Circumcision may be the kindest cut of all

Circumcision (the surgical removal of the foreskin) has been practiced for millennia, often as part of religious rituals. Recent research confirms that from a health standpoint circumcision is a good idea.

There may have been other reasons for circumcision, as well. It is a mark that could distinguish male tribesmen who were circumcised from other tribes whose members decided to not circumcise. It may have been used to help promote an increased degree of hygiene, when water to bathe was in limited supply. It may have been used to mark slaves, or, in other groups, to denote social superiority. Or it may have been done because of some other cultural ritual.

More recently, in the last hundred years or so, circumcision came into vogue for other than religious reasons. It became popular, then briefly fell into disfavor, then began a slow rebound. Today, in the US many men are circumcised, though percentages vary depending on ethnic group. More white males are circumcised, followed by blacks and Hispanics.

Some of the reasons for circumcision other than religion

One key reason for circumcision is to decrease the spread of sexually transmitted infections (STIs, formerly STDs).

Research has shown that circumcised men have a decreased likelihood of becoming infected with a number of STIs. HIV is one. Circumcised heterosexual men have a lower rate of acquiring HIV, based on a few different studies. There also may be a lower risk for men who have sex with men (MSMs) to get HIV, as well. But the evidence is much more equivocal in this case. Additionally, circumcised males get herpes (HSV) and human papilloma virus (HPV) less frequently.

Additionally, circumcision seems to benefit the female partners of these men. Data shows that the female partners had a lower incidence of bacterial vaginosis, human papilloma virus infection and trichomoniasis. In MSMs (men who have sex with men), there is a somewhat decreased risk of HIV transmission when the circumcised male is the partner who penetrates the other partner in couples who have unprotected sex. There doesn’t seem to be a benefit for the receptive partner.

Why is the risk of acquiring HIV decreased in circumcised men?

A possible explanation is that circumcision changes the bacterial types present on the penis. Circumcision causes a decrease in anaerobes (bacteria that grow best in the absence of oxygen). The foreskin also contains denditric cells (in this case Langerhans cells) that can be infected by HIV. And, the increased numbers of bacteria on the penis in the uncircumcised male may lead to recruitment of additional immune cells that could also be infected with HIV.

 An anti-circumcision protester stands in front of the White House in Washington DC on March 30, 2013. Rena Schild /


Another feature is that circumcised men tend to develop fewer genitourinary diseases. Circumcised infants have a lower risk of urinary tract infections. Their risk for meatitis (inflammation of the urinary opening) and balanitis (inflammation of the head of the penis) are both greatly decreased, and phimosis (inability to draw the foreskin back over the head of the penis) is eliminated. The number of cases of cancer of the penis is decreased in circumcised males. As are cases of ulcerations of the penis, which may be caused by viral infections. Similarly, female partners of circumcised men have a lower risk of getting HPV which can cause cancer in women.

Because of the above reasons, and others, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) says that the health benefits of circumcision outweigh the risks:

[A]fter a comprehensive review of the scientific evidence, the American Academy of Pediatrics found the health benefits of newborn male circumcision outweigh the risks, but the benefits are not great enough to recommend universal newborn circumcision. The AAP policy statement published Monday, August 27, says the final decision should still be left to parents to make in the context of their religious, ethical and cultural beliefs.

The AAP lists their reasoning here.

An argument has been made that male circumcision reduces the sensitivity of the head of the penis, since the head is now permanently uncovered. The Journal of the American Medical Association weighs in:

Some who oppose male circumcision cite anecdotal reports that male circumcision can cause sexual dysfunction. The male circumcision trials evaluated sexual satisfaction in adult men and their female partners before and after the procedure and compared men randomized to male circumcision with uncircumcised controls. There were no significant differences in male sexual satisfaction or dysfunction among trial participants, and in one trial, circumcised men reported increased penile sensitivity and enhanced ease of reaching orgasm. In addition, 97% of female partners reported either no change or improved sexual satisfaction after their male partner was circumcised.

Why not wait and let the child decide when he gets older?

Other people feel that the parents should not opt to circumcise. They say that the infant can make that choice when he reaches his late teens. The problems with that are that waiting would increase the child’s risk for urinary tract infection as a baby, and leave him at increased risk for phimosis, balanitis, meatitis and other genitourinary diseases.

Also, many young males may have become sexually active before choosing to have a circumcision done. They could have already acquired herpes, HPV and/or HIV by the time the decision to circumcise is made. Also, circumcision as a neonate is usually an uncomplicated procedure that has very little risk for the infant. In someone older, there is pain, bleeding and risk of infection. The patient may need to take time off from school or work to recover. Therefore, a delay in circumcision could have negative consequences for the male, both as a child and as an adult.

In spite of this data and the recommendation of the American Academy of Pediatrics, there has been a decrease in male circumcisions in the US. The lower incidence of circumcision is more pronounced in states in the western US. This corresponds to an increase in Hispanic populations there, which traditionally tend to not circumcise their male children. Additionally, in some states, Medicaid will not pay for circumcisions. So these uncircumcised infants, later men, and their future sexual partners are at higher risk for a number of conditions and diseases. These conditions could not only affect the quality of their lives but also, in some cases, the very lengths of their lives. Secondarily, the medical conditions that these men, and their partners, may develop can cost billions in health care dollars.

From the Mayo Clinic Proceedings:

A cost-effectiveness study that considered only infant urinary tract infections and sexually transmitted infections (STIs) found that if male circumcision rates were to decrease to the levels of 10% typically seen in Europe, the additional direct medical costs in infancy and later for treatment of these among 10 annual birth cohorts would exceed $4.4 billion, even after accounting for the cost of the procedure (average, $291; range, $146-$437) and treatment of complications (average cost, $185 each [range, $130-$235]; prevalence, 0.4% [range, 0.2%-0.6%]).Each forgone infant circumcision procedure was estimated to lead to an average of $407 in increased direct medical expenses per male and $43 per female. This analysis did not consider other conditions, and neither did it consider the indirect costs. It seems logical then that this analysis might have greatly underestimated the true cost.

The study adds to one by the CDC that found that neonatal male circumcision was cost-saving for HIV prevention, at least in black and Hispanic males, in whom HIV prevalence is highest.

An Australian analysis of genital cancer prevention found that neonatal circumcision provides at least partial cost savings for these.

A study of a Medicaid birth cohort of 29,316 found that for every year of decreased circumcision due to Medicaid defunding there would be more than 100 additional HIV cases and $30 million in net medical costs as a result of these. The cost to circumcise males in this birth cohort was $4,856,000. Modeling has found that cost savings initially generated by noncoverage of elective circumcisions by Medicaid in Louisiana and Florida was mitigated by increases in the rate and expense of medically indicated circumcisions. The Louisiana study considered only the costs of these for boys aged 0 to 5 years. Lifetime costs would represent a much greater financial impact on health care systems. The Florida study involved males aged 1 to 17 years undergoing circumcision between 2003 and 2008 and found that Medicaid defunding was followed by a 6-fold rise in publicly funded circumcisions (cost = $111.8 million).

In light of the fact that there are clear benefits to circumcision, and negative consequences when this procedure is not performed, we may want to address two targets. The first would be to educate the parents (as addressed in the link to the AAP paper on circumcision, above) to the risks and benefits of circumcision. Also, to educate uncircumcised males as to the health benefits of circumcision. Another, would be to apply pressure to state governments to cause them to have their Medicaid programs fund circumcisions.


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  • ml66uk

    She might have a lot ot experience, but I’d still go with what all the Dutch doctors are saying, rather than a blogger. I’m intact, and the only time I’ve ever seen smegma is on a woman. You don’t need surgery to keep clean.

  • Robin-Frans Winkel

    In the Netherlands, there is a very experienced woman who is decidedly in favor of circumcision (in Dutch):

    “Mijn eerste vriendjes hadden allemaal smegma. Mijn eerste liefde, en mijn krakersvriendjes, die waren allemaal nogal voorzichtig met schoonmaken, en dan hoopt het een beetje op. Ik had al heel snel geleerd om het te accepteren. Ik maakte me er niet druk over, en ik pijpte ze gewoon zonder condoom. Ik gruwel er nu van, maar toen vond ik het normaal. Ik likte het op en slikte het door. Brrr.”

  • Frederick Rhodes

    All the reasons given for ritual, religious and routine circumcision are based on superstitions, misinformation, ingorance. When people become educated, it becomes clear that distroying the neurological functions of both/either sexes prepuces is not for health, hygiene, or asthetics, but for controlling the future sexual functioning of the prepuce that will develop after puberty that the child would have grow up with. It’s used as religious witchcraft/witchdoctor medicine, religious and racial hygiene, a sacrificial punishment on the sons of week minded men by psychotic wicked man hating witches. These proponants of MGM and/or FGM are suffering from a psychosis and should be separated out of normal socetiy. All us victims should be made to wear skull caps so normal people can easily identify and see us coming. Procirc witches should be made to wear those pointy witch hats.

  • Robin-Frans Winkel

    Botching is less likely if the surgery is postponed.

    However, STD statistics can be misleading. Malnutrition and less access to personal hygiene mean that STDs are overrepresented among the poor. Mexican immigrants in the USA are uncircumcised, Muslim immigrants in Europe are circumcised.

    Vaginal abrasion caused by pounding can be prevented by having men being less centered on getting off first.

  • keirmeister
  • FrederickRhodes

    “And honestly, you’ve used the word “prepuce” so many times, I’m wondering if you persist because typing this stuff gets you hard. Eeew, gross! ”

    In your dreams.

  • John Aravosis

    Well, that was a fun and productive discussion.

  • FrederickRhodes

    What ever

  • keirmeister

    Wow…you really can’t stop, can you? I invite you to reread what you wrote above and see if you can extract any understanding of why your words sound absolutely ludicrous.

    One could find your posts offensive, but you’ve gone on the deep end so much, it’s kinda annoying yet cute at this point – like a mean chihuahua that won’t stop barking in a high-pitched voice.


  • FrederickRhodes

    Well, the fact that you were most likely lied to and fooled into having your son’s prepuce sacrificed to pay for some witchdoctor’s superstitious addictions, remains. His wife as well as your own will prolly get vaginal erosion from his/your rough keratinized glans and the rough pounding it now takes you to reach climax and end up getting a total hysterectomy before she turns sixty like 1 in 3 US women, or start making up excuses not to have sex with it anymore, get divorced or start cheating on her because you think your aquired penile insensitivity is caused from her growing older. If your son is lucky enough to have a son, he’ll prolly grow up resenting his parents or worse, commit suicide, completing the cycle, unless you can find it in your heart to tell your son the truth that you were fooled and made a terrible parental mistake and teach him how to avoid repeating the curse on his son.

  • keirmeister

    I have moved on. Now I’m having fun. >:)

  • FrederickRhodes

    You typed you were “moving on… ” Were you lying?

  • keirmeister

    Ha ha ha ha ha!!! You don’t even understand what “nihilism” means or how to spell “response,” so whatever legitimacy you think you have on this issue is clearly open to skepticism.

  • FrederickRhodes

    Thanks. That was a very nihilistic responce, as I expected.

  • keirmeister

    Enough of this stupidity. I changed nothing. Again, for the reading challenged, WE DID NOT HAVE OUR NEWBORN CIRCUMCISED! It HAD to happen later (when he was a small boy) for medical reasons.

    Now, you dispute those reasons. But you, in no way, see the absurdity of diagnosing a medical issue that WE went through, not YOU. Do you not grasp this simple concept? Anything else you can possibly offer to this discussion is both arrogant and irrelevant.

    Oh, and by the way, I was actually curious about some of this stuff you wrote. But looking deeper into it, it became clear that you are spouting nonsense, wrapped in medical or legal terms, but wholly divorced from reality.

    I’m open to the possibility of being wrong. No problem with that, but it ain’t coming from you. And I sure as hell won’t be second-guessed about the personal medical decisions my wife and I made as intelligent and INFORMED parents! Definitely not from the likes of you.

    Moving on….

  • FrederickRhodes

    Stop changing it from infant circumcision to circumcision. Being forced on infants is totally different from being able to choose as an adult or from having a rare disorder. I tryed posting a link for correcting non surgical treatment for phimosis for boys using medical devices with balloons, but it would not allow links. I am sorry, I have failed you. But there are others who will read this and know that you are living in denial because you will never be able to admit your mistake on your son…

    You yourself have been decieved with procirc extremists scare tactics into excising your sons prepuce. Many doctors and nurses are going against the AAP recomendations for proper intact care and are telling parents to forcefully retract their sons prepuce for cleaning. Even the AAP has to admit this causes rips and infections to the boys prepuce. Is this what happened to your boy?

    Parents acting on flawed medical oppinion will not be sued, but the doctor’s/hospital’s medical fraud/malpractice/negligence of full disclosure of the long term risks and harms from RIC will be, and already are being sued and winning by the victims. People have already sued some circ industries out of business.

  • keirmeister

    This diatribe of yours perfectly illustrates your failing. You try to present yourself as informed, but your own arguments/statements show otherwise.

    Aside from your wonderful description of induced mitosis, you don’t talk about the difficulty a very young boy would have with such therapy. Why? Because the answer is both obvious and inconvenient for you.

    “…next year the 1997 law protecting girls from circumcision will be aplicable to boys as well, because of the equal protection clause/sexual discrimination laws”

    That’s a legal stretch (pun intended).

    “…boys 18 years old will be able to sue the doctors for dammages if they are not happy with the results of their unnecessary surical prepuce excision.”

    Hysterically doubtful. 1) there’s a statute of limitations. 2) The procedure was legal. 3) It was by consent of the parents (so sue them instead).

    Also, from a legal standpoint, it would be interesting to see how circumcision will become illegal, considering America’s penchant for “religious freedom”.

    The rest of your horror stories are comical. Considering the relatively high number of circumcisions in the US (that you, yourself, stated), one would expect far more occurrences of what you described. Scare tactics are not arguments, but instead the refuge of an extremist.

    What you don’t seem to get is that I actually don’t think circumcisions are generally necessary either…and should not be done unless medically necessary (not even for religious reasons, in my opinion). It’s the “necessary” part that is at issue here. Reality requires more nuance than what you seem to be able to comprehend.

  • keirmeister

    I honestly don’t know what the condition was called, all I know is that it wasn’t good (it was a long time ago). But all of this is irrelevant, because your premise is flawed. The pediatrician convinced us of nothing – and sure as hell didn’t push for it. It was AFTER the procedure was done that we learned how serious it was. Idiot.

    But enough of this. I don’t have to lie about anything, but sure as heck don’t have to explain the personal choices I made to you. I am quite comfortable in the knowledge that we did the right thing. And my son agrees. For you to have any problem with that is simply uninformed at best, hypocritical at worse.

    The entire POINT of this is that your position is extreme, accuses doctors of conspiring to amputate prepuces (which is absurd), and questions the real personal choices that some people have to make for medical reasons. Based on nothing but your prejudices, you question those reasons. That doesn’t make you informed. That makes you an asshole.

  • FrederickRhodes

    You’re still being evasive. why don’t you look up a legitimate medical need/cause for circumcision and choose it. Religous, ritual and routine circumcision are not legitimate medical reasons because they are based on superstitions, paranoid delusions and profit for pediatritions.
    Induced mitosis is when you put tension on the skin to cause cell division. It happens to obese people. It is used for foreskin restoration as well as for burn victims for growing new skin for grafting. In foreskin restoration the remaining shaft skin is pulled on with T-tape or foreskin restoring expansion devices for 2 to 3 years to grow enough skin to recover the glans, which caused the rough keratinized skin on the glans to slough off and then it is all shiny and new, replaced with new soft skin like Mother Nature intended. For skin grafting the surgeon puts a balloon under the good skin and inflates it gradualy to induce celular mitosis. Also ear gauging, African female plate lips, and Burmese ring neck women, use mitosis to develop more skin.
    Anyway, when you get off your high horse, and come to your sences, next year the 1997 law protecting girls from circumcision will be aplicable to boys as well, because of the equal protection clause/sexual discrimination laws, and boys 18 years old will be able to sue the doctors for dammages if they are not happy with the results of their unnecessary surical prepuce excision. So keep the surgeons name handy until after your boy finishes puberty, in case one of the long term medical problems shows up, like when they cut too much nerves and some of the shaft skin off and puberty’s growth causes the glans to split open, or he might get painful tight erections leading to an unhappy psychological sex life, or without enough shaft skin, his testicals could get pulled up inside his groin causing over heating leading to low sperm count.

  • FrederickRhodes

    So far you haven’t mentioned what the specific medical problem was. Have you forgotten what the doctor told you to convince you to allow the doctor to amputate your sons prepuce? Are you embarrassed, or maybe you’d have to tell a lie and dig yourself deeper in denial.

  • FrederickRhodes

    I’m complaining because I had a botched circumcision so you are totally wrong.

  • keirmeister

    BTW, antibiotics…no, not in our case. Infection wasn’t the problem. Induced mitosis? Yeah, try that with a 6 year old, assuming it doesn’t cause further damage. Waiting for puberty…HE WAS 6!

    You’re spouting bullshit.

  • keirmeister

    Let’s see…I’m talking about a specific medical case in which I was directly involved, versus your generalizations….and you call me misinformed and illogical, even though you weren’t there.

    Yeah, I feel totally justified. With every response, you prove my point even more. But thanks for playing.

  • FrederickRhodes

    Little boys and girls prepuces are alike when they develop medical problems/infections, there’s no reason to amputate any part of them. They can be treated with antibiotics, induced mitosis, or having patience until after puberty’s hormones have finished their job. You chose to use semantics to twist my words to fit your misinformed illogical decision to amputate your son’s prepuce. Did it make you feel justified?

  • FrederickRhodes

    Little boys prepuces are just like little girls prepuces, when they develop medical problems/infections. There’s no reason to amputate any part of them when they can be treated with antibiotics, induced mitosis through foreskin expansion techniques (, or simply allowing puberty’s growth hormones to finish their job. Of course, you can twist my words to suit your lack of knowledge and apply it to your misconceptions. You are choosing to use semantics to cause misundrestandings. The actual need for a real medically necessary prepucectomy is way lower than you have been mislead to believe.

  • AlexanderHamiltonsGhost

    Uh oh. Someone’s mommy and daddy cut up his dick when he was a little baby and now it’s bothering him? Quel surprise.

  • keirmeister

    Lemme put it this way, a doctor in Europe would have also recommended the procedure for my son.

    Now, I’m trying to categorize and understand the different reasons people are so adamant against circumcision. What i have so far:

    1) It dulls the sexual sensation
    2) It’s essentially body mutilation

    Anything more than this? The second one is subjective, but still a legitimate concern. The question is, how do these issues weigh against the medical benefits of circumcision? Some are arguing that there are no real medical benefits…that doctor’s who say otherwise are lying…and I think that’s lazy and reactionary (and a bit conspiratorial). What is the real balance, without all of the noise? That’s what I’m interested in.

    As I noted, I decided to give my son the choice, but medical necessity changed that when he got older. And no, it was not the result of some doctor cajoling me into it. Hell, my son, at the time, was asking for it to be done! The point is that if his condition was medically necessary (AND IT WAS), but would have never happened if he were circumcised in the beginning…to blanketly admonish the possible need/usefulness of a preemptive procedure is not reasonable.

  • ml66uk

    Around 99.9% of males are born with a foreskin, but almost no-one is born with a vestigial tail and removing it doesn’t result in the loss of erogenous tissue. If any of our children had been born with a vestigial tail, we’d almost certainly have had them removed. I’d pay a year’s salary to avoid being circumcised though, and more for my son. That little bit of skin makes a big difference. It he wants to be circumcised later on, then that’s his decision, and I’ll pay for it and help him find a good surgeon.

    I don’t think doctors intentionally cause medical issues in small boys, but there’s a huge difference in the rates for medically-required circumcision in US and Europe. The rate of medically-required circumcision in the UK is down to 1 in 140 and dropping, and is far lower than that in Scandinavia.
    I don’t know why your son needed to be circumcised, but given the
    different rates in the US and Europe, there seems a good chance that he
    would have been left intact in Europe.

    Possible reasons for the US rate being so much higher include:
    – many US physicians still diagnose phimosis in small boys when Europeans would consider there to be no problem
    – in the USA, circumcision is frequently seen as the first solution, when in Europe it would be a last resort
    – some US doctors still recommend retracting the foreskin of small boys, or actually do it themselves, even though most medical organizations (including the AAP) specifically say not to do that, and that it may cause harm.

  • keirmeister

    The point about the vestigial tail comparison is valid to anyone with a modicum of common sense. But beyond that, you believe doctors are so hell-bent on removing foreskin that they’ll somehow cause medical issues in a 6 y/o in order to convince a parent that circumcision is necessary?!?

    How fucking stupid are you?!?

    Aside from the fact that you have no problem arguing about something to which you were not a party and have no idea what you’re talking about, you now throw conspiracy-minded ignorance into the fold.


    You betrayed your stupidity with this simple sentence:

    “Just like little girls prepuces, when they develop medical problems/infections, there’s obviously no reason to amputate any part of it.”

    By this logic, ANY part of the human body should never be removed because of disease or infection.

    Look, people can debate this topic responsibly and intelligently. But you lose all credibility when you come at it from an extremist position…and it makes you no better than a right-winger.

  • FrederickRhodes

    You stupidly compaired foreskin to a genetic throwback that may or may not nead surgical intervention, a vestigial tail. FAIL! You were most likely lied to/fooled by the doctors or your wife who claimed it medically necessary, because they wanted to cut off your son’s prepuce in the first place. They tryed and and succeeded in convincing you that you made a mistake for not wanting to commit infant circumcision. Your ignorance about proper care for your childs prepuce lead you to belive the doctor was being accurate/honest. They probably convinced you that your son was suffering from phimosis, a normal condition for infants/boys before puberty’s growth hormones cause the whole thing to grow to maturity. Even after puberty, if dammage cause by a doctor, nurse or wife from forcefully retracting and ripping the boys frenular delta nerves, can be treated by the boy himself with foreskin stretching techniques, no surgery neccessary. Doctors often use the lie of phymosis to fool parents into letting them distroy the neurological functions of their sons prepuces. Just like little girls prepuces, when they develop medical problems/infections, there’s obviously no reason to amputate any part of it. Circumcision mythology lies only work on superstitious ignorant atheists and religious people. I’m sorry, but the truth about circumcision is strainger than the fiction, and the truth hurts sometimes.

  • keirmeister

    What an unbelievably STUPID thing to say. First, if you read my post correctly, you would understand that we DIDN’T have the procedure until it became a medical necessity.

    Geez, get off your soapbox. And next time, how about trying NOT to blame the parent for their child’s medical condition. Jerk.

  • Terrence Brann

    So there’s Big Oil, Big Pharma, and now, Big Foreskin?

  • FrederickRhodes

    They didn’t. Jesus was against circumcision and erectile dysfunctional because the Mohel gave him a botched infant circumcision since His 14 yo Jewess Mother Mary wasn’t married to the father when she concieved. The Rabbis, Mohels, Pharisees, and Jewess cabbalah witches would have stoned poor young Mary to death for becoming pregnant without being married first, because that was the Jewish law. Jesus was working with other Jews to replace infant circumcision with a cleancing ritual called Baptism, now known as Brit Shalom in modern Jewish intactivism.

  • FrederickRhodes

    The doctors, nurses, and primary caregivers who cause the medical problems to little boys and girls prepuces do so out of ignorance of function and development, and have no knowledge of proper care, hygiene, and use. Your little boy could have been spared having his prepuce excised and have grown up with a healthy functioning foreskin if you knew how to protect your son from the dammage caused by unnecessary intrusions from circumcisers. When he’s old enough you should be honest and make sure you tell him what someone did wrong to cause him to become circumcised, so he doesn’t let the same traditional mistakes happen to his son.

  • ml66uk

    Yawn. Female genitals are harder to clean than male genitals, but we don’t cut parts off baby girls to make it easier.

  • Patsy Stone

    All the men with dirty peens are complaining

  • vittelrouge

    So these uncircumcised infants, later men, and their future sexual
    These conditions could not only affect the quality of their lives but
    cost billions in health care dollars.

    ==> So funny, men in europe and japan are better life and sexual life, and cost cheaper.
    Why do not hold the same kind of reasoning with women?
    There breast are very expensive for society as well as their genitalia. Why not cut ?
    You said uncircumcised vulva ? No, with men it is the same the real term is intact or not mutilate.
    Why do not you talk about the hundreds of study showing that circumcision kills, destroyed more than half of the erogenous areas of the penis, causing erectile problems etc.

    Where is your scientific mind or your impartiality? You cut at the same time as your penis?
    Go Go buy yourself an ethical

    In europe debate for ban this sexual mutilation.

  • Tilottama

    Which medical organizations are in favor of cutting?
    The AAP

    Which medical organizations are NOT in favor of cutting?
    The Netherlands Society of General Practitioners,
    The Netherlands Society of Youth Healthcare Physicians,
    The Netherlands Association of Pediatric Surgeons,
    The Netherlands Association of Plastic Surgeons,
    The Netherlands Association for Pediatric Medicine,
    The Netherlands Urology Association, and
    The Netherlands Surgeons’ Association.
    College of Physicians and Surgeons of British Columbia
    Swedish Pediatric Society
    Australian Federation of Aids organizations
    German Association of Child and Youth Doctors
    Royal College of Surgeons of England
    British Medical Association
    Australian Medical Association
    Australian College of Pediatrics
    Royal Australasian College of Physicians
    Royal Australasian College of Surgeons
    The Norwegian Council of Medical Ethics
    Norwegian Children’s Ombudsman
    Denmark National Council for Children
    Norwegian Medical Association,
    Norwegian Nurses Organization,
    Norwegian Ombudsman for Children,
    …You get the idea.

    But yeah, I’m sure the Mayo clinic’s report citing the words of a non-medical professional is more reliable than the words of actual doctors. You know what protects against STIs? CONDOMS.

    The rate at which a man will actually need to be cut: ~ 1 : 16,600.
    The rate at which baby boys DIE as a result of being cut in the US alone: ~ 1: 10,000.
    Do the math. Your child is more likely to DIE being cut than he is to ever need to be cut. Only in the US do foreskins magically rise up and attack their owners. I wonder why that is? Something in the water here, perhaps? …Or perhaps it is simply a bald-faced lie because circumcision is such a lucrative business for US doctors who would rather have a fat paycheck than a clean conscience.

  • Tilottama

    I like my men intact. They’re soft and smooth, and the way they glide inside you is lovely. On top of that, foreskins are just plain fun to play with. And, quite frankly, I think they look damned cute. A cut penis is rough and unpleasant. The scar line makes me feel so sad, I can’t manage to stay in the mood looking at it; I feel so bad for the poor man. He deserves better. All men do.


    This article is a disgusting joke. How about we cut off all the breasts of baby girls just to make sure they never get a breast infection later in life? Ridiculous. Infantile circumcision is a hideous CRIME against humanity. It is an atrocious violation of BASIC human rights. All humans should have the personal right to keep their genitals whole.

  • Steve Knight

    Babie boys don’t develop perfectly for 9 months then need to be altered, mutilated, cut, scarred, reduced, traumatized, tortured through a barbaric practice that serves no therapeutic purpose. I would love the opportunity to strap down the doctor who touched then cut MY organ, then cut something off him.

  • koko

    Where is the article for cut clitoral hood and labia?
    And where is the ethcis ?
    And where is the science ?

  • TLCTugger

    Circumcision alters sex dramatically. The only person with the ethical standing to request amputations of healthy normal body parts is the rational informed patient. Proxy/parental consent is only valid when waiting for the patient’s input would lead to harm and when less destructive options are exhausted.

    Circumcision of children fails this test decidedly.

  • Hugh7

    Dr Thoma cites the Mayo Clinic Proceedings without noting (probably without knowing) that the author is not a medical doctor but a retired molecular biologist with a bee in his bonnet about circumcision, who has repeatedly been found to misrepresent data. See

    The “billions of healthcare dollars” supposedly saved by circumcising babies simply do not appear in the healthcare budgets of the developed countries where circumcision is not practised – every developed country outside the USA. The rest of the English-speaking world tried it (circumcising in Australia and New Zealand as enthusiastically as the USA in the 1950s), found it did no good and has given it up. Don’t you think we would have noticed those enormous additional costs?

    It was well-known for millennia – from Philo Judaeus of Alexandria in the 1st century CE, through Maimonides in the 12th, to John Harvey Kellogg and Peter Remondino in the 19th, that circumcision impairs sexual function. (Remondino thought it would be useful to prevent black men raping white women). That was why they recommended it, in the days when people thought too much pleasure was bad for you. That “moral hygiene” was confused with real hygiene as the masturbation hysteria abated and “medical” benefits took its place. The science, bad science, was an add-on to justify what people already wanted to do.

    Typically, this article starts with circumcision and says nothing whatsoever about the uniquely situated, uniquely mobile, erogenous and protective organ that infant male genital cutting removes. It follows that Dr Thoma ignores the human rights issue.

    This article has a Coefficient of Objectivity and Circumcision Knowledge of 7. It lacks only flippancy, euphemism and a picture of a banana. See

  • Hugh7

    You are more than wrong about meatitis (inflammation of the urinary opening in the glans penis). Circumcision is heavily implicated in meatal ulcer and hence meatal stenosis (narrowing) which can in turn cause kidney problems if not treated (usually by surgery – meatotomy – to widen the opening).

  • Hugh7

    It should be self-evident that “not being circumcised” (having a whole penis) does not CAUSE penile cancer (just as having whole breasts does not cause breast cancer). It can only be a co-factor. The other co-factor has been identified, and it is phimosis (a tight foreskin) tending to poor hygiene. In fact, circumcised men are at MORE risk of penile cancer than men with normal foreskins. All this is in the AAP’s 2012 policy, but they ignore it.

    Look even more closely at the data and see how many boys have
    aesthetic damage
    – skin-bridges
    – skin-tags
    – scarring
    – unevenness
    – excessive skin removed
    hairy shaft
    meatal stenosis (narrowing of the urinary opening, very common)
    meatal ulcer
    urethrocutaneous fistula
    – MRSA
    – hepatitis
    – tetanus
    – bladder infections
    – septic arthritis
    blockage of the urethra
    buried penis
    penoscrotal webbing
    necrotising fasciitis (galloping gangrene – very rare)
    gastric rupture
    oxygen deprivation
    clamp injuries/plastibell ring injuries
    loss of glans
    ablation (removal) of the penis or
    as a result of being circumcised.
    If that figure is one in 500 as the AAP admits at one point (but is quite inconsistent elsewhere) 2400 boys suffer one of those.

    And all have had their human rights violated.

  • Hugh7

    A study in Brazil found a deathrate that would translate to 156/year in the USA, so >100 is quite credible. Country-against-country comparisons like yours have too many confounding variables to be useful. The only countries that still circumcise a majority of newborns are the USA and Israel. The scandal is that no good studies of circumcision deaths have been done. It’s all too tempting, easy and comforting for parents and doctors to blame the death of a newborn on something other than their decision..

  • Hugh7

    And this from someone who calls the normal human penis “a doggy pizzle”….

  • AngelXY

    Sorry no… this genital cutting habit was established first. The efforts to gift-wrap it as some strange form of “medicine” evolved later and the custom was eventually hijacked by those who profit. The same way they are now hijacking genital cutting traditions in Africa to push surgical kits, circumcision devices and pharmaceuticals. They love snake oil remedies in America… the “studies” that support circumcision and “suggest” it “may” have benefits is merely a way to sugar coat and elevate run of the mill genital cutting rituals, make it seem more palatable and keep their victims in the dark.

    The truth is ugly… societies that practice genital cutting have no choice but to cling to their deeply rooted beliefs that it has health, hygiene, aesthetic or social benefits or that it is somehow culturally important. It is the only way they can justify harming their children generation after generation. Hey everyone! Look over there… they way we harm our children is much more civilized and justified than the way those savages do it over there!

    Circumcision does not have a great track record as a effective health or hygiene intervention. Have a look at the history of circumcision… At various times medical opinions also supported the “evidence” that it prevented masturbation and a host of other issues. None of these actually worked… but at the time people believed it did. What makes people think these desperate attempts to keep the industry going are any different?

    The “health benefits” that support genital cutting is simply based on the principle that if you remove something, it automatically makes it unnecessary to clean and preempts any future issues with it. This weird principle is solely focused on genitals and not practiced on any other part of the body. At least not without the informed personal consent of the owner. The curious double standard makes it glaringly obvious that this is rooted in cultural beliefs and not in real medicine. The exact same “health benefits” circumcision pretends to offer can also be easily achieved by boys and girls alike and without a scalpel.
    If the

    “Claimed research findings may often be simply accurate measures of the prevailing bias. There is an intellectual conflict of interest that pressures researchers to find whatever it is that is most likely to get them funded. At every step in the process, there is room to distort results.” – Dr. John Ioannidis

  • ml66uk

    Neither the appendix or wisdom teeth are useless, and the foreskin certainly isn’t. I’d pay a year’s salary rather than be circumcised – that little bit of skin makes a big difference. Outside the US, most people keep their wisdom teeth unless there are problems btw. I’m 48 and still have all 32 of my teeth, as do most of my friends.

  • Intactivistmom

    Why don’t we remove the appendix routinely? It’s not necessary to life right..? And a huge majority of the population have herpes regardless of being intact so that argument is crap and as for greater risk with age… A full gown man has a much more mature immune system to fight infection than an infant who hasn’t even had a common cold yet. Not to mention the risk of infant circumcision is DEATH not just infection bleeding and pain. 120 babies die on average from unnecessary circumcision complications Each year! I know quite a few intact happy healthy men. As for it doesn’t affect sexual sensation how would a group of circumcised men know what having a foreskin feels like? That’s like them being able to say that there is no reduction in sexual function when a clitoris is removed. It’s ridiculous. And no extra care is needed for a foreskin. None until the child is old enough to shower alone and be in charge of his hygiene. Girls get smegma too so maybe we should circumcise them…

  • keirmeister

    All males and females have an appendix and wisdom teeth. Certain parts of the body evolve to become useless. I’m not necessarily saying that’s the case for foreskin, but I think you get my point.

  • Indigo

    Oh, grow up!

  • R-L

    i prefer a man with his whole penis. sex with circumsized men is often painful and unenjoyable. it feels like rigged rubbing, and extra lubrication is always needed. plus, ive been with a man with a botched circumsizion and he didnt even realise, he just though it was supposed to feel tight and unpleasant when he had an erection. then consider please that due to years of rubbing and chafing what is supposed to be an internal moist part of the bod y, the head of the penis is desensitized, leading to *gasp* erectile dysfuntion – also not fun to deal with as a lady when your man cant keep an erection. i love foreskin!!!!!!


    have not seen or heard of any problem with intact boys I know
    personally….mine or anyone else! I wish people like this author
    would stop scaring people with “possible problems”. And I wish they all
    would stop saying “cut” because it the complete REMOVAL of a precious
    piece of a baby that was put there for a reason. In the beginning the
    Jews snipped a piece of the foreskin only to give a small amount of
    blood. Research history Dr. Mark Thoma…..and by the way WHAT is up
    with your profile pic on this piece? Scared my a little bit just like circumcision!! Please research this more, please!!!

  • Tina

    All males have a foreskin it is supposed to be that way, not sure of the stats on vestigial tail.

  • pj9jbrj-903b0-be30

    Why not cut off everyone’s earlobes? Who needs them? 100% of all people who have any disease of the earlobe have at least one earlobe. Guess what the percentage is for those without earlobes? In case you can’t it’s ZERO PERCENT! Why take the risk? I’m cutting off my earlobes right now.

  • Tina

    Good grief didn’t your parents teach you to shower?

  • Tina

    Really? What choice does the man have after its gone?

  • Tina

    The circumcised doctor who profits

  • Tina

    This lady prefers the soft, silky head of an intact penis over the tough skin on the head of a cut penis any day.

  • Kay

    This is just…I can’t even begin to express how much wrong is in this post. Besides it being mostly misinformation, what about the fact that infants are not given proper pain management? That 117 baby boys die each year from it and countless infant boys have issues from said circumcision? Besides that, and the whole doing cosmetic surgery without consent, yeah, it’s a kind cut. So disappointed in the ignorance this article holds.

  • di is in los angeles

    There’s so much willful disinformation in this article I hardly know where to start, but as you’ve selectively quoted the AAP statement, people should at least read the rebuttal:

  • ThoughtAudit

    Can you offer a better argument than “no”? It sounds like you’re arguing from emotions rather than the facts of the situation.

  • ThoughtAudit

    Yes, everyone. Otherwise why would they have not allowed their child to choose when he became a man?

  • Ninong

    Circumcision is mutilation and child abuse. It’s founded on superstitions and now people go out of their way to find medical reasons to justify it. Of course infection rates will be marginally higher in uncircumcised men than in those that have been permanently mutilated without their consent by their parents but that’s a function of persona hygiene or lack thereof. Infections or any kind could be even better prevented by always using a condom. That would help even those who were “privileged” to have been mutilated as infants by their parents.

  • AlexanderHamiltonsGhost

    That’s quite the declarative statement, Zeke. “Everyone”? You sure?

  • AlexanderHamiltonsGhost

    Nice try, but… no.

  • Luigi DaMan

    Uh…right. Well, you keep believing that a foreskin is the only part of the human body that needs to be eliminated in order for the body to function properly. And, me and my foreskin will continue to enjoy all the benefit sand enjoyment that having that extra little bit of skin has given me. All of which, you’ll never know.

  • NoBigGovDuh

    Nature gave us and almost every animal a forskin for a reason. The problem is we are to uptight to teach kids to keep their dick clean.

    It should be the boys choice when they are older. Most of the world is not cut. It is a religious practice that needs to stop.

  • ml66uk

    Dr Thoma’s views on male circumcision way are out of line with those of several national medical organizations, and I already posted extracts from the position statements of the CPS, RACP, BMA, and RDMA.

    There’s nothing at all absurd about being aggrieved about circumcision. I’d pay a year’s salary rather than be circumcised. Why would I want the most sensitive and pleasurable parts of my penis cut off? That little bit of skin makes a big difference.

  • Glenn I

    Let’s just allow men to sue the doctors who cut their penises. Since there is (according to Dr Thoma) overwhelming evidence that snipping the penis is the very best thing for everyone, I’m sure any lawsuits would be laughed out of court. Still, it would only be fair to leave open the option to any penis-owner who feels (absurdly!) aggrieved.

  • Moderator4

    They do keep returning, though, don’t they?
    The work of Moderators is never done. :)

  • Moderator3

    Gee, I thought I got all of his yesterday.

  • Moderator4

    It is spam, Naja pallida. She/he/it has been so noted.

  • Naja pallida

    It’s called the ‘electrojack’. These days it’s used for bulls. Don’t watch the YouTube video. :)

  • 4th Turning

    I have no first-hand knowledge but all that hj business is, I think from the old
    testament and the movie documentary proves he and mary m. emigrated to
    somewhere in france-again, if I’m not mistaken. My speculation is that he
    certified his 12 buds to fill outstanding orders. Or-later vendors supplied
    their own since as you know, customers can tell the difference between
    “it” and swamp water. After all, turning back the odometer is we all know,
    for example, highly unethical-and illegal.

  • Jackno

    The practice is dying because Parents are getting the word, that this practice is very harmful to the man the baby will become. People are becoming aware that the parts that are amputated contain over 3 feet of arteries, veins and capillaries and thousands of nerve endings (well above 10,000). Of course cutting the parts off leads to sexual DYSFUNCTION. Americans are getting the word that the parts that are cut off are some of the most highly innervated parts of the human.

    This wounding of babies and children is the health risk, there is no health risk to keeping and growing old with NATURAL genitals. In fact that is clearly the healthy option for an adult to keep all of his genitals – and almost all men that have the choice do that. How can it be ethical to not give the option to the men that the children become. To take part of a persons body (AMPUTATE EROGENOUS TISSUE of a non consenting CHILD) without their consent is heinous. To do this to a newborn baby is creepy, child abuse and a human rights VIOLATION.

    Oh and there has been a health study that shows the mutilation is not healthy. It has been ongoing for more than 50 years. The results are in. Cut men (men that have had parts of their genitals cut off as a baby) get HIV and STDS at a higher rate — natural (intact) EU has much lower HIV and STD rate than cut US. Shouldn’t that just end this mutilation campaign by high HIV risk partial genital Americans??

  • heimaey

    Maybe if you kiss the circumcised penises, they’ll feel better. That’s a strategy I’ve used.

  • Mike_in_the_Tundra

    I have no idea what your point is, but FU. There are many of us on this blog that had to watch friends die of AIDS. Now STFU!

  • FrederickRhodes

    You must learn the difference between real science and creation science. Then you can learn how to discern the difference. Creation science creates studies to justify their preconceived theologies/ideology, while ignoring logical scientific reasoning, and twisting and spinning word meanings to fit their notions/fetishes.

  • heinleiners

    I agree. Like the article, I wasn’t talking about cutting girls

  • ml66uk

    There are countries where the men prefer their ladies cut, but that doesn’t make it acceptable to cut parts off baby girls.

  • heinleiners

    Nice to know what doctors think. How about a survey as to which the ladies prefer? For science.

  • 1jetpackangel

    Wait, how’d they get semen from Jesus? I thought masturbation was a sin and he died a virgin.

  • MyrddinWilt

    US medical studies by doctors who are circumcised find it beneficial. Studies by Europeans who have not find its bunkum.

    There is a real bias problem in any study of this type. There is no evidence for the causal mechanism suggested. Circumcision like most forms of conspicuous consumption tends to be practiced by the wealthier elements of society which tend to be healthier for a lot of other reasons.

  • 4th Turning

    I read somewhere-right now unretrievable-that little vials of Jesus’ blood, sweat,
    tears, semen, urine, etc. were sold as miracle cures, relics to put out of the way
    churches on the pilgrimage map, etc. Incredible what all is on that ickiness scale.

    The ages are passing by, but hypocrites’ psychology persists. Recently even the sculpture of “The Resurrected Christ” has been “dressed”.

    Michelangelo. “The Resurrected Christ” (1519–1520

  • Naja pallida

    The earliest mention of the Holy Foreskin was somewhere around 800 years after the life of Jesus, when Charlemagne claimed that an angel gave it to him. Of all the parts of Jesus’ mortal body an angel could have given him, why the foreskin? I’d like to think they suppressed it because it’s obviously just another fake holy relic – I swear, people will venerate anything – but the story is most likely right, they found it icky and didn’t want people talking about Jesus’ prick.

  • Naja pallida

    I don’t doubt the results of the studies, but I wouldn’t want to be the one advocating people cut off a part of their body for any reason. I’d rather be the one advocating for good hygiene and safe sex education. Which are just as effective lowering the risks for all of the above.

    Then I can’t ignore simple biology. Every other mammal species in the world has some kind of foreskin, penile sheath, or completely retractable penis, which protects the penis when not in use. We might not be running naked through the wild, fearing catching it on a protruding branch any longer, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need some measure of natural protection. There’s even some debate about some species, like the koala, which have naturally occurring bacteria within the sheath which are believed to play a role in fertility that isn’t quite understood yet.

    The real question we’re asking is whether we believe the human foreskin is vestigial, and serves no purpose, and is only a problem waiting to happen. We once thought the appendix no longer served a purpose too, but newer research is showing that it may still serve as a bacterial reservoir which contributes to digestion. Can we live without it? Sure. Millions of people have proven it. Should we be preemptively removing body parts before they’re actually posing a health risk? I don’t really see why.

  • 4th Turning

    Fore Shame
    By David Farley

    In 1983, as the residents of Calcata, a small town 30 miles north of Rome, prepared for their annual procession honoring a holy relic, a shocking announcement from the parish priest put a damper on festivities. “This year, the holy relic will not be exposed to the devotion of the faithful. It has vanished. Sacrilegious thieves have taken it from my home.” Not since the Middle Ages, when lopped-off body parts of divine do-gooders were bought, sold, and traded, has relic theft been big news. But the mysterious disappearance of Calcata’s beloved curio is different.

    This wasn’t just the residuum of any holy human—nor was it just any body part. It was the foreskin of Jesus Christ, the snipped-off tip of the savior’s penis, the only piece of his body he supposedly left on earth.

    Nuns and monks from nearby villages and monasteries made candlelit processions. Calcata was a must-see destination on the pilgrimage map.
    That is, until 1900. Facing increasing criticism after the “rediscovery” of a holy foreskin in France, the Vatican decreed that anyone who wrote about or spoke the name of the holy foreskin would face excommunication

  • ComradeRutherford

    “If I was born with a vestigial tail, is it mutilation to have it removed at birth? If circumcision has a generally medically beneficial reason, why is it wrong?”

    Your comparison is invalid: the foreskin is not vestigial.

  • ComradeRutherford

    Here’s a fact for you: Circumcision at birth is forced male genital mutilation.

    Go ahead, argue in favor of surgically altering infant’s genitals for very little benefit.

  • TampaZeke

    EVERYONE who supports and promotes infant circumcision opposes letting grown men make this decision. That’s not “so few” people. That’s the overwhelming majority of circumcision advocates.

  • 4th Turning

    I’m sticking with Jimmy Dean-the enormous variety of Euro sausages is
    frankly overwhelming.

  • disqus_BNbEfrPmXP

    Infant circumcision should be banned. Circumcision should be
    a personal choice when the person is old enough to decide for themselves.

  • GarySFBCN

    too late…

  • ronbo

    Show some pride man, walk out before EVERYONE can see you are a douche.

  • ronbo

    I love how you are totally unaware that you are a douche. All acid and water.

  • ronbo

    Miss Massengill, you are a douche.

  • Edgar Carpenter

    But your sexual preferences shouldn’t be a reason to circumcise infants – it’s not your penis.

  • ronbo

    Said the Dr. who profits from the surgery….

  • Edgar Carpenter

    You still ignore the fact that this decision is not being left to the person who is attached to the penis.

    No one objects to adults getting themselves circumcised – for religious, or health, or aesthetic, or erotic reasons.

    But it should be forbidden to remove part of someone else’s penis without their informed consent.

  • keirmeister

    Perhaps that’s a question for the philosophers. In our case, my wife and I thought it medically necessary; and after the procedure, the doctor confirmed the situation could have gotten quite bad he we not had it done.

  • Edgar Carpenter

    I don’t know about deaths – what I do know is that a lot of botched circumcisions don’t show on flaccid penises. When the penis is erect, though – ack, the number of men who had chunks of the head of their penis sliced off, or too little skin left to let them get fully erect, or flaps of skin which healed attached to odd places, leaving pockets of skin – I’ve personally had a very close look at a large number of mangled circumcisions, and I’ve known men who had so little feeling left once most of the skin on their penis had been removed by circumcision that they had great difficulty having an orgasm.

    None of these effects were voluntary – all this damage was done to these guys before they were old enough to talk.

    And none of these real-life results are ever mentioned by advocates of infant circumcision.

  • GarySFBCN

    Why? Because the Circumcision Industrial Complex charges for circumcisions and then sells the foreskins. We’re talking billions of dollars every year.

  • Edgar Carpenter

    Not so. IF you advocate circumcising babies, you are taking a strong stand against letting adult men make that decision for themselves, when they are old enough to understand what they are giving up.

  • Edgar Carpenter

    The question that writers like this ignore when they advise circumcising babys is – who’s penis is it?

    Who will use that penis daily for seventy or eighty or ninety years? Who will have sex with it, pee with it, and send pictures of it to his friends?

    It does not belong to his mom, or his dad, or his doctor, or his rabbi, or his mullah.

    The main reason people circumcise babies is that uncircumcised adult men, who know how pleasurable a foreskin is, don’t want to. Most men love their foreskins, although there will always be a few who decide to cut theirs off. And the men who love their foreskins find the thought of someone else chopping it off without their consent horrifying.

    And that’s the best argument for not cutting off another person’s foreskin without their consent. If it horrifies adults to contemplate it being done to them, it is wrong to do to babies.

  • ml66uk

    The “evidence”? It’s not that simple. Here are the positions of some national medical organizations outside the US:

    Canadian Paediatric Society
    “Recommendation: Circumcision of newborns should not be routinely performed.”
    “Circumcision is a ‘non-therapeutic’ procedure, which means it is not medically necessary.”

    Royal Australasian College of Physicians

    British Medical Association

    The Royal Dutch Medical Association
    “The official viewpoint of KNMG and other related medical/scientific organisations is that non-therapeutic circumcision of male minors is a violation of children’s rights to autonomy and physical integrity.”
    “[30 September 2013] – At a meeting today in Oslo, the children’s ombudspersons from the five Nordic countries (Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark, and Iceland), and the children’s spokesperson from Greenland, in addition to representatives of associations of Nordic paediatricians and pediatric surgeons, have agreed to work with their respective national governments to achieve a ban on non-therapeutic circumcision of underage boys.”

    German Pediatric Association
    (very long, but very much against circumcision, and includes the following)
    (written in direct response to the AAP’s position statement, and signed by 38 senior physicians, about half of them presidents or chairs of national paediatric or urological organisations).

  • ml66uk

    It wasn’t just Dr Kellogg though. NoHarmm just had a useful list of quotes, but like I said, you could just read a few medical texts from around 1850-1950 that mention either masturbation or circumcision. They seem to have been obsessed by masturbation and how harmful they thought it was, and that belief persisted till long after the US circumcision rate was over 50%.

    I could point out some of the anomalies in the AAP’s position statement, but this is from a direct response to that statement signed by 38 senior physicians, about half of them presidents or chairs of national pediatric or urological organisations:

    All my children have had all their vaccinations btw, I’m not a creationist, and I believe that anthropogenic climate change is a real and serious threat.

  • PeteWa

    that’s what I got from a read through as well.

  • CSStrowbridge

    I see your emotions got the best of you and you are crying, again.

  • GarySFBCN

    The data regarding circumcision is not consistent.

    The data on smoking is consistent.

  • CSStrowbridge

    Look who is getting emotional now.

    Face it, you lost on the facts and now you are lashing out. The AAP disagrees with you. Your own sources disagree with you. You don’t know basic science. It’s fucking pathetic.

  • CSStrowbridge

    “Learn to read, moron.”

    Learn to do science, you fucking asshole.

    Did you know there is no proof that cigarettes cause cancer? We know smoking kills, because of the increased death rate among smokers and the known mechanism smoking would use. However, there’s no absolute proof.

    In real science, they talk about risks and probabilities. You would know that if you took a fucking high school science class.

    Just when I thought you couldn’t get any dumber.

  • GarySFBCN

    I see that Dr. Tuskegee posting again. Don’t you have some people in Guatemala to infect for ‘science’?

  • CSStrowbridge

    “It became popular in the US to dull sexual pleasure.”

    No it didn’t. Dr. Kellogs was never influential enough to have a serious effect on the medical community. The majority of boys weren’t being circumcised until well after that medical bull was disproved.

    “The AAP’s Task Panel seems to have been very one-sided, and it seems
    very unlikely that any of the seven members actually had a male prepuce.”

    Well, if they were wrong, then you could point out where they made mistakes. If you can’t, then you are just making baseless accusations. I hear the same crap from Anti-Vaxxers, Climate Change Deniers, Creationists, etc. “The science is bias!” is an easy thing to say. It’s another to actually back it up.

    Secondly, you trust No Harm as a source but not a AAP? That’s rank hypocrisy.

  • GarySFBCN

    Oh look, it’s Jack the Clipper again.

  • GarySFBCN

    You’re the only one emotional on this thread.

  • GarySFBCN

    Learn to read, moron. That is based upon the pretend RISK of cancer, if one is not circumcised. Otherwise it would say “for every 900 circumcisions 1 case of penile cancer WILL BE prevented.”

  • heimaey

    Only Jews and Muslims require circumcision – not Christians. Americans started doing it around WW2 because they thought it was more hygienic. It’s the same time they were over prescribing drugs and we ended up with things like the Thalidomide babies. Also it should be a choice – if you want to be circumsized then fine – get it done. But babies are forced into it just as they are forced into religion. People should be able to chose their religion (or no religion) and whether or not they want to cut off their foreskin. Some people have to have circumcision done because their foreskin is too tight and causes pain. But those cases are rare.

  • CSStrowbridge

    Poor me? I’m not the moron running around telling lies and crying when called on it.

    Your own damn sources disagree with you. What does that make you? A complete and total moron.

  • CSStrowbridge

    “There is no proof that not being circumcised causes penile cancer. Maybe you could stop pushing bad science.”


    “…it would take over 900 circumcisions to prevent one case of penile cancer in this country.”

    According to the number of births in the United States per year and the circumcision rates, that would mean there are 1200 boys born last year who won’t get penile cancer because they were circumcised.

    Actually look at the data.

  • GarySFBCN

    LOL! Poor you.

  • CSStrowbridge

    Nice bit of hypocrisy complaining about facts while using emotionally loaded language. If you had facts, you would stick with facts.

  • ml66uk

    It became popular in the US to dull sexual pleasure. It’s worth remembering that no-one except for Jewish people and Muslims would even be having this discussion if it weren’t for the fact that 19th century doctors thought that :
    b) circumcision stopped masturbation.

    Both of those sound ridiculous today I know, but that’s how they thought back then, and that’s how non-religious circumcision got started. If you don’t believe me, then check out this link:, or just read a few medical text from around 1850-1950 that mention either masturbation or circumcision.

    Heck, they even passed laws against “self-pollution” as it was called.

    The AAP’s Task Panel seems to have been very one-sided, and it seems very unlikely that any of the seven members actually had a male prepuce.

    Sorrells (2007)
    “Circumcision ablates the most sensitive parts of the penis.”

    Kim and Pang 2006 (255 circumcised men)

    Frisch 2011

    Bronselaer et al, 2013
    “For the glans penis, circumcised men reported decreased sexual pleasure and lower orgasm intensity”

  • CSStrowbridge

    I get the same shit from anti-vaxxers, so shut the fuck up.

    If you think they lied, fucking prove it or shut the fuck up.

  • ml66uk

    If you remove men with phimosis from the equation, there seems to be no difference in penile cancer rates between intact and circumcised men, and phimosis can usually be treated without circumcision.

    Penile cancer is rarer than vulval cancer. It’s rarer than breast cancer in males, and of course far rarer than breast cancer in females. We don’t routinely operate to prevent vulval cancer or breast cancer though.

    Europe has lower rates of HIV and almost all other STI’s than the US, and the longest-running study of male circumcision and STI’s found a slightly higher rate in the circumcised men (the ahem Dickson study in New Zealand).

  • ml66uk

    Why is that American doctors are so much more likely to diagnose a medical need to circumcise than European doctors. Almost no-one gets circumcised in the UK- less than 5% at birth (almost all to Jewish or Muslim parents), yet the rate of medically-required circumcision is 1 in 140 and dropping.

  • ml66uk


  • ml66uk

    The national medical organizations of at least 12 countries recommend AGAINST male circumcision.
    Canadian Paediatric Society

    Royal Australasian College of Physicians

    British Medical Association

    The Royal Dutch Medical Association

    Add Germany, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Iceland, and Greenland.

  • ComradeRutherford

    Since when do facts make any difference to the forced male genital mutilation crowd?

  • ComradeRutherford

    Circumcision is awful. Oh, sure, a doctor can come up with all sorts of reasons to justify it, but really, it’s male genital mutilation, nothing more.

    If prophylaxis is the sole purpose, then the same arguments this doctor makes also justifies surgically removing the clitoral hood and labia minora of all girls upon birth, too. Who would argue with that? So why is doing it so boys OK?

    Why not replace everyone’s hearts with mechanical ones since they might get heart disease?

    Most often, circumcision apologists want what was done to them to be done to everyone else.

    Circumcision should be illegal, and in a sane society it would be.

  • GarySFBCN

    Thanks for adding to the conversation. Oh, and fuck off.

  • GarySFBCN

    It’s not just that they get paid to do circumcisions; by perpetuating the ‘benefits,’ they shield themselves from fiscal liability when things go wrong, because, you know it is better for everyone that baby boys be mutilated, for a fee of course.

    “Look, even the data we created, which is nothing more than a peer review of other data, suggests that we MAY be right about this, so fire up the insurance claim machines.” –American Pediatric Society.

  • Monophylos Fortikos

    Thus proving again that nobody who ever ostentatiously says, “I’m done talking to you,” is ever done talking.

  • Comfortably numb

    The urinary tract infection argument is bullshit, the HIV argument is bullshit. Most of what you’ve written here is bullshit. There are NO benefits whatsoever with non-medical circumcision. The foreskin is there for a reason! It actually protects against infections. Can you please stop spreading these lies that have been debunked over and over again!?

  • AlexanderHamiltonsGhost

    Ridiculous. There are so few people who’d oppose letting a grown man make this decision that the point is moot.

  • BeccaM

    Having experienced both, I found I don’t have a preference either way.

  • TampaZeke

    Why are so many people against allowing MEN to make the decision for themselves if they want to be circumcised or not. I understand that some people prefer circumcised penises and I understand that some people believe that there is a medical benefit to it. What just blows my mind is how many people get so angry and crazy at the prospect of allowing adult men to make the decision for themselves.

  • CSStrowbridge

    “You’re seem nice.”

    You’re seem uneducated.

    “I am selective in which ‘science’ I trust…”

    Clearly. You ignore science that disagrees with you.

    You trusted Dan Bollinger’s complete bullshit numbers about the number of boys who die because of circumcision, even though he had no control group to compare his numbers to.

    On the other hand, you refuse to believe the people who say RIC will save money, because they get paid to do circumcisions. The people who did the study are not even the people who do the circumcisions, yet you think they are biased.

    “Science has suggested that anger is harmful to one’s health.”

    Science has also suggested being stupid is also harmful to one’s health.

    So I’ll make you a deal. You act smarter and I’ll act nicer.

  • sanfranguns

    Well, if John thinks its disconcerting then by all means…

  • sanfranguns

    It’s still mutilation. That skin is there for a reason and it’s cut off cosmetically and then demonized by society. I’m sorry, but my risk of getting minor health problems isn’t worth it.

  • CSStrowbridge

    No. Christians are not supposed to get circumcised. Paul says so in the Bible. Paul also circumcises someone in the Bible, but that’s another discussion.

  • GarySFBCN


  • GarySFBCN


    From the American Cancer Society’s website:

    “In the past, circumcision has been suggested as a way to prevent penile cancer. This was based on studies that reported much lower penile cancer rates among circumcised men than among uncircumcised men. But in some studies, the protective effect of circumcision was no longer seen after factors like smegma and phimosis were taken into account.

    In the United States, the risk of penile cancer is low even among uncircumcised men. Men who wish to lower their risk of penile cancer can do so by avoiding human papilloma virus (HPV) infection and not smoking. Those who aren’t circumcised can also lower their risk of penile cancer by practicing good hygiene. Although infant circumcision can lower the risk of penile cancer, based on the risk of this cancer in the US, it would take over 900 circumcisions to prevent one case of penile cancer in this country.”

  • DonewithDems

    This is one of those classic statistics debates. You can make statistics say just about anything. The UK National Health Service rarely does circumcisions. I’m sure that the NHS is very aware of all these statistics and feel that leaving a man intact is an acceptable risk. The odds of getting into a car accident in your lifetime are pretty high (about 25%). That’s 1 in 4 people will get into a car accident. Should we ban the use of cars? Saying things like circumcised males tend to have less of a risk of STI’s is vague. How much less? You don’t give a concrete statistic. If you use this sort of reasoning on the opposite sex: a lot less women would have yeast infections if we just closed up the vagina at birth. Hey they’d have a lot less transmission of STI’s too. It’s barbaric but hey its for their own good and besides look at the money we’d save on all that treatment? Unnecessary, infant circumcision is barbaric mutilation and the decision to circumcise should be left for them to decide in adulthood.

  • GarySFBCN

    You’re seem nice.

    I am selective in which ‘science’ I trust, and I am always dubious of 3rd-hand discussions of science. There are many reasons to trust science and a few reasons to distrust science.

    May I suggest that you take a pill to control your ‘anger management’ issues?

    Science has suggested that anger is harmful to one’s health.

  • CSStrowbridge

    “There are over a hundred deaths from circumcision each year.”

    This statistic comes from a man called Dan Bollinger. What Bollinger did was look at the death rate of boys and the death rate in girls and compared them. He then assumed the difference was due to circumcision. This is complete bullshit. It’s faulty science.

    You can look at the death rates of infant boys vs. infant girls country by country and you find a small correlation that countries with higher rates of routine infant circumcision have LOWER deaths among infant boys than those who lower RIC rates.

    “Horrible photos…”

    I could post horrible photos of guys with penile cancer, but I won’t, because I know it is a pathetic Appeal to Emotions fallacy.

    You really have nothing to back up your argument.

  • JulieDManzi


  • Naja pallida

    You sure have a lot of uncles… did your grandparents not believe in birth control?

  • CSStrowbridge

    “There is no data…”

    Liar. If you actually read the story, you would not the science shows a reduced rate of penile cancer in circumcised men, as well as reduced rates of AIDS, Herpes, HPV, etc.

    “Until we know more…”

    We do know more, you are just ignoring any data that disagrees with you.

    “Oh, and I’m done with you. Have a good day.”

    Good. I hope your day fucking sucks. I hope you refuse to trust science in everyday life as much as you refuse to trust it here.

  • 4th Turning

    By rights David should’ve been Bobbed.

  • JulieDManzi

    My Uncle Zachary recently got a 9
    month old Mercedes-Benz CL-Class CL63 AMG only from working off a home pc… go


  • jared

    While I’m also personally against circumcision, I think the question you posed is a very dangerous one and could sometimes lead to the wrong conclusions. For example, replace the end of your sentence with allowing a mentally retarded child to live. Personally, I prefer to frame the question as one of human rights.

    This second part is a little unrelated, but I don’t want to write two posts. Sometimes things may have made sense at a certain point during the development of civilization, but don’t anymore. It’s a tad weak, but I guess one could make the argument that when humans were trying to populate the earth, it was necessary to prevent disease at any cost. Now, not so much.

  • 4th Turning
  • Elijah Shalis

    But it is Christian which wants circumcision

  • 4th Turning

    Not all those who were born with ambiguous genitalia are happy about
    the early surgery that altered their gender. Affected adults have been
    increasingly vocal about their dissatisfaction with clinical decisions made
    on their behalf during childhood or adolescence. Many adult intersexuals
    have had to discover their history and status independently, without having any
    emotional support. As a result, more than a few have become estranged from
    their families. An organization was formed and is known as the Intersex
    Society of North America (ISNA). These intersex individuals are challenging
    the current practice of irreversible sex reassignment surgery for infants. The
    group contends that this genital-altering surgery can damage a person’s sexual
    function for life due to loss of feeling, painful sex because of scar tissue, or
    complete lack of sexual response. The damage done from this process, which
    some intersexes refer to as “mutilation,” can result in the inability to have
    normal sexual relations. The ISNA recommendation is to wait until the child is
    old enough to make his or her own decision as to whether or not to have the
    surgery. “We’ve heard more and more people, coming forward saying, this hurt
    me, either physically, psychologically or both,’ says Dr. Bruce Wilson, a
    pediatric endocrinologist at Michigan State University.

  • 4th Turning

    Evolution should have allowed us opposable spines.

  • GarySFBCN

    I was just trying to communication with you – you who raised the issue of penile cancer. There is no data that indicates that not being circumcised causes penile cancer, so one wonders why you even raised the issue.

    Likewise, the data do not indicate that circumcision reduces/eliminates the risk of HIV infections in non-heterosexual men.

    Until we know more, we should ban this barbaric procedure on children.

  • Indigo

    It’s much cleaner than a doggy pizzle.

  • CSStrowbridge

    “I’m not ignoring science.”

    Fucking bullshit. You are ignoring the science and now you are lying about it.

    “I’m providing a greater context…”

    Ha! You make a baseless claim the scientists are bias and refuse to back it up.

    “As for penile cancer…”

    And in Israel, it’s 0.1 per 100,000 compared to 0.82 / 100,000 in Denmark. Guess how common circumcision is in Israel?

    You can’t just cherry pick data and claim you are doing science. This is why metastudies are needed, and the AAP did the largest metastudy on the subject in 2012 and found the benefits of circumcision outweighed the risks.

    So… do you have any real science to back up your claims?

  • GarySFBCN

    What could possible go wrong? Don’t hit the link if you are eating lunch. There are over a hundred deaths from circumcision each year. The number of botched circumcisions is higher.

    Horrible photos – not for everyone:

  • GarySFBCN

    I’m not ignoring science. I’m providing a greater context, something that scientists seem to be unable to do.

    As for penile cancer, the rate in the US is higher than Denmark and the UK, where the rates of routine male genital mutilation is not at all prevalent.

  • keirmeister

    With regard to it being considered mutilation, I guess it depends on why it was done. If I was born with a vestigial tail, is it mutilation to have it removed at birth? If circumcision has a generally medically beneficial reason, why is it wrong?

    On the other hand, modifying a person’s body part in order to please a god could be considered mutilation, so….

    For my part, I was circumcised as a baby. I’m happy I was. But when I had my son, I was sensitive to the argument of it being “mutilation” and decided not to have the procedure for him. Six years later, he ended up having it done for medical reasons relating to problems with the foreskin – problems that would have never happened had we simply done the procedure when he was born.

    The point is, there are real medical reasons for circumcision, and to outright call it “mutilation” may not be a fair representation. I’m sure no one is against it being done when it’s explicitly necessary, but as Dr. Thoma noted, there may also be a more general medical benefit – outside of religious tradition – and it’s these benefits that may make the procedure a safer bet than not. But it also seems there is still much research to be done.

  • CSStrowbridge

    “And if that educational…”

    You don’t get to ignore the science and pretend to teach someone else a lesson.

    I could post videos of people dying of AIDS, but I know that’s just a pathetic Appeal to Emotion fallacy. So unless you have facts, just shut up.

  • GarySFBCN

    And if that educational video is too graphic, I suggest that we need to consider the actual act of circumcision and not just some abstract statistics.

  • GarySFBCN

    In your pathetic world. And for the record, I’ve worked at several immunization clinics. Your equating the real threat to the public’s health by the anti-IZ crowd to this exposes your delusion.

    From the New England Journal of Medicine. Watch if you dare – the child’s screams are not included in the video:

  • Tyrone

    I too wish I’d been given the choice.

  • LanceThruster

    I wish the choice had not been made for me.

  • CSStrowbridge

    “Yeah, people who profit from circumcision are going to be objective.”

    And now you sound like an anti-vaxxer. Congratulations. Layer upon layer or irrational thought.

  • CSStrowbridge

    Nope. Circumcision is mostly done for non-religious reasons in the United States. One of the countries with the highest rates of circumcision is South Korea and there are almost no Jews or Muslims in that country.

  • GarySFBCN


    And the ‘study’ – if it is the same study I read – is peer review of literature, not surveys or other methods to determine levels of sensitivity, etc.

  • Elijah Shalis

    um religion is what wants circumcision.

  • CSStrowbridge

    “I don’t care what a bunch of academics…”

    Translation: “Fuck reality. This is my religion and you can’t use evidence against my religion.”

  • CSStrowbridge

    “…there is one death per 500,000 due to circumcision.”

    The death rate of penile cancer is higher than that. Not to mentions AIDS, gonorrhea, etc.

    “It would appear that health/hygiene education…”

    No amount of education is going to change the nature of Langerhans cells.

    “What people who read these studies are suggesting is tantamount…”

    Unless you have science to back up your claim, you are talking out of your ass.

  • GarySFBCN

    Mutilation, regardless of the underlying motive, is mutilation.

    I don’t care what a bunch of academics have to say about sexual satisfaction.

  • CSStrowbridge

    It started in the western world in Egypt for hygienic purposes, not to dull the sexual pleasure in men. In some cultures, it was done for virility rites, to increase sexual prowess.

    The American Academy of Pediatrics did the largest metastudy on circumcision in 2012 and found no evidence that it harms sexual satisfaction. In fact, it might increase it.

  • GarySFBCN

    How much is the cost to an individual and society when circumcisions go bad? In the US, where, presumably the facilities to do this are clean, there is one death per 500,000 due to circumcision. And what about the thousands of botched circumcision mutilations?

    It would appear that health/hygiene education for uncircumcised males could cut the rates of infection and have almost no risk.

    What people who read these studies are suggesting is tantamount to removing mammary glands and other breast tissue from women when they are born – because, you know, breast cancer.

    Sorry, removing healthy parts of a child’s body should not be the right of parents or anyone else.

  • CSStrowbridge

    It’s amazing how many people ignore the evidence when it comes to circumcision.

  • heimaey

    Not too personal. I love uncut guys. Part of it is envy, as they were not mutilated, but the other part is that I just find it natural and looks normal, and therefore sexy. I have never been truly happy with myself because of this.

  • Elijah Shalis

    It is just as bad as female genital mutilation. It is a barbaric outdated practice designed to dull the sexual arousal pleasure in guys. So that they are less sexual.

  • John Aravosis

    I agree with Mark on this one. Not to get too personal, but as a single man, I find it a bit disconcerting when guys aren’t.

  • Jim Olson

    So, we’re going to mutilate infant boys to save health care costs? Barbaric. I was also circumcised as an infant, without consent. I consider it unnecessary mutilation.

  • heimaey

    I believe my circumcision to be mutilation done to me against my will without my consent. If I could sue the doctors I would. I begged my sister not to let her kids undergo the same mutilation, but to no avail. This barbaric practice should be stopped.

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