Gregg

Rlogan, your comment was an ignorant one. Arguing that "Americans" are being hypocritical for protesting female circumcision while practicing male circumcision is simplistic and naive. If circumcision routinely destroyed a man's ability to feel pleasure or even engage in intercourse, it would not be practiced. Evidently it did not routinely have this effect even in ancient times when the means of surgery were more primitive, because I doubt even a priestly order could have persuaded Jewish men to so risk sacrificing their manhood or the manhood of their children, not to mention their ability to generate offspring, in order to please their god.

Although the Jews apparently did not practice female circumcision, I wouldn't doubt that the practice is as old if not older than male circumcision. And keep in mind that in most ancient cultures a woman was not thought to contribute anything to the formation of a baby--she was merely the vessel it was implanted in. Therefore, accidentally destroying a woman's ability to have intercourse was no big deal--the man could simply put her aside and get another wife.

In the United States, near-universal male circumcision is just a practice that caught on for a variety of reasons and has hung around (pardon the pun) mainly due to indirect peer pressure (people don't want their boy to look different from the other boys in the shower room). It apparently does not do enough harm to persuade people that it's time to end the practice. Even so, new parents are free to specify that their babies should NOT be circumcised.

On the other hand, female circumcision is an exercise in male power and control. It's done to lessen the pleasure of intercourse and keep women from wandering. And unlike male circumcision, it frequently has disastrous effects, making intercourse painful or impossible, and sometimes resulting in infection and death. Furthermore, women usually have no choice but to submit to the procedure. (True, male American babies don't exactly have a choice either, but again, I seriously doubt most parents would subject their children to the procedure if the risk of permanent damage was anything but negligible.)

I'm sorry, I just don't see sufficient justification for equating these two procedures. That's why I suggested you need to educate yourself on the realities of female circumcision. Sorry you took it as an insult. People don't say that to me that often, but when they do, unless they're wrong and I DO know what I'm talking about, I tend to take it as an invitation to learn.

Gregg

CX

I have no idea why this is here. I'm moving it.

Amen-Moses

Two things wrong with this, 1) This is EXACTLY the reason that MGM is done BUT it has nothing to do with women trying to stop them straying, 2) The driving force behind FGM is WOMEN not MEN, in fact in many cultures where it is carried out men (apart from surgeons of course) do not even know about it.

In the UK it is a regular problem amongs ethnic minorities and in almost all cases it is the mother who attempts to take her daughter out of the country for the surgery and the father who attempts to stop them.

In a similar way it is men who tend far more to insist on their sons being the victim of MGM rather than women.

I have spoken to women who have been circumcised and they say they have no complaints about their sex lives, similarly I have spoken to men who have been circumcised who say the same thing, guess what ... I don't believe either of them as neither know what they are missing so how can they possibly judge?

Amen-Moses

macschmermer

"thanks mom for circumcising me"
I have searched but can not find it.
Thanks
Tamara

echoes

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.p...threadid=73849

Toto

My latest issue of Discovery Magazine says that male circumcision appears to provide some protection against HIV infection. Areas in Africa that do routine male circumcision have lower HIV rates than areas that do not. Further details will be forthcoming in a few months.

Amen-Moses

No doubt it would, moist soft thin skin will be far more likely to be infectable than hard dry thick skin. Another reason could be that circumcision does exactly what it says on the label, i.e the men are less likely to wander. (a more serious suggestion would be that with circumcised men the women are far more likely to use extra lubricants which could be reducing viral transmission)

For similar reasons I would expect areas in which purely withdrawal methods of birth control are practiced to show exactly the same sort of reduction in circumcised women.

(strangely people with no arms suffer the least from tennis elbow but I wouldn't use that as an argument for infant amputations!)

Amen-Moses

AquaVita

I don't want to hear that "I don't know what I'm missing" crap just because I've been circumsized.

I grew up a very sexual person for various reasons, and it has always been an important part of my relationships and my life. Has circumcision been detrimental to that in any way? I think not.

It's a piece of freaking skin. Not "an entire part of the penis" as so many people try and state. I've heard people even say it takes off an inch or two from the actual penis! It's amazing just how uneducated many arguments are when it comes to this.

In all honesty, the main difference is simply aesthetic. Granted, I don't have much experience with other men, but from the stories that my girlfriends have told me, uncircumsized men often do not last nearly as long in bed(I guess because of the increased sensitivity) don't "taste" very good, and it just plain looks ugly to a lot of women.

Of course, none of that justifies circumcision if you consider it barbaric or unecessary, and I fully understand that. But to me, the benefits far outweight any possible lessened sensual sensations. Sex is as mind blowing as you want to make it, regardless of other factors.

And in regards to hygeine, I understand there are mixed studies and evidence regarding whether or not it is actually more or less hygeinic, but it seems pretty obvious to me that it's much easier to keep an area clean that does not have an additional layer of skin over it, trapping dirt and sweat and god knows whatever else. Of course it's an area to be cleaned quite often, but unless you can wash there 4 or 5 times a day, I can't see how it's as easy to keep clean without having the extra skin there in the first place.

Adora

In reply to the original topic that was split.

First of all, you have to understand, you can't compare male and female circumcision. Although there are some cultures who circumcise the female in a way similar to male circumcision (ie- they only take a bit of a clitoral hood, or do a sort of "cerimonial" circumcision where the gentitals are just rubbed with the flat of a knife or something) the majority involve a surgical procedure far larger.

Usually part or all of the clitoris and labia are removed, and in some cases the genital area is sew up. And this is why you can't compare it to male circumcision. The only way you *could*, would be if male circumcision involved part of or all of the penis and skin around the testicles being removed. This never happens. Ever. You can still enjoy sex when you have your foreskin chopped off, whereas most cases of female circumcision degenerate greatly or remove completely the female's ability to enjoy sex or reach and orgasm.

You simply cannot compare the two. Ever. The world condems the idea of any man being deprived of an orgasm, but can't give a damn when it's women having their sexuality destroyed.

MrDarwin

As I've said before, removing one testicle from every newborn boy would cut the rate of testicular cancer in half. Anybody wanna try it?

One thing you're lucky to have missed is a bad or botched circumcision. No, they're not common, but they do happen--I knew a guy in college for whom sex was very difficult because too much skin had been removed.

Why anybody would want to fool around with the skin around a newborn boy's penis remains beyond me.