Many young and older people have questions about their bodies, how it works and what it looks like. This text is based on RFSU’s text “Kukkunskap”, we’ve shortened it quite a bit and updated some of it. We’ve chosen to use the word “dick”, but many others use different words, like penis or cock. It’s common to change which words to use depending on the situation and who you’re talking to. Only you get to decide which words you want to use about your own body.

All dicks look different from one another. There are variations in size, shape, and colour between all people with dicks. For example, it’s common that dicks are a bit crooked and that the skin’s colour is a bit blotched. In this text, we talk about some parts of the dick, both the ones that are visible from the outside and the ones that are on the inside of the body.

Dicks  

The dick consists of the shaft, head (glans) and foreskin. There is a strip of skin that stretches from the shaft to the head. It’s called the frenulum (or the “banjo string”) and is unlike other parts of the dick pretty hard and stiff. 

When a person is horny, the dick gets an erection. This means that it is filled with blood, grows and hardens. You can also get an erection for other reasons, for instance in your sleep or when the dick senses certain movements which it reacts to.

There can be many causes if a person can’t get an erection, even though they try and want to. For example, many medicines have side effects that affect the ability to get erections. Commonly, though, it’s caused by stress or nervousness.

The foreskin

The foreskin’s purpose is to protect the head from chafing. The inside of the foreskin, and the head, are of the same kind of skin as the inside of our lips and the cunt’s labia. When you wash your dick, only use water, no soap. Soap can dry out and irritate the sensitive skin.

Circumcision

Some people have had their dicks circumcised. That means that the outermost part of the foreskin is cut off, this is often done when the person is a child. There are many reasons for why circumcisions are done. It can have medical, cultural, or religious reasons. One common medical reason is that the foreskin is too tight. During puberty, the foreskin expands. Puberty is usually when you discover whether your foreskin is too tight. Circumcising dicks is, as opposed to circumcising cunts, completely legal in Sweden. This is because of that few experience problems on account of circumcised penises.

The scrotum (or “the ballsack”)

The testicles (balls), epididymis, and the vas deferens are all contained in the ballsack. The testicles are heat sensitive, which is why the ballsack hangs on the outside of the body. The ballsack has heat sensitive muscles to regulate its temperature. WHen it’s cold, the ballsack shrinks and gets closer to the warm body, and when it’s hot, the muscles relax and the sack hangs more loosely, in order to cool down the testicles. The ballsack also has more sweat glands than any other part of the body, because when sweat evaporates, it cools the ballsack. The hair on the ballsack is also there to help keep the testicles at the right temperature.

the Testicles (the Balls)

The testicles rest in the ballsack and their primary task is to produce sperm. The testicles start growing just as puberty is about to start, and the growth is highest at the beginning of puberty.

Sperm, epididymis, and semen

Each testicle is divided into pyramid shaped boxes, about three hundred in each testicle. Each box contains two to four canals for semen. The semen canals are small pipes that transport sperm to the epididymis. The epididymis is a long tube at the back of the testicle, and this is where sperm mature and are stored. A person with testicles can produce up to 160 million sperm each day. The epididymis then transitions into the vas deferens. Semen consists of few different fluids, only a few percent is from the epididymis and contains sperm. Semen contains about 3-4 millilitres of fluid per ejaculation (just about a teaspoon), with around 100 million sperm per millilitre.

More information about dicks

There’s a lot more to say about dicks than this! You can read more about the inner anatomy of dicks at RFSU or UMO and more about trans people’s cunts at transformering.se

The original text was written by RFSU
Edited by Jona Mörn, Förenade tjej-, trans och ungdomsjourer

Translated by Dannie Milve, Förenade tjej-, trans och ungdomsjourer

Further reading:

The body

Cunt knowledge

Sex

Trans and gender identity