If you check both your history and your medical procedures you will find that it's more than cosmetic or relegious.

Circumcision evolved among ALL desert dwellers from the bushmen of the Kalahari, to the Australian aborigines, to the Arabs. And then became part of thier various relegious rites.

It evolved because good hygiene, which is water dependent, was not always available, among these tribes.

This is something which does not normaly happen in modern society.

HOwever the military still has some good horror stories, among soliders, who have been deployed to desert areas.

Rex, you're only looking at this from a "fully funtioning" point of view. As a nurse, I see many males with foreskin intact, both those in their twilight years who are unable to care for themselves, as well as those of all ages who don't have the mental capacity to comprehend hygiene and in relation to Sparticusss's post, I for one could tell you some horror stories too! If you value your nurses at all, please leave male circumcision on Medicare alone and vote "1" for curcumcision. For those of you who are older and considering having the procedure done, just remember this....it only hurts until the pain goes away :-)

sparticusss, “HOwever the military still has some good horror stories, among soliders, who have been deployed to desert areas.”

There are also heaps of ‘horror stories’ about circumcision-gone-wrong. If it is ever screened again there was a doco, whose name I have forgotten, about a boy whose circumcision was botched so they amputated his penis and testicles and tried to raise him as a girl – horror story indeed.

My son had a trapped, rancidified sebum problem with his penis – the typical ‘hygiene’ problem of uncircumcised penises – our midwife showed us how to simply ease the prepuce away from the glans, to which it is normally adhered, and so make it easy to keep clean. This is a process much less invasive, dangerous and painful than conventional circumcision but equally effective. To maintain that it is necessary to amputate the foreskin to allow penises to be kept properly clean is as justifiable as maintaining that it is necessary to amputate vaginal labia to allow vaginas to be kept properly clean.

From this paper:
http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:FE8K_qjxoHQJ:www.doctorsopposingcircumcision.org/essay_contest/finalists/FIRSTPLACE_GERSHUNl.doc+sebum+penis+%22male+circumcision%22&hl=en&gl=au&ct=clnk&cd=5
“Routinely performed by untrained and unsupervised medical interns, male circumcision involves removing the foreskin (prepuce) from the head of the penis (glans penis). What circumcision proponents may consider a “useless piece of skin” is interestingly as much as 80 percent of the skin on the penis. Far from useless, the foreskin is healthy, highly sensitive tissue, which protects the glans and provides it with optimal warmth, pH balance, and sebum (moisturizing oil). Amputating the foreskin also destroys three feet of veins, arteries and capillaries, 240 feet of nerves, and more than 20,000 nerve endings.
The procedure itself takes 10 to 12 minutes and is performed on the first or second day after birth. Strapped to a tray or board with his arms and legs restrained, the infant’s penis and surrounding area are sterilized with antiseptic. General anesthetic is never used because of the respiratory risk it poses. Local anesthetic is occasionally used in topical or injected form, but is surprisingly uncommon.

I am not a health professional, Wildcat, but I like to have informed opinions on subjects which I find interesting. Two relevant websites:

http://www.norm-uk.org/
Already posted once. What do you think about the various points raised here?

And an Australian site:

http://www.circinfo.org/

You mention "many males with foreskin intact, both those in their twilight years who are unable to care for themselves, as well as those of all ages who don't have the mental capacity to comprehend hygiene".

In our twilight years, many of us will need extra care, with many aspects of our personal lives. This is just one instance. Cleaning behind an incapacitated older man's foreskin shouldn't be a problem, either for the patient or the carer. Surely it's just a normal part of having a shower, at any time of a man's life.

As for "the mental capacity to comprehend hygiene", what small proportion of men would really come under that category? I agree that some are never taught and/or some just can't be bothered, but we can't modify all the rules of society just to suit people with poor attitudes to hygiene, can we?

If you are talking about men who really do have general comprehension problems, then surely we already give special consideration to these people, in all sorts of ways.

As for soldiers who go to fight in the desert [raised in another post], well again we're looking at a small number of exceptions. This kind of consideration does not apply to the community in general.

Rex, I was actually talking about men with mental illness and yes, we provided for them very nicely as a society. We closed down all the institutions without thinking through the consequences and left a huge proportion of them (women too) out on the street without proper support. Unfortunately, so called "normal" people haven't a clue as to how much damage has been done by do-gooders and money orientated Government policy. The same people have no idea as to just how many people with mental illness live in appalling conditions. Forget hygiene. They often don't even get basic support or necessities such as shelter, clothing and food.

Wildcat. I really do not think that people should be subjected to medical procedures just because it is convenient for the nursing staff. This goes for institutionalisation in general. It may be convenient, but it is inhumane. The government should provide people with a mental illness services at their convenience, ones which protect their dignity and sense of worth. Offcourse in turn, if the provision of humane health services cause more inconvenience to the nursing staff,then the government should compensate the nursing staff accordingly. But to demand that we go backwards in time, just coz it is a pain for the health professionals, well wasn't that the justification for atrocities committed during ww2?