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All About Genital Piercing

As genital piercing becomes more common, doctors may need to learn more about it.
By R. Morgan Griffin
WebMD Feature
Reviewed by Brunilda Nazario, MD

Genital piercing: the very idea of it is enough to send many of us, whimpering, into the fetal position. But it's a practice, whether it intrigues or disgusts you, that's becoming more and more popular for men and women alike.

"It isn't something done only by the fringes of society," says Elayne Angel, a professional piercer in New Orleans and Medical Coordinator for the Association of Professional Piercers. "Most people probably already know at least several adults who have genital piercings. They just haven't had the occasion to find out."

And true enough, while a glance can establish whether someone has a nose ring or pierced eyebrow, you'd need to know a person intimately -- or possess an unobtrusive metal detector -- to discover a genital piercing. Who knows what lurks beneath the boxers or panties of that person you've been flirting with at work, or for that matter, your landlord or mail carrier?

In a recent article in the medical journal The Lancet, Aglaja Stirn, MD, assistant director of the Frankfurt University Teaching Hospital for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy in Germany, surveys the history of the practice and argues that because of its increasing popularity, medical professionals need to learn more about the phenomenon -- and to avoid the impulse to pathologize those who have gotten pierced.

A Short History of Piercing Down There

Genital piercing has probably been around for a while, although just how long is difficult to say; histories of piercing tend to be woven with myths. According to Stirn, genital piercing of men has only been confirmed among a few tribes in Borneo, who implant bones in the glans, or head of the penis. There's also some evidence from the Kamasutra -- the ancient Sanskrit text that establishes the rules of love and sensuality in Hindu society -- of men who had penis implants adorned with jewelry. However, claims that Arabs, Africans, or Greek cultures engaged in routine genital piercing -- or that nipple rings were developed by the Romans to hold up sagging togas -- are fabrications or legend, Stirn says.

In fact, while piercing as a general practice is common to many cultures, genital piercing is largely a recent and Western phenomenon. This may be disconcerting to a few ill-informed proponents of the practice, who might prefer to imagine that they are rediscovering a venerable and ancient rite of passage, rather than practicing a newfangled invention. But as Angel and Stirn assert, most of the exotic sounding names for different types of genital piercings were actually made up in the 1970s in the U.S. and Europe.

The Western origins of genital piercing are also disconcerting to those uncomfortable with the practice, who would prefer to imagine it is a barbaric custom imported from far, far away and not something domestic. A public information officer at the American Medical Association in Chicago was disbelieving and then aghast when informed about the practice and asked, hopefully, whether it was a custom only "practiced in tribes somewhere." Little did the she know, it was probably done every day at piercing parlors within a few miles of her office.

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