As I currently have no offspring (and my husband and I have been pretty thoroughly failing to conceive), it’s an academic question for me, but I’ll have a go anyway
As I have no preference in the matter personally, I would defer to any preference my spouse may or may not have (we haven’t discussed it). If my spouse does not have a preference, I would default to, well, the default condition in the absence of any external factors weighing in on the side of circumcision (medical condition, what have you).
Two sons here, both intact/uncut/whatever. On a scale of 1-10, with 1 being “do not care about this issue whatsoever” and 10 being “become insane with frothy rage at the very thought of this issue”, I’m about a 6. Do what all the rest of y’all want, but don’t come near my sons’ private parts with a scalpel, thanks.
My eldest son is circumcised. At the time I was unaware of my unusual circumcision. It wasn’t until after he was circumcised that I discovered a “real” circumcision removes a lot more foreskin than I had removed when I was an infant. I watched his and was shocked when the midwife cut off more than just the tip. I asked her why she did that and she said “that’s a circumcision.”
Second son, not circumcised. I still think the “half cut” may be a good approach, facilitating both cleanliness and sensitivity/glans protection, but I don’t see the appeal of the full cut.
Further investigation with my mom revealed that of her three sons, the first was a full circ, the second was a half circ, and the third had no circ. She said she planned to have all three circumcised, but they botched mine and she didn’t want to put my brother through that.
Biblically, circumcisions are supposed to be performed on the eighth day after birth. I was raised as a fundamental Christian. We kept kosher and the Biblical holidays, pretty much Messianic Jewish. My father, who was wrong about a lot of things, said this was because “babies don’t bleed on the eighth day.” They had my elder brother’s performed on the eighth day and his went fine(he was born in a hospital). By the time they had me they had changed over to having homebirths. They called a Dr to have my circ appointment set for the 8th day, and he wasn’t open until the 9th day. They shrugged and said “God will understand.” So on the 9th day they took me in, and it seemed the Dr had either never done one or not enough.
TMI WarningAccording to my mother the implements were dull, rusty, and disused(this is almost certainly an exaggeration, even in the stone age of my birth they didn’t let Dr’s have dull, rusty scalpels). So the Dr attached the clamp which holds the foreskin away from the glans and started cutting. The clamp was supposed to restrict the bleeding, but it seems he hadn’t applied it correctly because I started bleeding like mad. He tried to open the clamp and re-adjust it and blood spurted. He couldn’t get the clamp re-attached correctly, mom says this was because it was rusty and malfunctioning, and I was screaming and covered with blood. So the Dr was hacking and chopping while I was screaming and bleeding like mad. Mom was so furious at the Dr’s ineptitude, conditions of his implements, and my obvious discomfort that she made him stop less than halfway through and “took her baby away from that butcher.” Thanks mom. I didn’t have ANY self esteem issues with my penis after hearing that story.
I gave birth to my son when I was 18 and circumcision wasn’t much of a debate in my neck of the woods. His father was circumcised, and at the time one of the biggest things you were suggested to consider was how your son might feel if his penis looked different from his father’s and the other boys in gym class (the unspoken answer being that he’d feel like a deformed freak.) So I went ahead and paid the extra $100 to have him snipped.
While I don’t beat myself up over it and I don’t think he suffered long term damage from it, I would not make the same choice today. His reaction to the pain and my current views on unnecessary surgeries would lead me to not circumcising as an infant.
If research indicating reduced penile cancer and/or HPV and/or HIV transmission rates continues to be in favor of circumcising, I might change my mind again, however. Although it’s all theoretical in my case, as my baby making days are over.
This was at a gay bar in Kansas City, MO back in the early 1980s. I was there to see the world most bizarre disco lighting, built entirely out of relays and stepper motors. And I saw a sign that said “Thursday Night is Uncut Night!”.
1: Cut
2: No, though I might not have it done to any hypothetical sons I might one day have.
3: There’s a slight link between HIV transmission and circumcision, with circumcised men having a somewhat (numbers vary, mostly between 40 and 60%) lower chance of contracting HIV through heterosexual intercourse, and a similarly lowered chance of contracting some other STDs. That small benefit is more or less balanced in my mind by the low but extant complication rate, so I’m pretty much ambivalent about the whole thing.
I don’t get the debate excepting that the infant doesn’t get a choice in the matter. Which I guess is pretty huge. But I have never missed my foreskin even once. It is not even on my radar screen. I don’t think I gave it one moments thought in my life.
Sensitivity? If I was any more sensitive my lady friends wouldn’t be hanging out with me.
Female. I strongly prefer intact. But that’s not the norm around here, and I don’t discriminate against the cut.
My son is uncut, but that decision was made long before I became aware of my own preferences in the matter. Up to that point, I hadn’t had experiece with intact men. Our decision was based on two principles–“if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” and “his body, his choice.” And we’re Jewish, too. But the other considerations superseded that.
Now that I know that I do prefer intact men, I’m extra glad my son is uncut.
I suppose it would be interesting to see what it’s like to have a foreskin, but it doesn’t bother me that I don’t. I like that it is easier to keep clean, I don’t have problems masturbating (though I tend to prefer it with lube, I can do it without), I don’t have any memory of being traumatized by it nor had any complications arise from it, so I think it’s fine the way it is.
No (Yes if there was a magic wand restorer, but not under present technology)
It was the thing to do at the time so I don’t blame my parents unduly, but it was an unnecessary medical procedure.
At work one day we got to talking about circs (I forget why) and one guy mentioned that while his younger brother was circumcised, he was not. Asked why, he said their mother did not have it done at birth for some reason but took them to the doc to do it when he was four and brother was two. Little brother went first and after hearing the noises emanating from the room, he absolutely refused to go in there, making such a fuss Mom relented.
But an erect penis with the foreskin tucked looks an awful lot like an erect circumcised penis. The Wiki article Circumcision illustrates this nicely, but I’m not going to link to it. So, it would seem you’ve been exposed (heh) to both worlds, a glans blatantly exposed and a glans coyly hiding. Women who’ve been with cut men get all glans all the time. Or is it the slack penis looking like it’s erect that puts you off?
