OPINION: Tuli doesn’t boost height and sexual prowess. It reveals how fragile masculinity is

radar’s previous column commenters resorted to “supot,” “bakla,” and other grade school-level insults.

Previously, radar asked to rethink circumcision or tuli. Not condemn it, not call for its ban. We questioned a practice framed more as a rite of passage and less as a medical requirement—one tied to social acceptance.

As expected, fragile masculinity did the talking. The automatic responses? “Supot,” “bakla,” and the greatest hits of grade school machismo. Few bothered with the sociocultural and medical contexts cited. Fewer attempted actual discourse.

That says more than any rebuttal could. If tuli were actually about health, it wouldn’t collapse into insults just to defend it.

Among the most persistent claims made was that tuli is needed because it makes boys grow taller. It doesn’t.

There’s no biological pathway linking foreskin removal to increased height. Growth is determined primarily by genetics, nutrition, and overall health.

And in the Philippines, nutrition is the more pressing variable. It has the second shortest population in Southeast Asia, with an average male height of 5’3″ (160 cm) and female height of 4’11” (150 cm). A 2015 Save the Children report linked this partly to inter-generational malnutrition and poverty.

That’s not abstract. The 2023 National Nutrition Survey found that three in 10 Filipino households face moderate food insecurity, while three in 100 face severe food insecurity. As a result, about two in 10 children under five are stunted and underweight. Last January, the Department of Health warned that malnutrition during a child’s first 1,000 days can also stunt their brain development.

The height fallacy

Bottomline: being tuli doesn’t determine height.

If anything, global comparison makes the claim even weaker. In most parts of Europe, where men are among the tallest on Earth, circumcision is rare. Their stature is shaped not by foreskin but by long-term nutrition and superior healthcare, having consistent access to high-quality animal proteins and dairy for generations.

The performance paradox

Worse, a more loaded belief is that tuli improves sexual performance—and makes one more “lalaki.”

A 2007 British Journal of Urology International study found no significant differences between circumcised and uncircumcised men in terms of sexual drive, erection, ejaculation, or latency time. A 2013 study in Taiwan concluded that circumcision’s effects on sexual function remain unclear.

There are studies suggesting certain medical benefits. A 2011 study in Kenya found that circumcised men reported increased penile sensitivity and enhanced ease of reaching orgasm. They didn’t experience risk of sexual dysfunction compared to uncircumcised men.

But the point remains unchanged. Tuli may have medical value in certain contexts, but the meanings attached to it—the promises of height, performance, and manhood—are largely constructed.

If it were only about health, it wouldn’t need masculinity to defend it so loudly. And if “supot” or “bakla” are the only counterarguments, they only confirm what was already clear from the start.