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If it's a boy, please don't circumcise him. http://www.nocirc.org/

If the results make almost everybody uncomfortable, then journalists don't write about it.

Case in point, this study documenting the effects of circumcision got almost no journalistic attention whatsoever, even though it's exactly the kind of information needed by parents in about half of all births:

abstract
pdf

It's the same reason this comment will be ignored.

Parent comment selectively presents evidence which itself is selective.

This study found greatly reduced touch sensitivity in circumcised men. This study differs methodologically in that it did not ignore sensitivity in the parts removed by circumcision. It also included many more participants.

The "tissue that acts as an easy point of entry" has actually been shown to have a special quality: "Langerin-bound HIV-1 is taken up by the Langerhans cell and destroyed inside - it's a bit like the cell eating the bound virus".

Objectively, there is not sufficient evidence to claim that circumcision has potential benefits in excess of the risks. Even the conservative medical societies all agree on this.

"An article in science blog says we may have to rethink how genes work. So called "junk DNA" actually appears to be functional. What's more it works in a mysterious way involving multiple overlaps that seems to be connected in some sort of network."

This recent study is also about hacking or senses. It measured sensory loss to circumcision (announce,abstract,full study pdf).

This recent study is also about hacking or senses. It measured sensory loss to circumcision (announce,abstract,full study pdf).

Hopefully they arent circumcised, or the aliens will think we are a barbaric race that mutilates each others private parts, and as well fail to give them an accurate picture of real male anatomy. It said that the hosts are from Europe, where they are a more decent and civilised society that respects the basic bodily integrity rights of all persons and do not mutilate helpless children, so I am sure they are intact. In fact, 80% of the worlds population is intact (although it should be 100%, except for those who have made their own choice as an adult). Otherwise they would not be given an accurate picture of the real, complete human body if we sent them pictures of mutilated men, in fact, mutilated men are missing one of the most fascinating and wonderous parts of their body, the most densely innervated and spiritual parts of the body which is designed for the specific purpose of giving its owner intense and unwordly pleasures. The foreskin is probably the most densely innervated fine touch centre on the human body, MGM removes over 20,000 specialised nerve receptors.

Do not believe the myths. The foreskin is a very healthy and normal part of the body. In fact, in Europe and Japan, where circumcision is nearly unheard of, the life expectancies are in fact the highest in the world, and far ahead of the US. Japan is #6. Sweden, also a mostly intact country, is #7. The US is #48. Sure there are other factors, but this shows MGM is not needed for good health and that people do fine without it. They also have an AIDS rate that is half that of the US and a penile cancer rate in Europe that is lower than that of the US. In fact, nearly all problems the foreskin is blamed on can be fixed without circumcision, or are often not serious at all to require such a drastic amputation. Amputation must only be considered a last resort option, in the most extreme necessity.

Circumcision is nothing less than an unnecessary mutilation of the male body, decision to make greedy doctors money, an unnecessary amputation of a healthy body part without their owners consent, and a stealing of up to 95% of erogenous pleasure from men for the rest of their life, and a deprivation of their most basic human right to a whole body. If an adult wants to have them selves circumcise, go ahead, its your choice, and your body. But do not do it to children, who are too easily coerced and cannot give full consent. By prohibiting unnecessary, elective MGM of children we are preserving the persons right to make the decision for themselves as a fully informed and consenting adult, when they have the best chance of making the right decision for themselves. Its our bodies and it should be our choice, regarding such clearly unnecessential and unnecessary mutilations.

For more info:

http://www.cirp.org/
http://www.nocirc.org/

You're gonna have to do a little better than that. You've left a loophole. Who defines harm? The people going ape shit over the fact that a 37 year old woman married a 15 year old 'boy' in Georgia perhaps? It's difficult for me to figure out how falling in love and producing children constitutes harm personally, but apparently, it's enough to qualify as child abuse. On the other hand, genital mutilation of newborn boys happens routinely here in the United States of America. I can see how cutting off a portion of a boys penis would qualify as child abuse. Nope, not in the land of the free.

Please revise your definition and resubmit. Thank you :-)

An excellent point. A lot of Americans have serious cognitive dissonance regarding the barbaric practice of circumcision. (I'm a card-carrying member of NOCIRC BTW)

Wow, that last bit of misinformation links to a site with no actual scientific citations, where the "further proof" is a powerpoint presentation also with no citations, not to mention no AUTHOR, and I'm supposed to take that as fact. Yeah, right. Try perhaps a site that actually cites scientific studies. What? You can't find one because all the studies showing that the benefits of circumcision outweigh the hazards are bullshit? Oh, sorry about that.

Ten times of a miniscual number (in the case of 'serious kidney infections') is still a miniscual number. Why do you persist? If the threat was really as great as you say it is at least ONE of the major children's health organizations would be in favor of routine circumcision, but none of them are.

I'm sure I could think of a better analogy than this but I'm running on 2.5 hours of sleep: You can die by touching hot electrical wires with your fingers. Should we lop everyone's fingers off so that it would be more difficult to be electrocuted, or maybe we should just teach people the proper manner of handling live wires? Perhaps rather than trying to continue to create reasons for a barbaric practice we should instead learn to eduate people to, say, not be fucking stupid with sex and use a condom? Honestly.

Ah, yes, strong loss of sensation in the glans, sometimes very painful erections and inability to have sex, as well as the often found damaging of the frenulum during circumcision leading to men with circumcisions only feeling "half of" what an uncircumcised man would feel. Routine infant circumcision just to keep the dollars flowing into the doctors' wallets, that's indeed "Score: 4, Funny".

Routine infant circumcision gets American docs a few million US Dollars every year, and it doesn't serve any medical purpose at all. It's cleaner? Yes, if you're one of those men who only shower once a month that's true.

At least those docs who can't make the incision properly are slowly retiring and the younger ones use some sort of funky device to damage the frenulum less, but you still lose the ridged band and a lot of sensation in the glans. Enough of it that many older American men become "physically" impotent or unable to have orgasms years before that would have happened had they been uncircumcised.

If Americans would cut off half of a girl's clitoris at birth (some African tribes do this), there would be an outrcy. Yet cutting off half of the same structure with men is okay. And doing it without the consent of the child and most often even without informing the parents about the consequences isn't very nice either.

Check out NOCIRC for some links to more medical information. There are also some links there for getting a fake foreskin back non-surgically with basic household items. It doesn't bring back your frenulum, but at least you'll have the same amount of sensitivity in the glans as an uncircumcised man.

Sorry for being so off-topic!

Disclaimer: I'm not even circumcised or American, just trying to get rid of the myth that this procedure is harmless or even useful when it's clearly not.

It is never done for hygine, but mearly to elimate sexual pleasure.

Actually, the reasons for male circumcision are very similar. Did you know that the typical American circumcision removes up to 80% of the skin from the penis, containing unnumerable nerve endings? That the glans is a mucus membrane (like the tongue), and constant exposure results in drying and eventual loss of sensation? I won't go on, it's not my intent to make you feel guilty. But you should know the truth.

Please read up at NOCIRC and NORM and learn what the American medical profession wants to keep quiet.

It's called Female Sexual Castration (FSC) or sometimes referred to as genital mutilation, and is performed (forcefully, no doubt) in a number of African nations.