Circumcision???

mrduffy wrote: »

what about other primates are they naturally circumcised or uncircumcised ?

Don't ask how I know this... :eek::o:D Well it was an unrelated book/study on the different sexual adaptations of the greater apes. I'm not a pervert I swear. ...

Actually it's a fascinating area of study. Humans are quite the outlier in a number of respects. All great apes like us have foreskins(as do most mammal species). Indeed they have more enervated foreskin than glans(knob end). Humans have a particularly large and sensitive glans. It appears in the great apes that the foreskin is more involved in arousal than the glans, so clearly an important evolutionary structure.

Now we as a species show quite obvious sexual differences in structure, never mind behaviour. For a start we have huge willies in comparison to body size compared to other great apes. Don't let the other thread on Irish lads lads throw ya. Gorillas have tiny willies. Chimps sport a little bigger. We're the big dong kings though . In the ladies there are diffs too. The clitoris in women is further away from being directly stimulated by sex. In other apes it's directly involved. The theories behind the "migrating clitoris" have some interesting notions.

Annnnyway.. yes our close rellies have foreskins. Now regard the obviously strong evolutionary pressures involved that made humans so different to our cousins were at play over millions of years. Men have bigger willies, medium sized testes, bigger glans, focus on pubic hair. Women have constantly enlarged bewbs(apes only have bewbs when pregnant and breastfeeding), bigger bums etc. Yet for all that selective pressure that changed us sooo much, human males retained the foreskin. It must have a clearly necessary evolutionary and biological function. So it makes no sense except in medically necessary cases to remove it.

smash wrote: »

Unless medically necessary, there should be no reason for it at all. Ages ago on another forum, there was a debate about it and the majority of posters were American. They seemed to be convinced that non being circumcised was dirty and wrong.

Yea our American cousins are mad crazy for the practice for some reason. Like you say there's the hint in the background of a natural willy is somehow dirty, animalistic and even to be feared. Something that will ostracise you if you're not cut. They can get weirdly fetishistic about the whole thing going on about different "styles" of cut, the most severe being the most favoured. It's very odd.

Elsewhere in the west the 19th century support/fashion for the practice largely died out, but not in the US(and Canada to a lesser extent). South Korea was mentioned earlier in the thread as another culture that embraces it and that can be specifically traced back to the Korean war and the large amount of US soldiers and support medical staff that went to the country as it was very rare previously in the culture. Ditto to a lesser extent in Japan. It seems to be part of the "American way of life" along with Hollywood and hamburgers*.

The usual explanation is said to be because of the amount of Jewish doctors in the US, but that's BS IMHO. There are far more non Jewish doctors overall for a start. Plus every cultural sub group and religious affiliation in the US buys into the practice, less so among Hispanics(I've actually read in one US forum that their penile state was another reason why they were "un-american" :rolleyes:). The Jewish doctor explanation simply doesn't fit. Hell I had a Jewish doc growing up and he never suggested it. I reckon it's a mixture of pure habit/rite of passage and medical insurance covers it so ye might as well have it done with a side order of "we've always done this so..." which has made the practice very culturally engrained. I'd also add that mainstream porn which is mostly US based has added to the popularity in recent years and where even people outside of the culture think it's the "natural" way of things.






*I seem to recall in a PLO(i think) hijack in the 70's one guy was released early because he could prove he was neither American nor Jewish cos he dropped he pants and was as nature made him.

smash wrote: »

Maybe I'm mistaken, but historically doesn't it date back to a practice amongst Jews for hygiene reasons because they'd spend months crossing deserts etc without the facilities to wash?

It predates Judaism by many thousands of years. It was quite common off and on in that region, the early Jewish culture may have picked up the practice from the Egyptians or Babylonians. Islam is more likely to suggest the hygiene thing with Judaism it's for the religious aspect.