A
female
age
36-40,
anonymous
writes:Should All men and Boys be circumcsied? If so why and when would be best, and would it be an american thing Reply to this Question
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Fancy yourself as an agony aunt? Add your answer to this question! A
male
reader, James_T  +, writes (19 February 2009):
No, of course not. You need to learn more about circumcision if you think that. Basically a man is born with a layer of skin covering the glans (head of penis).
This page shows a man retracting his foreskin to reveal the glans:
http://geocities.com/painfulquestioning/naturalresources
This is a video of a baby being circumcised (having his foreskin cut off):
http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=-6584757516627632617&ei=sNyaSay4JpPSjgKT7Lm4Cw&q=circumcision&hl=en
Why is it done?
Well it was originally done as a rite of passage in primitive cultures thousands of years ago. When a boy reached puberty and was about to enter into manhood - this was performed on him as a test of strength (it hurts -obviously). The Egyptians were one such group. The Jews copied the Egyptians, although they transferred the time of circumcision from adolescence to the 8th day because that is when the leader of the Jews, Abraham, circumcised his son. According to Jewish tradition it was the Hebrew God that told Abraham to do this. Most intelligent people realise however that this is too unbelievable to be true. Not so the Jews. Ever since then, Jews have copied this act as a sign of a covenant (connection) with God.
Why do non-Jews do it?
In Christianity, Jesus formed a new covenant and so the old covenant wasn't needed. For Christians it was now important to circumcise your hearts (cut out sin from your heart) rather than the physical circumcision which was now thought meaningless. So in Christianity it is not required and the Catholic church issues a statement in the 15th century saying that it shouldn't be done. Here is a page that explains more of the Christian view:
http://www.noharmm.org/christianparent.htm
Up until the late 1800's it was only Jews and Muslims that did it. At this time (about 1870) it began to be done for non-religious reasons. The main reason was to prevent masturbation. Here is a more complete history:
http://www.historyofcircumcision.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=category§ionid=5&id=70&Itemid=48
As you can see from the first link I posted above, a man masturbates by moving the foreskin up and down. This is pleasurable because the foreskin is the most sensitive part of the penis. It contains many nerves on it's underside. Without the foreskin it is harder to masturbate. Also, because the glans is not protected by the foreskin, it dries out. It also rubs on clothes which makes the skin harden. You can see the damage done and a comparison of circumcised and intact penes here:
http://www.noharmm.org/IDcirc.htm
And sex is worse for both women and men if the man is circumcised, for various reasons:
http://www.sexasnatureintendedit.com/10F/doctor_northrup.html
Non-religious circumcision was only done in English speaking countries. It never really caught on in Britain though and had died out by the 1950's. Less than 1% of British boys are circumcised today. In the USA it began to become routine and most boys in the USA (about 77%) will have been circumcised. Some pro-circumcision doctors began to come up with reasons to justify the procedure. The main one is that it is cleaner. But studies have been inconclusive and most doctors agree that it is wrong to perform this operation on someone without his consent. See here for medical studies:
http://www.cirp.org/library/
Most of the world are intact (80%) and are doing just fine - it is much easier to care for an intact baby, there is no work to do. The foreskin is attached to the glans( head of penis) at birth(they have to forcefully separate it to perform the circumcision). It should not be cleaned under, it should be left to separate naturally:
http://www.cirp.org/pages/parents/care/
Once it becomes retractable most boys and men just take 2 seconds to clean under it in the shower.
The rates in the USA have declined recently to about 55-60%. Although it is still too high. Things go wrong in circumcision. This page lists the complications that occur, these boys have been mutilated for life:
http://www.circumstitions.com/Complic.html
Hopefully the USA will see sense soon and stop this procedure.
A
reader, anonymous, writes (10 February 2009): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionI agreed with you a long time ago, I do not think that this should be a law, I also think that this decision should be left up to the people to deside for them selfs, I like people for who they are and not what they got. We fight for equale rights that is why I said if this is a law then fair would be fair, you said you could not see anybody making this a law so I showed you the letter, I could not get the rest of it on here but it did not say it was passed it was talked about by people, again I AGREED WITH YOU RIGHT FROM THE START I DO NOT THINK IT SHOULD BE A LAW.
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reader, anonymous, writes (9 February 2009): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionAccording to the new issue of Time Magazine, a new National Institutes of Health study shows that circumcision reduces the risk of contracting HIV by 60 percent. A report of the study appears in the most recent issue of The Lancet, a widely regarded British medical journal.Now obviously this means that the more boys who are circumcised, the better off we will be. The more circumcisions, the less HIV. And the less HIV, the fewer deaths that will result from it. And how best to ensure that more boys are circumcised? Surely the answer to that question is obvious:Mandate the circumcision of middle school boys.Just look at the HIV statistics. How many people die of HIV every year? Imagine the lives that might be saved if we ensured that every young boy was circumcised before entering middle school.And that's why we need to mandate circumcision in Kentucky: because it will save lives.Now undoubtedly there will be those detractors who will oppose this idea. But these are the same people who opposed mandating the HPV vaccine: religious people. And we know about them, don't we?These people say that the decision to circumcise their children should be left up to parents. And that would be a fine idea—if all parents were good parents. But we all know that is not the case. All parents are not good parents. There are some parents who will not do what is best for their own children (according to us), and so we must make these decisions for them.According to most statistics, only 76 percent of boys are circumcised. But among some groups of people—and these are the people who we are really concerned about, even though we don’t like to admit it because we want them to continue to vote for us—the rate is as low as 45 percent.The government has the responsibility to step into the relationship between families and their physicians for their own good. Of course, this principle does not extend to the abortion issue, where we take the complete opposite position. There, the government has no business in the health care decisions of individuals, as we have said repeatedly until we are blue in the face, and then decide to say something completely different.But that is another issue altogether that we really don't want to talk about right now.Back to these religious people who think that parents have rights. Even though these people will argue that mandating circumcision violates parental rights, they really have an ulterior motive. What really bothers them about mandating the circumcision of middle school boys is that it has to do with sex. In fact, as State Rep. Tom Burch points out, they wouldn't even be involved in debates like this if it weren't for sex.Come to think of it, nobody would be involved in any debate if it weren't for sex. In fact, nobody would be here at all. But regardless, we need a mandate.This is why I asked the qestion
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reader, anonymous, writes (9 February 2009): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionI agee it shouldn't mater if you are cut or not' I asked this because I read somewhere that some women in some places all over the wolrd were trying to make it mandatory for all men to be circumcsied. I think if this was a law than all women should get circumcised too.
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reader, anonymous, writes (8 February 2009): Er no, we were born with foreskin, thats the way nature intended it to be so it cant be all bad!But theres also nothing wrong with getting circumsized!In the UK, people my age, only about 5% of people are circumsized if that i think!Maybe its more common in America who knows!Bottom line is youll be perfectly healthy cut or not :)
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