Is Barack Obama circumcised?
At the book signings for his new book, When You Are Engulfed in Flames, writer David Sedaris is polling people on this very question. He says he keeps a sign-up sheet where people can write whether they think yea or nay, and say why. Last night he posed it to the audience at Copley Symphony Hall in what was ostensibly a sold out show (though I saw a lot of empty seats) for the San Diego leg of his book tour. The answer is not obvious, and although not technically unknowable, unlikely ever to be answered. On the one hand, in the era when Obama was born, a man would almost certainly be circumcised as a matter of course, regardless of race, creed, or religion. Most American men and boys are circumcised, and it wasn’t until the last few years that the practice was even questioned. But Obama was born to kind of a free-thinking mother, and he was born in Hawaii, both features that make it possible that he is not, in fact, circumcised. It’s complicated.
And that wasn’t even the most interesting part of the show. Sedaris is a top-notch live performer, but mainly his schtick is to read directly from his writing. He opened with “Cry Baby” a piece he wrote first for the New Yorker, a story apparently so funny that the woman in front of me snort-laughed all the way through it. But Sedaris got stronger as the evening went on, reading from a great deal of unpublished work, including a piece prepared for the radio show This American Life (but never aired), and some soon-to-be published illustrated animal fable-like stories that will be very much for adults. He finished with an audience Q&A in which we learned that the title of the new book came from a Japanese emergency procedure manual (“What to do when you’re engulfed in flames”), that he now hates his famous story “Santaland,” and that he once wrote a serious essay entirely in the buff. He was living in a nudist colony at the time and, as he explained, a nudist colony is the one place in the world where if you answer the door clothed, people worry. So he reworked a serious essay musing about his mother’s death, wearing nothing but his birthday suit. He said he doesn’t really plan to repeat the process, but he’s convinced it made his essay much stronger than it would have been otherwise.
You learn all kinds of strange stuff spending 90 minutes with a mind like Sedaris’. He’ll be back in town again next time he’s on a book tour, and I highly recommend the show.
Obama’s father’s people, the Luo, don’t circumcise. That could have influenced his mother. It would certainly knock back the US circumcision rate if he proves to be as he was born, but unless Howard Stern asks him (it isn’t as though Barbara Walters would) and he answers, it’s nobody’s business but his. What I don’t understand is why the question exercises David Sedaris.
You said “Most American men and boys are circumcised” but in your city of San Diego only about a third of baby boys are circumcised today.
Overall the rate of infant circumcision in the US dropping pretty fast. It’s close to 50/50.
Regardless of whether Obama is circumcised, I am still going to write to the next president to let him know I believe infant circumcision for little boys should become punishable by jail time just like it is for little girls. Little boys have just as much right to their whole genitalia as little girls have.
“Renee K. Says:
July 19, 2008 – 11:34 am at 11:34 am
Regardless of whether Obama is circumcised, I am still going to write to the next president to let him know I believe infant circumcision for little boys should become punishable by jail time just like it is for little girls. Little boys have just as much right to their whole genitalia as little girls have.”
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WHAT SHE SAID!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Renee and Tina are right! Genital integrity for all!
yeah integrity… but, uncircumcised penis are smelly and ugly. u r just too idiot to see it
Stephen, I don’t know where you are posting from but, I would like to introduce you to a very new invention that takes care of not only smelly penis but, smelly girl parts. It’s called a BAR OF SOAP. Why should infant boys be subjected to this barbaric practice because of personal hygene when in fact all that needs to be done is to teach your son to wash himself. Girls are taught to keep themselves clean why then instead of teaching boys, they just cut off the offending piece of skin. Complete idiocy.
That’s pure BS. I’m married to an uncircumcised man, and his penis is beautiful and doesn’t smell at all. Such comments only demonstrate your own idiocy.
Well…while the idea of circumcision does seem a bit odd, and brutal to me, I’ve got to wonder why David is wondering about this and what does it even matter? The status of a candidates genitals never even crossed my mind. Except that I would like to know the genitals of some eventual president is of the female kind.
As far as writing in the buff…I do it all the time…doing it now…very liberating and easier to scratch those itches…Ha!
Routine infant circumcision is unethical and is not recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics or the American Medical Association. To give infant boys the same rights to genital integrity that girls have, please support this bill http://www.mgmbill.org/
Canadian Actor Taylor Kitsch (‘Friday Night Lights’) is intact and an Intactivist.
“12 Reasons To Say ‘NO’ To Circumcision!”:
http://www.naturalfamilyonline.com/5-bc/64-no-to-circumcision.htm
I hope he’s not. Every baby that is brutalized by this horrific “cultural practice” is a tragedy. Let’s hope his mother loved him more than that.
Not only is routine infant circumcision, but it is a horrible act of sexual violence. I hope he can help end this idiotic “tradition”.
Circumcision is good. Uncircumcision is dirty and smelly. Looks like a turtle. Ugly looking.
Say… you aren’t a plumber, are you?
And a circumcised one is pretty??????????
DUDE how would u know that unless your gay and have hookd up wit a guy who didnt wash if so nice choice lol u dont hook up with someone because they have a good looking cock isnt it the body and face that ladies are attractive to??? you dont win a prize for best looking penis lol and before circumcision was practised ,was it ugly or normal???? so closed minded and for the dirty remark is it dirty after u shower??? or after 3 days of not showering??? circumcised smell 2 if not washed??? that must be how u roll??? lol get a clue dude and take a shower daily
I have no respect for a man who will not say yea or neigh if he was religiously circumcised.
I am a complete male, and when as a kid I asked my dad about it, he replied, “Well, I’m not circumcised either son, and I can only give you the advice my mother gave me: you’ll have to wear it off.”
Now that I’m older and more experienced (and still entire), I marvel at the ovine behavior of my fellow Amerikans, the prime examples of which are their breeding, believing, circumcising, and insuring.
The truth is that, as idiotic as they are in their socialism, the Scandinavians, Germans, French and Brits do not mutilate the vast majority of their kids at birth. They also live longer!
You said “Most American men and boys are circumcised” but in your city of San Diego only about a third of baby boys are circumcised today.
Overall the rate of infant circumcision in the US dropping pretty fast. It’s close to 50/50.
Hello,you did not read correctly he states at the time Obama was born
I would say Obama is most certainly circumcised not because of when aand where he was born,but because both his biological and stepfathers were muslims and most muslims circucmised.
Now most muslims circucmised at a latter age and he did not have contact with his father,but his stepfather enroled him in the Wasabi muslim school which is one of the strictest muslim branches,I do not know if an uncircucmised boy would be allow to enroll in such a strict muslim school?
Was there mention of him having a a muslim circumcision at a young age in Jakarta?
I do not think so cause with all the talk about his “muslimness’ this is something the media would have already mentioned
Canadian Actor Taylor Kitsch (’Friday Night Lights’) is intact and an Intactivist.
“12 Reasons To Say ‘NO’ To Circumcision!”:
http://www.naturalfamilyonline.com/5-bc/64-no-to-circumcision.htm
Most Canadian men his age are not circucmised(Canada got smarter way before the USA and stopped routine male circucmision way back…and in Quebec it never was popular,it is not customary for the French to circucmise) and then on top of that he was born in Kenowa(a small town) in British Columbia
To all intact men ,do not worry you are by far not alone,au contraire worldwide you are the mayotiy, 85% of the world’s men are intact and fine…
Even in the USA circumcision was not practiced routinerly prior to the 1940…
All American forefathers were intact..
But if you want to know about recent presidents Ronald Reagan was intact and died intact
The Kennedeys do not practice circumcision, for what I hear JFK had to have one at 16 because of phimosis or else he would have remained intact,but for what I have read Ted Kennedy and his sons are still intact.
Canadian Actor Taylor Kitsch (’Friday Night Lights’) is intact
of yougner American actors I hear the following are intact:
Jason Presely
Luke Perry
Mcolen
Leonardo DiCaprio
Keanu Reeves
River Phoinex(deseased) but his intact brother Joaquin is still alive and intact.
Tony Danza
What I’d really like to know is if Obama is hung.
well ……….. about 6 years go i was taking a piss at the base ball and huh huh ………………. i saw it!
it is big and it is not cut
I don’t really care if Barack is intact or cut… but then I started thinking about it, and if he’s intact that could mean that he could help pass laws to stop this terrible act of infant genital mutilation. Wouldn’t that be great???
I agree with Dan that we should hope Barack is intact because, if he is, he is much more likely than a circumcised president to understand that cutting off a baby boy’s foreskin is a major human rights violation. The foreskin contains three fourths of an intact man’s erogenous nerves. Circumcised men depend on the scar tissue left after circumcision to get excited and have an erection; they’re engaging in sex with two cylinders while intact men have eight! The bad news is that many men fighting for the rights of future baby boys in America tried to alert Obama via his Change.org website, but someone in his organization pushed the idea from number 2 status, with hundreds of votes, to no status at all by the time of Obama’s inauguration. We haven’t given up hope, though, because that’s what Obama’s campaign was all about and he probably was in the dark about this nefarious tinkering with democracy.
I forgot to mention that I personally believe Obama is not circumcised. His comfort in his own skin and obvious self-confidence, which is not manufactured or desperate, is what I imagine would likely be the case for an intact man. I could be wrong, but if I am found to be wrong I will be very surprised. As Hugh7 said in July, Obama’s father’s people, the Luo, don’t believe in circumcision even though they are Muslim (this is part of the conflict in Kenya), so it seems possible that he might have influenced Obama’s liberal -thinking mother not to let the doctor’s cut Obama. I hope so. And I hope we live to see the day when this incredibly traumatic, brutal, and damaging practice is made punishable by life sentences, hanging, or exile to a melting iceberg.
Of course he’s circumcised. As Barry Soetoro, a citizen of Indonesia, he was permitted entry to a school for Muslims. Muslims regrettably practice circumcision with no scriptural basis except the idea that Mohammed was “naturally circumcised” (in other words, likely had a short foreskin).
Not all Muslims practice circumcision, nor do all Jews.
Obama’s father’s tribe in Kenya, although Muslim, don’t.
i read somewhere that one of obamas teenage love interests gave details i believe he was 7″ intact //// just what i read hahaha i dont really care but like alot of people have said circumcision is brutal which i agree why are you given a foreskin just to cut it off/???60 – 70% loss of sexual pleasure with circumcised i also read somewhere if the head is always exposed then your nerve endings on your penis head will desensitise… there is a function to the foreskin and that would be to keep sensitivityhere is a do you cut off your feet cos they smell ??? NO … now if america stats are 50/50 that is a extremely low percentage of the worlds population but american are loud and heard the most although i like americas its just the truth hahah
I am intact and I love it. My penis is thicker and sensitive.
I think Obama is intact.
I think all of these posts are *interesting*…
Robert, I like how you believe circumcised men are less self-confident than uncircumcised men… great theory. Not. That’s completely absurd. Plenty of circumcised men are very self-confident and find “comfort in [their] own skin.” Hi, I’m one of them.
ur a douche lol
For what it`s worth I was recently circumcised at 54. I had to have a cyst removed from under the foreskin and the dr. said to take it all.
I am really happy I did it, I was always the only guy not cut and had a lot of woman freak about it. When my son was born I had him cut by a mohel not a dr. I found that at first it was irritating when the head rubbed but now I love it and my wife now tells me she always hated that I wasn`t cut.
Also I don`t really see any difference when it comes to sex.
All you people so against circumcision are wacky, the kids don`t remember the procedure.
Being cut is much cleaner, what a relief not having to clean the area anymor.e
My guess is Obama is cut, but who cares.
Good for you. I was cut at birth, and I hate it. At least you had a choice (something everyone deserves for themselves)
lol your one of the ones that didnt wash huh???? and u got a cyst under your foreskin you are one of the guys given intact guys a bad name please still wash thoroughly even you are cut!! as for being wacky lets not only cut penises but armpits and assholes cos u didnt wash and its starting to smell children dont have a choice which i think is so sad and subject to insecurities of the parents and social ideals DONT GIVE IN TO THE ewwww his one looks funny …. ive been told mine tastes good!! lol
Sorry dude my cyst had nothing to do with my uncircumcised status, it is a penile cyst that occurs
in utero and normally isn’t a problem.
All you uncut guys are kidding yourself, woman like cut guys and sex feels fine after you are cut. It took a few months for the soreness to leave thats why best to do it at birth.
As for Obama who knows but JFK was circumcised as a teenager and I read that Jimmy carter and nixon were circumcised also.
It is visable in your face, like Lincoln you a very kind and thoughtful man. My best wishes go out to you!
Most Sincerely
Hanns Engel
Obama is an athlete, familiar with locker rooms. Certainly SOMEONE has to know.
Is this germaine?
Most likely Obama is circumcised since he was raised in a muslim country it is highly unlikely he would have gone uncut. Also since he was born is the usa almost every male born in 1961 would have been circumcised in a hospital setting. So how long until fox asks him at a press conference?
I understand that males are not circumcised in Indonesia until they reach their teens; indeed, it seems the event is a rite of passage in that country.
1961 melting-pot Hawaii, where whites blended with aisians, 19% of white women married Chinese men and interracial marriage was legal could hardly have been said to have been enamored of the mainland’s fetish for circumcising male infants I seriously doubt that Barack’s father, uncircumcised himself, highly intelligent and magnetically assertive, would have brooked the mutilation of his first-born – particularly, when his own native culture condemned such disgraceful behavior.
If you want to give women cervical cancer then dont get circumsised! No matter how clean you are, there are glands which produce oncogens which can cause cancer.
Utter foolishness. Otherwise, women who engage in vaginal sex with the 85% of the world’s males who are uncircumcised would be reporting much higher rates of cervical cancer.
It must be said that women, too, produce smegma (the secretions you are speaking of). Why don’t circumcised males contract penile cancer when having sex with these women? What protects these same women from infecting themselves during coitus?
Oh, no! Don’t tell me! You’re all for female circumcision, too!
Yes, judging by his projection of a shattered self-image, I would bet $50 to a dime that he was circumcised in infancy, perhaps as a neonate. Circumcision at any age is a profoundly demoralizing and traumatizing experience. There is always a haunted, shattered quality to any creature (human or otherwise) which endured this traumatizing experience.
He’s muslim. It’s unlikely he escaped the knife. The Luos don’t traditionally circumcise, but most of the Luos are not Muslim. My guess would be that those who are Muslim, are cut.
Sorry, I don’t mean Obama is Muslim, I meant his father was.
Other than four years in Jakarta between the ages of 6 and 10, Obama spent the rest of his youth in the U.S. Indonesian Muslims do not circumcise their young until puberty. Indeed, it’s rather a rite of passage with them, a rite I’m sure Obama escaped given his return to Honolulu to live with his maternal grandparents until his graduation in 1979.
I have lived in Hawaii for a long time. My profession is an analytical psychotherapist. President Obama was born in one of largest hospitals (Kapiolani) in Honolulu for mothers’ giving birth. Native Hawaiians as Polynesians have always required circumcision before marriage. The circumcision rate in Hawaiian has stayed at 90% to 95% for many decades for all male infants. That includes the many families of service men and women here. In recent years the pediatric department at the University of Hawaii medical school has emphasized that all infants boys should be circumcised for health reasons. There is no doubt in my mind that Obama is circumcised.
P. S. There are some misconceptions about Obama. He is not a Muslim. His father’s father was. Obama is a “born again” Christian and a member of the United Church of Christ along with his wife and two daughters. His grandparents who raised him were Christians. So was his mother. For a couple of years he went to a school in Indonesia. The majority of children were Muslim. But there were a lot of Buddhists and Christians there also. After he graduated from Punahou School, the best school in the Islands academically, he entered Occidental College in California. It is a Presbyterian college. After that he transferred to Columbia University (NYC) and later to Harvard Law School.
I laughed to find this blog topic existed at all. Surely someone was next to him at a urinal and glanced at some point. Anyhow, here’s a hilarious (yet accurate) argument about circumcision. http://thingsthatshouldntstillexist.wordpress.com/2010/09/23/03-circumcision/
Barack Hussein Obama is not circumcised. While his penis is long (about 8″), it is also very thin, like one of those long, thin hot dogs. His marriage and children with Michelle Obama is out of convenience. He is still a heavy smoker and is said to still be hooked on crack cocaine. This is one of the reasons he refuses to release his medical records.