Skip Channel4 main Navigation
Eunuchs
Your chance to have your say about voluntary castration
The issues:
What is it?
Castration means the removal or destruction of the testicles and perhaps also the scrotum that holds them, leaving the penis. Some men like to have their phallus shortened as a separate issue ('stumping'). If removed altogether along with the balls, this is called 'nullification' (and such a man is a 'nullo' rather than a eunuch). Some men, maybe the majority who eventually become eunuchs, start by inflicting damage or pain to their genitals by banding, inserting pins or metal rods, injecting chemicals or any manner of other self-mutilation techniques. If a penis is the ultimate bodily statement of manhood, why do eunuchs not want to lose that too? What is it that the testicles represent that the penis does not? Or is it more than a matter of representation?
How new is this?
Of course, castration is anything but new – for 4,000 years eunuchs have represented some of the most marginalised and most honoured in society. In ancient India, eunuchs advised princes and guarded their harems, and the Biblical Daniel was a eunuch who rose to become prime minister of Babylon and later Persia. More recently there have been the Italian castrati of the 19th century – boys who sacrificed their manhood for the sake of singing careers in the opera houses of Europe. Today there are the cross-dressing Hijras in India and religious extremists such as members of the Russian Skoptsy sect who see the testicles as an organ of weakness. The medical profession today understands this 'syndrome' only in relation to transgender reassignment surgery or as part of body dysmorphia (a syndrome in which people become fixated with having a limb amputated). But is this desire for castration more complicated than simply body modification? How does castration fit into the context of 21st century life? Like the castratos, how 'functional' is it? Or is it purely a route towards psychological healing? Why is that centuries ago men might have been proud to be counted as eunuchs, yet today almost all eunuchs hide behind closed doors and internet aliases?
So why now do men voluntarily want to be castrated?
In the UK, self-motivated castration mainly exists only in the most extreme S&M scene, while in America those aspiring to be castrated comprise a burgeoning and divergent tribe made up of both gay and straight men. Men who want to be castrated often fit no stereotype, have no common neuroses or childhood experience. Some are androgynous types (thin and underdeveloped) who want to remain in a prepubescent, asexual phase; others are eroto-phobes who don't like to feel driven by their libidos and want to become surgically tranquillised. Some want to be feminised, and want to become nullified by having their penis removed along with their testicles. And of course, many feel they do not feel they fit neatly into any of these camps and have their own, very individual reasons. Often seen by those on the outside as a sick practice stemming from deep-rooted psychological problems, how does this form of self-inflicted mutilation differ from other forms, such as piercings and tattoos? Is it not any man's right to do whatever he wants with his own body? Or should the state and international inter-governmental organisations legislate to protect these men from themselves and help address the underlying issues behind the desire for castration? How does this form of self-mutilation differ from men and women who undergo sex-change operations? Or even parents who decided their sons should be circumcised? Where is a line drawn? Should one be drawn?
How common is it?
Due to the fact that the practice has been forced underground – often carried out by men on themselves or in conjunction with other eunuchs contacted via internet chat sites – it comes as no surprise to learn that no official figures exist. However, 'Gelding' – the internet alias adopted by one of America's gurus to all wannabe eunuchs – says he's been contacted by over 5,000 gay and straight men, who believe their obsession is unique. Meanwhile, one US doctor claims to have performed over 12,000 'orchiectomies'. It would therefore not be unreasonable to conclude that there are tens of thousands of men around the globe who have become, or are actively seeking to become eunuchs. Consultant psychiatrist Dr Russell Reid, of Hillingdon Hospital in west London, identifies castration fixation as 'highly disturbed behaviour, in mainly gay men, whose self-hatred is directed towards their genitals'. Gelding's response to this interpretation is equivocal. 'Yes, it's true that no normal person would do that, but then given that homosexuality has always been called a sickness, what's normal?' Reid's experience of this tender topic is predominantly with transsexuals as well as with men who are hypersexed. 'These men are led by their erect penises and some are driven to offend. Being castrated can be a huge release because they become pre-pubital, and sex is no longer an overwhelming preoccupation.' If these men feel their testicles to be the root cause of not just their unhappiness but also a potential cause of them being a threat to society, are they not doing us all a service by undergoing castration? How 'normal' is it to want to change your body in this way? Are men who want to become eunuchs hoping for something which castration can't offer them?
Is it legal?
While orchiectomy operations can legally be carried out by qualified surgeons, very few openly advertise such a private service to men who voluntarily want to undergo the operation. In fact, no such surgeons exist in the UK, while only a handful exist in the US. Due to the cost and inconvenience of getting their testicles removed by a trained surgeon, is it a surprise that so many men are willing to take the huge risk of either performing the surgery on themselves, or get other non-medically trained men to do it for them? Do we not have a responsibility to at least provide these men with a safer route towards become eunuchs?
What do you think?
You've read some of the issues, so here's your chance to let us know what you think about self-motivated castration.
