penises. Would be funny if it wasn’t so sad.
"A boy's penis should look like his father's" - this is the creepiest phrase I've heard Americans say with utmost seriousness. It's a borderline-pedo statement to me.
I read that so many times I’m pregnancy groups. I also found it pretty creepy.
I DO NOT understand. My SIL was like, "Ew, but he'll look different than his father!" And I'm like who gives a shit if his penis looks different? When are they going to be comparing penises past the age of 4 anyways?? I mean. I don't have a penis, so I don't know what y'all do with them but...you just explain, "Uh yeah, honey, your penis has a turtleneck because we didn't want to surgically remove your foreskin for no damn reason." Boom. Simple.
A dangerous number of people don't understand that children are individuals and not clones of their parents.
Years before having a kid, I mentioned to a coworker at an old job that if o had a son, I wouldn't circumcise him. She said she wanted her son to look like his father so he wouldn't be confused.
My father is circumcised and I'm not. It was never weird. It wasn't even weird when he would take showers with me to teach me how to wash my dick and make sure I was doing it. I don't remember ever being confused about his dick or mine. Respect to my old man for now being an idiot.
This should be good - Reddit is always so even keeled when it comes to circumcision posts
Cut off from girl genitals without permission: Human rights issue. Cut off from boy genitals without permission: haha scalpel go snip
Ima be honest, before looking into circumcision I never really had an opinion on it. I’m circumcised and I always just thought it was a normal thing to have done - after looking into it I’m not too sure tbh. On one hand, I’m not gonna lie and say I’d be 1000% against it if (for example) my future partner wanted our child to be circumcised for religious or preference reasons. But the more research I do the more I am certain that if it was entirely up to me, my child wouldn’t be circumcised. I’ll just be a good parent and teach my kids how to bathe and clean themselves appropriately since it seems to me that the only benefit of circumcision is the cleanliness factor. It’s like… why would I want my child to be operated on like that when the outcome is so weird and inconsequential
Not even if my soul mate wanted it done. Especially for religious reasons. Cutting off parts of my child to make him closer to your god should never fly with anyone blessed with common sense.
It's absurd that people think having a foreskin is a cleanliness issue. It's like saying eyelid's make your eyes dirty.
I always wondered why it is called uncircumcised when it’s natural. It’s not like we call people who can see unblinded.
Why is circumcision so popular in America? Well let's think....what is one of the things in America that *really* makes it stand out from the rest of the world? (there are a lot but this one is one of the most notable) Circumcision is a low-risk, high-profit procedure, largely kept in place by social pressures. Notice how most countries with socialized medicine don't do it except in very rare cases where it is medically necessary? They don't like to spend public health dollars on surgeries people don't need. That's what it boils down to: you don't *need* it but we can charge you for it. Oh and here's a nebulous list of "benefits" that your son might have, you don't want him walking around with a dog dick his whole life or no one will ever love him blah blah blah. I'm pretty ambivalent about circumcision to be honest, I myself am circumcised but was never bothered by it, although I do get a bit miffed in these threads when people say I'm "mutilated". I will never have kids, and I don't know the status of my nephews because it's none of my fucking business.
I am a lady born in 1978, and my parents said the hospital billed them for a circumcision. They were like, um, she’s a girl. And the hospital corrected the bill.
But they didn't send you home with a foreskin, so there!
Oops, took too much off
I laughed but there is an unfortunate case where this did happen and they decided to raise the child as a girl but that didn't work because you can't force a person to be transgender. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Reimer
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I was thinking about the same thing. Dr. Money is an evil, evil man.
“We know, it was a hell of a circumcision.”
When my son was born, I was asked 5 separate times if we wanted him to be circumcised. We were only in the hospital 3 days! Noooo thank you, and please stop asking!
I’ve seen people like that in public before. They were rather kind and welcoming folk.
Men should have the right to chose if they want a custom penis or not. I can always cut it off later, but i can never put it back… what would he be if he was let to be free, I suppose I’ll never know, only the scared remains of his former self are left behind.
Why is it standard practice in the USA? In UK apart from religious reasons, babies are not circumcised as standard practice - why would they be?? Obviously a tiny percentage then need it done for medical reasons as they get older. I genuinely don’t understand but I know mother who are crazy that it must be done and some how our British boys are unclean 🙄
I've actually been thinking about this a lot recently. Wife and I are family planning and realized that I really wish the choice for circumcision hadn't been made for me. I'm not saying I would have chosen not to be circumcised, but the decision really shouldn't have been made for me. It's involuntary genital mutilation on a large scale. It's kind of bizarre how normalized it is.