I think I could have accepted a deformity that
was an accident of nature, but I can’t accept that someone did that to
me.
The fact that other boys were circumcised too
never made me feel any better.
I used to think there were 2 kinds of boys:
circumcised boys like me and real boys.
I was circumcised when I was a year old. I
remember my foreskin. I want my foreskin back.
My feelings about the doctor who circumcised me
are too violent to describe.
What circumcision did to my body is bad enough,
but what it did to my mind is worse.
I was just a baby - I couldn’t stop them.
There's a story by Harlan Ellison with a title
that exactly conveys my feelings about having been circumcised. It's: ‘I
Have No Mouth And I Must Scream’
I feel like half a man.
I have revenge fantasies about circumcision.
I have resented my circumcision ever since I
saw my first intact friend when I was 5 or 6.
It cast a pall over my entire life.
It's a life sentence at birth.
I want to kill the doctor who circumcised me.
I have never been able to accept the fact that
someone cut part of my penis off when I was a baby. The sheer
monstrousness of it haunts every waking moment of my life. Sometimes I
think I'm beginning to make some sort of adjustment to it, but then I
see an unmutilated man in a magazine or shower and I become overwhelmed
by uncontrollable feelings of outrage and disbelief that I was made the
victim for life of something so sick. Sometimes I feel I'm at the edge
of madness and just can't handle it.
I think of myself and other circumcised men as
amputees.
I feel as if part of me had been murdered.
Fear, pain, crippling, disfigurement and
humiliation are the classic ways to break the human spirit.
Circumcision includes them all.
To: circumcision_pro_or_con@yahoogroups.com
From: "philip"
Date sent: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 16:22:24 -0000
Subject: [circumcision_pro_or_con] ruined
Send reply to: circumcision_pro_or_con@yahoogroups.com
i
was cut right after my 13th birthday before then i was proud of my
uncut dic but was told by my Mom and Doctor how much better it would be
to be cutwhat a LIE! Now it is so ugly that i am ashamed to
let
anyone see it and there is almost not feelings in it anymore most times
i cant even jack off for the skin is so tight and doesnt move at all
and i go soft from the lack of feelings. And the pain i
suffered
while it heal was almost embarable for weeks it hurt the head was so
tender and hurt for so long from rubbing my briefs then the head peeled
so bad as it dried out that it left sores it was horrible i hate my
Doctor and Mom and always will for ever for what they did to me!
I am against circumcision because I was not
circumcised until I was
45. They said I needed it for medical reasons. If I had it to do over
I’d tell them to go to hell. I lost so much sensitivity it’s almost
unbelievable. No one should do this to anyone unless there is no other
way to fix the problem. An if there is no problem it should never be
done. To me it is child abuse to circumcise a child for no real reason.
100% DONT CUT IT! I am polish/European and was
born uncut. I moved to
USA when I was 2 and felt different from other boys. I didn't like
having foreskin so when I was 18 I got cut because I couldn't [bear]
the insecurity. I'm no[w] 26 and TOTALLY regret doing it. I lost SOO
much sensitivity. There is NO need to cut your foreskin. It's not JUST
a piece of skin. It PROTECTS the penis. My girl and I are NOW expecting
a baby boy and we are DEFINITELY NOT CIRCUMCISING!
At the age of 21 I allowed the US military to talk
me into
getting circumcised. It would prevent disease, they said, and I would
be cleaner, which the girls would enjoy (not much clearer than that)
and such.
What they didn't tell me was that intercourse
would never be
quite as enjoyable, that the reduction in sensation while excited would
make the area feel almost numb compared to before, and that the
increase in sensation when flaccid would lead to make the rest of life
uncomfortable.
I still wish I had my foreskin back.
cirecire90 Wrote 6 months ago
[February 2009]
i m jealous...i m cut n really m mad at my parents
4 having me circumsized...
My penis was butchered at birth and I resent it.
Wait until men
are 18 and let them make their own decision. Otherwise this constitutes
forced genital mutilation.
How did this barbaric religious practice spread to the general
population?
No. 17 · Jesse
...
I myself was originally not circumcised but when I was 12 I slowly
began experiencing Phimosis, the closing of the foreskin, my parents
ignored it even though I kept telling them I wanted to see a doctor
about ti and it wasn't until I was 14 when it began to become difficult
to urinate that I finally got to see a urologist, who told me before
even looking at the problem that the ONLY way to fix it was
circumcision, so I got circumcised and it was a terrible experience,
especially since I was going through puberty, imagine having to avoid
getting an erection because it would cause the stitches to dig into
your penis, AND YOU'RE 14! The age when anything will cause an
erection.
It was only after I finally recovered that I
learned there
actually WERE other ways to stop Phimosis and that my urologist had
LIED to me! In order to push a surgery I didn't need.
And being one of the few people that can remember
having
foreskin and now doesn't have it, I REALLY miss my foreskin, it is
terrible not having it, I lost 2 inches!
Posted: Aug 24, 2009 at 2:57
pm
No. 29 · unimac
I wish my parents never had me circumcised. I didn't care about it
until a few years after I started becoming sexually active, and then it
hit me like a brick wall…the fact that I had something removed from me,
surgically, and that it has happened to millions of other men without
their consent. I thought about it a lot and became upset about it. It
is a serious problem and indicative, i think, of an obscene medical
system.
Posted: Aug 24, 2009 at 4:10
pm
No. 49 · Jeff K.
If being cut reduced sensation all that
much we'd have all these cut men screaming "I can't cum."
I can't. At least not during normal sex. Only
while masturbating.
I was hoping to leave that detail out, but oh well. :/
Posted: Aug 24, 2009 at 6:32
pm
[#30.] No. 51 · Nobody
F*** no. It's my body and I'm still annoyed that my parents had the
audacity to cut off part of my dick.
Posted: Aug 24, 2009 at 6:47
pm
No. 52 · Shawn
@Nobody: I agree, but I more mad at the doctor than my parents
Posted: Aug 24, 2009 at 6:58
pm
No. 66 · Mark
My boyfriend is cut. No, he (unlike the other, uncut ones) cannot
come unless with his own deathgrip, and yes, it was a very traumatic
procedure for him.
Nobody in their right mind should be advocating
circumcision especially in the industrialised world.
Circumcision whether male or female is a fucking
disgrace..
The fact this bronze age bullshit still occurs is utterly disgusting..
I'm furious with my parents for doing it to me as a child..
Posted: Jul 28, 2010 at 1:56
pm
No. 24 · Whoddafunk?
I agree with you David, circumcision is genital
mutilation and I
wish more people would talk openly about this. When I asked my parents
why they circumcised me they didn't want to talk about it and they said
it was just what is done. I couldn't believe they would just do
something for that reason without thinking about it more deeply, and I
couldn't believe how nervous they got when it was brought up. That they
would do something to their child that they can't even talk about or
justify without getting really nervous is crazy....
Posted: Jul 28, 2010 at 2:10
pm
I certainly have enjoyed my share of foreskins,
don't like the
look of scars on cocks and regret the fact that I have to wrap the head
of my un[?]cut penis in silk or some other supersoft material to
protect it during sweaty physical activity. Despite the callouses
developed on the glans of an uncut [sic a cut?]
penis, my head
gets irritated very easily, on into pain, making it difficult to ride a
bike or run. So yeah, I have been a bit annoyed at my parents.
If I’m going to bare any scarred or
partially-amputated body part in the
gym shower, it should be because it had to be done for medical reasons
or
because it was my choice. My penis is no different in this regard. I
don’t want my cockhead permanently exposed to strangers because some
religion told my parents how much of my penis I could keep or because I
was unlucky enough to be born in some country where boys go through
surgery to lose half their penis skin “to fit in”. That’s beyond crazy.
Males who get penis plastic surgery at birth will never know what it’s
like to be a whole man in control of his own body. For me, that control
was ceded by proxy during my first week of life. From then on, I’m just
a
slave; I’m living someone else’s idea of how I should explore my body,
develop and enjoy sex.
Worse than that, it’s taboo to complain that my
(unnecessary) penis scar
is crooked, or that I lost so much skin that my erections hurt, or that
my penis bends because my circumcision is lopsided. Skin bridges?
"Live
with it." Hardened lymph fluid, fistula, cold glans? "Live with
it." Meatal
stenosis? "Everyone’s got it, it’s normal. Shut up."
Listen up: It’s my penis and I’ll decide how much
of it I’ll keep. I’ll decide what’s “beautiful”. I’ll decide what’s
clean. I’ll decide how
safe to keep it from disease and especially from anyone’s scalpel.
Yeah,
I’m angry that doctors and my parents are too brainwashed to understand
all this, but I’m really pissed off that the law doesn’t spare them
from
having an ethical dilemma. It sure stopped anyone from even wondering
whether to cut my sister.
...I don’t feel I’m cleaner, or more attractive,
or more normal for having been put through this surgery. All I really
feel is that I’m permanently branded, like a steer.
- John, from Washington, DC
I was circumcised as an infant, and as an adult I
feel both violated
and mutilated. Not a day passes in which I fail to contemplate the fact
that my genitals were modified in a way that I did not consent to nor
could control - when I did not suffer from any medical issues
whatsoever.
My penis was mutilated without my consent when I
was a baby. Like
many thoushands of men, I suffer pain as an adult from this horrific
act...
Trevor on Student Life (Washington
University), December 2, 2009
I have had nothing but grief from being
circumcised at 14 days of
age for no medical issue whatsoever. ... Due to the constant discomfort
and irritation of having an exposed glans I am forced to pull the shaft
skin forward over the glans and taping up with medical tape every day
just to get relief and feel normal. ... To this day I find it difficult
not to boil over with anger over the injustice of this inhumane, cruel
and barbaric procedure.
Having been so tortured in 1950, I am only lately
coming to grips
with the induced PTSD. My sexual feeling has so blunted that sex is a
chore now rather than a joy.
I was not given a choice. Nobody asked if it was
alright to disfigure me.
Joseph Rissetto, California
on petition to the AAP (# 2,158)
December 21, 2009
I had phimosis, and was circumcised at the age of
11. ...
I never got a choice as far as how I wanted it to look. Years later,
when I read about the condition online, and realized that removal of
the entire foreskin was not necessary… well… needless to say, I got
very bitter.
I really don't understand how doctors can do this
and sleep at night. First do no harm! Then again the ...
doctor that amputated my glands did not even apologize. He also did not
have parental consent. He was sent here in the early 60's to civilize
the Hillbillys by Uncle Sam. I am sure he is in Hell now. Being that he
died before I reached 18 and brought suit against the bastard.
No evidence of psychological trauma?? That is only
because they weren't looking.
If they knew the rage that I have for my mutilator
runs so deep
that I would willingly "return the favor to him" in the way he did me
they might change their mind.
I had a medical circumcision when I was 18, and I
can report that
there IS a difference. Afterwards I was really pissed off because at
the time they offered me a new procedure where they just make a cut in
the skin rather than hacking it all off.? Being totally ignorant I
turned it down thinking it would be good to have shot of it. If I'd
known that I'd be left with scar tissue and the end of my knob less
sensitive, I would have taken it. But they never told me anything about
that.
My mother was advised to circumcise. The procedure
was botched
according to a distressed nurse in attendance. I am over 60 and have
virtually no sensation in my penis. I have no sensation during
masturbation and sexual penetration and have never ejaculated while
conscious. I still have occasional wet dreams. I am married to an
understanding wife, we find other ways for affection.
Would some circumcision advocates please reply and
explain why my circumcision was the right thing to do.
I do have a circumcision. I hate whoever did this
to me. It's
spilled milk, though, I realize. You say that I'll never know unless I
have a circumcision. Well because I do, I can attest to bleeding and
complete destruction of sensitive nerve endings in the glans. Yes, even
a chunk of my glans was taken along with the foreskin. I can't feel
nearly as much as my husband. What else am I missing? I can only
imagine.
Just so you know... I was circumcised and then
abandoned to the
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. How is that for child abuse? How is that
for "cut and run", huh?
What do you say for people like me? What sort of
rationalization do you have for children who had body parts sacrificed
to god or the gods of the medical establishment?
Where was my consent form? Where are my rights for
bodily integrity? I will say this again:
At birth in the United States, I had less rights
than dogs in
Switzerland. At birth in the United States, I had less rights than dead
bodies here. At birth in the United States, I had less rights than
girls at birth.
The allowance of circumcision in the United States
for parents'
whim is sexist, ageist and places the rights of dead bodies higher than
my rights at birth. Where is the outrage? My body, my rights!
nhguy78 of
Hudson, NH, on Rant/Rave February 21, 2010
to be honest the whole circumcision thing has
gotten me paranoid and
scared, I would never put my childern through something like that. my
parents were very nieve for having me circumcised because they thought
it was better for me but in the long run it left me with a skinbridge
and im still goin through hell because of it!
Okay, circumcision is bad i was circumcised at
birth and after
reading this article and many others i feel like a lost arm at birth. i
have never felt the foreskin i am starting the restoration process but
you lose so many advantages being circumcised. I now hate my parents
for removing part of my body a very important part may i say. When i
have kids if the woman wants to circumcise the kids i will say fuck her
and ask for a divorce.
in teenage years (hitting puberty) i felt lots of
discomfort in
becoming erect and i ask some of my friends if they had the same
problem i found out that only the ones with a circumcised penis had
them and they reported occasional bleeding as well.
and so i think F@#$ MY PARENTS FOR CIRCUMCISING
ME!!!!!
i am extremely pissed off that my mom forced me to
get a
circumcision. ignoring the obvious pain that i had to endure as a
goddamn infant (seriously. i dare you to watch a video of a circumcision
all the way through), and all the sexual pleasure i'm going to miss out
on, i can't believe she'd put me through a barbaric ritual that is
purely religious.
Since my brainwashed parents were obedient, and my
jackass doctor
didn't start the cut where he ended it, I have a weird "red storm of
jupiter" where he tried to change course on my penis. Thank you doc. I
will never know what it's like to have the normal, natural penis I was
born with. Idiots.
After I received this torture, I apparently
rejected my mother and
my parents had a difficult time finding a replacement for her milk.
Then I was so stressed out that it took extra years before I stopped
bed-wetting. The result was to make me a more inward-looking, less
emotional kind of person than I would have liked to be.
I am sure that I would have been a different
person if I had not been circumsized.
Trowbridge H. Ford on The
Local (Sweden), April 29, 2010
I am a circumcised male and I have suffered for
years as a result of a decision my parents made.
This video is very significant and deserves more
publicity.
Be allowed? - no
If I had a son... no!!
I've done enough reading that this whole thing with circumcision is
barbaric. I am jealous of guys that are still fully intact.
I don’t buy that line that male circumcision is
harmless, because my
Bris resulted in some pretty severe damage. I have a large irregular
band of scar tissue, and when I was a teenager erections were painful
and sometimes resulted in ripped, bleeding, skin, making the scars even
worse. Ever since I was a little boy I knew something was wrong. I was
told that circumcision was a good thing, without even knowing what it
was – as it turns out, amputation of about half the skin of my penis. I
did not ask for part of my penis to be destroyed, and I’m furious when
I read clueless articles like this one that dismiss the harm with
clueless chuckling. ...
I’m a man who had his foreskin removed without his
consent. If this
was done to me as an adult, how much money would I be entitled to and
how much prison time would the perpetrator receive?
I didn’t want to be mutilated. Fuck you if you
have come to
terms with it and want to tell me to get over it. Fuck you. Really.
That’s about all I have to say about that.
Comment #145: on 05/10 at 09:30 AM
I was born a muslim
and was circumsised. I
feel that I had something taken away from me, which is not natural.
Nobody had the right to take something away from me.
Why don't we force kids with big noses to have
plastic surgery?
Humans deserve the right to choose what happens to their bodies once
they are adults.
I was mutilated at birth and i deeply resent this
terrible decision.
Most people don’t know or even care to look but 4 out of the 5 most
sensitive parts of the penis are amputated by “circumcision”, and if
that wasn’t terrible enough the last remaining sensitive part “the
glans” becomes “keritanized” which means that due to abrasion a
substance called keratin, the same substance that forms your nails,
builds up in the glans to help protect itself, further reducing
pleasure. it is a crime beyond comprehension to mutilate children male
or female. Lets stop this wave of mutilation. NO EXCEPTIONS.
As a
male-bodied individual, I am really upset that my parents made the
decision to have me snipped when I was fresh out of the oven without me
even having a say in the matter. I am against controlling other peoples
bodies in any way. If the statistics on the health benefits of being
circumcised were accurate, which I deeply doubt they are, it should
still be a decision left for an adult-male to make about his own body
when he is of age to safely undergo the procedure of his own free will.
Its just my luck that i was born into a jewish
family. i cant even
prove to them that circumcision is bad because their so brainwashed! I
hate them for it. If they come out with a way to genetically
regenera[t]e foreskins so its like you never even lost it ill be first
in line
fuck my parents. they said they did it to me to
fit in. fuck that,
likes its such a big deal to be a tiny bit different. yea i agree it
might be a little more attractive to females but that is by far not a
good enough reason to go through with it. not only that but as a baby
it is out of your control weather it happens to you or not. thats the
fucked up part. is your body and its not even your choice. its honesty
fucked and i can not put into words how pissed i am
Just turned 70 – had a badly botched infant circ
excessive skin
removed with significant scarring and irreperable nerve damage – result
left me unable to enjoy any kind of mutual sex activity – not only is
it non-productive, but it is just plain painful. There has been
considerable emotional damage over the years as well, plus eventually
the complete estrangement from my entire family – I feel mutilated and
raped – at this point, I hope I will live long enough to see the end of
this monstrous practice, and the best would be to see it made totally
illegal as FGM is now -
I was cut as a baby and have suffered because of
it…. and I’m very
angry with my parents because of that decision. Sure there’s a lot of
risk in life. But circumcision is NEEDLESS amputation and mutilation of
a normal, healthy, functioning body part.
Circumcisers are child rapists, most just don’t
realize it. My
mother’s OB/GYN inflicted circumcision on me, and I’m beyond PISSED
about it. How does anyone except ME have the right to cut off important
parts of MY penis? If you get the urge to cut up your baby, cut
yourself instead.
Another reason why religion should be keep away
from EVERYTHING! Any
docter who thinks this should be done should have their profession
denied by law.
Anyone who performs this should got to jail on
MULTIPLE felony
charges. The doctor who did this to me…I wan[t] to behead with his own
damn scape[l] knife.
Man, I wish I wasn’t circumcised. I was
circumcised at birth, so I
never had a choice. Now I have all these embarrassing scars. I can’t
forgive my parents for doing this to me.
I was circumcised, It has many problems, the most
severe being the
desensitization on the glans (penis head). Over time, after rubbing on
rough fabrics in the underwear, it keratinizes, meaning a thick layer
of dead cells form over it, eliminating a lot of sensitivity, and on
top of that the millions of nerve endings are damaged or even
destroyed.
This makes it take very difficult to do things
normal men can do like masturbating and having an orgasm.
I was circumcised at birth and I AM mentally
scarred and resent it
deeply. You only have to work out how a foreskin acts like lube during
masturbation and sex to know us cut guys are missing out on a lot of
pleasure for no good reason at all.
One of my best friends killed himself because he
was so disturbed by being circumcise.
strivealivebrian on Moms Health September 30, 2010
I have got cut when
i was 10 years old & i still have sleepless
nights. I choose to do it as my dad said everyone has it. But my mom
said if i leave pakistan then i don`t have to have it done &
people
die Also i will miss my dick ( i regret it ) she was right.
My mother was not in the room when I had my bris.
I confronted her about it when 27 yrs old, she said she would still
have done it to me even if she knew I would kvetch about it to her when
I was 27. If I could have been self aware & able, I would have
put
the moyls head
through the wall and
used his instruments to cut off his genitals and ram half down his
throat and the other half up his tokhus.
It would be a giant leap in the right direction if
they ban infant
circumcision. I had no choice, my body was cut and altered. That is
mutilation by the very definition of the word. Men are getting
information on what circumcision really is and more importantly, what
it removes. Ill tell you that I deeply resent the fact that forced
genital cutting was imposed on me, and millions upon millions of others
(most of them infants: unaware of sex, diseases, pain)....
And if you argue about hygiene issues, take a walk to your local
pharmacy and look at all the products to help maintain and aid in
female hygiene, try to find a product that men need other than soap.
None, and they cut me so that i would be cleaner? WHAT THE F...!!!
All I can say is i hope future generations will be spared from this
genital cutting so they can enjoy the pleasures of an intact body.
"My grandfather was circumcised with a reed, and
my father and I
were circumcised by a Gillette blade. I still remember it. When the man
came to circumcise the boys they were taken to a separate place and
kept behind a kind of screen. I was five years old and very curious to
see what was happening. I went to see, and they saw me and grabbed me
too. I am still angry about that."
A Ugandan businessman quoted
in "The Masque of Africa" by V. S.
Naipaul, October 2010
I am a victim of infant circumcision. The
"ancient" Greek and
Roman civilizations did not practice circumcision, so I am uncertain
why we did so in the twentieth century, when modern sanitation and
medicine precluded the need for this unnecessary and barbaric practice.
I cannot forgive my
parents for subjecting me to Judaic religious practices
when we are not Jews. STOP INFANT CIRCUMCISION NOW! The UN Convention on the Rights of
the Child bans it in most developed countries. [It doesn't explicitly, but that's
a logical interpretation of it.] Why not the
USA?
NYCAustinNYC
@80jasey
I am also "a victim of infant circumcision". My
nominally
Christian mother had it done because she was told the lie by her doctor
that doing so would eliminate the chances of me giving my future sexual
partners vaginal cancer.
:-(
jimmymastiff (26 October 2010)
circumcision is disgusting....let the child choose
if he wants his own penis mutilated when he grows up...I HATE that I am....it really
is barbaric and unnecessary....
I wish I were no circumcised. I feel cheated out
of that extra
sensitivity it gives a man down there... the glans were meant to be
covered up and protected... it's false to say that the extra skin will
spread disease. If a Father did his job right and TAUGHT his son how to
clean himself properly there would be no argument or discussion about
that. ....
I don't forgive my parents, and I was 2 days old.
the reason most
boys don't get mad at their parents? because they don't UNDERSTAND what
happened to them.
...trust me, if I could have I would have killed
the people who did it to me...
I am SO GLAD someone is doing this [the San
Francisco ballot]. I
strongly resent having been cut. Circumcision is medically
unjustifiable genital mutilation of uninformed, non-consenting minors.
Religious reasons for doing it are not acceptable,
for you can
create a religion to sanctify anything (e.g. Mormons with polygamy,
Rastafarians with marijuana). Mutilating babies' genitals is nothing
short of barbaric.
I am very dissatisfied with the results of my
unauthorized genital
alteration - what would you say to me? What you say to many men who are
offended by our culture's lack of respect for bodily integrity?
I wish my parents and the doctors hadn’t shoved
THEIR beliefs down
MY throat when I was helpless to speak up about it. They cut away more
than my flesh, they took away my freedom of choice over MY OWN body. I
agree, NO ONE has the right to force their beliefs on anyone else. That
includes my parents. My body, MY choice.
I was circumcised as a baby, and no I am not happy
about it. Did it
prevent me from getting HIV? NO! I know a many who are HIV+, all but 2,
my boyfriend and one other guy I know are circumcised. If the study
were performed among gay men in the US most likely the majority of men
infected with HIV would be circumcised, simply because this barbaric
practice still rules in the US not because there are really any
meaningful differences among the risk of infection between circumcised
and those left intact.
Circumcision is a barbaric practice whether
preformed on males or
females, and male circumcision has been used as a means to prevent or
cure every malady imaginable, now HIV. It is simply ridiculous to treat
a natural part of the male body as a defect and a cause of disease.
I
was circumcised at birth. Now, as an educated, sexually
active,
27-year-old adult, I wish it had not happened. I won't say
anything about the pain and
suffering of the
physical event, because it's true that I don't remember it (though
anyone who has witnessed one can tell you the baby is in horrific pain
throughout the process). What I am going to talk about is how
I
feel now. I feel a sense of loss for the fact that a physical
part of me is permanently missing without my ever having known
it. More painful than that is a sense of violation.
Something was unnecessarily done to me as a baby that I would not have
chosen to have had done if I had been given the choice as an informed,
consenting adult. (And yes, I do know it to have been
unnecessary
because I have been able to discuss the issue with my father.
He
confirms that he and my mother were undecided about
it and
asked the doctor for advice. The doctor said that everything
appeared healthy, but that he recommended it anyway for the cosmetic
and societal reasons. It was this preferential, non-medical
recommendation that led to my mutilation at birth, and many other baby
boys in the 1980's and other decades.)
The only thing I can do about it is to undergo
foreskin restoration,
either a surgical or mechanical process. I am choosing to do
that, but I also know from my research on the subject that it is not a
reversal of my circumcision, but only a physical simulation which may
or may not be successful in fully amending the altered appearance and
function of my penis.
I have heard it said that many women prefer circumcised men.
I have been with many women and found through my own sexual experience
that I prefer women with natural pubic hairstyles and small nipples on
medium-large breasts of a certain shape. I have respect for
my
sexual partners and feel that I can either accept a woman's body or
find someone else who better fits my preferences. I would
never
ask a woman to change the way she grooms her pubic hair or expect her
to surgically amend her breast shape or nipple-to-breast
ratio.
And I hope a woman would have more respect for herself than to change
her body to please a man who felt his preferences outweighed her body's
natural form. I was appalled to see a woman's contribution on
Circlist where she proudly recounted consistently nagging her boyfriend
to be circumcised, and his subsequent compliance despite initial strong
refusal to do so. I wish I had been his friend so I could
influence him to see that he deserved better than a woman who would
criticize his body, and I wonder whether she would have been willing to
change herself if he had imposed a preference on her that didn't match
who she was physically. So I don't think the old "women
prefer
circumcised men" argument holds up. Every individual in the
world
is different and has different preferences about the appearance of
sexual partners. Imagine how we would look if, when we were
infants, our parents had surgically altered everything about us
that they suspected our future sexual partners might not
"prefer."
Another concern I've heard is that circumcised fathers want their
sons to look like them.
My father is uncircumcised, and when I occasionally saw him undressed
as a child, I didn't think anything of the fact that his penis looked
different from mine. And I imagine that if I had thought
anything
of it, the presence of a foreskin wouldn't have even made the Top 10
list of differences between a 34-year-old's penis and a
pre-schooler's. Now that we are both fully-grown men, we have
not
seen much, if any, of one another's penises in many, many
years.
As someone whose penis did not (and still probably doesn't) look much
like his dad's, I have the experience to say with full knowledge and
authority that that particular question is a complete non-issue.
Then there's the
hygiene argument. I
just ran my theory by my uncircumcised roommate, and he confirmed that
an uncircumcised penis does not develop odors, accumlated smegma, or an
inability to be retracted healthily if its owner invests a few seconds
a day in quickly cleaning it in the shower. Unless I'm the
only
circumcised guy in the world who washes his penis in the shower, that
doesn't sound like an added burden in any way.
This is the perspective of one circumcised man who
wishes he were
not. I know that a lot of guys who have been circumcised
don't
mind that they are (some report a sense that they "got it over with"
without having to remember it, but of course circumcision isn't an
inevitable event that you must submit to sooner or later, so I don't
know where that frame of mind comes from). Anyway, I'm glad
that
many them don't mind, because I know from my own experience that it's a
very painful thing if you do mind. I'm glad they don't have
to
face those feelings. But the fact that many men are fortunate
in
that respect doesn't mean that it should continue - what if the next
baby boy who undergoes routine infant circumcision grows up to feel the
way I do instead? I would rather not take the risk of letting
that happen. If a man reaches adulthood with his foreskin
intact
and decides he doesn't want it, let him choose to have it
removed. Options are far more limited for men who reach
adulthood
without it and wish it hadn't been taken away.
(Question:
are there any health insurance plans that treat infant circumcision, or
even adult voluntary circumcision, and adult foreskin
restoration
the same way?) If I'm fortunate enough to become a father, no
son
of mine will be circumcised. That's for him to decide, and I
will
not rob him forever of the opportunity to make that choice for
himself as an informed adult capable of making it.
Kevin, by email on December
19, 2010
I too am a victim of circumcision. My quality of
life because of the botched penis "fix" makes me a very depressed
person.
I was circumsised as a baby and ended up with a
super tight
circumcision which has literally scarred me for life and is
uncomfortable. I blame my parents for what they did to me and this has
affected our relationship no doubt. I cannot understand how any
intelligent free-thinking individual can agree to have their son
mutilated for no medical reason whatsoever. If it was my choice I would
never have done it (and my 1 month old son won't be mutilated either).
I am a 20 something male that deeply wishes his
mother hadn't
circumcised him. I feel that this North American society seriously
ripped me off. This is individual liberty 101 folks. It is my body, it
should have been my choice to remove a perfectly healthy body part- not
my parents, not anyone, me, the person whose genitals these are.
I was circumcised, so I know quite a bit about its
damaging effects.
Circumcision does cause many men severe psychological problems. It has
caused me feelings of being raped, sadness, depression, betrayal, and
deprivation. I am constantly reminded and it causes me pain and sadness
everyday that i was mutilated and my body was scarred. I first learned
of circumcision when i was 12. I feel like i have been stabbed in the
heart and am depressed that people would do such an inhumane and
asinine thing to children. ...
I'm 29 years old, and was mutilated-oh sorry,
let's use the
politically correct phrase-circumcised shortly after birth. It has
severely affected both my body and psychological well being. I have no
sympathy for my parents who allowed it to be done, the doctor who
performed the barbaric act, or my community that did not protect me
from this form of physical and sexual abuse. But I do have plenty of
anger for them, with enough extra for people like you.
How dare you spread your filthy propaganda trying
to persuade people
to have HEALTHY, FUNCTIONAL tissue amputated from those who cannot
consent. You probably have no idea what the functions-yes plural, there
are multiple-of the foreskin are and yet you have the audacity to write
that disgusting, baseless pro-circ drivel. People like you are shameful
and if you ever have a circumcised son don't be shocked if you find out
some day that he resents you for it once he learns all that was lost.
...
The bottom line: It is WRONG to amputate healthy
tissue from those
who cannot consent. All people should have a right to genital integrity.
I am a man that was non-consensually circumcised
as a neonate and I
really wish I wasn't. I wanted to have the choice to keep my complete
genitals and find out for myself if my foreskin was significant.
My muslim parents had me circumcised as a 3 or 4
year old in a
Glasgow hospital by a jewish doctor. I am now 40 and have always
resented the procedure done to me without my informed consent. I still
cringe at the humiliation and shame.
I was circumcised after birth and wish I'd been
left intact. My body
healed poorly from the procedure and I was left with a skin bridge that
made me very self conscious after puberty. Many years later I had
surgical correction but I have vowed that I would never put my son
through the same ordeal
I'm for it [the San Francisco ban]. There's not a
good enough reason
for it [circumcision]. Mine was botched. I still resent my parents for
doing it based merely on aesthetics and tenuous claims of hygiene.
Although I'm not Jewish, I was circumcised at 5
months of age, and
now I'm older I am really suffering the consequences. A numb penis is
no pleasure, intercourse is unproductive, even masturbation is often a
failure.
I’ve endured a lifetime of discomfort, pain
(physical and
emotional), recurrent infections requiring massive and lengthy doses of
antibiotics to cure, which have now caused life-long digestion issues
ALL because of a (botched) "perfectly routine circumcision." Do NOT try
to tell me it’s not a big deal. My penis should have been left alone so
that *I* could decide what to do with it, not some quack doctor looking
to pocket an extra fee at my expense.
...
I consider circumcision rape, I am circumcised, I consider circumcision
rape and mutilation. It was against my will, and ultimately I Speak
that now. I wish it were legal for me to execute people.
...you could also count me as one
who realizes that his
own infant circumcision was an infringement of his
physical
rights. A significant one. And the realization has
been an
emotional burden to me. I cried every day for a
while back
when I first realized, ten years ago or so. I haven't cried
about
it for a while and usually it's forgotten but sometimes I read
something or someone says something that flares it up again..
The
San Francisco thing flared it up again.
- Aaron to this site, June
17, 2011
As
a male in my early 40's I was the victim of circumcision for no more
reason than it was the fad of the 60's and 70's and explained away as
hygienic. I blame my parents for this and their decision to go along
with prevailing fashions rather than make their own investigation and
moral decision. I feel robbed as a man both of my foreskin and more
importantly my choice to make decisions about my own body.
When I read about the functions of the foreskin,
how much more
sensitive intact men were, and how much more pleasurable sex was for
intact men, I had a mixture of feelings come over me: anger,
depression, resentment, hatred, among a number of other things. Long
story short, it drove me into a deep depression.
I'm a man who is circumcised and nobody asked me.
It's a permanent choice inflicted on me.
It also has damage they don't speak of. I'm numb there. Obtaining orgasm is
incredibly difficult for me and always has been. Either by
myself or with a partner.
Gee thanks.
Plain and simple this is genital mutilation. You
are cutting off part of a person's body. Not YOUR body. Someone else.
That is physically inflicting your beliefs on
another person who can't defend themselves.
I'm all for making this barbaric practice illegal
to be performed on children.
It is cosmetic and non necessary and those
criteria alone should prevent it from ever occurring again.
...
Personally
I do consider circumcision mutalation and lament my Catholic parents
having been talked into allowing our family doctor into taking away a
large number of my nerve endings. To cut or not to cut should have been
my choice.
I was circumcised - and I am NOT happy with the
results. We need a
worldwide end to this torture and genital mutilation of children.
Adults can cut, pierce or tattoo their own bodies if they wish. 4
months ago
I am a Latin American man who has been
circumcised. I did not have a
choice in the matter being an infant at the time. I can wholeheartedly
state that I wish I had my foreskin. ...
The real issue here is choice and the fact that there is no, NO
scientific proof that circumcision is beneficial in any way and all it
does is desensitize the penis. Males lose about 35 to 40% of
sensitivity when circumcised, all based on religious mumbo jumbo and a
perpetuated lie that circumcision makes the penis more hygienic and
safer.
I feel as if something that by all means should
have been my
birthright has been taken from me - the right to even have a say over
what is and isn't done to my own body. ...
I feel that if someone like me would finally step
forward, someone
who has been so badly damaged both physically and emotionally by what
supposedly is a preventative health measure, [then] so would others. I
think that it could be the very thing necessary to start the cascade
that could derail routine infant circumcision everywhere.
My father converted to Islam in 1990. I was early
in my third year.
I remember being circumcised. It's my earliest memory. It's too vivid.
I can't shake the pain every time I think about it. I've been
mutilated. Between 10000 and 20000 erotogenic nerve endings taken from
me and I had no say in the matter. I'm? mutilated.
I want to kill the doctor who did it to me. And
I'll never forgive my parents for letting it happen.
From
my own personal experience, circumcision did not make it feel better.
The doctor cut too much skin off. It is a very imprecise procedure and
it really depends on how much the doctor cuts off. It is hard to
estimate how much to cut.
The doctor cut too much skin
off. It was way too tight and it is extremely painful when stretched. I
absolutely hate it. I regret having it done. After circumcision, the
skin on the organ becomes extremely dry and is prone to severe
irritation. Also, they supposedly say circumcision makes you last
longer in sexual relations. This is not correct. In fact, after
circumcision, there is so much irritation of the skin from the missing
foreskin that you go off sooner.
...
I hate the effect of circumcision. If you were
circumcised as a
baby, you don’t know what you are missing. I don’t believe people
should live in ignorance. I don’t believe we should go on being a
society that says sexual pleasure does not need to be as good as it can
get. I don’t support, “As long as it is kind of good feeling, it is
enough. Settle for ho-hum pleasure. Who cares about full sensation and
feeling.”
My husband is very upset that he was circumcised.
He has
scar[r]ing, nerve damage and a fistula that won't heal. All from
routine infant circumcision.
Kirsten Veronica William on
the Huffington Post, October 4, 2011
Two teenaged sons are now asking WHY did I allow
doctors to DO THAT
TO THEM??? Wish I hadn’t… Parents now have much more information
available to them to help with the decision. If I knew then what I know
now – I would have left them intact, just the way God made them,
practically perfect in every way!
- smc626 on , October 4, 2011
I've lived with it 50 years and I fucking hate it.
I should have been given the choice at least.
I
had no choice
when I was cut. I had a friend who decided to have circumcision done
when he was twenty so he would "look like everyone else". Many months
later I asked what was the difference. He said " my sex world went from full color to black
and white and I can't go back". I feel I was abused and
robbed of a important experience.
I hate being circumcised and I hate the monsters
that forced their
creepy religious sacrifice on me. It has done major damage to my sexual
function. Anyone but a parent would go to prison for this sexual mayhem.
I
was circumcised at birth—and it wasn’t to prevent HPV or HIV. The
reasons to do it change each year.
...
The harm circumcision has caused me physically and psychologically is
immeasurable.
...
It started for the wrong reasons. It causes harm. And they will keep
finding more reasons. But none of them hold a candle to the fact that I
was born with a foreskin and it was part of my body
and I did not want it removed and it was taken without my consent. I
have a right to my body.
Dr Meg – ...
As
a male circumcised at birth, I am angry and feel that I have been
cheated of a vital part of my sexual anatomy. Given that millions of
men worldwide are left intact, it seems the American medical community
would do better to investigate methods of caring for the intact male
instead of cutting off a part of the body because it is inconvenient.
...
The issue is a matter of PERSONAL choice – not the
choice of the
parent or doctor but of the individual whose rights are being taken
against his will.
Hi, I was just a baby - I couldn’t stop them. My
mom said they had
to tie me down and also hold me down so they would not screw up. But
they did anyway. They cut off too much skin and when I was younger I
looked like a peeled banana. I feel like only part of a guy. I have
never been able to accept the fact that someone cut part of my penis
off when I was a baby. ...
I have never been able to accept the fact that someone cut part of my
penis off when I was a baby. The sheer stupidity of it used to haunt
every waking moment of my life. I was jealous of the guys I knew that
had been able to retain their 4skins. My brother had his first son
circumcised and then he had to take him in for "corrective surgery" to
fix something that should have not been done in the first place. He
said "NO!!" to his other 2 sons and I said "NO!!" to [having] my son
circumcised. He has no problems with his penis or his 4skin. I saw a
lot of screwed-up penises in school and the YMCA when I was younger. It
really freaks me out when I hear people say that they are going to have
their son cut.
When
I was about 5, I
observed most boys in my class weren’t like me, as circumcision almost
exclusively religious in my country (My family aren’t Jewish or Muslim)
plus my second brother was born around this time, and he was left
intact. I only learned this year that my two youngest brothers were
allowed to keep their penises in their proper state because of money
issues, and that my mother was dead against circumcision, but
eventually gave in to my father’s demands.
...
As for complications, I’m all too familiar with
them. In the past
I’ve been asked by partners what was wrong with my penis. I’ve recently
come to learn that the abnormalities are called “skin bridges”,
previously, I didn’t even know there was a name for them. Smegma
gathers beneath them, but instead of simply retracting, then washing,
which is what I’d do were I…unmodified, I have to poke out the smegma
with a paperclip, a most annoying task. And here I thought circumcision was meant to be
cleaner. ...
If i could make my penis
normal again, I’d
do so in a heartbeat,
but short of a scientific leap in tissue regeneration or time travel,
or finding a magic lamp, I don’t see that happening. It’s easier to
destroy than create, and sadly this is especially true where infant
circumcision is concerned.
I was circumsized and it was botched. I am 42 and
never had a
satisfactory sex life or long term relationship. The scarring is
horrible and I have no sensitivity in my penis. Think on this. My life,
while not ruined, is very unhappy. I also hate my parents for letting
this happen to me. Parents let your children make up their minds as
adults PLEASE. Do not let their lives become mine.
I had "the op" at birth and wish I hadn't. ...
-
so it is all about "grossness"? Ever thought about the **complete loss
of sensation** "down there" for those of us who have "been done"? No,
of course you haven't. I now have no more sensation down there than the
back of my hand. ...
I
wish I was never circumcised after doing research, and I hate the fact
I can never reverse it. I wish parents were more informed, my folks
just thought it was what they had to do. So please, do the research,
understand, and perhaps you’ll leave your kids intact.
i was circumcised as an infant because of my
parents being jewish.
because of my circumcision, i am now 19 and i cant have sex. my penis
has severe keloidal scarring and lacks the skin i need to have an
erection without pain. the only hope i have is undergo more surgeries
to remove the scar tissue, which has a 50/50 chance of growing back,
and undergo foreskin restoratin to try and regain skin. because of my
circumcision, i am not on a speaking terms with my family because their
ignorance and lack of compassion for me as their child has cost me the
chances of having sex, a relationship, and children. ive also become an
atheist so the irony is that circumcision doesnt profit me anything in
eyes of a god either so it was truly all for nothing. ill probably
never get an std though. you have to be able to have intercourse to get
one.
- Cameron Christopher Cross
on Facebook, December 2, 2011
My own mother was, I imagine, very easily talked
into to sexually
mutillating me when I was first born and I have NEVER forgiven her (I
never will, either), in spite of her and many other of her defenders’
excuses...
As a man circumcised at 5 months of age, who is
no longer able to
orgasm when having intercourse, and being able to masturbate only with
great difficulty, I am filled with loathing of the man who did this to
me...
Bear in mind that he was paid to do this...
I have consulted a urologist, and though he said
that the cutting
was neat, he said the loss of sensitivity was inevitable sooner or
later. This is why infant circumcision is very rare here, except among
Jewish and Muslim parents, and whilst adult circumcision is possible,
very few do it, and for very good reasons.
... I feel
violated that my foreskin was
removed at infancy. For me it's an issue of consent.? An infant cannot
consent to circumcision. If an adult male wants to hack away at his own
penis, let him have at it but I think ANYONE seeking to mutilate the
genitals of a child, male or female, should be criminally prosecuted.
I am circumcised, and I hate it. I hate the way it
looks and it
feels very tight and painful when I masturbate. It may not have caused
any of you pro-circumcision activists any problems, but it has
definitely caused me problems. Just because something works for you, it
does not mean it works for everyone. I am living evidence that
circumcision can cause people problems.
...
I was circumcised as an infant. I discovered this at about the age of
seven, and I still remember my anger, my childish outrage. Who gave
them the right to do this to me? For much of my life I had no idea what
I was missing. Now I do. Now I understand that my penis was mutilated
and desensitized because of anti-sexual values that originated with
perverted religious loonies and then were adopted by the medical
profession.
...
If
it’s cultural pressure that is causing the practice to continue, it
will only end when the counter pressure builds to a scream.
I’ve started screaming. I hope you all will join
me.
At 63 I have perhaps 5% of penile sensation left
due to
neuropathies. Being intact would left me with an intact nervous system
and probably a signitficantly increased amount of penile sensation. I
can tell you with the redundency of our nervous systems, losing
the first 80% of sensation is much less noticable than losing
those next few percent which starts leaving big holes in what we feel.
I have been genuinely pissed off at those who damaged me in this way
for at least 40+ years. ...
I did some research on a random whim when I saw a
picture of an
uncircumcized penis, and after learning all the fact, I wish I still
had my foreskin. I honestly feel victimized that I was not involved in
the decision. It's incredibly unfair to make a decision for somebody
else when it is his body and he has to live with the effects the rest
of his life....
I'm circumcised, I'm also desensitized leading to
the near inability
to ejaculate. My parents aren't even religious, my mother just thought
they look better circumcised, which I think was absurd because the
moment I start dressing myself regularly she would never see it again.
However, I generally don't engage in this debate
because I hate
arguments from personal experience. I recognize that my experience is
the statistical rarity. But my personal opinion is that it should have
been my choice.
It was done to me at birth and not a day passes
when I don't regret
this unnecessary and unwanted mutilation. Loss of sensitivity, sexual
disfunction and discomfort in walking (it is there to protect a very
delicate part of the body). Those who seem to think they are better off
without will soon find out how necessary it is as their skin ages. this
process should be outlawed in any civilised society (as it is for
women), whether practiced for assumed medical (phimosis) or
fundamentalist reasons. Barbarism...
I am cut and i wish that i could go back and make
the decision for
myself because there is no way that i would have that crazy as quack of
a doctor cut my sh!t off! uncut lover here!
I'm circumcised and I hate it. It's just plain
mutilation, and it's
stupid. Yeah, I've heard all the health related arguments, and they're
bogus - they don't practice it in Europe - it's a stupid American
thing. It's humbug. And the fact of the matter is, it does reduce
sexual pleasure.
I was circumcised as an infant. I'm not sure of
the exact reasoning
for me being circumcised, but I was born right at the peak of
circumcision rates in the United States, and in the region where it was
most common. I am unhappy with the decision to have me circumcised. If
I have a son, I will not have him circumcised, because it takes away
his right to bodily integrity.
...
The bottom line though is that once he is
circumcised, it cannot be
undone. It is a permanent alteration to his body. If he chooses later
in life, when he is able to understand what circumcision is, to get
circumcised he will still have that choice if you leave him intact.
- matchrestore on February
15, 2012 and on Bayside Patch, June 2, 2012
I do take circumcision very personal. I hate that
it wasn't my
choice to decide weather to get rid of the foreskin or not. Sex is one
of the greatest things in life. Why mess with your sons penis? Are you
sick? I hate my mom for circumcising me. Im 5ft 8in. My penis is 6
Inches. When i get a good erection sometimes my penis hurts like its
trying to jump out of its skin. I'm a handsome guy believe me i had
nice women but i'm insecure. Men like me wants the big booby girls who
wants the 8inch dicks. It sucks how men can't enlarge the penis because
they are circumcised. Why cross out the best in life?
- i was circumcised and thanks to that i lack
sexual function and my
parents regret forcing it on me at infancy, name ONE benefit i received
from being mutilated
I am circumsized and have always had problems with
achieving orgasm my ENTIRE LIFE I am 47 now. ...
are you people stupid........keep your hands off babies penises let
them decide ...
Hetrosexual men usually only have intimate
experience of one penis,
their own. They are not very well qualified to make a choice that will
effect their child for life.
I have been circumcised and have always been angry
with my
parents for doing this to me. At least they have the excuse it was not
a topic widley discussed in the 1950s.
In my experience as a gay man i can say without
doubt sex is more enjoyable if you have not been circumcised.
If you want to chop off a functioning part of your
childs body and deny them sexual fulfillment go ahead chop it off.
... Im cut and not
happy about it at all. I hate
the way it looks and it has led to some inferiority complexes with
myself. There are numorous psycological issues that spring from this
mutilation and all cut men do have them...we are less likly to trust
easialy. Theres also a physical issue that takes place... Its called
desensitation, so sex is not as enjoyable as it should be. I wish my
parents had me in a time that was educated but in 1990 information on
this issue was not a computer or phone away. ...
...
Intact penis are more
attractive erect or flacid and are certainly instantly recognizable.
Circumcized penises are more likely to be bowed, crooked, or hairy. The
glans is will be dry and pock-marked and of course there is the scar.
Circumcised men like to make people think that intact penises are
laughable because they are insecure. I was circumcized at birth, but I
am trying my best at non-surgical "foreskin restoration". I will continue to be indescribably furious
about my circumcision until the day I die.
I'm 14
and a freshman in
highschool. When I found out what circumcision was, it literally struck
me. I was circumcised at birth and have been very angry about it ever
since. I then decided to order a restoration device, but my dad made me
return it. I did some research and read that uncut men have 3 times
better sex due to "nerve endings". I wanna know if that's true or if
its just made to stop infant circumcision. Believe me I'm 100% against
it. But I need to know. My dad told me all this bullshit that its
healthier and that I shouldn't make a big deal about it, but to that I
say "piss off"
... I am circumcised and hate it! I wish I had
been given the chance
to choose for myself. Intact men can choose to get cut at any time in
their life, though most have no desire to do so. Many men resent being
circumcised.
im a married man in my 20s. i was circumcised as
an infant. my circumcision has left me unable to make love to my wife
without pain for both of us.
if i am able to get an erection - and more often than not, i cant -
orgasm can take hours. and at least half the time, i dont orgasm at
all. my penis is virtually numb and its ridden with scarring. ive had
to undergo surgery to correct meatal stenosis and to correct skin
bridges, both of which were caused by circumcision. im currently
undergoing manual foreskin restoration in hopes that it will help some
of my issues. in addition to my personal experience with circumcision,
im also a nurse. and the first time i saw a circumcision take place in
person, i cried. no one should perform surgery on another person's
genitals just because their mom and/or dad says "eh. that looks weird.
cut it off."
As a clinical psychologist I have counselled men
who were very
distressed that they had been circumcised as infants. They have felt
depression and anxiety, with feelings of powerlessness and anger.
What is rarely talked about in the great
circumcision debate is that infant
circumcision takes the choice away from the man the child
will become.
This is the moral and ethical problem with infant
circumcision. Let the man decide when he is 18.
...
put yourself in
the place of the male infant. Imagine you are restrained, against your
will, and a healthy organ is amputated from your healthy body. Would
you still be so call[o]us toward the feelings and rights [of] male
infants? If the same cutting were to be the fashion for little girl
infants would you still feel so indifferent? I AM A VICTIM OF MALE
GENITAL MUTILATION. I will live out my ent[ire] life having been
deprived of an important and functional part of MY body. I am a human
being, just like you. Would you let some one alter your body forever,
without your consent? ...It
is a known psychological fact, the abused become the abusers. Where
will it all end... ?
I will not
allow you to silence my voice by
deleting my comment. If you REALLY enjoy a good debate as you claim
from your profile, you would have the courage and tenacity to address
this comment, and not abridge it.
I am a 21 year old male rendered impotent by circumcision.
There are tight skin bridges that go all around my
penis that healed
there after the trauma of circumcision, terminating at distal points
along the glans, covering roughly 33% of the head of my penis. As my
penis began to grow, my bridges did not, resulting in painful erections
that started at age 14. I have been technically impotent from the age
of 16 because the pain renders me completely incapable of total penile
erection without pain.
Nighttime is the worse. I can usually control it
during the day, but
at night I awaken every few hours or so to the painful sensation of an
erection, gripping the sheets and holding back my choked sobs. I have
not had more than three hours of consecutive sleep since I turned 17.
I have consulted my doctor on surgeries. A
predilection toward
keloid scars runs in my family, and operating would leave me looking
worse down below, and remove what little erogenous, sensation-receiving
flesh I have left in my penis. I had the surgery, and now have
something that looks like cauliflower on the end of a gouged bratwurst.
I am at a no win situation. I will never be able
to experience
physical intimacy with a woman because of the pain or the shame of the
sorry mess between my legs that I call my penis.
I am not an isolated case. I am not a single
voice. I know that
there are others like me, permanently damaged and scarred both
physically and psychologically, ranging from various states of function
left.
This gallery proves that there are others out
there like myself.
Recent estimates of prevalence of conditions like mine, that is to say,
adhesions of all levels of severity, are anywhere between 10 and 30%,
the last I read.
The whole problem starts with prematurely
separating the congenital
penile adhesions between the foreskin and the glans. This process is
very much like using a blunt piece of wood to remove your own
fingernail. After the flesh was cut on me, unevenly, the prematurely
separated congenital adhesions healed back together permanently. On
other men, these newly formed trauma adhesions may break very painfully
on their own, but mine never did.
Every time people like yourself think that YOU
have any right to
discuss circumcision, there are two voices missing, and they belong to
the people like me who are damaged but so normally afraid to speak out
of shame that they never do, and most importantly the infant who cannot
even speak for himself.
I feel as if my very right as a human being to be
born with an intact body has been abridged.
I hate you. I
hate this website. I hate my parents for ruining me. I HATE THAT YOU DELETED MY LAST COMMENT LIKE
THIS.
I say to you
out of nothing but spite that
your logic, your life, and the very fiber of your being are the only
thing that I can think of that are uglier than my penis.
I will fight until the day I die to prevent this
damned preventative measure.
I'm circumcised and not happy about it. I don't
blame my parents but
I do see it as unnecessary mutilation and the worst part is I got no say in the decision.
I
think the health benefits were more important before we had the
healthcare and hygiene of today (I'm thinking like a couple hundred
years ago). Nowadays you should just wait and let the boy decide.
There are tons of nerve endings there that cannot
be replaced. Women-- imagine not having labias. Totally sucks.
To help save many boys from the phycological and
physical effects of
circumcision that I have suffered since I was unnessercerily
circumcised at the age of 4. My earliest memory was asking a docotor
not to give me the operation.
I am someone who is extremely unhappy with the
decision my parents
made to circumcise me. Without going into details, there were
complications which haunt me to this day and cause me distress. ...
It's too late for me, but not too late to save others from this
procedure.
I’m not a fan of government intervention on almost
anything. But I’m
torn on this because what is being done to kids is disgusting. I have never said anything to my parents,
but there is a huge amount of anger in me now that I
realize what has been taken away from me.
All I can say is if you circumcise your child
before they are old
enough to know what is happening, you had better be prepared for the
backlash later. My dad is already gone, but this affects how I feel
about my mom.
I was circumcised as a baby, as are most American
baby boys to this
day. I know for a fact that this non-consensual sexual surgery as an
infant affects my sexuality as an adult significantly and negatively.
(The otherwise-protected glans is continually brushing against
clothing, which results in a semi-callused surface and a dramatically
reduced sensitivity.)
I remain angry
about it as a 48 year
old man, but women here just don’t get it. Both of my sisters
circumcised all of their sons. Even though I have heard both of them
lament the plight of African women who are subject to FGM (which is now
illegal everywhere), nonetheless they are completely deaf to what they
themselves have inflicted upon their own boys for no reason.
I have only one theory as to why this practice
continues in secular
America. Just as when a man buys a truck or a motorcycle he wants to
customize it with accessories, so also must new mothers want to take
their babies in to the clinic and have them customized as well. I have
no other explanation.
Thank the gods [for
the German
legal decision]
! Common sense at last. I had it done to me and it p*sses me off that
someone was allowed to do something to my body without my permission.
...
I
can honestly say that my parents well-intended decision to have me
circumcised has in some ways ruined my life. My sexual formation was
dysfunctional from the get go. For example, overly sensitive to
sensation, I was really unable to endure intercourse until I was in my
thirties. That ruined my first marriage. Overly sensitive to sensation,
I became fixated at an early age on my genitals. ...
I have had similar issues and can undestand how
this affects
your relationships and self image. I am a german- canadian and was
circumcised at age 4. Have recently gone through 8 years of
non-surgical forskin restoration and am about to have my second minor
surgery for tightening of my new foreskin. (Yes, this is possible and
has a good final result, ask my wife). Alot of work and time to repair
damage done, for a surgery that was recommended to enhance my health
when it has caused me nothing but personal problems and more surgery.
...
I now am a dad myself and want my kids to be protected from this
unnecessary cosmetic work. I wish you other guys luck with this as well.
Just for future mothers (and their sons, for that
matter) thinking about this barbaric anachronism. I resent my mother for so arrogantly having
made such a highly personal and irreversible decision for me.
I would prefer to have been asked as a consenting adult. If your not
happy with it as an adult there is nothing stopping you from making the
medical decision for yourself, just like any other.
I had a circumcision done when I was 13 due to a
tight foreskin. It
was unable to retract and I ended up with paraphimosis, where the
foreskin gets stuck behind the glans. I went to hospital and got that
fixed, and the doctor got my parent's consent to perform a
circumcision. No other options were given, and I have since found out
that circumcision was definitely not necessary. Stretching and special
creams can solve the problem. In fact, many boys are unable to retract
their foreskins until they are in their late teens/early twenties.
Circumcision
has RUINED my life. The
foreskin contains 80% of all the sensitive nerve endings that make sex
so pleasurable. The glans contains the other 20% but because it is now
exposed to the air it becomes keratinised and so loses all sensitivity
also. I have problems getting erections, I find no pleasure in having
oral sex performed on me, and the only way to reach climax when having
sex is by having very vigorous sex in the doggy position. This has
caused intimacy problems, where partners think I am insensitive, and so
has ruined the relationships. I simply get no pleasure from other
positions; in fact, it's a complete chore that I have no interest in.
I wanted to sue the NHS but apparently, because my
parents gave
consent, I don't have a leg to stand on. I feel depressed, suicidal and
I've realised recently that this is probably the main reason for my
failed life in terms of career/job and relationships.
The fact is rarely, if ever, medically necessary,
and if done for
religious reasons, IS child abuse. It is equivalent to raping your
child.
...
I
am a circumcised male born of Christian parents and I regret the fact I
had no decision in it. As an adult knowing what I know about the purely
religious ceremonial reasons for it I would not opt for the senseless
cosmetic procedure. I once knew someone while serving in the military
that had the procedure done because of his frequent problems with
venereal disease. Years later after meeting him by chance he told me it
was the worst decision of his life. He told me after the protective
skin had been removed his penis gradually became more and more
desensitized to the point of lessoning his desire for sex. He said if
he could do it over he would have just used better hygienic and safe
sex practices. It makes me wonder what I’ve been missing by not being a
whole male. Once it has been done there is no going back. It should be
left to the individual when they reach the age of reason.
Here's one male who's enraged over being mutilated, aka circumcised
without consent. Circumcison is literally disfiguring child rape, and
sexual torture when done without anesthesia, which is often.
... I
was circumcised as a child
because my parents were/are Muslims, a faith I rejected in my early
teen years. I was subjected to a barbaric religious ritual I not only
didn’t consent to but also could not have consented to given my age.
...
I
too am a circumcised male who feels he’s been mutilated. The saddest
thing is that the most vehement proponents of the practice seem to be
circumcised males. After the “it combats disease” and “it’s more
hygienic” claims have been discredited, they invariably fall back on
“well it never bothered me so it won’t bother my son when I do it to
him.” It makes me so angry and sad that in order to protect their own
feelings, they are willing to sacrifice the bodily integrity of their
child.
I was circumcised just after I was born, and I am
horribly unhappy
with it. Not because the circumcision was botched or anything like
that. But because over the years I have come to recognize that the
human body is a fascinating and wonderful piece of technology. There
are neurons in my brain that correspond to the nerves on every square
centimeter of my skin. Evolution has fine-tuned nearly every aspect of
my body, so that I can enjoy sensory input to the fullest degree. I
take care to wear earplugs at loud concerts, and wear sunglasses on
bright days.
But a piece of me was taken without my consent.
Not just any piece.
One of the most sensitive, personal pieces on my entire body. It's on a
part of my body I use to express my love for others. Unless there's a
fantastic medical breakthrough in the future, I'll probably never know
what it would've been like to enjoy having it. Do you know how utterly
cruel it is, to do this to a person? Maybe I'm just being a crybaby and
I should instead focus my attention to starving children in Africa. But
that doesn't change the fact that what was done to me was wrong. Stop
cutting children. Just stop it.
"I’m not asking secular Jews to
circumcise their kids....... they shouldn’t try to push their choices
on me."
Someone DID force a choice on me when I was
circumcised without my
consent. And it wasn't a choice that belonged to them, it belonged to
me. Yet everytime I use the bathroom, change clothes, shower, or even
make love, I am reminded that I can never be whole again. No one had
any right to do this to me, and they should be punished for it. ...
I'm male and I hate that I was circed against my
will as an infant! It makes me feel like a partial eunuch.
- Evan Soringler on , July 2,
2012
...
I
am a Jewish male and I wish I could have this procedure reversed. And
besides, how would somebody who had been circumcised be able to tell if
they had lost sensitivity due to this practice? what would they be
comparing it to exactly? The only way to do so would be actual
scientific research.. and guess what? The evidence shows that the
foreskin contains thousands of nerve endings that are cut off, which
decreases sexual pleasure....
I ...
was born and
raised Catholic but have pretty much kicked religion out of my life. I
think religion is bunk. I am circumcised too, and wish I weren't.
And I see no reason why such a thing should continue. I believe it
serves no useful purpose other than to line the pockets of the doctors
who do it, it is barbaric as all genital mutilation is, and it does not
deserve any more tolerance than the practise of cutting off earlobes.
Circumcision should be abolished completely except then there's an
immediate medical need for it, which is extremely rare.
The recent German circumcision ruling is not an
attack on religion —
it is a defence of a boy’s right to say ‘No.’ As the judge said,
‘[parents’ religious rights] would not be put in unnecessary danger if
parents had to wait until the child could give consent to the
circumcision.’ I am a victim of a
Muslim circumcision I did not want. I was never given the
chance to say ‘No.’ It is time we finally recognize the rights of boys
to refuse this procedure.”
...
there is no procedure which truly fixes the loss of the foreskin. and
if there were, we have laws to make people who harm others pay for the
harm they've inflicted. My parents had absolutely NO right to take the
end of my penis from me. it's MY body, ALONE. they did not have to make
this decision. Just like with a tattoo or genital piercing, they could
have easily left me alone, enabling me to make such a choice later in
life in the unlikely event that I would want to do this to myself. yet
they had me mutilated for life instead, and now I can never be whole
again. do you know what it's like when every day of your life, every
time you shower, chang clothes, use the bathroom, or even make love,
you are reminded that you can never be whole again? do you know what
it's like to be reminded of that during your most personal moments,
discovering sexuality as a young man? Yeah, it's a bit harmful. I've been severely depressed for years due
to this, at times suicidal. No one had any right to do
this to me.
... I
did not ever want to be
circumcised. I'm missing part of my genitalia due to my parents' faith
in a religious ideology that I want no part of. If given the ability to
make an informed decision about my own body I wouldn't ever have chosen
to be circumcised. I do not care that my ancestor's cut off their
foreskins for nearly 6,000 years. I'm sure they trepanned each other
too, but I would not want to do that either even if it is relatively
harmless. Circumcision is not at all the same as electing to receive a
rhinoplasty or tattoo.
When an adult brings a knife to a baby's penis and
cuts a part of it
off it is an assault which results in a permanent bodily damage, and so
it violates the child's right to bodily integrity.
...
I was circumcised and I
resent the fact that I don't and will never know how the intact penis I
was born with feels like.
Freedom of religion does not give parents permission to bring a knife
to their children's genitals and permanently alter it to their liking.
Oh give me a break. Really? You're going to
compare letting men
decide for themselves if they want to be circumcised or not... to the
holocaust? Do you know how immature that is? I'm 26 years old, and I
wasn't born in a camp in Germany. But I was born in a hospital in the
US, and as a result, I was circumcised. And I
strongly resent it. Children have human rights, too.
As a mutilated without consent person, I fully
agree with the court.
When the infants are of legal age to consent, they can choose to
undergo that horrible ritual. The uproar from the different religious
groups is just an attempt to maintain their stranglehold on the masses.
I've ... been very much
aware of my own circumcision
from a young age. The unsightly scar around the shaft of my penis,
halfway along its length. The discolored flesh above the scar which
used to be the inside of my foreskin. The scar tissue where my frenulum
used to attach to my glans.
When I reached puberty, my erections were tight
and painful. When I
started masturbating, I didn't understand that I needed to use
lubrication, and as a consequence I seriously damaged my penis. The
skin was bleeding, chaffed and flaking off. I was in pain. At this
point I realized that the skin should be gliding back and forth over
the shaft, but this was very difficult to do because my circumcision
was so tight. I could only move the skin up towards my glans, pulling
more hair-baring skin from my groin up onto my shaft. I couldn't move
my shaft skin downward at all. When I became sexually active, I
realized I had virtually no touch-sensitivity. I felt devastated. Not
much has changed since.
I also frequently experience lymphedema, where the
top of my penis
above my circumcision scar fills up with fluid and swells. This happens
spontaneously and during arousal. Recently I experienced a lymphedema
episode where my penis didn't return to its normal size for over twelve
hours. Due to all my issues with pain and swelling, I can only
masturbate once or twice per month. Even with copious lubrication, my
shaft skin becomes chaffed and bleeds. If I had the choice, I would not
be circumcised.
I am a victim of circumcision as discussed by
Giles Fraser and have
resented this mutilation all my life. If I shared his primitive
superstition, I would marvel at his arrogant rejection of his god's
anatomical design work.
... I was cut as a
baby against my will, and I
too went through a phase of trying to justify having a mutilated penis
that only religious fanatics and a dwindling number of Americans have.
But I knew I was trying to fool people the whole time, and you know it
too.
Break the cycle and quit living out a lie. If I
have a son I would
never mutilate him as a substitute for hygiene and safe sex, EVER. But
then I'm no longer trying to overcompensate for my own sexual
disfigurement.
"It clearly doesn't matter a jot if a baby boy is
circumcised or not"
Say that to me, someone who can't feel sex at all. I feel numb. It's a
dead stick, because some ignoramus thought it would be a good idea to
cut a highly sensitive piece of erogenous tissue essential for full
sexual pleasure off my person.
As someone who was circumcised as an infant
without may consent, I
will tell you to take you child-cutting apologism and shove it. By way
of analogy: you don’t really use your earlobes for anything, right?
Let’s just chop ‘em off, whether you like it or not, because I think
there’s a good reason: it will prove a point.
It’s a matter of bodily integrity/autonomy. If
someone capable of
consent WANTS to have bits cut off of or added to hir own body, power
to hir. Other people don’t get to make that call.
Circumcision does not
cause harm, is hygienic and increases sexual pleasure.
... , I assume from your
name that you are a woman. I
am a man who was circumcised as an infant. I deeply resent it. I deeply
resent any woman telling me that it had no affect on my sexual pleasure
or, even worse, that it increases sexual pleasure. ...
Just observed my first circumcision- kind of
intense, even for a
doc. Kinda pissed my parents let a moyel do that to me. #jews #oncall
- Daniel Mohrer @danmohrer on
Twitter, July 28, 2012
...
Male circumcisions are not all created equal, just as all female
circumcisions are not created equal.
It seems that some men who are unfortunate enough
to get circumcised
'get lucky' in that some or all of their frenulum (the G-spot) is left
intact. So although they are still missing a lot of sensitivity, they
still have some. I was unlucky enough to have had the NHS, when I was
13, circumcise me unnecessarily. It was done for 'phimosis'. ...
I was unfortunate enough to have had my frenulum
removed. I
cannot feel sex now and it has cost me relationships, caused me to be
anxious and depressed, it has lowered my self-esteem, and I also have
erectile problems too due to the complete lack of sensitivity.
The circumcision I had is probably comparable to
complete removal of
the clitoris. If not that, then possibly the clitoral hood and the
labia. Either way, it is hard to understand where some people are
coming from here, turning the abhorrent act of circumcision into some
sort of competition/gender war.
Male circumcision/female circumcision......they
are both equally barbaric.
I have permanent nerve damage that gives me a
fraction of feeling
that normal circumsized guys feel, and even less when compared to
uncircumsized. I am physically unable to top because of my
circumscision. Please, please tell me again how I persuaded myself that
my cock was broken. It's nice to hear from you that all the medical
tests and doctor bills were for nothing, that the years of
embarrassment and all the ointment I had use from rubbing myself raw in
order to masturbarte like anyone else was pointless and I was fine,
that that was just me being pathetic.
...
I am only twenty one years old and have had sexual intercourse hundreds
of times with ten different females, and have had other sexual
experiences with countless others. Out of the hundreds of times I've
had sexual intercourse, I've only been able to orgasm and ejaculate a
handful of times with only one of the ten partners. I've never orgasmed
or ejaculated from any type of sexual foreplay (IE: Oral). Unlike a lot
of circumcised men, I was not too embarrassed to go to a medical
facility to find out what the problem was. After several tests, there
was no conclusive diagnosis.
Completely overwhelmed and hopeless, I decided to
look for answers
online. I stumbled across an Intactivist website that suggessted
performing a test in which a cotton swab is used to contact various
parts of the penis to test the sensitivity. My results were horrible. I
could only feel the cotton swab directly on the tip of my Glans, and no
where else.
In my heart, I know that being circumcised is the
reason why I lack
sensitivity, and because of my inability to reach climax, I've been too
ashamed to be in a steady relationship. The physical and mental trauma
is real.
... My penis was
ruined just because an incompetent
doctor thought I’d be happy with the result. Well I’m not, and if I had
been left intact, I certainly wouldn’t have chosen it. It is high time
that the mutilating procedure was consigned to the garbage can of
history. ...
... I encourage all parents NOT to circumcise your
baby boys. Where
do you get the right to chop off part of your baby's body? They don't
even use anesthetic when they do it to the baby. I'm angry that my
parents did it to me.
Editors' Pick
As a circumcised American man I tell my Mother every year on my
birthday that she had No right to mutilate me like that. I ask what her
reasoning was and she never has a good answer. Circumcision of females
is illegal in the U.S. and the same should be true for males.
Mutilation of a child in any way should be criminal. PERIOD.
I was circumcised at birth and wish I hadn't been.
To me it seems
wrong to do this without consent - which can only be reasonably given
when someone reaches 18 years old. ...
I was done when I was a baby and I'm perfectly
appalled that my
parents, doctors and hospital staff would allow it to happen to me. How
dare they. My son did not suffer this procedure.
I've been circumcised and never had any choice in
it. it made me
feel different than everyone else [growing] up and why is it classed
different than female circumcision[?] I fully resent my parents for
doing this and wouldn't ever think about committing child abuse against
my child such as this, let alone doing it in the name of fairy tales.
Shame on any parent that does this to their child.
[I'm a] Canadian in my late 40s, living in [a hot,
humid country], whose enjoyment of
life was and still is destroyed by not having a prepuce.
... the area that should be covered is super,
painfully sensitive to
any kind of friction or contact ... the glans looks completely "normal"
[but] it sure as hell doesn't feel normal. Any activity, all sports,
cycling, walking up steps, and of course all sexual acts, soon feels
like sand paper is being dragged across the glans and the area just
near it where the prepuce should be. So I have not had sex in about
nine years. Or ridden a bicycle. And I don't think I can get a white
collar job in Canada, not a decent paying one. Even with the super
lightweight cotton pants and the soft organic cotton brief underwear,
which seems to be the least painful combination, normal activity even
in the freezing cold, not possible.
In my case, there are just no other possible
causes of the pain. I
have never had an STD or even any kind of rash in that area. Never
engaged in any kinky sexual practices ... My spouse [and I] had a good
relationship, very compatible world views, many similar interests and
tastes, no interest in having children, good sex life until this pain
came along. And she was very understanding but years of living together
as friends and roommates instead of a sexually active couple took its
toll. And just the enjoyment of going for a cycle togther was gone.
Ethically and morally, I would say she is entitled to compensation also.
- Anonymous (Canada),
personal communication, January 31, 2013
I'm a Colombian who had a badly done circumcision
at age 21. It was
absolutely unnecessary, I was induced by an ignorant circumcised
urologist. I consulted with him because of something I thought might be
a problem, but it was really nothing. The urologist told me I had to
get it done, that it would bring lots of benefits and just started with
the typical pro-circumcision discourse, which I swallowed quietly and
innocently. I went for it too fast, without doing any research, because
of the way the urologist spoke about circumcision, as a panacea that
could bring no negative consequence.
The result was 95% loss of sexual enjoyment. He
destroyed 90% of the
frenulum, practically all the inner mucosa. He didn't even said that
circumcision destroyed the frenulum, all he said was that circumcision
was the removal of the foreskin. Never mentioned the frenulum, which is
the part i miss the most.
Eduardo Rosales, personal
communication, February 5, 2013
I’m circumcised since birth and don’t really even
care to have sex,
the only time it felt great was when I was a teenager. I suppose since
I still had great sensitivity, but over time it becomes numb, the sex
itself now I can barely feel anything and takes a lot just to get an
erection which I lose quickly if not constantly stimulated, I just have
sex for the orgasm which is about all I can really feel, but aren’t
really that impressive.
My doctor couldn’t find any medical cause for my
problem, he could
only recommend Viagra but that won’t increase the sensitivity so I can
actually feel sex so that’s not much of a solution for me. Now that I
know it’s circumcision that’s the culprit ...I’m
currently looking into that and hope it will help restore sensitivity
in at least the glans so I can feel sex more.
I should come clean. I was circumcised at the age
of four. Why ? Who
knows ? I imagine because of my mother's sexual anxieties and a
misplaced sense of hygiene. There was no medical or religious reason.
The doctor arrived at our house one afternoon. I was not expecting him.
I was invited to climb onto our dining table. Climbing down was harder.
But I was done. It hurt. I remember that alright. It was not discussed,
and I was not comforted. At four I suddenly felt unsafe at home.
I have hated being circumcised all my life. Hated
it. As an adult,
it has always felt to me like a mutilation, a diminishment, a grotesque
elective deviation from nature. It has always felt like intolerable
violence against my person by those who loved me. And yes, it made me
wonder about that, too, though age tells me that they did so
unequivocally and were simply misguided on this issue.
I ...
have had sexual issues
do to my circumcision. I have been in such pain from the lubrication
running out in one spot that it created a badly bleeding abrasion on my
penis. This has happened more than a few times and it causes me and my
wife pain and anguish, and caused us to put off sex a number of times.
This has also affected her because it creates painful abrasions in her
as well.
Why my parents choose this painful sex life for me
makes no sense.
Im wondering if Ill ever stop being upset about
being circumcised as
a baby. Iv had so many problems, some of which I was punished for by my
my parents, as a result of something they did. Im not even sure if Ill
ever decide to talk to them again.
I was circumcised as an infant, and have hated it
and those who did it to me since
the day I knew. No one had any authority to deny me the right to choose
to be
whole. Do you know what it's like when every time you shower, use the
restroom,
change clothes, even make love, you're reminded that you can never be
whole
again? Do you know what it's like when you go through your youth and
teen
years, discovering sexuality, yet being reminded of this every single
time?
Yeah, it does some damage to some of us. I no longer speak to my
parents, and
never will again. I just wish they were punished for what they've done.
I am sure the boys who were the victims of this
butcher would like a
lot more to be done than simply not allowing him to perform any more
circumcisions. My own doctor botched my circumcision. Too much skin was
removed, I've had adhesions and pain throughout my adulthood, and it
has severely damaged my self worth as a human being. If I ever find out
his name, the doctor who cut me will also not be performing any future
circumcisions... or much of anything else again, ever.
Please, flying spaghetti monster, don't
ever let me learn that butcher's name.
we decided to circumcise our boy. it was a
painless, easy procedure
that involved a tiny plastic bell and some string. fast forward 25
years: my son went apeshit crazy on me one day as i was chopping
vegetables. he revealed that he was incredibly upset that i had cut him
and mutilated him without his consent and that i should apologize. when
i picked my jaw up off the floor, i told him that no knives were
involved and that i made the decision based on the information i had at
the time. i would not ever apologize for something irrevocable and 25
years in the past. he feels that i took something important from him. i
cannot fathom why he would equate what we did with actual genital
mutilation since he is functional and useful. i told him to read up on
infibulation, and what an actual mutilation looks like. i have tried to
see his point of view, and told him about his cousin who had to have a
circumcision at age 6, due to his foreskin closing up on him. that was
trauma. hopefully he has come to accept what cannot be changed. i stand
by my decision, i just wish my son would understand.
- Jenniefer P.
(Jenniefer_Milot_Pickup) on Huffington Post, April 10, 2014
I was circumcised as an infant, and have hated it
and those who did
it to me since the day I knew. No one had any authority to deny me the
right to choose to be whole. Do you know what it's like when every time
you shower, use the restroom, change clothes, even make love, you're
reminded that you can never be whole again? Do you know what it's like
when you go through your youth and teen years, discovering sexuality,
yet being reminded of this every single time? Yeah, it does some damage
to some of us. I no longer speak to my parents, and never will again. I
just wish they were punished for what they've done.
- Chuck Weder, Saint Peters,
Missouri on JTA, April 14, 2014
#220
If someone had, I'd be extremely grateful to
whoever said 'NO' to my
circumcision, and it's my mother I'm most resentful towards for handing
me over. Like I've said in this thread, I try really hard not to fault
her for it, given the culture, but the facts on the ground (so to
speak) tell me they didn't care what I, the adult man, the owner of the
penis in question, might want.
...
like
most American men, I was circumcised at birth. Didn't have a choice.
I've always known I was circumcised but never really thought about it.
Recently though, after doing some research, I'm kind of pissed I'm
circumcised.
It seems to me that the reasons for being
circumcised, outside of
religious aspects, aren't at all compelling. Health differences appear
to be negligible, and the whole "uncut dicks aren't clean" narrative
seems silly since you can just clean it in the shower or something. I
guess the main reason I'm happy to be circumcised is that a lot of
girls in America are grosses out by uncircumcised dicks-- but that
speaks more toward ignorance/immaturity of some women than any actual
issue with it in my eyes. They just "look weird", and I agree that they
do. But is that really enough to slice off skin off a baby's penis?
Like, really?
This isn't some huge issue in my life, but it's
something I've been
thinking about lately. Just kind of bothers me I had a part of me
removed without having any say.
I was circumcised in 1948 when I was a few months
old. It was by
parental demand and there was no good medical reason for it. I have
spent a lifetime hating this and detesting my mutilated penis. My
relationship with my parents was not what it should have been and I
still become anxious during consultations with doctors. I know of many
other men who are in a similar position. Please, doctors and surgeons
of Ireland, think very carefully before doing unnecessary and
mutilating surgery on a baby or child who cannot give informed consent.
Remember that all surgery carries risks. Think just how much more
committed a young man would be to his chosen religion or ethnic group
if he could make the choice of circumcision for himself.
I was a baby
You would never have punched me
You would never have stabbed me
But you cut off part of my penis
I was a baby
I couldn't have said no
And even if I had said no
It wouldn't have made any difference
As the blood ran
From the wound that you inflicted
With the knife of your power over a baby
With the knife of your power over me
I was a baby
And for circumcision there's no anaesthetic
I probably screamed or as some babies do
Went into the silence of terrible shock
I was a baby
I didn't know
That sex as a man would lack feeling
For lack of the nerves in the tissue you stole
That sex would sometimes be painful
That I would cry and shout from my grieving heart
For my sex, for that deep deep part of me
For what was taken and can never be returned
I was a baby
You would never have punched me
You would never have stabbed me
But you cut off part of my penis
- Max Cade (pers.com.),
November 20, 2014
I am circumcised from birth. Had painful erections
in teen years due
to overly tight skin. I would have preferred to not live that. I got
circumcised twice actually because as an infant they did it wrong and
left me with a cyst in what was left of my mutilated foreskin, then
when they went around the second time they did it super tight. I was
maybe 4-5 when they did that. I had no choice like the millions of
others that have problems later in life. I've been working on restoring
to take back some of what was taken from me.
...
My
genitals were altered unnecessarily when I was a newborn. I resent the
American doctor who violated me, and I resent the American hospital
that provided the venue for this violation. To advocate for the removal
of normal, healthy, functional tissue from babies and children is
unethical, immoral, and abusive. In America girls are protected under
federal law from non-therapeutic genital alterations. ALL CHILDREN --
female, male, and intersex -- deserve EQUAL PROTECTION under law.?
Growing up I never thought about being
circumcised, I just assumed
that's how it was supposed to be. As I've gotten older I've learned
much more about my own anatomy and frankly...I'm pissed it was done to
me. And it wasn't even done for a good reason, my parents just thought
that's how it's supposed to be so it's "cleaner". To put so little
thought in to mutilating your own childs anatomy is insane to me,
like...that was part of my dick and you went and chopped it off like it
was no big deal. Luckily I have a proper one instead of a botched one
or I'd be especially angry (look up botched ones and be horrified), but
circumcision does remove sensitivity and causes the skin to thicken
over the years. It's like if you routinely removed women's clitorial
hood, that sucker would get so much friction it wouldn't be very
sensitive after years and years now would it? I mean yea, sure it still
works fine but it would have worked better if people had left it alone.
I just can't help but feel something was stolen. Leave your kids junk
alone for Christs sake, jebus.
I
hate that I was circumcised! I've always thought uncut was preferable.
Not to mention uncut guys get way more sensation!
Jonathan
E Guydon on the Huffington Post, August 11, 2015
I was circumcised at
birth for asthetic reasons
and am not happy about it. ... please find attached and feel free to
use it. ... I find this keepsake vile.
Throughout my life I’ve experienced somewhat
minimal sensation in my penis
even during time of intercourse, and as I reached my mid 20s I found
that I
had erectile dysfunction, upon which even Viagra had no effect. The
issue
has always been a lack of sensitivity, and a difficulty in getting
physically aroused even when I was fully aroused mentally. Even when I
am
able to become physically aroused, it is difficult to maintain an
erection
during intercourse due to a lack of physical sensitivity – which I must
stress has nothing to do with mental arousal.
By the time I reached my mid-30s and it became
time
to start a family, I found that I had significant
trouble getting physically aroused to the point of ejaculation, which
has
greatly impaired my ability to father children. While I cannot
conclusively
say that the lack of penile sensitivity is due to circumcision, I
strongly
suspect that this is the case, given the nature of the hardening and
scarring.
Moreover, I was circumcised as it is part of the
Jewish Covenant,
and it makes me feel that my parents too were victims, and that it was
their love of me that was twisted and leveraged as a means of hurting
their
child.
My mother did tell me that whereas I was an
incredibly attached
and
loving child for the first week, after I was circumcised my personality
seemed to change, that I took the surgery poorly, and that I didn't
seem to
‘trust’ her and my father thereafter. Her words, not mine, but I do
feel
there is real damage to the familial bond, as well as the physical harm
to
the child, and I have absolutely no intention of passing this cruel
tradition to the next generation.
- Matt L of Beverly Hills,
December 26, 2015, pers. comm.
i was hacked up as a child n been mourning the
loss of my butchered foreskin for 56 years ... I only recently found
out that i was such a tiny baby they didn't cut me, but after 4 months
my skin wudnt retract so they did it then. So I recon im so obsessed w
it thru that early muscle memory?
- Rusty in New Zealand, personal
communication, December 17, 2017
- Twitter, February 21,2018
- The Telegraph
- Twitter, February 27, 2018
- Twitter, February 28, 2018
- The Daily Mail (Australia),
February 2015
- Twitter, February 28 , 2018
#310
As children myself and my siblings
suffered severe child
abuse, mental
and physical. Despite the abuse most of us grew up and came to terms
with what we went through, moved past it and are now living good lives.
One of us was not as lucky. My brother Joseph perhaps suffered the
worst abuse of all. In high school he became very depressed and
withdrawn where before he had been a very popular and well loved kid. I
was much younger by almost 10 years, so back then I really didn't know
why.
As an adult around age 25 he met a woman who he would later
propose to. She seemed to love him a lot. He was dishonest, and told
her that
he wanted to wait until they were married before having sex. She agreed
to wait even though she had been with previous partners. She thought
they were waiting because of his personal beliefs, however my
brother was waiting because he had a secret she knew nothing about.
Joe
married Gina, and on their wedding night she took one look at him with
out clothing on and walked out on him. She was in no way right for
leaving, and he was in no way right for not being completely honest
with her. However, this was the final downfall for my brother.
The next
night joey went back to the place where his torment began. His high
school track field. Took out a gun and ended his life. He left our
family a note detailing the ridicule he was subjected to in high school
when he was forced to shower in front of other guys. Then the rejection
of his wife Gina who left him after a glance at his body.
My brother
would have been an amazing police officer. He killed himself 2 weeks
before he was to become one. The ridicule could have been avoided,
the self loathe and torture of being deformed could have been avoided.
He was circumcised shortly after he was born. It was botched badly. His
penis was cut short, the opening grew to the side and it was crooked.
This is why he was teased in school and became depressed. This is
why he hadn't enough confidence to show or even tell Gina about it
before they were married and this is why I will never see my brother
again. I miss him every day.
I am sharing this story so others know
that Circumcision is unnecessary and potentially very damaging. These
are the only pictures I have of Joey. I do not believe in Circumcision
and I hope others will do research on this topic before making a big
mistake with their own boys.
- (counting signed posts only) on
Twitter, February 6, 2019
- Twitter,February 6
and March 2, 2019
(324)
- Facebook,June 21, 2019
- Twitter, July 22, 2019
- Twitter, December 28, 2019
(350 non-celebrities)
Polls
This quickfire poll of men at Burning
Man 2011 is telling:
Like
Dislike
Ratio
Intact
63 (95.4%)
3 (4.6%)
19:1
Cut
66 (50.4%)
65 (49.6%)
1:1
These intact men were 19
times as likely
to like their state as the cut men.
A poll on Buzzfeed in 2015 has a
much
larger sample, still with a clear result.
The intact men who answered this poll were half as
likely to wish they were not, 1 ¼ times as likely to be glad about it,
as the cut men.
This 24 hour poll on Twitter in 2018 had a similar
result:
25/63 or 39.7% of these cut men
are
unhappy about it, compared to 5/37 or 13.5% of these intact
men. That is, the cut men are 2.9 times as likely to be unhappy.
100/176
or 57% of these cut men are unhappy about it, compared to 14/170 or 8%
of
these intact men. That is, the cut men are 7 times as likely to be
unhappy.
This (May 11, 2018) is the first such poll to show a clear
majority of cut men to be unhappy about it.
NB:
to this question, a "Yes" answer means unhappy. 417/973 or
42.9%
of the cut men (nearly half!) are unhappy about it, compared to 104/764
or 13.6% of intact men. That is, the cut
men are
3.2 times as likely to be unhappy. The "push a button" option
eliminates the issue of pain for the intact men, making them more
likely to opt to change, but it is still presumably irreversible,
unlike being magically restored.
- Twitter, April 25 2019
376/973
or 38.7% of the cut men are unhappy, compared to 13/324
or 5% of the intact men. So the cut men are 7.74
times as
likely to be unhappy as the intact men.
Other such informal polls have given similar results. A
common
response from the pro-cutting side is "The poll shows a majority of men
are happy with their status, whatever it is" but that was not the
question, and it throws out the whole point of asking, telling us
nothing about any effect of genital cutting on happiness. (Consider if
a
large and well- selected survey showed a 51% majority of
intact
men, 99%
of them happy (50.49% of the total), and only 1% of the cut men happy, 0.49%
of the total:
happy
unhappy
total
intact
50.49%
0.51%
51%
cut
0.49%
48.51%
49%
total
50.98%
49.02%
100%
You could still
pool the data and say "A majority of men - 50.98% - are happy, whatever
their status." but this would be an absurd reading of the actual data.)
This poll avoids that trap by asking about genital cutting in general,
rather than personal satisfaction:
Cut
men are 1.23 times more likely to agree with genital cutting than to
disagree. Intact men are 9.5 times more likely to disagree with it.
That is, intact men are 7.7 times as likely to agree with what happened
to them (nothing) than cut men are with what happened to them
(being cut). (This poll also shows a 64:36 vote against genital cutting
overall.)
Because the selection bias of self-selected polls is
unknown, their results are considered worthless by
statisticians.
Only one
scientific study
of men's satisfaction has been done. It found the same as the
above polls, that intact men are much more likely to be happy to be
intact than men cut as babies:.
Table
2
Participants who reported feeling ‘‘unhappy’’ or ‘‘neutral/happy’’
toward their circumcision status, broken down by timing of circumcision
Unhappy n (%)
Neutral/happy n (%)
Neonatally
circumcised
235 (64.2)
131 (35.80)
Circumcised as child
45 (42.5)
61 (57.5)
Circumcised as adult
6 (12.8)
41 (87.2)
Intact
16 (5.5)
270 (94.4)
Data
were missing for 5 individuals
So the neonatally cut men were 1.78 times as likely to be
unhappy as neutral or happy with their status, while the intact men
were 16.9 times as likely to be happyor neutral as unhappy. That is,
the cut
men were thirty
times as likely to be unhappy as the intact men.
But Bossio et al.
blurred the issue by first merging the men cut as babies with those cut
as children or adults
(who might have needed it or chosen it), and
then by looking at
"satisfaction with one's
status" as a single variable - a bogus measure, as discussed above.
![resent-deren ''I would have decided [to remain whole] without question''](Images/resent/resent-deren-lego.png)
![resent [coerce] grant w ''I was ... mutilated for no reason''](Images/resent/coerce-grant-w.png)
