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How Circumcision Works · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the Reinvented twenty twelve Camra. It's ready.
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Speaker 1: Are you welcome to stuff you should know from HowStuffWorks
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Speaker 1: dot Com? Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Joshua
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Speaker 1: m clark. With me is Charles W. Bryant that makes
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Speaker 1: this stuff. You should nizzo and that's that. Hi. Hey,
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Speaker 1: josh m Clark, Joshua, Joshua m clark. Yes, you don't
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Speaker 1: have a fancy setup today, I have an intro. Okay,
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Speaker 1: let's hear it. Okay, Wow, Chuck, you really kind of
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Speaker 1: get up against the wall, aren't you today? Are you
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Speaker 1: waiting on me a little bit? Okay? Are you ready?
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Speaker 1: I'm ready, Chuck. Josh Have you ever heard of Lloyd Schofield?
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Speaker 1: I have not? Yes, you have? You always do this?
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Speaker 1: Who is he? Uh? He is a guy out in
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Speaker 1: San Francisco who has proposed, Yes, next Novembers, I guess,
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Speaker 1: referendum elections. It wouldn't even be midterm. What do you
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Speaker 1: call the elections between midterm and you know, the big
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Speaker 1: one quarter term? I don't know. Okay, we'll call it that.
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Speaker 1: For next November's ballot in San Francisco, there may be
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Speaker 1: a referendum if Floyd Schofield has anything to do with
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Speaker 1: it that outright bans male circumcision in San Francisco. Well, yeah, obviously,
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Speaker 1: but you got to start somewhere. Yeah, Schofield needs seventy
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Speaker 1: one hundred signatures. Huh and basically read the read the provision, Chuck,
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Speaker 1: the wording of the proposed referendum, it would make it
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Speaker 1: a misdemeanor to circumcise, xcise, cut, or mutilate the genitals
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Speaker 1: of a person under eighteen, right, and he he says
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Speaker 1: it's genital mutilation. That's how he feels, and other people
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Speaker 1: feel that way too. Yeah, he's definitely not on his
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Speaker 1: own in that one. There's some people in this CBS
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Speaker 1: AP article they're like, it's a little too far. It
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Speaker 1: should be the choice of the parents, Schofield's idea, And
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Speaker 1: it's kind of it kind of appears in this in
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Speaker 1: the wording of the ballot measure that it's a parent's choice,
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Speaker 1: but it's not the choice of most people who are circumcised,
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Speaker 1: because they're generally circumcised as newborn infants. Yeah, little boys are.
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Speaker 1: And he likened it to tattooing because you're not allowed
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Speaker 1: to tattoo a child. When did you start saying tattooed
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Speaker 1: like that? What do you mean? Tattoo? Is that weird? Yeah,
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Speaker 1: it's a little weird. It's like humans. Well that's what
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Speaker 1: he says. He said that, you know, to felony, to
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Speaker 1: tatoo a kid. So he's really laughing in there, Yeah,
2:40
Speaker 1: to tattoo a child. And so he says it's the
2:43
Speaker 1: same thing. Well, yeah, he's actually saying it's way way
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Speaker 1: worse than tattooing exactly. But he is saying it's a
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Speaker 1: long the same lines as a choice by the parents
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Speaker 1: that is possibly against the child's will later on. And
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Speaker 1: that's that. So let's talk about circumcision, because this is
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Speaker 1: a little that's an odd approach to me, you know,
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Speaker 1: like the way I've always understood it is, you know,
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Speaker 1: there's circumcision out there. It's not weird, it's not odd.
3:10
Speaker 1: But as you kind of get older, you realize that there's,
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Speaker 1: you know, two sides to this whole story, and it
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Speaker 1: kind of is actually and you kind of come to realize,
3:21
Speaker 1: like there's people out there who think that people who
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Speaker 1: aren't circumcised or weird, and people out there who think
3:27
Speaker 1: that people who are circumcised? Are weird? Right? Exactly? Let's
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Speaker 1: do some stats, stat man, Well, I think the first
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Speaker 1: stat we should open with, perhaps, is that if you
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Speaker 1: are an American boy or a man in the last
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Speaker 1: thirty years, then there's about a three and five chance
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Speaker 1: that you are circumcised here in this country over the
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Speaker 1: past three decades, although that is falling big time. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: what was the three and five chance now in two
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Speaker 1: thousand and five. Between nineteen eighty and I think two thousand,
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Speaker 1: it was three and five, right, Yeah, and then by
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Speaker 1: two thousand and five it had dropped to about fifty
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Speaker 1: three percent. Yeah, and the Schofield says that in two
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Speaker 1: thousand and nine it fell to thirty three percent. That's
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Speaker 1: a huge job. So in a decade it fell thirty percent.
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Speaker 1: And they actually think one of the reasons why is
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Speaker 1: because there's been an increasing presence of Hispanics in the US,
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Speaker 1: and Hispanics are much much less likely than any other
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Speaker 1: group to circumcise their male infants. And it's also lower
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Speaker 1: out west than where there's a larger Hispanic population. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: in the Midwest, there's about a seventy five percent chance
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Speaker 1: that you are going to circumcise your boy. Yeah, in
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Speaker 1: the South, there's half yeah, fifty to fifty, right, it's
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Speaker 1: like Russian Roulette with a two barreled, two chamber gun. Yeah, yeah, sure.
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Speaker 1: And then out west, Yeah, it's less than a quarter
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Speaker 1: of the male infants are circumcised out there every year.
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Speaker 1: But ultimately there's about one point two million circumcisions. Well
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Speaker 1: there were in two thousand and five. Yes, so now
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Speaker 1: we're down to less than that. But in two thousand
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Speaker 1: and five, they're about one point two million male boys
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Speaker 1: born in the United States who were circumcised, right, yeah,
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Speaker 1: And since you mentioned that, that at about two hundred
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Speaker 1: dollars a pop, even though it's included in your in
5:21
Speaker 1: your berthen bill, it's about two hundred and forty million
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Speaker 1: dollars that insurance companies would love to not have to
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Speaker 1: pay exactly. So there's actually, I don't know if it's
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Speaker 1: overt support or maybe quiet financial support or whatever, but
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Speaker 1: the insurance companies are very happy to side with the
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Speaker 1: anti circumcision movement and medicaid. Yes, of course, So Chuck,
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Speaker 1: let's talk about the penis. Let's talk about the foreskin.
5:48
Speaker 1: That's part of it. We're gonna say the word penis
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Speaker 1: a whole lot ycause you can't avoid it when you're
5:54
Speaker 1: talking about circumcision. That's right, because let's just go ahead
5:57
Speaker 1: and set up for our foreign friends who may not
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Speaker 1: know what circumcisi is. Like Roller Derby circumcision is when
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Speaker 1: the foreskin of the penis that's also called the prepuse,
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Speaker 1: is removed. Simple as that. So you got the prepuse
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Speaker 1: which is the foreskin. Yes, it covers the tip of
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Speaker 1: the penis, which is also called the glands g L
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Speaker 1: A N s. Right. And then there's a piece of
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Speaker 1: connective tissue that works much like the connective tissue that
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Speaker 1: anchors the bottom of your tongue to the floor of
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Speaker 1: your mouth. Yes, call a frenulum, and that keeps the
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Speaker 1: prepuse connected to the glands. Yeah. And they also said
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Speaker 1: the inner portion of the foreskin is also much like
6:40
Speaker 1: the inside of your mouth in that it has a
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Speaker 1: natural moisture to lubricate the glands. It's hot and moist
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Speaker 1: in there, that's what it says. Yes, Yeah, it provides
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Speaker 1: lubrication which kind of keeps it safe and sheathed, I
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Speaker 1: guess right, yeah, from abrasion. And like they mantled, cold
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Speaker 1: and the dry winter air can be rough on a glands. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: and they this was a Tom Sheeve article. In my
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Speaker 1: hat is off to him for this one. Yes, Tom
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Speaker 1: did a great job with us. I liked your first response,
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Speaker 1: Thank you, Chuck. It also contains the prep use, also
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Speaker 1: contains some nerve cells, did net bundles blood special blood cells.
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Speaker 1: I had no idea, just it makes the penis that
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Speaker 1: much more sensitive. And the fact that it's it produces
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Speaker 1: movement aids in stimulation and lubrication. So there's a lot
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Speaker 1: of people who are happy with their prep use or
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Speaker 1: foreskin and are very glad that they are uncut. As
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Speaker 1: the anti circumcision groups would call it right, right or
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Speaker 1: natural is another one that's right. And since we're talking
7:48
Speaker 1: about the foreskin, it's not the same on all dudes.
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Speaker 1: It's like every human body part. It varies from person
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Speaker 1: to person. And some men actually are sort of naturally
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Speaker 1: circumcised because they're born with very little foreskin, or they
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Speaker 1: have foreskins that actually retract during puberty. They go exactly
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Speaker 1: where maybe said trombone, and they do serve a protective purpose,
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Speaker 1: but they can also and for people that are on
8:17
Speaker 1: both sides, we're going to present both sides of the
8:19
Speaker 1: arguments that don't say, you guys are just talking about
8:22
Speaker 1: this one side. We're gonna talk about both sides, sure,
8:24
Speaker 1: of course. But some one camp believes that it can
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Speaker 1: cause some problems. Well it can. I think everybody agrees
8:31
Speaker 1: on these, like these are the very rare problems that
8:35
Speaker 1: can come about it. And we should say that it's
8:37
Speaker 1: rare though, because one of the big problems that the
8:40
Speaker 1: anti circumcision folks have is that these are overstated. Like
8:44
Speaker 1: when you say it can it's easier to get dirty,
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Speaker 1: and bacteria can build up and all these things can happen.
8:52
Speaker 1: That is true, but it's not like if you skip
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Speaker 1: a shower, this is gonna happen. Well, let's talk about this,
8:58
Speaker 1: because okay, there are some some problems that can arise
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Speaker 1: just from having an or normal foreskin. One of those
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Speaker 1: problems because it is like the inside of your mouth
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Speaker 1: and there warm moist. Gotta keep it clean. You do
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Speaker 1: have to keep it clean, and if you don't, a
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Speaker 1: white build up, a white soapy build up, soapy soupy.
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Speaker 1: This says cheesy in the article cheesy. That's right. A white,
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Speaker 1: cheesy build up called smegmum can develop and once you
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Speaker 1: start developing a white, cheesy build up called smegmum within
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Speaker 1: your foreskin, you want to take a really hard, long
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Speaker 1: look at your grooming habits. Yeah, did you say smegmum? Smegma? Okay,
9:39
Speaker 1: Smegmum's maybe the plural. No, I want to make sure
9:44
Speaker 1: you were saying it right, megma, because the last thing
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Speaker 1: I want is listener mail on the pronunciation of smegma.
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Speaker 1: We get all these voice files. Although I've always said shmegma,
9:52
Speaker 1: but I think smegma. Yeah, maybe I've just said shmegma
9:56
Speaker 1: for humor sake. Maybe all right, that was around the
9:59
Speaker 1: time Wayne's what was out, wasn't it properly? So that's
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Speaker 1: just one that's probably a pretty minor thing. I'm sure
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Speaker 1: that's easily corrected. Your foreskin, though, can also be well.
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Speaker 1: It can develop two ways, too tight or too loose right,
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Speaker 1: and each other problems. Too tight it can cause a
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Speaker 1: condition known as fimosis. It's like trying to put on
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Speaker 1: a sweater that's way too small for you. It's a
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Speaker 1: good way look at it, and that is a medical
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Speaker 1: that's the main medical determinant for whether or not you
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Speaker 1: should get a circumcision. Like the main medical reason would
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Speaker 1: be fimosis. I think that's probably because it's the most frequent.
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Speaker 1: It's probably the most frequent problem you think. I think, Okay,
10:43
Speaker 1: if it's too loose, then it's going to be called paraphimosis.
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Speaker 1: And that's like wearing your dad's sweater. Yes, And it
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Speaker 1: can cause swelling of the glands in the foreskin. And
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Speaker 1: there's also something called balan posthesis, which is swelling of
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Speaker 1: the mucous surfaces of the foreskin, and that can lead
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Speaker 1: to skin disease, problems with the urethra, pain, all sorts
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Speaker 1: of things that you don't want to end this in general,
11:10
Speaker 1: like why, God, why, I would imagine so you can
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Speaker 1: have your frenulum attached too tightly, that's the frenulum brevy
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Speaker 1: where it's just like that's like trying to poke your
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Speaker 1: head through that very very tight sweater. That's a good
11:24
Speaker 1: way to look at it as well, Thank you, Chuck,
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Speaker 1: very evocative, Josh. And circumcision can help correct all of
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Speaker 1: these problems, but it is rarely medically necessary to get circumcised, right,
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Speaker 1: And like we said, these problems do exist, they are
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Speaker 1: serious problems. It's at the very least uncomfortable if not,
11:42
Speaker 1: you know, downright dangerous. Sure, and I think both sides
11:46
Speaker 1: agree that there are circumstances such as these that do
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Speaker 1: warrant circumcision. The problem is most circumcision. I'm sure the
11:56
Speaker 1: vast majority of circumcisions are customary, cultural preventative, right, yeah,
12:04
Speaker 1: sociological in nature. Let's talk about the origins of circumcision.
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Speaker 1: When did humans get the idea to cut the foreskin
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Speaker 1: off of the boys penises? Well? Did it start with
12:14
Speaker 1: the Bible? This is where tom started. But no, it
12:17
Speaker 1: didn't start with the egypt As far back as we
12:20
Speaker 1: can find the Egyptians, we're doing. Okay, that's what we understand. Okay,
12:24
Speaker 1: Well you want to talk about that, Well, let's talk
12:25
Speaker 1: about the Bible first, because in the Book of Genesis
12:29
Speaker 1: God made a covenant with Abraham, and as we all know,
12:33
Speaker 1: Abraham was a Jewish patriarch and his descendants, Abraham was
12:37
Speaker 1: the patriarch of the houses of the Jews and the Muslims. Dude, really, yes, Isaac,
12:44
Speaker 1: his son went on to found the Jews, Well, went
12:47
Speaker 1: on to found Judaism. He's the father of Judaism. Ishmael
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Speaker 1: the other son, illegitimate son, right, but he went on
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Speaker 1: to found Islam. Yes and Isaac. They said, basically, God's
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Speaker 1: gonna bless Jews with riches and success all the you know,
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Speaker 1: the land will be fruitful if you get circumcised by
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Speaker 1: your eighth day, Yes of life. And not just you,
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Speaker 1: but your sons. Yeah, any servants that you captured, any
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Speaker 1: sons that those captured servants has. All boys have to
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Speaker 1: be circumcised. And this has led to the fact that
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Speaker 1: today ninety eight percent of Jewish Men are in fact circumcised. Right.
13:28
Speaker 1: And according to biblical tradition, Ishmael was circumcised before he
13:35
Speaker 1: was basically run off from Abraham's family, right, And so
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Speaker 1: that kind of formed the basis of the Muslim tradition
13:43
Speaker 1: of circumcision, which continues today. If you look at Muslim texts,
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Speaker 1: the Qur'an, apparently it doesn't have any endorsement or mention
13:52
Speaker 1: of precision, but most Muslims today still do circumcise because
13:57
Speaker 1: Muhammad apparently was circumcised. So I guess it's a reverence
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Speaker 1: for their prophet. Yes, and today about two thirds of
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Speaker 1: every circumcised men on the planet are Muslim. So nine
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Speaker 1: percent of Jewish Men, yeah, and two thirds of muslim
14:13
Speaker 1: in circumcised. Well, no, no, thirds of all men on
14:16
Speaker 1: the planet are Muslim, exactly. That's a tough one, exactly.
14:22
Speaker 1: It's kind of an odd qualifier. Christian sects don't really
14:26
Speaker 1: endorse one way or the other. They say, like, you know,
14:28
Speaker 1: decide amongst your selves and Buddhism and Hinduism, they don't
14:33
Speaker 1: really have a stance one way or the other. Is
14:35
Speaker 1: that right? That's right? And we talked about the Egyptians
14:38
Speaker 1: probably being the earliest group as far as Western culture
14:41
Speaker 1: is concerned. Like with most things, the Egyptians came up
14:47
Speaker 1: with this idea, yeah, not necessarily independently, or if it
14:50
Speaker 1: did independently, they weren't the only ones, but they apparently
14:53
Speaker 1: were the ones who exposed the early Israelites, the early
14:58
Speaker 1: Jews too, this concept, right. Yeah. And then at about
15:04
Speaker 1: the same time, possibly even before other groups, the Mayans
15:07
Speaker 1: and the Aztecs, Yeah, were both circumcising their boys indigenous Australians,
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Speaker 1: African Asian and other American tribes, right. Yeah. And Georgians, Yeah,
15:22
Speaker 1: what is that that? I've never heard of them? The
15:24
Speaker 1: coal Colchians, Yeah, I hadn't heard of them either, But
15:27
Speaker 1: as described them, so there were ancient people that is
15:30
Speaker 1: now modern day Georgia and they were into it. Yeah,
15:33
Speaker 1: well they practiced it and then so here in the West,
15:38
Speaker 1: I guess it was strictly religious until about the nineteenth century, right,
15:42
Speaker 1: and then all of a sudden, medicine is like, we
15:44
Speaker 1: can do that. Well yeah, but that's also around the
15:47
Speaker 1: same time that they were doing all sorts of things
15:50
Speaker 1: saying that this could solve this and this, like we
15:52
Speaker 1: can treat VD and we can cure homosexuality with circumcision,
15:57
Speaker 1: and impotence was another one. Yeah, So they were a
16:00
Speaker 1: little bit off base, I would say there, as in
16:03
Speaker 1: way off base, I would think, so, yeah, but it
16:06
Speaker 1: did it did have a lasting impression. The circumcision did
16:09
Speaker 1: become associated with the medical establishment here in the West,
16:14
Speaker 1: and that I think that's translated elsewhere. In the Jewish
16:17
Speaker 1: faith a mohel mohole mole. Okay, they still perform bris
16:25
Speaker 1: briss briss i brisom I. Just the only thing I
16:31
Speaker 1: know about that is from Seinfeld when Jerry was supposed
16:34
Speaker 1: to perform the snap. They they they may still perform
16:39
Speaker 1: these procedures in the Arab world, in the Muslim world,
16:44
Speaker 1: that's it's generally done in the medical realm, right, and
16:50
Speaker 1: then that's actually that was taken away from barbers in
16:56
Speaker 1: ancient Turkey, and yeah, in Turkey, in the Middle East,
17:00
Speaker 1: the Middle Ages, barbers used to do amputations, blood lettings, sure,
17:04
Speaker 1: and circumcisions. Blood lettings like give you a nice leading
17:09
Speaker 1: and you'll be feeling better, get all the toxins out
17:11
Speaker 1: of your blood. Let's talk about it around the globe,
17:15
Speaker 1: like how how it actually goes down like today? Yeah,
17:19
Speaker 1: Like the Jews still still do it traditionally before the
17:23
Speaker 1: eighth Day. They kind of stick to that, and Egypt
17:26
Speaker 1: it's anywhere from birth to about eight years old, and
17:29
Speaker 1: in Malaysia it's in other places it's like a rite
17:33
Speaker 1: of passage like at early adolescens. Yeah, some and some
17:38
Speaker 1: Muslim cultures, once a boy can recite the Quran right once,
17:43
Speaker 1: like all the way through, right, right, I mean think
17:46
Speaker 1: about that, then think about it if you don't want
17:48
Speaker 1: to get circumcised, you like, I remember, once a boy
17:52
Speaker 1: can do that, that's associated with the time when he'll
17:55
Speaker 1: be circumcised after that. And you didn't see there's some
17:59
Speaker 1: really sad cute pictures in this article. Oh yeah, there's
18:03
Speaker 1: a little boy who's clutching his genitalia under his hospital
18:07
Speaker 1: gown and crying because he's like second in line to
18:10
Speaker 1: be circumcised. There's a kid who's being circumcised on page zero.
18:13
Speaker 1: It's sad stuff. I'm glad I don't print the pictures out. Yeah,
18:17
Speaker 1: I don't want to see that. In Africa, Josh, it
18:20
Speaker 1: is also in a lot of tribes a coming of
18:22
Speaker 1: age type of thing. And here's the deal. In Africa,
18:25
Speaker 1: though sometimes there's not in these remote areas a trained
18:30
Speaker 1: professional with all the right equipment, and they do it anyway.
18:33
Speaker 1: And because of this, there's like a thirty five percent
18:36
Speaker 1: increased risk of complications, six percent severe complications that possibly
18:42
Speaker 1: result in partial or full amputation of the penis. Yeah,
18:46
Speaker 1: but sometimes a traveling circumciser will roll through town in
18:52
Speaker 1: his ice cream truck and everybody comes out and with
18:56
Speaker 1: boys of all ages because they know the safe, real
19:00
Speaker 1: doctor with the real clean equipment is there, and so
19:02
Speaker 1: they'll bring out boys of all ages to get circumcised
19:04
Speaker 1: when he rolls through. Yes, which it's a good thing
19:07
Speaker 1: that happens. Asia, it's extremely rare unless they have thriving
19:13
Speaker 1: Muslim populations. But in Asia, among Asian cultures, it's pretty uncommon,
19:18
Speaker 1: except Chuck. In South Korea and the Philippines, circumcision is
19:23
Speaker 1: pretty common. Who knew the American serviceman knew? Yeah? Is
19:27
Speaker 1: that the reason why? In Korea? Yes, and the Philippines.
19:30
Speaker 1: American servicemen stationed there in the ladder half beginning in
19:34
Speaker 1: the latter half of the twentieth century apparently got the
19:39
Speaker 1: word leaked out that they were missing their prepuce, and
19:43
Speaker 1: South Korean's and Filipinos started following suit. Alrighty, well, that's
19:48
Speaker 1: circumcision around the globe today. If we forgot your country,
19:51
Speaker 1: then we apologize. Please rite in. Shall we talk about
19:55
Speaker 1: the procedure itself? Yeah, as Tom put it. Next up,
19:58
Speaker 1: the big show is that he said, I didn't see
20:02
Speaker 1: that part. There's some did you So you didn't see
20:05
Speaker 1: the pictures? I had the illustrations like step by step illustration. Yeah,
20:09
Speaker 1: I didn't eat it. You had dotted lines like where
20:12
Speaker 1: you clip out a coupon. They have these. I have
20:14
Speaker 1: a pretty get idea what's going on down there, So
20:16
Speaker 1: I didn't. I was just fine with the words. Uh
20:19
Speaker 1: so what happens Josh is uh a baby? If it's
20:24
Speaker 1: a baby in infant circumcision. Then they strap the baby
20:26
Speaker 1: down of course arms and legs, which it just seems
20:30
Speaker 1: like an awful thing. It's a bad start when you
20:32
Speaker 1: read it. They give a either a topical anesthetic, uh
20:36
Speaker 1: you know, rubbed around the area or injected around the
20:40
Speaker 1: base of the penis to numb the area. There are
20:44
Speaker 1: a few different devices that the person performing the procedure
20:47
Speaker 1: can choose from, and I know you know a little
20:49
Speaker 1: bit about these, I do. Let's hear it. There's like
20:52
Speaker 1: three things. Well, there's the Gomco clamp, the Mgan clamp,
20:56
Speaker 1: and the plastic bell device. Right, yeah, so I did.
20:59
Speaker 1: I didn't really look into the Mogan clamp because it
21:03
Speaker 1: just too wow. But the Gomco clamp has been around
21:09
Speaker 1: for a while and that sounds like something you would
21:11
Speaker 1: see on a late night TV ad. You can actually
21:13
Speaker 1: buy them on the internet for the two hundred and
21:15
Speaker 1: thirty bucks. Yeah, search gomcoke clamp. It comes up, and
21:19
Speaker 1: do not do not buy one and do this at home.
21:22
Speaker 1: That is in no way an endorsement a coat clamp.
21:26
Speaker 1: Do any just stop stop right now there. The Gomco
21:30
Speaker 1: clamp involves a bell with a an arm and appendage
21:34
Speaker 1: that comes off the tip of the bell, put that in,
21:37
Speaker 1: pull the foreskin up around the bell. So what you're
21:41
Speaker 1: doing is you're inserting this metal layer between the glands
21:44
Speaker 1: and the foreskin. Yeah, like all these things, you're separating
21:47
Speaker 1: the foreskin from the glands exactly. That's pretty much the
21:50
Speaker 1: key to circumcision. Sure, you pull it up around, you
21:53
Speaker 1: slide it through this hole. It has an arm attached
21:56
Speaker 1: to the top of the bell's holding everything taut, and
21:59
Speaker 1: then you cut around it and remove the foreskin. The
22:03
Speaker 1: plastic bell device is similar. It doesn't have the arm
22:08
Speaker 1: and the clamp holding everything, but basically you're just you're
22:11
Speaker 1: putting a bell in between the glands and the foreskin,
22:13
Speaker 1: and then you basically tie off the suture around the
22:21
Speaker 1: foreskin that's been pulled up right, and then you cut
22:24
Speaker 1: that and then eventually, after like a few days, the
22:27
Speaker 1: bell falls off and you're fine, supposedly well, And that's
22:31
Speaker 1: about the recovery period period if you're an infant is
22:35
Speaker 1: about three to four days. Plan on having a grumpy
22:38
Speaker 1: little baby boy for those next few days, and plan
22:41
Speaker 1: on keeping the area really really clean and maybe you
22:45
Speaker 1: might even have to bandage it, and just you got
22:48
Speaker 1: to make sure that you keep it separate from diaper
22:53
Speaker 1: poo poo, because you don't want a fresh surgery being
22:57
Speaker 1: around fecal matter not a good thing. No, you're you're
23:00
Speaker 1: looking at a pretty hefty, little horrible infection there too.
23:04
Speaker 1: And it takes about thirty minutes. Yeah, if you're an adult,
23:07
Speaker 1: you don't necessarily need to use any of these other
23:09
Speaker 1: bells or whistles literally bells. But you can just pull
23:14
Speaker 1: the foreskin forward, make a couple of incisions, cut off
23:17
Speaker 1: the frenulum, stitch back. Basically you're stitching this hanging loose
23:22
Speaker 1: skin to the just to the corona, which is the
23:25
Speaker 1: strip just below the glands. Yeah, and bamm bada bing
23:31
Speaker 1: no sex for a couple of weeks, which no one
23:33
Speaker 1: should have to tell you that, but we're telling you that. Yeah,
23:36
Speaker 1: that would be common sense. If you ask me, then
23:38
Speaker 1: it's done. So why are people doing this, Chuck? I mean,
23:41
Speaker 1: think about that, especially as an adult. Why are people
23:44
Speaker 1: circumcising both their themselves and their infant sons. Why is
23:49
Speaker 1: it like all the rage? So this is the argument for,
23:53
Speaker 1: and we will cover the argument against before you get
23:55
Speaker 1: upset by Chuck Bryant. Mister Schofield. The reason some of
23:59
Speaker 1: the reasons, Josh are are obviously, like we said, you're
24:01
Speaker 1: raised in a religion or a culture where that's the
24:04
Speaker 1: thing you do, then you would probably do that, right.
24:08
Speaker 1: Some fathers think that their son's penis should kind of
24:12
Speaker 1: be like theirs, and they're a little matter fact, nine
24:17
Speaker 1: tenths of circumcised men opt to have their sons circumcised,
24:21
Speaker 1: and about three quarters of uncircumcised men opt to have
24:24
Speaker 1: their sons not circumcised. Yeah, it's about fifteen percent. Main natural. Interesting, Uh,
24:30
Speaker 1: some parents want their sons to just be like the
24:33
Speaker 1: rest of the little boys. If and if you live
24:35
Speaker 1: in the United States and most boys are like that,
24:38
Speaker 1: they don't want you to stand out in the locker
24:39
Speaker 1: room and potentially be teased that kind of thing. This
24:45
Speaker 1: one uncircumcised men or twice as likely to contract HPV
24:50
Speaker 1: and pass that along here. And apparently circumcision also helps
24:56
Speaker 1: prevent or protect against chlamytee and syphilis, they say, and
25:00
Speaker 1: this is from the Journal of American Medical Association. We
25:03
Speaker 1: should say we should same goes with a study that
25:07
Speaker 1: found recently that areas that don't circumcise or where circumcision
25:12
Speaker 1: is uncommon tend to have higher prevalences of HIV. I
25:18
Speaker 1: don't know if those two are causal, like HIV is
25:23
Speaker 1: more easily contracted because there's this maybe the blood vessels
25:29
Speaker 1: are closer to the surface right when the foreskin is attached, yeah,
25:34
Speaker 1: or if it's just correlated, like maybe they have maybe
25:37
Speaker 1: these areas have lesser health care right, right, or less
25:43
Speaker 1: adequate healthcare. Well, at any rate, they put that number
25:45
Speaker 1: at sixty percent less likely. But it's only it's not
25:49
Speaker 1: for male to male sex. It's only female to male
25:51
Speaker 1: transmission right of HIV is what it says. You go.
25:54
Speaker 1: I know some people think it's cleaner, but that's completely
26:00
Speaker 1: unsupported from what I can tell medically. Right, that's just
26:03
Speaker 1: a perception, if I'm not mistaken. And then there are
26:08
Speaker 1: some who just think it's prettier, yeah, better looking, sleeker,
26:15
Speaker 1: All right, Josh, that's the case for generally. Let's talk
26:18
Speaker 1: about people who are against this, like mister Schofield, what
26:21
Speaker 1: are their arguments. Well, I get the impression that there's
26:23
Speaker 1: a lot of people who well, the people who are
26:25
Speaker 1: against it are vehemently against it. One of the biggest
26:28
Speaker 1: arguments is that it's mutilation. Yeah, general mutilation. It is
26:34
Speaker 1: genital mutilation. Female circumcision, which we'll talk a little bit
26:37
Speaker 1: more about in a minute, is basically considered now in
26:42
Speaker 1: the Western world, the developed world, female genital mutilation, right,
26:47
Speaker 1: not female circumcision any longer. And the one of the
26:50
Speaker 1: big points among anti circumcision people is that this is
26:54
Speaker 1: the same thing with ment. It's just for some reason
26:57
Speaker 1: more accepted in the West than email circumcision is. Yeah,
27:01
Speaker 1: but if you're against it, you probably think it's old
27:03
Speaker 1: fashion and unnecessary. Unnecessary is a big one. Yeah. The
27:07
Speaker 1: American Academy of Pediatrics considered this in nineteen ninety nine
27:11
Speaker 1: and said, you know what, we're not going to endorse this.
27:13
Speaker 1: We're not going to come out against it, but we've
27:15
Speaker 1: looked at all of the information. We see no medical
27:18
Speaker 1: reason to do this, and we're not going to endorse it.
27:21
Speaker 1: So that's that's a big one that the anti circumcision
27:25
Speaker 1: lobby sites. Oh yeah, when I read that that they
27:28
Speaker 1: didn't endorse it, or they said that you shouldn't do it.
27:30
Speaker 1: This is such a tender subject. That kind of got
27:33
Speaker 1: the impression they were a little bit like, I ain't
27:36
Speaker 1: going there. Why don't you just decide? Right, Like, we
27:39
Speaker 1: don't have a lot of data either way, so we're
27:41
Speaker 1: not going to say. I get the impression that it's
27:43
Speaker 1: a lot like the natural birth movement. There's a lot
27:46
Speaker 1: of probably similar sentiment, maybe a lot of crossover actually
27:49
Speaker 1: between the two. Josh, there are risks of scarring, their
27:53
Speaker 1: risks of infection. Yeah, this is a big one right here.
27:56
Speaker 1: It can go wrong. Yeah, and it does like you
27:59
Speaker 1: can have your penis lopped off because of a bad circumcision. Yeah,
28:03
Speaker 1: that's a pretty good reason not to do it. I
28:05
Speaker 1: don't think it's super common. It's very uncommon. Yeah, but
28:09
Speaker 1: when you're talking about your your maybe you're only male son,
28:13
Speaker 1: it can only be a male son, but your only son.
28:16
Speaker 1: Do you want to take that kind of risk? I
28:19
Speaker 1: don't know yet. Well, yeah, sure, I don't know. Stop
28:22
Speaker 1: pressuring me. No, I'm not pressuring you. I was just
28:25
Speaker 1: I'm not asking you. I'm just asking theoretically. But I
28:27
Speaker 1: think that's probably the sentiment among a lot of like
28:30
Speaker 1: first time parents, you know, like should we do this?
28:33
Speaker 1: I haven't really thought about it before, and like, holdly, cow,
28:36
Speaker 1: now we have to decide or do we Another argument
28:40
Speaker 1: against is that you take away the child's right to choose.
28:45
Speaker 1: There are there is a procedure called an epipasm, which
28:49
Speaker 1: there's actually a surgical procedure, which is kind of a
28:52
Speaker 1: skin graft. It is not always desirable. Sometimes you get
28:57
Speaker 1: a different color, a different texture because this is someone
29:01
Speaker 1: else's foreskin or else it's skin from elsewhere on your body.
29:04
Speaker 1: It's probably from your body, I would say. And then
29:06
Speaker 1: there's also like a non there's non surgical things you
29:08
Speaker 1: can do too, right, Chuck, to to create a foreskin,
29:14
Speaker 1: to recreate it. Yes, Josh, there are non surgical ways.
29:17
Speaker 1: And I have never heard of this at all. I
29:20
Speaker 1: hadn't either until I read this article. Over time, and
29:23
Speaker 1: we're not recommending that you try this at home, by
29:26
Speaker 1: the way, this is this is something you really need
29:28
Speaker 1: to know a lot about. Over time, though, you can
29:31
Speaker 1: apparently stretch your foreskin using weights and straps and it
29:36
Speaker 1: will eventually stretch to where it could cover your glands.
29:40
Speaker 1: That's what they say. There's another method that has involves
29:44
Speaker 1: inflating little balloons under your skin, under your penile skin
29:49
Speaker 1: prompt new skin cell growth. I guess, to fill in
29:51
Speaker 1: the void, I guess. And then when you deflate the balloons,
29:55
Speaker 1: You've got all that extra skin, right, and you go
29:57
Speaker 1: to So that's an epipath. So yeah, the point is
30:03
Speaker 1: one of the arguments against circumcisions that you take away
30:06
Speaker 1: a kid's right to choose. And if you kid turns
30:08
Speaker 1: like eighteen twenty one, thirty five fifty and goes, I
30:11
Speaker 1: really want a foreskin, basically he doesn't have a lot
30:15
Speaker 1: of options available to him balloons and weights and straps
30:18
Speaker 1: and skin graphs and skin graphs. Yeah, so that's another reason.
30:21
Speaker 1: What are some more reasons, Chuckers, Well, like we said
30:24
Speaker 1: in the foreskin, there's a lot of sensitive areas for
30:28
Speaker 1: sexual stimulation and that once you lose that, it's gone. Yeah,
30:32
Speaker 1: so theoretically you're cutting down on the man's pleasure. Sinners
30:37
Speaker 1: somewhat sure, and he wants to do that to your kid. Puritans,
30:42
Speaker 1: I don't know, they say, you know, like psychologists might
30:45
Speaker 1: say that a child might remember this somehow, resulting in
30:50
Speaker 1: lingering psychological repercussions. It's very Freudian sentence. Some people think
30:55
Speaker 1: it's better looking to have the foreskin and prettier that way. Yeah,
30:59
Speaker 1: I I would like to conduct a Paul. I don't
31:01
Speaker 1: know how we could do this conceivably, but I would
31:04
Speaker 1: like to I know, not and not and not get
31:06
Speaker 1: in trouble, right, But I am curious, like where, like
31:11
Speaker 1: which one is considered more attractive? I have no idea. Yeah,
31:15
Speaker 1: so I'm I'm I'm very curious. Yeah, you know, like,
31:18
Speaker 1: is it like do people think people who like foreskin
31:23
Speaker 1: think those people are weird or vice versa, or I'm
31:26
Speaker 1: very curious. This is all just I'm curious. Yeah, you've
31:29
Speaker 1: been even fascinated by this whole thing, Huh. I have
31:32
Speaker 1: from paid zero. Uh. And there are a couple more
31:35
Speaker 1: reasons some men subconsciously might not feel complete, and then
31:38
Speaker 1: the big reason you're born with it, So that might
31:41
Speaker 1: mean that you should keep it on your body. Yeah, Like,
31:45
Speaker 1: if we didn't need it, why would we have it?
31:47
Speaker 1: Wouldn't it have whether you whether you believe in creationism
31:50
Speaker 1: or evolution, there's that. Both of those kind of touch
31:54
Speaker 1: upon that. Yeah, we wouldn't have it if we didn't
31:57
Speaker 1: need it, it didn't serve some purpose. Did you already
32:01
Speaker 1: cover the language part? I think you'd mentioned that right
32:04
Speaker 1: a little bit. If you are talking to somebody who
32:07
Speaker 1: is in the anti circumcision camp, you don't want to
32:11
Speaker 1: use the term uncircumcised because it implies that there is
32:17
Speaker 1: something wrong, that there's something missing, right, something hasn't been
32:20
Speaker 1: done yet. That's not the norm, right, And so they
32:23
Speaker 1: the people in the anti circumcision camp tend to prefer
32:28
Speaker 1: terms like natural, uncut, full length, intact, intact. Yeah, yeah,
32:37
Speaker 1: we'd be remiss, Josh, you did mention female general mutilation.
32:40
Speaker 1: This is a big problem around the world. Between one
32:43
Speaker 1: hundred and one hundred and forty million women have been
32:46
Speaker 1: victims of this. A lot of times. There are I'm
32:50
Speaker 1: sorry all the time. There's no medical reason for doing this, right,
32:54
Speaker 1: Like they will remove the clitterists sometimes. Yeah, this actually
32:59
Speaker 1: was kind of It came about in the West too.
33:03
Speaker 1: It's still a huge problem in Africa. Apparently ninety two
33:06
Speaker 1: million girls under the age of ten have undergone female
33:11
Speaker 1: genital mutilation. And that's just Africa alone. But in the
33:17
Speaker 1: West it was popular. I had no idea. But here
33:21
Speaker 1: in the West, in the United States, really until nineteen
33:24
Speaker 1: seventy seven, Blue Cross covered it. That's female. They covered clitterectomy,
33:30
Speaker 1: clitter clittery, glitteridectomy, that's awful, glitteridectomy, which is the partial
33:37
Speaker 1: total removal of the clitteris right. And this this fad
33:43
Speaker 1: of circumcision came about at about the same time in
33:47
Speaker 1: the nineteenth century and for the same reasons as male circumcision,
33:51
Speaker 1: which has yet another argument against male circumcision, because we've
33:54
Speaker 1: come to see female circumcision as barbaric, even though they
33:58
Speaker 1: were both brought up for the same reason, which was
34:00
Speaker 1: it's cleaner, it's more hygienic, it's it's healthier. And also
34:05
Speaker 1: with girls, they had the added bonus of its reduces
34:09
Speaker 1: their sexual pleasure from masturbation. Therefore it will it's much
34:13
Speaker 1: more morally hygienic as well. This is one of the
34:16
Speaker 1: reasons why it's become or come to be seen as barbaric,
34:21
Speaker 1: because it actually does reduce tremendously the sensitivity a woman
34:25
Speaker 1: can experience in sex. Right, There's a lot of other
34:28
Speaker 1: problems with it too. There's a little procedure called infabulation
34:34
Speaker 1: that basically is you cut the inner outer labia so
34:40
Speaker 1: that it grows back to narrow or close the vagina.
34:46
Speaker 1: And what's the idea here are they is it a
34:47
Speaker 1: moral thing where they're trying to prevent their daughters from
34:50
Speaker 1: being tempted to have sex or having sex. Yes, because
34:53
Speaker 1: to to get this reversed, you to have children, to
34:57
Speaker 1: have sex, to conceive, to do all these things basically
35:00
Speaker 1: have to have the procedure reversed. Wow. And then in
35:03
Speaker 1: some cultures that promote this, after childbirth, after the reproductive years,
35:08
Speaker 1: it's closed up again. So not only are you undergoing
35:11
Speaker 1: it this first time, you're having a reverse and then
35:13
Speaker 1: you're having it done again. So it is a huge
35:16
Speaker 1: problem and it is viewed as barbaric in the West,
35:19
Speaker 1: and the World Health organizations come out starting in nineteen
35:22
Speaker 1: ninety seven against this, and then I guess over the
35:26
Speaker 1: ensuing decades really lobbied the rest of the UN and
35:30
Speaker 1: got much wider support. In February two thousand and eight,
35:33
Speaker 1: pretty much the entire UN issued this statement saying like
35:36
Speaker 1: this has to stop. This is really bad. But it
35:39
Speaker 1: still continues. It happens in the US, it happens in
35:43
Speaker 1: Great Britain, and a lot of the minority African populations
35:48
Speaker 1: that immigrate here immigrate here. It's a problem. Yeah, Well,
35:52
Speaker 1: thank god for the WHO. In groups like UNICEF and
35:55
Speaker 1: other human rights groups, we're trying to get the word
35:56
Speaker 1: out on that too, right, But Chuck, we just urarrived.
36:00
Speaker 1: I did a really kind of a hinky place. Like,
36:04
Speaker 1: everybody agrees this is barbaric. One of the reasons why
36:08
Speaker 1: is because it serves absolutely no medical reason whatsoever. No,
36:11
Speaker 1: there's no medical purpose to it, right, It's all just
36:14
Speaker 1: basically chastity. Right, So we all agree that that's barbaric.
36:19
Speaker 1: If there's really no medical reason for male circumcision, isn't
36:24
Speaker 1: the same thing? Is it barbaric? Yeah? Well, people against
36:28
Speaker 1: it sure say it is, people like Scofield. Yeah, And
36:31
Speaker 1: I'm not here to make a judgment either way because
36:33
Speaker 1: I don't have a sun at this point. But maybe
36:37
Speaker 1: that day will come when I'm gonna have to make
36:38
Speaker 1: that decision, and hopefully we put out at least some
36:41
Speaker 1: facts and figures on both sides that point some stats. Yeah,
36:45
Speaker 1: it's tricky. Well, if you want to know more about circumcision,
36:48
Speaker 1: and you want to see probably more illustrations of the
36:52
Speaker 1: male reproductive organ than any other article on the site,
36:57
Speaker 1: including cut here, do cut along the ditted line dots.
37:03
Speaker 1: You can type circumcision into the search bar at how
37:06
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com and that will bring all that
37:08
Speaker 1: stuff up. It's an interesting article, right, yes, sir, since
37:12
Speaker 1: I said handy, search bar, well, I said search bar
37:14
Speaker 1: at least right, Yeah, it's time for a listener mail. Yes, Josh,
37:19
Speaker 1: I thought this might be appropriate. You asked for stories
37:22
Speaker 1: about people who had their fingers cut off, and what
37:25
Speaker 1: podcast was at one of them? Yes, one of the
37:29
Speaker 1: podcasts one of the things we did. And so we
37:32
Speaker 1: got a bunch of stories of people who have lost fingers,
37:35
Speaker 1: and I picked out three fairly short ones to read.
37:39
Speaker 1: The first one comes from Melanie from Minnesota. She did
37:41
Speaker 1: not lose a finger, but her husband's uncle did. He's
37:44
Speaker 1: doing some woodworking in his garage solid his thumb, index finger,
37:48
Speaker 1: and part of his middle finger clean off while his
37:51
Speaker 1: wife rushed him to the hospital. They were able to
37:52
Speaker 1: reattach the thumb, but not his index finger. They were
37:55
Speaker 1: never able to find the rest of his ring finger,
37:58
Speaker 1: and they suspect that the dog ate it. Now he
38:01
Speaker 1: now has a prosthetic index finger, which he likes to
38:04
Speaker 1: remove and toss to people just to freak them out.
38:07
Speaker 1: He was a musician before the accident. He's still able
38:09
Speaker 1: to play the piano with his faux finger, wow, which
38:11
Speaker 1: is pretty cool. And he has a winter and summer version.
38:14
Speaker 1: One is tan and one isn't no way Way. Well,
38:18
Speaker 1: this next one is from Abby from Hamden, Connecticut. Guys,
38:22
Speaker 1: I thought you might find this interesting. I am, in
38:24
Speaker 1: fact missing two fingers, but I still have five fingers
38:27
Speaker 1: on each hand. Awesome, Awesome, This one may win the prize.
38:32
Speaker 1: The same is true for my mother and her grandmother.
38:34
Speaker 1: We all have a slight genetic disorder called polydactylism m HM,
38:38
Speaker 1: which is when you're born with extra pinkies. The extra
38:41
Speaker 1: fingers were all cut off at birth because the bones
38:44
Speaker 1: in them were not fully formed. So now we all
38:45
Speaker 1: have little bumps on the sides of our hands that
38:48
Speaker 1: were once pinkies. That's circumcision of fingers. It is I
38:53
Speaker 1: kind of wish I had kept the little extra fingers
38:55
Speaker 1: and that they were fully functional, because I would use
38:57
Speaker 1: him to play impossible pieces of music. I told my
39:00
Speaker 1: bio teacher about polydactylism in high school. She got very
39:04
Speaker 1: excited and gave me extra credit. She gave her extra
39:06
Speaker 1: credit for missing those fingers it's pretty cool. Or she
39:10
Speaker 1: gave her extra credit for being born with two extra fingers,
39:13
Speaker 1: or being brave enough to admit it in a classroom
39:15
Speaker 1: sending yeah, all right. And this last one is from
39:17
Speaker 1: James from Ohio, guys. I have a missing finger story
39:21
Speaker 1: you might find disturbing or fascinating. In high school, my
39:23
Speaker 1: shot class teacher always had these crazy stories about his
39:26
Speaker 1: work in the industry field. In the industry field, and
39:30
Speaker 1: it's a pretty wide field, And one day he had
39:33
Speaker 1: a story to tell us about a man who was
39:35
Speaker 1: unfortunate enough to lose some fingers. The story starts when
39:38
Speaker 1: my shop teacher worked at a metal sheet shaping factory.
39:42
Speaker 1: I bet you it was a lot of fingers in
39:43
Speaker 1: one of those places. Sure, they make impossible curves on
39:47
Speaker 1: metal that couldn't normally exist. Fellow worker decided to pull
39:50
Speaker 1: an all nighter and attempt to work machinery with coherency. Unfortunately,
39:55
Speaker 1: the fingers of the worker were caught in the metal
39:58
Speaker 1: working machine, pinched off, not cut, pinched off. My teacher
40:03
Speaker 1: explained that it took about a half an hour to
40:05
Speaker 1: find all the missing fingers and keep them cool and
40:07
Speaker 1: a fridge until they were able to reattach them. It's
40:11
Speaker 1: like the Machinist Christian vale Man. That movie was messed up,
40:16
Speaker 1: Yes it was, so we got a lot more stories
40:19
Speaker 1: and a lot. We're very detailed and more gruesome, so
40:21
Speaker 1: we went with these because it were short and a
40:22
Speaker 1: little lighter. Him interest you for that. That's very good.
40:27
Speaker 1: That's all I got. If you have an email that
40:29
Speaker 1: has absolutely nothing to do with that, we want to
40:31
Speaker 1: hear about it. You should wrap it up, send it
40:34
Speaker 1: to us, spank it on the bottom, and send it
40:38
Speaker 1: to stuff podcast at HowStuffWorks dot com. For more on
40:46
Speaker 1: this and thousands of other topics, is it HowStuffWorks dot com.
40:49
Speaker 1: To learn more about the podcast, click on the podcast
40:52
Speaker 1: icon in the upper right corner of our homepage. The
40:55
Speaker 1: house Stuff Works iPhone app has a arrived. Download it
40:58
Speaker 1: today on iTunes, brought to you by the reinvented two
41:04
Speaker 1: thousand twelve Camri. It's ready, are you