Owen's recent Ask my Mum episode of Daditude fired off a little commenter dustup over at YouTube. What are your thoughts on circumcision? Will you/did you with your sons? What was the rationale?<br><br>It's a hilarious piece clip segment show, btw.

We circumcised Indiana. (Well, WE didn't...) It was a decision based more on what was normal for US rather than health or medical issues. The hygiene reason seems pretty lame, because if ya keep your body clean, then that includes your junk, cut or not. I'm sure it was painful, and it was hard to look at the results for a few weeks. But it was a medical procedure. It wasn't random guy with a pair of scissors on a table in the alley. And I don't remember mine, does anyone really? (For those cut as infants.)<br><br>For anyone judging ME on my decision for MY son... well... they can bugger off!<br><br>Dude, YouTube commentors are Grade-A 100% psycho! Certifiable. It's ridiculous. One rule I've learned in my online life is Don't feed the trolls.<br><br>But there is one argument against circumcision I agreed with: Who wants LESS penis!?

We decided against circumcising our son about to be born. The reason was pretty simple, why perform a procedure on our child that isn't necessary or even really medically proven to provide any real advantage?<br><br>It's not bad to circumcise either, it's just not what we wanted.

Though years ago I had read that fathers and sons with similar equipment had better long-term relationships (I am, shall we say, a son of David in that regard), we decided that it was not necessary, so we left it undone. To the best laid of plans...<br><br>By the age of 2 and a half, my son was experiencing some discomfort and we had as yet been unable to unhood his little man with the help of gentle persuasion. Eventually it became nigh impossible to coax the foreskin into retreat, so we opted for a later circumcision.<br><br>There has been reports of infections dwelling within the foreskin, but they are largely experienced in parts of the world without adequate amounts of water or hygienic facilities. Has my son not had the residual problems, I'd have left well enough alone and simply taught him to clean himself.<br><br>Pretty damn funny episode as well- I couldn't help but notice that Owen's mother required a modest amount of alcohol in order to get her to talk about it. With a son like Owen, I'm sure she has a wonderful sense of humour.

If in fact im having a son I will. Being in the army you see alot of guys who arn't , and after week 2 with out a shower in the desert, all forskin is good for is a trip to the medic.

We had both of our boys circumsized, and I'm pretty sure we would tip the other way if we had to do it all over. The medical evidence that circumcision may help reduce some sexually transmitted diseases doesn't close the deal for me. I don't feel good that we did this for cosmetic reasons, at the cost of some pain and loss of sensation. I kind of wish we had left well enough alone.

My wife and I are both medical people. We had our son circumcised, because we have both seen what happens to catheterized adults and the elderly, when they are no longer able to clean the foreskin properly.<br>We didn't want this to happen in our son's future, since circumcision for an adult has painful complications like tearing of the stitches if an erection happens, or infection.<br>We had it done at the hospital after our son was born. With new techniques it is less painful for the infant than in the past.<br>I have also had a friend who had his Penis-A1, (original issue), converted to the Penis-A2, (modified version of same), because he tore his foreskin during sex.<br>I know that most men don't have these problems as long as they can keep themselves clean, but I do agree with hunter that problems can develop if your not able to do this on a regular basis.

As a pharmacist at a hospital, I know that it's the norm to have it done, but my wife and I did our reserach. We decided to not just circumcise because it's what is generally done, but we put all of our feelings aside and RESEARCHED. After months of research, we decided to have our son circumcised. From stories of men who wished they were and what they went through in their childhoods, to the medical advantages (which there are PLENTY of advantages, sorry Mike), to reading stories of caregivers of elderly uncircumcised men and what they go through, we decided it's what's best for our son. We read stories and journals from uncircumcised men as well; it wouldn't be proper research if we didn't look at both sides. Rarely did we see a journal where someone said they were happy about not being circumcised. We did see a few, but not as many as the I wish I were journals we saw. We also took into account that if we didn't circumcise him, and he decided to have the procedure done when he was older, what he would go through. The older you are, the slower you heal, which is why the procedure is done at infancy. Also, my wife's good friend has a younger brother who is uncircumcised and now wants to have the procedure done. She talked to him about it and why he wants it done.<br><br>He will not, however, be circumcised in a hospital. We refuse to have him strapped down during the procedure. We will be having a Holistic Circumcision which will be done in our home. My wife will be able to hold the baby, and even nurse him. Rabbi's have been doing this for years, and they are now offering their services to those who aren't of their faith, but who want a more natural circumcision. And, unlike hospital circumcisions, these holistic ones heal after only 2 or 3 days, not weeks like those done in hospitals. Also, he won't have to be injected with a numbing medication. The best thing about Holistic circs has to be that they aren't done right after birth. They are done when babies are 8 days old, for Jesus was circumcised on the 8th day (and Jesus was perfect). Therefore it has a special meaning to it as well, since we are Christian.<br><br>Also, we will be donating his foreskin. Yes, you can donate them. They are used in skin grafts for burn patients.<br><br>We actually still research, every day. I'm glad that I work at a hospital so that I get the information direct from medical sources (medical journals, etc). My wife actually found the blogs of the men who were circed/uncirced, and the statements from caregivers of uncircumcised elderly.<br><br>In the end, it's the parent's choice, but we did NOT just jump on a bandwagon; we made an educated decision as to what we want for our son, and that's what I hope every parent does.

Bravo, for the depth of your research here. You guys are really on the ball. One question, who performs the home circ and how did you find him/her? Was it through the site you linked in your post? What helped you get comfortable with that person doing the job? Curious because this seems like a really cool option.

We're having it performed by a Rabbi who often comes here . He does them in Dallas and surrounding areas. My wife had actually started looking into finding someone who did them in our area when a lady on some website told her about this particular Rabbi. We spoke with him, and though only over the phone, we got to ask him lots of questions and he answered every one of them. Many Rabbis these days are willing to do these circumcisions, since many people these days are going green and/or are trying to avoid unnecessary medications and medical procedures. Someone just shared that website with us, and once we saw the comparison list, we knew that this was the way we wanted the procedure done. We are comfortable with this particular Rabbi doing the procedure because he has done them for YEARS. As a matter of fact he has done over 4,000 circumcisions. He relocated to St. Louis, but he travels all over to do these rituals. He is very highly recommended. The woman who told my wife about him used him, and she gave her the e-mail address of another woman who used him, and they both spoke of him in very high regard. . Now these procedures do cost, but they cost around the same as a hospital circumcision. But, at least for us, this type of circumcision doesn't even compare to the one done in hospitals, and that's why we chose this route.

To begin, there can be no holistic circumcision because at the end of it, the baby is no longer whole.<br><br>Another curious thing about the glans-baring circumcision practiced by Rabbi Rovinsky et al. is,: It isn't native to the Old Testament.<br><br>As documented in ancient Judaism -- and in other, non-Semitic cultures as well -- male circumcision began as a minor bloodletting, a reminder to all that men may be called on to suffer bodily harm defending the tribe. Today, in some parts of Africa, it's a rite of passage about the time of puberty.<br><br>But in Old Testament times, circumcision didn't remove much, if any, skin. About the time of Christ, Jewish authorities changed the traditional milah to peri'ah, cutting the foreskin all the way back to fully expose the glans. This was to prevent Jews from assimilating easily into Greek culture, where working out nude in the gymnasium made it obvious where you came from.<br><br>Peri'ah forces the glans, an internal organ by design, out into the open permanently. The list of complications includes meatal stenosis, or a narrowing of the urethral opening, which today affects upwards of half all circumcised males. Some require additional surgery as the meatus restricts the flow of urine. Also, there's the inevitable keratinization of the glans as it tries to protect itself from the elements -- kind of like chapped lips of the penis, except it never heals.<br><br>Scar tissue, bleeding, infection -- these are all risks of surgery no matter how careful the operator. But it's the long-term, negative effects on the penis that peri'ah advocates actually came to embrace.<br><br>In medieval times, the Jewish philosopher Maimonides defended penile impairment, hailing its fulfillment of the wish to bring about a decrease in sexual intercourse and a weakening of the organ in question, so that this activity be diminished and the organ be in as quiet a state as possible.... The fact that circumcision weakens the faculty of sexual excitement and sometimes perhaps diminishes the pleasure is indubitable. For if at birth this member has been made to bleed and has had its covering taken away from it, it must indubitably be weakened.”<br><br>Perhaps unsurprisingly, a few centuries later the prudish Victorians adopted peri'ah as a medical procedure, long before anyone studied the foreskin's purpose and function. The practice caught on in the Anglosphere, dressed up as a masturbation curb, then as a cure-all for dozens of maladies -- none of which proved out.<br><br>Modern medical science can't justify circumcision, either. When you compare large, similar populations with opposite circumcision practices -- U.S. and Europe come to mind -- there is no notable difference in STDs or other infections. In fact, the U.S. has more HIV than Europe even after circumcising a majority of its infant boys for 60 years. What good did it do?<br><br>Circumcision is a cure in search of a disease. Calling it holistic is inaccurate but consistent with all its previous rationalizations throughout history. However, now that we know the whole story, we can be done with the excuses.

I forgot to add ... the STD stuff is old news, yet it still stands true. There are lots of other benefits that have been found. We have plenty of articles and journals, so drop me a line if you are interested in information.<br><br>It's funny, I studied Smegma, Phimosis, and Paraphimosis in college, but they never really hit a nerve with me until I found out we were having a son. There was a man who came into the hospital suffering from Smegma once, and I had to give him some pain medication. I won't ever forget how much pain he was in. When we were researching these ailments, and reading blogs and journals from those who had suffered from them (and unfortunately viewing photos as well), I could see my wife fighting off tears. She looked at me and said Our son deserves better than to have to go through that Ted, and I agreed.

We had our son snipped when he was born. Our deciding factor was a relative who delt with frequent infections all the way up till he was in his mid teens and my brother who had the same to the point where my parents had him snipped at 2yrs old. It's bad enough for a baby to have it done, but can you imagine being at the point where you're fairly aware of what's happening to you and then having it done? The agony... My brother was the first born in the family and after that all the rest of the boys were done soon after birth.<br><br>I was thinking about this last night and I kind of likened it to a vaccination. With many vaccinations, few people really ever develop a problem related to the vaccination but they still recomend everyone to do it to irradicate the problem overall.

I grew up in Europe and the US, mostly over here.

I absolutely understand how these family experiences can shape the debate about whether to circumcise, but what I had trouble understanding for the longest time is why these problems almost never crop up in Europe, where circumcision rates of newborns are generally under 1% -- essentially nonexistent. Males there very, very rarely have to be circumcised for medical reasons (in Finland, for example, it is less than 1 in 10,000).

Vaccinations are protection against something you can't control or that spread through a population. And never do they affect function. The key difference between intact parts of the world that don't get infections, and the US, seems to be that for decades doctors have advised American parents to try to wash under the foreskin. They suggest gently trying to pull it back every day until more and more of the glans is visible, but this sort of advice is unthinkable in most of the world. They leave the penis alone -- it's largely self-cleaning up through puberty -- and then teach a boy to slide it back and rinse with warm water. Avoid soap... soap dries out any mucosal surface of the body, and can lead to inflammation and tightening. When you tell Americans that most European parents never see their son's glans, they are speechless. They shouldn't be; how often do we look up our daughter's vulva? Both are meant to be internal areas as they develop.

So it seems that the real issue isn't the risk of keeping our sons intact, it's that we as a society have been practicing circumcision for so long, and expect to see a glans right away, that we've lost sight of proper care of the intact penis. Fortunately, nature makes it easy, far easier even than a penis that's had a surgical wound: just let it be. Fiddling is the risk, the foreskin isn't.