Author Topic: Questions/add to techniques guide  (Read 6715 times)

Offline Jim1

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Questions/add to techniques guide
« on: 2016-09-10 02:08:55 »
There's the strange little book "Foreskin a closer look" by "Bud Berkeley"   He talks about the U.S. in the 1950s when circumcision was
nearly universal;  says that self-circumcision kits and anti-circumcision rings were being marketed to the public.  Then he quotes
an anecdote from a man who was raised on a farm.  The man said that when he was 12 years old his new step father fitted him with
"the rings" and said that all the boys had to wear them.  He wore them for about a year and says it must have worked because now
he can't get his foreskin down except by tugging at it.  Goes on to say his brother was apparently too late at age 16, as every time
he took the device off his foreskin went down, and then that his brother was circumcised when he went into the Army.

There is a sex toy sold as a male chastity device under the name "Gates of Hell"  The picture shows a ring that goes behind the
balls, and then several rings spaced along the shaft of the penis by leather or rubber straps.  I've been wondering if this is anything
like what was used on the boy back in the 1950s and if it is an effective device to hold the foreskin retracted.

Offline soundsgreat87

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Re: Questions/add to techniques guide
« Reply #1 on: 2016-09-10 02:20:05 »
Huh! I really wonder about that. I'd think it might be easier to find out what they look like by searching for old advertisements for them.

Offline jdm

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Re: Questions/add to techniques guide
« Reply #2 on: 2016-09-10 17:22:26 »
This is very interesting. Please let us know if you learn more about this. I am very curious and may have to find that book now.  :)
Are the "self-circumcision kits" mentioned in the book actual circumcision kits, or are they some sort of device for permanent retraction? And what about the "anti-circumcision rings"?

Offline cavalier

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Re: Questions/add to techniques guide
« Reply #3 on: 2016-09-10 20:36:20 »

Offline jdm

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Re: Questions/add to techniques guide
« Reply #4 on: 2016-09-10 20:47:09 »
It's still available from Amazon.

https://www.amazon.com/Foreskin-Closer-Look-Bud-Berkeley/dp/1555832121
Yeah, thanks. I saw that, but it's kind of expensive. I will try to find a cheaper source.

Offline Jim1

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Re: Questions/add to techniques guide
« Reply #5 on: 2016-10-05 16:46:21 »
The Berkeley book, which I had my hands on once, doesn't say any more about self-circumcision kits and anti-circumcision rings
than just to mention them and allege that they were offered to the public.  There is one patented device with the title "anti-
circumcision ring"  Twachtnman, U.S. patent 2,538,136 patented in 1951.  It appears to be a ring made of sponge rubber,
slightly oval shaped and thicker on one side than on the other.  It is to fit behind the corona with the thicker portion on top
of the penis, so as to keep the foreskin retracted at all times and thus secure some of the benefits of circumcision without
resort to surgery.

The Berkeley book is, to my thinking, weird and of little interest to would-be foreskin retractors except for the one passage
which I  quote below
"The [Korean] war finally ended, and the fifties became the golden era
for the all-American boy -- a boy who was cleancut of hair, of jaw,
and of penis.  Dr. Spock advocated that parents have their son
circumcised because 'it makes him feel regular.' Many ethnic minorities,
missed by the original circumcision bandwagon, now started sending
their little squires to school with unmuzzled acorns.  Circumcision
tools became big business for the surgical supply companies, and new
gadgets flooded the market.  'Self-circumcision' kits were advertised,
as were anti-circumcision rings.  Advertisements promised that the
rings would provide all the 'benefits' of circumcision without the
pain of surgery.

"These rings were advertised for teenage boys to wear much as they
would wear braces on their teeth.  The ring fit on the shaft of the
penis, and trapped the foreskin behind the corona of the glans.  The
theory was that the glans would permanently expand once the
foreskin stopped restricting it, and the expanded glans would thus
trap the foreskin behind it forever.

"One farm-raised man described his experience:

   'My new stepfather fit the rings on me when I was twelve years old.
   He told me all the boys had to wear them.  They must have worked
   because I only wore them for about a year and I've never been able
   to get my foreskin to go up over the glans since, unless I tug at it.
   My older brother wasn't so lucky.  He was sixteen when he got fitted
   and I guess it was too late.  We did everything we could think of
   to make his cockhead get fatter, but every time he took off his
   rings his ole foreskin would just roll back over everything.  He
   wore the rings right up to the time he joined the Marines.  They
   solved his problem in Korea when they circumcised him clean off.'

"American men who still had prepuces became a distinct minority.  They
faced humiliation in public showers and the trauma of being different.
Like most minority groups, uncircumcised boys developed guilt complexes
which, in their case, often became erotic circumcision fantasies.
Emergency wards treated countless teenagers who messed up a self-
circumcision attempt.  One urologist estimated that such attempts
were the second most frequent cause of boys ending up in his emergency
care, the first being the placement of objects inside their urethra."

I have no idea where you would look to find advertisements for the devices,
if such actually existed.



Offline soundsgreat87

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Re: Questions/add to techniques guide
« Reply #6 on: 2016-10-05 21:29:55 »
Very interesting and nice find on that patent! A link to the patent text: https://patents.google.com/patent/US2538136A/en

It's funny that even close to 70 years ago, guys were coming up with ways to keep their skin back.

Offline Jim1

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Re: Questions/add to techniques guide
« Reply #7 on: 2016-10-06 19:16:27 »
You can also download the patent as a pdf using www.pat2pdf.org

Trying to put a date on the boy's story - The Korean war was from mid 1950 to mid 1953.  Presumably the older brother would have
been at least 18 to have served in Korea (although he could have been part of the U.S. contingent there before or after the
war)  So he might have been 16 in 1948-1951.  The patent on the Twachtman ring was applied for in 1948.  So we seem to have
late 1940s - early 1950s as the period these devices were supposedly in use.

Offline jdm

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Re: Questions/add to techniques guide
« Reply #8 on: 2016-10-09 00:08:44 »
Interesting stuff. Thanks Jim1 for posting the excerpt from that book.