Psychology Today: More Circumcision Myths You May Believe: Hygiene and STDs

Submitted by Minuteman on Sat, 2011-09-17 06:01

Link here. Excerpt:

'Myth: You have to get the baby circumcised because it is really hard to keep a baby's penis clean.

Reality check: In babies, the foreskin is completely fused to the head of the penis. You cannot and should not retract it to clean it, as this would cause the child pain, and is akin to trying to clean the inside of a baby girl's vagina.
...
Myth: Little boys won't clean under their foreskins and will get infections.

Reality check: The foreskin separates and retracts on its own sometime between age 3 and puberty. Before it retracts on its own, you wipe the outside off like a finger.
...
Myth: Uncircumcised penises get smelly smegma.

Reality check: Actually, smegma is produced by the genitals of both women and men during the reproductive years.

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Myth: "My uncle wasn't circumcised and he kept getting infections and had to be circumcised as an adult."

Reality check: Medical advice may have promoted infection in uncircumcised males. A shocking number of doctors are uneducated about the normal development of the foreskin, and they (incorrectly) tell parents that they have to retract the baby's foreskin and wash inside it at every diaper change.
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Myth: My son was diagnosed with phimosis and so had to be circumcised.

Reality check: Phimosis means that the foreskin will not retract. Since children's foreskins are naturally not retractable, it is impossible to diagnose phimosis in a child.
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Myth: Uncircumcised boys get more urinary tract infections (UTIs.)

Reality check: This claim is based on one study that looked at charts of babies born in one hospital (Wiswell 1985).
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Myth: Circumcision prevents HIV/AIDS.

Reality check: Three studies in Africa several years ago that claimed that circumcision prevented AIDS and that circumcision was as effective as a 60% effective vaccine (Auvert 2005, 2006). These studies had many flaws, including that they were stopped before all the results came in.
...
Myth: Circumcision is worth it because it can save lives.

Reality check: Consider breast cancer: There is a 12% chance that a woman will get breast cancer in her lifetime. Removal of the breast buds at birth would prevent this, and yet no one would advocate doing this to a baby.'

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Comments

I have not been circumcised, just from my own experience whenever I had sex without a condom, the girl would get an infection, nothing too serious but for a long time i did not know it was my fault. I'v been tested for STDs and have none so I can only assume that it is from me being dirty down there.

On the plus side I experience pretty good sex and can last for a long time which is what I heard are the benefits of not being cut. As long as I use a condom there is no negative effects on the woman and I never suffered anything negative personally.

In the end, I think there's something to being circumcised that is positive but there is also negatives and maybe it's best to let the child decide later on, In the end I'm happy not being cut and having the option to do it if I ever want too.

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Submitted by Art on Sat, 2011-09-17 22:27