Even the most common side effect of circumcisions is bleeding (usually remedied by pressure to the area and dressings like usual), and that is only 1% of all circumcisions. More significant complications are a lot rarer.
I would wager the proportion of the replies we’re seeing here result from:
- People with botched circumcisions (or are otherwise displeased with their circumcision) are more likely to engage with a post discussing circumcision than those who have not had a negative experience with it
- Anti-circumcision activists are disproportionately common on reddit, and this site is basically a replacement for a banned subreddit
- Leftists are probably more likely to be against needless circumcision as it aligns with a lot of leftist thought against stereotypical american culture
Again, I’m not suggesting that unnecessary circumcision (botched or otherwise) isn’t something to be upset about. But it needs to be viewed contextually alongside FGM. To equate the two is foolish.
(usually remedied by pressure to the area and dressings like usual), and that is only 1% of all circumcisions. More significant complications are a lot rarer.
100% suffer loss of the most erogenous part of the penis (the foreskin). The other negative effects of circumcision have never been properly studied, so they can’t be confidently stated. Meatal stenosis alone could effect more than 20% of those circumcised. Not to mention the psychological damage.
But it needs to be viewed contextually alongside FGM. To equate the two is foolish.
I recommend this great essay by Brian Earp, a bioethicist who studies genital cutting. He addresses this conception directly.
That first link seems to be behind a paywall, so I can’t really engage with that. On psychological damage, I found this study that seems to refute that, but I haven’t read through it beyond the abstract and skimming the whole body of it. Additionally, a lot of the claims rely on doctors not using proper anesthetic, citing studies from over twenty years ago. Searching around, pretty much all of the hospital website pages on circumcision state they use some form of anesthesia. I can’t speak as to the situation at every hospital, of course.
The essay was really cool, and definitely upended some of my thoughts on the matter. The biases on viewing male circumcision in the best of lights vs. female circumcision in the worst definitely caught me off guard, as I hadn’t really thought about that at all. However, there were still some things that didn’t seem quite right. For instance, Earp mentions 400 deaths because of circumcision in South Africa. According to this article the leading causes of death were dehydration, malnutrition, and sepsis rather than being solely the fault of circumcision. I’m sure circumcisions were responsible for some of the deaths, but the exact proportion is unclear (unless it’s listed somewhere else I can’t find), so it feels dishonest to write all the deaths off as caused by circumcision. Additionally, given the relative secrecy of the initiation rituals specified, isn’t it possible that some of those sepsis deaths were caused by non-circumcision related wounds? Again, the article is unspecific and if you’ve got any additional details on the matter that would be dope.
