# Do you get an erection while being hung? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 3, 2002, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609 "2002-10-03T00:00:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/1 "2002-10-03T00:00:35Z")
A girl on another message board was going off on her scum boyfriend and said she’d hang him until he got an erection, then clamp it with a heated metal clamp. But would he really get an erection if he was being hanged? ---
**Author:** ![black\_rabbit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/f19dbf/32.png) [@black\_rabbit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/black_rabbit)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/2 "2002-10-03T00:02:30Z")
> [@](#): > > Do you get an erection while being hung? There’s not much of a point otherwise, is there? ---
**Author:** ![monkeychunks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90db22/32.png) [@monkeychunks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monkeychunks)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/3 "2002-10-03T00:05:57Z")
When being strangled, a guy will always ejaculate, because it’s the male’s instinctive attempt to try to procreate one last time before he dies. We just talked about this in my freshman Wellness class this morning. – Shaylin ---
**Author:** ![manhattan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manhattan/32/7_2.png) [@manhattan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manhattan)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/4 "2002-10-03T00:06:30Z")
[Cecil says yes.](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_218.html) ---
**Author:** ![clayton\_e](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@clayton\_e](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clayton_e)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/5 "2002-10-03T00:07:35Z")
Bad pun, and the question is so wrong. Can’t help you though. ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/6 "2002-10-03T00:15:34Z")
dah! i misspelled asphixiation when i searched the archives. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/7 "2002-10-03T08:01:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by monkeychunks \* > **When being strangled, a guy will always ejaculate, because it’s the male’s instinctive attempt to try to procreate one last time before he dies** Are you sure that’s the actual reason and not just some plausible explanation that somebody made up? ---
**Author:** ![voltaire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voltaire/32/313_2.png) [@voltaire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/voltaire)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/8 "2002-10-03T08:17:31Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Mangetout \* > \*\*Are you sure that’s the actual reason and not just some plausible explanation that somebody made up? \*\* Plausible?!? Plausible?!? :eek: I was hoping it was a joke but I didn’t want to touch it. I wouldn’t want to contradict the consensus of a freshmen wellness class. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 8:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/9 "2002-10-03T08:28:13Z")
Well, not all that plausible really, I suppose; how would such a reflex have originated? Ejaculating on strangulation just on the offchance that there is a vagina nearby is a bit of a long shot (if you’ll pardon the pun). If anyone wants to seriously argue that theory, I’ll be interested to know why strangulation produces the effect but other methods of death don’t. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 11:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/10 "2002-10-03T11:31:16Z")
> [@](#): > > — There’s one thing it hasn’t a deterrent effect on, says Alf. > > — What’s that? says Joe. > > — The poor bugger’s tool that’s being hanged, says Alf. > > — That so? says Joe. > > — God’s truth, says Alf. I heard that from the head warder that was in Kilmainham when they hanged Joe Brady, the invincible. He told me when they cut him down after the drop it was standing up in their faces like a poker. > > — Ruling passion strong in death, says Joe, as someone said. > > — That can be explained by science, says Bloom. It’s only a natural phenomenon, don’t you see, because on account of the… > > ``` > And then he starts with his jawbreakers about phenomenon and science and this phenomenon and the other phenomenon. > > ``` > > The distinguished scientist Herr Professor Luitpold Blumenduft tendered medical evidence to the effect that the instantaneous fracture of the cervical vertebrae and consequent scission of the spinal cord would, according to the best approved traditions of medical science, be calculated to inevitably produce in the human subject a violent ganglionic stimulus of the nerve centres, causing the pores of the _corpora cavernosa_ to rapidly dilate in such a way as to instantaneously facilitate the flow of blood to that part of the human anatomy known as the penis or male organ resulting in the phenomenon which has been dominated by the faculty a morbid upwards and outwards philoprogenitive erection _in articulo mortis per diminutionem capitis._ —James Joyce, _Ulysses_ ---
**Author:** ![London\_Calling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@London\_Calling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/London_Calling)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/11 "2002-10-03T11:51:41Z")
I guess Hangmen learn pretty quickly where to stand. Got to be a bit tricky if he starts to writhe around, though - you’ll be bobbing and weaving with the sway 'til the poor sod fires his final round. Seems a bit odd, though. Isn’t there also a tendency to defacate at this difficult time ? …rather busy all round by the sounds of it… ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/12 "2002-10-03T14:09:51Z")
Unfortunately, a friend of mine in college found out the hard way that this is true. He had apparently read that if you cut off part of the blood flow to the brain, it’s supposed to make for a more intense orgasm. He tried this by partially hanging himself, but got tangled up in the ropes and died. His father found him hanging from the basement ceiling pipes, pants around his ankles. The paramedics were unable to revive him, and the coroner’s certificate read “accidental suicide.” The more technical term is autoerotic asphyxia. Needless to say, don’t try this at home, folks. Needless to ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/13 "2002-10-03T14:24:52Z")
It happens to politicians every now and again; one MP near where I live was found dead, hanging by a piece of electrical flex from a door; it would have been bad enough to have found him like that, but there’s more; he had a tangerine laced with amyl nitrate stuffed in his mouth, a plastic bag over his head and was wearing stockings and suspenders. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/14 "2002-10-03T14:29:55Z")
Although it’s only fair to say that it may have been a bizarre murder… ---
**Author:** ![London\_Calling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@London\_Calling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/London_Calling)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/15 "2002-10-03T14:31:42Z")
Chiswick ? ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/16 "2002-10-03T14:42:49Z")
Stephen Milligan ---
**Author:** ![Martiju](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e8c25b/32.png) [@Martiju](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martiju)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/17 "2002-10-03T14:51:23Z")
I remember it well! Mind you, I think auto-erotica and execution are two very different things - the state of mind must be particularly relevant here. I’ve certainly heard of it before - but the procreation thing just doesn’t hold water. Surely if that were the case, whenever a guy died (and knew it was going to happen, presumably) he’d ejaculate beforehand. I’m not sure there’s evidence for that. ---
**Author:** ![Martiju](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e8c25b/32.png) [@Martiju](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martiju)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/18 "2002-10-03T14:51:31Z")
I remember it well! Mind you, I think auto-erotica and execution are two very different things - the state of mind must be particularly relevant here. I’ve certainly heard of it before - but the procreation thing just doesn’t hold water. Surely if that were the case, whenever a guy died (and knew it was going to happen, presumably) he’d ejaculate beforehand. I’m not sure there’s evidence of that. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/19 "2002-10-03T14:55:50Z")
The way I heard it, people suddenly double-post just before they die, as a last instinctive attempt to increase their post count. ---
**Author:** ![Martiju](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e8c25b/32.png) [@Martiju](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martiju)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2002, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609/20 "2002-10-03T14:59:26Z")
_gasp_ can’t…breathe…uunngggggg * * * yes, 125!! 😃 [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-an-erection-while-being-hung/130609.md?page=2)