dick wishes

A photo of a surgery Cronenberg himself could not imagine

NB IT'S TERRIFYING

imo this picture of a penis with phimosis is kind of dear in comparison

I had a cousin who had surgery for phimosis when he was about 10 (though not as severe as Abbot posted, and I know because our parents used to put us in the bath together when we were young, and I remember his dick looking weird). All the other 10-yr-old boys were very, VERY concerned about it, worrying that it might happen to them, too. In retrospect, he was amazingly calm and cool at explaining it to us. Like he had rehearsed.

BTW: take Abbot's Cronenberg warning v seriously.

one of my first boyfriends had phimosis! he functioned just fine but i think it could be pretty painful for him

bahaha kenan I bet most of you were circumsized anyway!

Of course we were! Most all boy babies were circumcised then. His parents were trailblazers, it seems. Only with exactly the baby that least benefited.

So you were all terrified of being able to not retract you non-existent foreskins?

No no, we wouldn't know what the word "foreskin" meant. It was just that our friend's thingie was all weird, and we didn't know if it was contagious or what.

When there's no sex education in schools whatsoever, and your parents won't tell you anything at all about the basics, or if they do (like my dad tried to when I was about 6) the discussion is so brief and cryptic as to only give the impression that this is a thing you should be extremely interested in knowing more about but with no useful information, well... all thingies are weird.

I remember my dad saying to me, "the seed enters the woman..." and imagining for a long time that he was talking about something like an acorn that had legs walking across the bed and jumping into the woman's butthole. Dads: don't try to get this out of the way when they're six.

oh man that is all kinds of hilarious

http://www.pokemondb.co.uk/images/artwork/seedot.png

I don't want to do a Tuomas here, but is sex education really bad in US schools? It's patchy in the UK, dependant on when you grew up rather than which part of the country, but I remember that when I was eight our class were shown a series of films which went into conception, pregnancy, and childbirth in full detail.

If you happen to live in a redder state, and especially if you had the misfortune to have lived eight key sex education years under Bush -- it's really shamefully bad. It's basically Jesus education.

It's nonexistent. (xp)

Under the Bush administration sex-ed was largely Abistinence Only curricula.

It's patchy in the UK, dependant on when you grew up rather than which part of the country, but I remember that when I was eight our class were shown a series of films which went into conception, pregnancy, and childbirth in full detail.

yeah that doesn't happen here

Basically, there's a girls-only sex-ed bit that talks about periods and how you aren't dying when you get yours that gets shown around 6th grade (age 11-12) and then in high school there's "oh look, STDs!"-style sex ed; the actual mechanics of reproduction are either taught to you by your parents or you learn it as a side-effect of taking life sciences in junior high.

My sex-ed class was just a bunch of anti-abortion scare slides of scrambled fetuses.

Well and when I was ten we had a very special girls-only thing where they explained vaginal discharge, menstruation, and how tampons won't make you lose your virginity.

Oh and there was this big emphasis on not calling a pad a "rag" bcz that was trashy & disrespectful (I thought she meant of pads, but later I think she meant women's reproductive systems in general).

Yeah, because that's the big issue at hand.

It worked!

No wait I call those little garbage things for tampons in the women's bathroom stalls "rag bags" so maybe it didn't work.

Why is it so squicky for parents to tell their kids about sex in terms that are age-appropriate but not completely baffling? Why so nervous? Why such a heavy conversation?

I made fun of Britishers and their library hard-ons, but boy howdy, we have enough sex issues to go around in this country, too. And go around they do.

mmm, OK. In the UK is is/was like this (please bear in mind I am lol old)

age 8/9: Biology and reproduction of plants, then animals, followed by human anatomy, leading up to several classes specifically about human reproduction, including the aforementioned sex ed film series. Mostly covered in science classes, but some is covered in special lessons and what are called now PSE classes (Personal & Social Eduction, the short period straight after afternoon registration).

age 10/11: Review of above material. Then small (half a dozen pupils) single sex classes (boys only classes and girls only classes) with a health visitor, who explains some of the more lurid details (erections, periods, wet dreams, body odour, body hair, etc.). Also this small class is where the girls get their "tampon talk".

age 12/13: Review of all that material again, plus more stuff about emotions, relationships, families, etc.. Some schools do the "tampon talk" again just for the girls.

age 14/15/16: reproduction is covered again in GCSE science classes.

did not understand what this thread was about and thought it was like "dick move" but srsly wow u guys

the actual mechanics of reproduction are either taught to you by your parents or you learn it as a side-effect of taking life sciences in junior high.

I didn't really get it in jr. high, either, but then again I didn't learn a whole lot of anything in jr. high. I was preoccupied, at least in part by trying to find my dad's Playboy stash. (Happy ending to that story: I eventually did. The girls were all very shiny.)

The actual mechanics, or at least their full implications, I learned from David Attenborough. No I'm not joking. I knew about penises and vaginas long before then, and how girls get pregnant, all that stuff. But it wasn't until Attenborough told me that ferns -- FUCKING FERNS -- make sperm, and that those sperm require liquid to travel to their destination, did it all really click. "Holy shit, this is bigger than I ever imagined."

So do moss!

So do just about everything.

women don't

Quiet, you.

Ferns and moss are the only plants with water-transmitted sperm, which is why there aren't that many species of them. They rely on external fluids, too, which is why you only find them in wet environments. Most other plants just shed sperm everywhere (lol hay fever is all the sperm in your nose) or by getting it all over some or another animal. Fungi & bacteria & prokaryotes don't have sperm either! </biology pedant>

http://www.grainsessential.ca/english/images/grains/wheat-kernel.jpg
^^^ a similar diagram on the side of a packet of Shredded Wheat put me off eating said cereal for a while when I was a kid

xp Oh of course! No you're totally right. I just meant the sperm part when I said that most everything does.

Then again, ferns and mosses are some of the most primitive plants, and some of the first... THINGS... to evolve sexual reproduction at all.

They're so fucking rad!

They got the simplicity of it all exactly right.

I mean, time-tested and everything. Don't take my word for it.

how y'all dicks doin??

still granting wishes!

They're so fucking rad!

― god bless this -ation (Abbott), Monday, August 17, 2009 3:53 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark

good, good.

You know one thing my dick totally loves? Huey Lewis and the News.

Kenan are you actually Patrick Bateman?

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

* i wish i did not have a dick 2
* i wish i had foreskin 1
* i wish my dick were more narrow 1
* i wish my dick were shorter 1
* i do not have a dick, but i wish i did 1

hmmmmmmm

Mirror mirror on the wall, will I ever again see a live human dick at all?

A dick is a wish your heart makes.

Wait, that's not right...