• Our Team
  • Initiatives
  • Blog
  • Events

    • Media

      Author, Speaker, and Intactivist Thought Leader

      Connect

      Facebook Instagram Twitter Youtube Linkedin

      Recent Blog Posts

  • Support Us
  • Donate

The Science Behind Skin and Its Role in Protecting Our Bodies

by
Blog
September 28, 2025

Why Skin Matters: Our Body’s Natural Protection

Humans have not just one, but two types of skin protection. Our bodies, composed mostly of liquid-filled cells, require serious defense against external elements. The keratinized skin covering most of our bodies acts as a shield, preventing moisture loss and protecting against environmental damage.

Keratin, the protein that also forms our hair and nails, ensures that our outermost layers of skin cells are tough and resilient. But the tough layers’ dead cells are definitely not desired for a few critical areas.  Instead we have special mucosal tissue, which plays a vital role in our sensory experience and bodily functions.

Mucosal Tissue: Nature’s Design for Sensitivity

Unlike keratinized skin, mucosal tissue is soft, sensitive, and moisture-rich, making it essential for key areas of the body, including the eyes, nose, mouth, genitals, and anus. This unique tissue enables us to sense and respond to stimuli with precision, which is why it’s crucial to handle these areas with care, avoiding harsh soaps and irritants.

How the Penis and Female Genitalia Are Naturally Designed

The human penis—just like the female vulva—was designed by nature to include both keratinized and mucosal tissue. The foreskin, like an eyelid, has both types of tissue and serves as a protective covering that preserves the sensitivity of the underlying mucosal tissue.

The Impact of Infant Circumcision on Sensitivity and Function

What Happens When the Foreskin is Ripped Apart?

When a baby undergoes circumcision surgery, a significant portion of the penis’s protective and sensory tissue is lost. This procedure removes almost half of the skin of the penis, both external and internal tissues, disrupting the natural function of the glans (head of the penis) and altering its sensitivity over time.

The foreskin contains over 20,000 nerve endings, making it one of the most exquisitely sensitive parts of the body.  Amputation exposes the delicate glans, leading to keratinization—a process where up to 20 layers of dead skin cells form as a defense against constant friction.  By contrast, men (and women!) with intact genitals find it uncomfortable to have anything dry rubbing their glans. Over time, foreskin amputation changes the natural texture, appearance, and sensitivity of the penis, often resulting in a calloused, drier, less responsive experience.

Sexual Sensation, Function, and Long-Term Consequences

Sex is designed to be an intimate interaction between BOTH partners’ sensitive mucosal tissues, and the foreskin plays a unique biomechanical role in natural lubrication and comfort. During intimacy, the natural “sleeve” motion of the intact penis allows for a gentler, more fluid experience, benefiting both partners.

When the foreskin is amputated:

  • The glans is permanently exposed, leading to a loss of natural moisture and friction reduction.
  • The absence of the “sleeve-within-a-sleeve” mechanism results in a more abrasive experience for both partners.
  • The Cowper’s gland (responsible for producing pre-ejaculate lubrication) no longer has the foreskin to retain moisture, often making initial penetration more difficult.
  • The loss of so many nerve endings often compels men to strain harder to reach orgasm.  This may account for perceptions of “pile driving”, rather than gentle, mutual arousal.

Several studies suggest that women with intact partners report greater sexual satisfaction, as the natural interaction between mucosal tissues enhances comfort and pleasure.

The Historical and Cultural Perspective of Circumcision

Historically, both religious and secular circumcision were introduced intentionally as methods to suppress sexual pleasure in young men. The scientific evidence behind the foreskin’s functional and sensory importance has led to growing discussions around bodily autonomy and informed consent.

Parents considering circumcision should ask:

  • Does anyone, even parents, have the right to permanently mutilate a male or female child’s body for no medical necessity and without their consent?
  • Would the child, once grown, appreciate the loss of sensitivity and function? (Many, many men are very angry when they discover what their parents allowed to happen.)
  • Does this procedure align with the latest medical and ethical research? There is not a single medical organization in the world that recommends this for infants, not even in the USA.

The conversation around genital autonomy is evolving, and many parents are increasingly choosing to leave their children intact, allowing them to make their own decisions about their bodies in adulthood.

Final Thoughts: Protecting the Body Nature Designed

Nature has endowed us with a complex, highly functional body, where every part has a purpose and a role. The foreskin is not a flaw—it’s a feature exquisitely designed to protect, preserve sensitivity, provide natural lubrication, and enhance sexual function.

As research continues to highlight the long-term consequences of circumcision, more and more parents are reconsidering its necessity, and choosing to leave future generations intact.

Author

Related Posts

No Comments

Post a Comment

Marilyn

Marilyn Fayre Milos, multiple award winner for her humanitarian work to end routine infant circumcision in the United States and advocating for the rights of infants and children to genital autonomy, has written a warm and compelling memoir of her path to becoming “the founding mother of the intactivist movement.” Needing to support her family as a single mother in the early sixties, Milos taught banjo—having learned to play from Jerry Garcia (later of The Grateful Dead)—and worked as an assistant to comedian and social critic Lenny Bruce, typing out the content of his shows and transcribing court proceedings of his trials for obscenity. After Lenny’s death, she found her voice as an activist as part of the counterculture revolution, living in Haight Ashbury in San Francisco during the 1967 Summer of Love, and honed her organizational skills by creating an alternative education open classroom (still operating) in Marin County. 

After witnessing the pain and trauma of the circumcision of a newborn baby boy when she was a nursing student at Marin College, Milos learned everything she could about why infants were subjected to such brutal surgery. The more she read and discovered, the more convinced she became that circumcision had no medical benefits. As a nurse on the obstetrical unit at Marin General Hospital, she committed to making sure parents understood what circumcision entailed before signing a consent form. Considered an agitator and forced to resign in 1985, she co-founded NOCIRC (National Organization of Circumcision Information Resource Centers) and began organizing international symposia on circumcision, genital autonomy, and human rights. Milos edited and published the proceedings from the above-mentioned symposia and has written numerous articles in her quest to end circumcision and protect children’s bodily integrity. She currently serves on the board of directors of Intact America.

Georganne

Georganne Chapin is a healthcare expert, attorney, social justice advocate, and founding executive director of Intact America, the nation’s most influential organization opposing the U.S. medical industry’s penchant for surgically altering the genitals of male children (“circumcision”). Under her leadership, Intact America has definitively documented tactics used by U.S. doctors and healthcare facilities to pathologize the male foreskin, pressure parents into circumcising their sons, and forcibly retract the foreskins of intact boys, creating potentially lifelong, iatrogenic harm. 

Chapin holds a BA in Anthropology from Barnard College, and a Master’s degree in Sociomedical Sciences from Columbia University. For 25 years, she served as president and chief executive officer of Hudson Health Plan, a nonprofit Medicaid insurer in New York’s Hudson Valley. Mid-career, she enrolled in an evening law program, where she explored the legal and ethical issues underlying routine male circumcision, a subject that had interested her since witnessing the aftermath of the surgery conducted on her younger brother. She received her Juris Doctor degree from Pace University School of Law in 2003, and was subsequently admitted to the New York Bar. As an adjunct professor, she taught Bioethics and Medicaid and Disability Law at Pace, and Bioethics in Dominican College’s doctoral program for advanced practice nurses.

In 2004, Chapin founded the nonprofit Hudson Center for Health Equity and Quality, a company that designs software and provides consulting services designed to reduce administrative complexities, streamline and integrate data collection and reporting, and enhance access to care for those in need. In 2008, she co-founded Intact America.

Chapin has published many articles and op-ed essays, and has been interviewed on local, national and international television, radio and podcasts about ways the U.S. healthcare system prioritizes profits over people’s basic needs. She cites routine (nontherapeutic) infant circumcision as a prime example of a practice that wastes money and harms boys and the men they will become. This Penis Business: A Memoir is her first book.