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For Intactness
A Glossary of words relating to Intactivism and normal anatomy. Some of the main ones are illustrated.
Diagrams of male and female anatomy at eight weeks gestation and at birth illustrate the simlarity of structure.
Not "just a flap of skin": a non-erotic animation of how a foreskin works. A more stylised animation to demonstrate its size. A remarkable illustration of its actual size.
A Gallery of Intact Men and their Penises. A Gallery of Intact Men and their Penises in Art. (The entire sequence of five pages is a slide show with music, off-site.) The "luscious beauty" of the intact male.
For intact (young US) men who worry about being "different", a Gallery of Intact Celebrities (with their clothes on). A page each of intact
historical personages,
US film stars former and
current,
US TV stars former and
current,
US sporting heroes,
US musicians, non-US celebrities (musicians,
actors,
sportsmen and others), and
leaders.
A Gallery of Very-Probably-Intact men.
Information for parents-to-be
A brochure, treating intactness as normal, available both online with links and in Word and pdf format. (This was written to answer the AAP's brochure for parents which doesn't even acknowledge that the foreskin is part of the penis!)
- a response to the AAP's "Care of the Uncircumcised Penis".
Fathers
A circumcised father with an intact son - a telling rejoinder to "A boy should look like his father". A cartoon. A 2500-year-old fable by Æsop.
Sexuality
The sexuality page answers "no difference in sexual function between intact and circumcised men". The foreskin itself gives pleasure. A musical illustration. Reports by women about what a revelation intact men were to them. Condoms and the intact man. Tantric sex.
Paraphimosis, one of the few real threats.
Frenulum breve "tight banjostring" - can be readily treated.
Human Rights
Genital integrity is first and foremost a human rights issue.
Intactness in the World
Some people imagine circumcision is universal in the western world. They should see the map of its prevalence worldwide. The same page shows a map of the prevalence of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).
By country: predominantly intact:
New Zealand:
A presentation and an article. From being very rare in the 1950s, intactness is now commonplace. An intact New Zealander celebrates. (.wav file, 103KB)
Australia:
In Australia four boys in five are now left intact some states, more than 19 in 20 in others.
The Pacific
Practices vary widely inPolynesia, Melanesia and Micronesia.
Sweden  (på svenska)
The first country to regulate male circumcision. Items from Sweden, many in Swedish and English.
Finland 
In Finland, where the home circumcisions of six African boys was botched, a working party has recommended that it be at parental discretion and public expense, but doctors refuse to co-operate.
Religion::
Genital Integrity - the broader perspective
A chart comparing circumcision with Female Genital Mutilation (FGM). The UN definitions of the types of FGM. A doctor defends FGM. A study showing FGM does not impair the frequency of women's sex (nothing about the quality).
A form of Female Genital Cutting still common in the US, episiotomy.
Another cruel sexually-related female mutilation, breast-ironing, practised in parts of West and Central Africa.
Intersexuality and the growing demand of intersexed people to have their genitals left alone too.
Mozart, Handel, Gluck and Rossini were among composers who wrote music for castrated singers, and Allegri was one. This was as accepted in Italy in 1600-1860 as circumcision is in the US today.
And beyond the genitals, infant circumcision compared with footbinding.
Background
Some relevant quotations
. A Chronology of the Foreskin and Circumcision.
An excerpt from an influential and wildly fantastical 1900 diatribe against the foreskin, still quoted today.
Scientific references.
Mass media
A summary of circumcision episodes on TV sitcoms, soaps, talk shows and in movies.
Books
Books about, or with significant parts about, circumcision. You can order them through this site.
Fictional positive treatment of the foreskin in Jane Smiley's "Horse Heaven" and in Armistead Maupin's "Tales of the City". A fictional negative treatment of circumcision in Arthur C. Clarke's "3001" (a sort of highbrow Futurama) and in Philip Pullman's "His Dark Materials".
Propaganda
An epic ballad, The Rape of the Cock; multimedia - animations, sound files and a logo
Campaign resources
Readymade T-shirts and bumperstickers from The Intactivism Shop
Also mugs, buttons, fridge-magnets, tote bags, and other gear. Or download a design, print out a bumpersticker or iron one on to a tee-shirt.
Miscellaneous
Types of circumcision articles; circumcision in Shakespeare; infection vs inflammation; diabetes; other "useless" organs, the appendix and Jacobsen's organ; whether babies remember being circumcised; permanent retraction; circumcision and royalty; intactness and Sikhs; sociobiology.
Feedback from readers Frequently Asked Questions
To other Intactivist sites
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Against Circumcision
For parents and parents-to-be:
close-up pictures of an infant circumcison.
Lists of
For Mothers and mothers-to-be:
Sheila Kitzinger's ''New Pregnancy & Childbirth". A thought-experiment. How to raise the subject with a circumcised husband.
The effect of circumcision on breastfeeding.
Complications:
Risks and damage, upto and including loss of the penis and death, The autopsy reports on a Canadian baby who died of blood loss, another when his urethra was blocked by a PlastiBellTM.
Pain:
The pain of circumsion has long-term effects and is only partially relieved by anaesthetics. A report from the AAP recommends avoiding painful procedures, but fails to mention the commonest painful procedure.
Appearance:
For those who think circumcision improves the appearance and is invariably harmless, there's a gallery of pictures of circumcisions. One man's multiple botches.
Side-by-side comparison of the intact and circumcised penis: you can see the difference.
Hygiene:
Who dares to be in favour of dirt? Facts about bacteria.
Disease
Circumcision is said to prevent
By country: intactness not yet common again:
U.S.A.: 
The United States is the only country in the world that surgically circumcises a majority of its boy babies.
Korea:
From unknown, circumcision has become almost universal in Korea in the last 50 years.
The Philippines
A traditional ritual for boys has become medicalised in the Philippines without the need for it ever being questioned. Myths are rampant.
The Yemen
Justified by appeal to Islam, a report of Yemeni circumcision from 1921 details a particularly brutal variant (an answer to "but FGM is much worse")
Religion::
Money:
Evidence that doctors promote circumcision out of greed. The declining rate of Medicaid cover. The real cost of circumcision.
Resentment
Famous men and others who resent/ed being circumcised
Foreskin restoration - a growing movement 
  Vorhaut-Restoration - ausführliche Informationen auf Deutsch
An artificial foreskin.
Motivation to circumcise
The psychology of circumcising.
"Circumcision as a memeplex". Prejudice against intact men. The remarkable silence around the intact penis and circumcision. Circumsurdities - absurd claims for circumcision.
Mutilation, Regrets, Second-thoughts
Why circumcision may be called "mutilation". A mother who regrets circumcising. A last minute change of heart. Women's preference (The Williamsons' study of women in Iowa).
Refusal
Circumcision is sometimes committed contrary to the parents's wishes. To prevent this, a firmly-worded
Doctors' organisations
The American Medical Association's policy statement on circumcision is weighed in the balance (and found wanting) here. It agrees with the recommendation of the American Academy of Pediatrics. The stark contrast between the AAP statements on circumcision and Female Genital Mutilation.
The statements of the American Urological Association and the American Association of Family Physicians - both ethically barren.
Nurses
Advice for nurses questioning circumcision
Midwives
The serious bias towards circumcision of a leading US midwifery textbook (including a chapter telling midwives how to do it (yet it details the disadvantages of each method) - analysed and contrasted with a British textbook.
Ethics
Medical organisations have very little to say about the ethics of circumcision. There is more here.
The British Medical Association has issued ethical guidelines that rule out infant circumcision based on parental preference alone.
An important book, "The Ethical Canary", includes a chapter on the ethics of circumcision.
Two ethicists defend circumcision and attack their critics using flawed arguments. Here is a rebuttal. |
Lawyers and their clients
The legal case against infant circumcision is growing. This section also contrasts the protection afforded cats, dogs and a baby's head against similar procedures.
A shocking parallel. Parental guidance recommended.
Rebuttals:
The case presented for circumcision is hydra-headed: answer one argument and its supporters will produce another, and another, indefinitely. (Urinary Tract Infections, until recently cited as the main reason to circumcise, were only added to the list in 1982) Something else is going on - if the foreskin has so many faults and varied, how could it ever have have survived?
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The RACP has issued a brochure which significantly waters down these recommendations.
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To people who think the subject is beneath discussion.
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