TER General Board
I was researching foreskin restoration in pursuit of an excellent birthday gift for my mate, when I came across this little gem... thought you folks would get a kick out of it
At the risk of making a pariah of myself here... be prepared to read a mini-novel!
Let me just preface this by saying:
While I disagree with circumcision, it is not my place to attack anyone who is happy with their circumcision or happy with the circumcision of their baby boy, and I have no intentions of EVER getting on anyone's case about their choices. I really and truly hope that my friends here on TER who have enjoyed my postings thus far will not judge me based on my opinion, just as I do not judge you based on yours.
Charlie,
When I was pregnant with my son, I told his father that I would leave the matter of circumcision up to him. The more research he did about foreskin and the procedure of circumcision (which is, by the way, a medically unnecessary cosmetic procedure, often performed without any anesthetic, to newborn baby boys who are actually hypersensitive to pain and can go into shock because of the pain --- and who obviously cannot give permission for this sort of procedure), the angrier he became. He even asked his mother why she had allowed him to be circumcised. Fact is, back in the late '70s when he was born, doctors didn't ASK ... they just did it.
The foreskin is a valuable body part, rich in nerve endings (twice as many as the rest of the entire penis, I believe I've heard, though I admit I don't have a reference to cite at this time, so I could be wrong). The glans of your penis is supposed to be an internal organ; it is not meant to be exposed. Foreskin provides both sensitivity (to the man) and mobility (to both the man and, in certain situations, the woman), making sex more pleasurable for both parties. As one woman said after her husband restored his foreskin, "a circumcised penis is like having sex with a broomstick, compared to a well-oiled piston."
Many mens' circumcisions are botched; the curved penises you see are likely the result of a circumcision that was just a little too severe, leading to the skin of the engorged member to stretch so tightly that it causes the member to curve. Some mens' circumcisions are so badly botched that the entire penis is removed; there has been more than one case of young women growing up only to realize that they were initially men. Hospitals also sell and profit off of foreskin.. whatever happened to "first, do no harm"? Ack!
There are benefits to circumcision -- decreased risk of UTIs (but this 'benefit' is a very small one, and generally only true for a few years) and STIs, mainly -- but despite that, not a SINGLE medical association on the entire PLANET recommends circumcision of normal, healthy baby boys, with one exception: some organizations recommend that men in areas with high rates of HIV be circumcised. Frankly, those benefits were not significant enough for me to circumcise my child. Circumcision may lead to decreased risk of STIs, you won't see me encouraging my son to practice anything BUT safe sex, circumcised or not. Link to situations when circumcision is recommended: http://www.pedisurg.com/PtEduc/Circumcision.htm
So, in a nutshell: medically unnecessary. Painful procedure. Risky. Detracts from the pleasurable sensations of sex for both parties.
While many men are still happy with the fact that they were circumcised, just as many men find themselves unhappy with that fact. They feel that a part of their body was stolen from them. It may seem dramatic, but frankly, if a part of my most important erogenous zone had been cut off of me without my permission when I was a baby, not only would you call it FGM (female genital mutilation), I would be TICKED.
Both of my mates happen to be unhappy with the fact that they were circumcised. They feel that they were mutilated. I suggested the idea of a foreskin restoration product as a birthday gift to my secondary mate a month or two ago, and he actually brought it up again today, stating that he thought it was a wonderful idea and that he would then pass it on to my primary mate.
I recommend that any interested parties watch "Penn & Teller's Bullshit!", Season 3, episode 1. I also have the following links available for your perusal, some of which have vast directories of information regarding circumcision (especially the hyperlinked one, that's all true!):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circumcision
http://www.askdrsears.com/html/1/t012000.asp
http://cirp.org/
http://www.cirp.org/library/statements/aap1999/
http://norm.org/
http://www.circumstitions.com/Botched1.html (BE WARNED: GRAPHIC PHOTOS)
http://www.infocirc.org/rollston.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Reimer
-- Modified on 9/5/2008 4:50:22 PM
It's actually not that much of a hassle to keep it clean. 
Look at some of the links I provided, you will easily be able to find that sort of information in at least one of them (even the first one listed, I believe).
