The foreskin is protective of the sensitive glans penis which it covers. The trend or need to ‘uncover’ and expose the glans by uncircumcised
men seems most likely a symptom of the ‘normalisation’ of circumcision by North American culture where the vast majority of pornography
(an important medium where men can compare themselves to other men) up until recently stemmed from. Many intact men exposed to ‘cut’
men in porn, may have felt ‘inferior’ at one stage or another, seeing that cut penises were predominant and so being continually exposed
to them via porn has led to the belief that a circumcised penis was more desirable than an intact one. This situation is changing
however since European porn has become popular with uncircumcised porn stars redressing the balance and it would seem that the intact
penis has now gained some sort of status symbol, particularly amongst gay culture.
For many men both straight and gay, the first thing they do when masturbating or having sex is to retract their foreskin. Indeed when
watching both heterosexual and gay porn, the vast majority of both men and women will retract the foreskin from the outset and completely
ignore it as if it was an obstructive nuisance. It’s no surprise then that the conditioning surrounding the foreskin perpetuated by
American porn has continued to maintain the foreskin as an object of disdain and derision or something that’s seems to get in the
way or to be an embarrassment and shameful. If pornography is a source of sexual education (as well as sexual pleasure and a safe
sex option) for men and women, then the role modelling has been that the foreskin is an irrelevant and a cumbersome irritation. Surely
the cut men in porn were simply doing the best they knew how with their circumcised penises, but the legacy left by them has had the
effect of promoting the idea that circumcised penises were what all penises should be like. The role modelling by cut porn stars would
seem to be more vigorous thrusting and forceful oral, vaginal and anal sex, the obvious reasons being, to obtain more sensations,
from having no foreskin, less nerve endings and needing more stimulation to get to the orgasmic trigger.
Having perpetuated circumcised penises as the norm, It is also porn that has seemingly reversed this trend by the recent promotion
of uncircumcised penises. In the 1980s some American porn directors started to promote uncut models in their films. The work of Kristen
Bjorn has been significant in elevating the status of the intact penis among the homosexual community. Bjorn uses many South American
and Eastern European men in his films, most of whom of course have foreskins. He quite often pays particular attention to foreskin
play in his movies with pulling, stretching, sucking, tonguing and docking of foreskins being prominent in many films. Al Parker,
an American porn star who also became a director and producer of porn films, was also an advocate of foreskin. He likewise indulged
in docking, chewing, sucking, tonguing and stretching of foreskins on film and although he was circumcised he towards the end of his
life had a surgical foreskin reconstruction which defied belief that he was once circumcised as his foreskin looked incredibly real
and natural. There are now a multitude of European porn directors and studios churning out porn with uncut models, to the point that
some American directors and studios (Falcon & William Higgins) are taking advantage of the glut of European men with readily available
foreskins who are only too willing to show them off in porn films.