• Ace T'Ken@lemmy.ca
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    1 day ago

    Oh definitely! Except condoms are not really readily available in a lot of places (for example, parts of Africa) which is where it happens frequently and is a permanent boost. A 30% reduction in transmission is significant.

    You don’t have to like it, but I’m factually correct and the science backs me up. See Wikipedia for a primer.

    • SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca
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      10 hours ago

      Wikipedia has links to one study. I used to work in the HIV field, there are levels of nuance the west doesn’t understand about sex in Africa. One example is the common practice of vaginal drying. The other is the lack of any hygiene training in some regions of the continent.

      The last consideration is evolution, there are reasons why foreskins evolved.

      • Ace T'Ken@lemmy.ca
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        9 hours ago

        Absolutely. There are some truly weird attitudes that are deeply unscientific about this stuff. Even my wife didn’t understand it when we first discussed it. We don’t have any sons, but even if we did I wouldn’t have had them circumcised unless they had a medical issue that required it. And yes that is true even though I am circumcised. No, I don’t care about making any dicks look like mine. That’s fucking weird.

        It is completely unnecessary because I live in a place with readily available contraception, low rates of STIs, and other factors.

        Am I mad that I was circumcised? No. Am I proud? No. It just is. I don’t understand attitudes about it. Everything is a small trade-off in life. I appreciate the plusses that I gained from it, and don’t really know or care about the minuses because they were never a part of my life.

        I have had compliments on it explicitly because I was circumcised and women expressed relief about it. I’ve also been told it looks nicer just hanging there. One lady I used to date would complain about her ex incessantly because he wasn’t exactly the cleanest dude, and when combined with his lack of circumcision, he was kind of gross and you can use your imagination as to what that entailed.

        On the other side, my best friend in high school had his circumcision fucked up and every time he got an erection, it hurt because it was done incorrectly and caused one side to “pull” wrong.

        I’ve also had a septoplasty later in life so I could breathe better. This argument that you see above would be like going online and telling people that there is a medical use for it, but they come back and start screaming at you in freaked out panicked tones and assume you’re meaning it’s for everyone. It isn’t, but to deny that there is a medical use is actively wrong and harmful.

      • Ace T'Ken@lemmy.ca
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        24 hours ago

        That study is from 2022. Some of the ones linked on Wikipedia are the same age, very slightly older, or even newer. These aren’t studies from the '70s using outdated methodologies or something. It doesn’t nullify the science. They’re both seemingly saying somewhat opposite things but that doesn’t mean that one is outwardly completely wrong, it means at best the science is still out and at worst it depends on specifics of the situation.

        And yeah, it would be great if they would provide full health care for everyone, but in people in war torn parts of Africa it’s not really an option because the governments aren’t stable or don’t care. I also wish proper contraception was available everywhere for free, but it isn’t. And even if it were, you can’t tell me that you believe that every person would use it 100% of the time.

        So again, every time I see this it’s simply people who don’t like circumcision getting mad that there may, in fact, be a functional use for it somewhere and it’s not just people trying to get their kids dick to look like their dick. That’s such a weird and disturbing dodge.

        • SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca
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          10 hours ago

          Explain why humans evolved a skin flap that needs to be removed. Many cultures justify removal of the clitoris.

          • Ace T'Ken@lemmy.ca
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            9 hours ago

            Well it doesn’t need to be removed for most people obviously, but to say it never needs to be removed for anyone is patently false. Same thing with other body parts like adenoids, wisdom teeth, and the gallbladder. It’s not like they have no purpose, but taking them out can fix or avoid medical issues. Reading the medical papers, it seems it is removed because it is the first thing to rip during sexual intercourse, and as we all know from grade school, exchanging blood is one of the fastest way to get STIs or other diseases.

            Obviously it is also the best way to cure phimosis which is something my uncle had repaired this way when he was 20 something.

            And again, this is probably extremely unnecessary in most areas of the world.

            I have never defended, nor said a single positive thing about clitoral removal. Don’t mix up circumcision with it please. They are not the same. I have yet to see a justification for removing anyone’s clitoris that isn’t some crazy religious bullshit that has no basis in scientific fact at all.