Very graphic video of female circumcision.

[Yulia_R]

WARNING: VERY DISTURBING http://www.medicalvideos.us/play.php?vid=1835

However, as disturbing as this video is, I personally did not find it more disturbing than a video of male circumcision. The whole thing seems to be done much faster than it is done to most male infants int he US. Even after watching this video I do not think that one thing is worse than the other. Both are horrific and evil. Genital cutting is genital cutting regardless of the gender it is preformed on.

[kimkabob5]

That was disturbing but not more disturbing than the male circumcision videos. Cutting genitals is wrong!

[annablue]

Yikes, that was hard to watch. So are the male circ videos. I don't understand why people feel the need to argue about which is "worse." Cutting genitals is wrong, period.

[hakunangovi]

Does not matter if it is a boy or a girl - both are torture to the child.

[Yulia_R]

Originally Posted by annablue

Yikes, that was hard to watch. So are the male circ videos. I don't understand why people feel the need to argue about which is "worse." Cutting genitals is wrong, period.

Exactly, I feel the same way! Cutting genitals is wrong, period!

[NewDirections]

I just can't believe that goes on, that people hold her down while being tortured. It's just so awful. Even more awful is the huge numbers of girls this is happening to.

ITA that cutting genitals is wrong- this has got to stop.

[bimpe08]

As someone who pass through the horor of female circumcision,

it is not only against human right it is inhuman. I live with the nightmares

of that humiliation daily and who feel it knows it all. It is about time that this

evil practise is stopped. I have three daughters and never will I allow it to

happen to them despite  their fathers tradition which recognise

femle circumcision as a right of passage.  It is about time we stand up

and fight.  Bimpe

[Super~Single~Mama]

I can't watch any circ videos.  Not the infant male ones, or this one either.  I try to, but I'm super squeamish and anything with blood and crying babies pretty much gives me nightmares.  It's one reason my son is intact - I couldn't bear thinking about it.

[MamaofLiam]

That's just horrible horrible horrible! It was so hard to watch and realize that this is not uncommon. No child should ever have their genitals cut! EVER

[milkcake]

I made it through the video but cried. It reminds me of a book I read in middle school called No Condition is Permanent - about an American girl who studies an African tribe, and who's mother is there trying to convince them to stop.

From what I've understood about female circumcision was that it meant the woman would NEVER enjoy sex or foreplay, and was essentially just another way for men to control women in these tribes - men refuse to marry women that are not circumcised.

[erin23kate]

Unfortunately, there are many different ways to mutilate genitals of both boys and girls, and correlations between all of them. 

Some forms of FGM are parallel to castration (clitoris ---> penis removal), others, like Sunat in some Asian cultures, are physiologically identical to circumcision, with the removal of the clitoral hood.  There are kinds "in between" on for both genders (infibulation comes to mind, stitching the labia together in women or sewing the foreskin shut in men - yeah, that's real too).  They are all bizarre, wrong, and sickening.  Male castration (removal of testicles) was practiced in Europe until ~150 years ago, and still happens in some remote parts of Asia and Africa.  I sing opera... I often sing the "Castrati" roles written about 200 years ago. 

FGM was legal in the USA until 1997. 

All forms of genital cutting, male and female, originated to curb sexuality.  Remember, male circumcision became prevalent in the USA to prevent masturbation.

People should be equally disgusted with all forms of non-consenting cutting of the genitals of a child.   

[Super~Single~Mama]

oops.

[hakunangovi]

Originally Posted by milkcake 

I made it through the video but cried. It reminds me of a book I read in middle school called No Condition is Permanent - about an American girl who studies an African tribe, and who's mother is there trying to convince them to stop.

From what I've understood about female circumcision was that it meant the woman would NEVER enjoy sex or foreplay, and was essentially just another way for men to control women in these tribes - men refuse to marry women that are not circumcised.

I grew up in Africa and lived there for nearly 20 years in an area where both FGM and circumcision of males were carried out as a "Rite of passage". Actualy it is the women of the tribe who both carry out and perpetuate FGM.  The rationale is much like MGM in the U.S. where fathers insist that it did no harm to them and want their sons to "be like them".

[milkcake]

Originally Posted by erin23kate 

Unfortunately, there are many different ways to mutilate genitals of both boys and girls, and correlations between all of them. 

Some forms of FGM are parallel to castration (clitoris ---> penis removal), others, like Sunat in some Asian cultures, are physiologically identical to circumcision, with the removal of the clitoral hood.  There are kinds "in between" on for both genders (infibulation comes to mind, stitching the labia together in women or sewing the foreskin shut in men - yeah, that's real too).  They are all bizarre, wrong, and sickening.  Male castration (removal of testicles) was practiced in Europe until ~150 years ago, and still happens in some remote parts of Asia and Africa.  I sing opera... I often sing the "Castrati" roles written about 200 years ago. 

FGM was legal in the USA until 1997. 

All forms of genital cutting, male and female, originated to curb sexuality.  Remember, male circumcision became prevalent in the USA to prevent masturbation.

People should be equally disgusted with all forms of non-consenting cutting of the genitals of a child.   

Originally Posted by hakunangovi 

I grew up in Africa and lived there for nearly 20 years in an area where both FGM and circumcision of males were carried out as a "Rite of passage". Actualy it is the women of the tribe who both carry out and perpetuate FGM.  The rationale is much like MGM in the U.S. where fathers insist that it did no harm to them and want their sons to "be like them".

That's even scarier. The only difference I can tell between the two is that it doesn't really change sexual pleasure for a man (or not much) but it does for a woman? I apologize if I'm vastly undereducated about the subject, I've just always been opposed to the idea as illogical without really looking into why it's done.

[erin23kate]

Originally Posted by milkcake 

That's even scarier. The only difference I can tell between the two is that it doesn't really change sexual pleasure for a man (or not much) but it does for a woman? I apologize if I'm vastly undereducated about the subject, I've just always been opposed to the idea as illogical without really looking into why it's done.

Honestly, having spoken with men who have restored their foreskins, I think it really does change sexual pleasure for a man.  My husband is intact; my ex-husband was circumcised.  There was a dramatic difference in the way they moved during sex, the way they experienced sex, and the sensitivity of their glans.  DH has a frenulum, which is incredibly sensitive - I would liken it to the clitoris in a lot of ways.  His foreskin is also extremely sensitive.  It's illogical to believe that removing 20% of a man's penis would have little to no effect.  This is a great site to check out if you'd like to understand the difference in function:

http://www.sexasnatureintendedit.com/  <-- Warning, VERY graphic.

Circumcised women can and do experience orgasm - see this study (scary stuff): http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17970975.  Do they experience it the same way?  Probably not, but if it's all they've ever known, why would they believe themselves lacking, in general? 

Human sexuality is very complex.  We find ways to compensate for what we have lost, male or female.  A man I know who restored likened it to color-blindness.  He literally didn't know what he was missing, and therefore he didn't miss it.  Restoring was, for him, like seeing color for the first time.

[QueenOfTheMeadow]

Originally Posted by bimpe08 

As someone who pass through the horor of female circumcision,

it is not only against human right it is inhuman. I live with the nightmares

of that humiliation daily and who feel it knows it all. It is about time that this

evil practise is stopped. I have three daughters and never will I allow it to

happen to them despite  their fathers tradition which recognise

femle circumcision as a right of passage.  It is about time we stand up

and fight.  Bimpe

Welcome to MDC. Thank you for sharing with us. I am so sorry for the pain you have suffered.

[Ldavis24]

Is there any way you could mention that it is a toddler in the video on the title. I was under the (obviously stupid) impression it would be a a young woman (rite of passage) who agreed to it. Not just a toddler being pinned down.  I thought I could manage to watch it but the minute I saw it was a toddler I really just had the blood rush to my head. I could only keep it on for a second. 

Ugh, whatever PP said it doesn't matter boy or girl it just needs to stop. I'm going to go have nightmares now.

Edited by Ldavis24 - 5/5/11 at 4:51am

[milkcake]

Originally Posted by erin23kate 

Honestly, having spoken with men who have restored their foreskins, I think it really does change sexual pleasure for a man.  My husband is intact; my ex-husband was circumcised.  There was a dramatic difference in the way they moved during sex, the way they experienced sex, and the sensitivity of their glans.  DH has a frenulum, which is incredibly sensitive - I would liken it to the clitoris in a lot of ways.  His foreskin is also extremely sensitive.  It's illogical to believe that removing 20% of a man's penis would have little to no effect.  This is a great site to check out if you'd like to understand the difference in function:

http://www.sexasnatureintendedit.com/  <-- Warning, VERY graphic.

Circumcised women can and do experience orgasm - see this study (scary stuff): http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17970975.  Do they experience it the same way?  Probably not, but if it's all they've ever known, why would they believe themselves lacking, in general? 

Human sexuality is very complex.  We find ways to compensate for what we have lost, male or female.  A man I know who restored likened it to color-blindness.  He literally didn't know what he was missing, and therefore he didn't miss it.  Restoring was, for him, like seeing color for the first time.

How do you restore the foreskin? Do they use tissue from another part of the body?

[Lory]

There is surgical restoration, which is pretty rare, and I think it does involve taking skin from elsewhere and putting it on the end of the penis. The most common restoration is non-surgical, where a man pulls the remaining skin over the head for a few minutes a day, or uses tape or a device like the TLC Tugger to do so. Eventually this promotes new skin cell growth and the skin covers it entirely, looks and functions pretty much like a real foreskin (though it doesn't have the ridged band or frenulum).
 

Originally Posted by milkcake 

How do you restore the foreskin? Do they use tissue from another part of the body?

[Calm]

Originally Posted by Lory 

There is surgical restoration, which is pretty rare, and I think it does involve taking skin from elsewhere and putting it on the end of the penis. The most common restoration is non-surgical, where a man pulls the remaining skin over the head for a few minutes a day, or uses tape or a device like the TLC Tugger to do so. Eventually this promotes new skin cell growth and the skin covers it entirely, looks and functions pretty much like a real foreskin (though it doesn't have the ridged band or frenulum).
 

I thought it was done for most of the day, that the device was attached for as many hours as the man could handle.