Aaaaaaaaagggggghhhhhhhhhhh!!!!

20-06-2003

Despite the bone through his nose, his shaved head and pierced face, the 25-year-old pacing a seedy stretch of New York sidewalk admitted he was terrified of what he was about to do.

But after a few minutes, a couple cigarettes and several deep breaths, he sat in the basement of a storefront tattoo parlor, closed his eyes and let a friend split his tongue down the middle with a scalpel.

The latest trend among teens and 20-somethings who indulge in so-called extreme body modification, forking one's tongue like a serpent's "is an art form," said T.J. McGillis, who offers the service for a $250 charge.

"Everybody wants to get it done. It could be the next mainstream thing aside from piercing," he said.

That may be an exaggeration. The number of people with split tongues is estimated at 1,500 to 2,000 people by the editor of a Web-based magazine devoted to body modification, but the trend is attracting enough attention that a few U.S. state legislatures have moved to ban the procedure.

Ian, the young man with the bone through his nose who did not want to reveal his last name, opted for tongue splitting after earlier adventures left him with huge rings in his ears, silver barbells piercing his face, myriad tattoos and who-knows-what-else under his baggy shirt and pants.

"I like the way it looks," he said, listing his reasons. "Two, I think it will be more fun during oral sex and the girls will get a kick out of it. Three, everyone and their mother has their tongue pierced and four, I'm an idiot."

The process is nothing short of gory. In Ian's case, his tongue was clamped in place, numbed and slit 2 inches (5 cm) up the middle, looking uncomfortably like a piece of raw liver freshly cut by a butcher.

Other methods entail tying increasingly tighter pieces of thread through a pierced hole or cutting with a laser.

Blood gushed out of Ian's mouth and over the silver barbell in his lip for a few minutes, then abated with several doses of mouthwash.

"Go home and pull it apart," McGillis ordered him, suggesting a regimen of separating the two halves each morning and night to prevent reattachment.

After splitting his tongue, Emrys Yetz, 20, said it wasn't long before he could move each half independently and do party tricks like picking up pens and pencils.

"It's done to better yourself," he said, opening his mouth to wiggle each half like a snail waving its antennae.

Yetz argues tongue splitting is no different than a far more socially acceptable face lift or breast enhancement. The only downside, he said, is eating ice cream, since it's harder to make a scoop of your tongue when it's split in two.

Not surprisingly, doctors say there are more downsides to tongue-splitting than dripping ice cream.

"There's the potential for life-threatening hemorrhage and the potential for life-threatening infection," said Dr. Lee Pollan, an oral surgeon based in Rochester, New York.

If that's not enough, he added, tongue-splitting can damage speech and taste and cause permanent numbness.

And reattaching a split tongue can be a complex process of reconstructive surgery and skin grafts, he added.

Dire warnings notwithstanding, tongue splitting is kids being kids, said psychology professor Stephen Franzoi at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, who specializes in issues of physical attractiveness and body esteem.

It's a form of self-expression, alienation, rejecting mainstream culture and asserting independence, he said.

Comparing tongue splitters to young people wearing long hair and ragged jeans in the 1960s, he said: "This is the same psychological process, albeit more extreme.

"We encourage kids to be independent and express themselves and find their own personal identity," he said. "Every generation has a different way to find themselves in our culture. Some of them are more extreme than others."

After splitting his tongue, Ian made plans to pierce each tip, even as one waiting friend dampened his hope that the girls would love it.

"I think it's gross. It creeps me out," said hairdresser Jill Johnson. "I've dated guys with tattoos all over. I've seen it all, but that's too much for me. Imagine when you're 60 years old and you have your tongue like that."

But for believers in modification, a split tongue is merely a start. Split penises, sliced lengthwise in half, are not unheard of among aficionados.

**rolfw** · 20-06-2003

That has got to be the most stupid thing I have ever seen anybody do to themselves.

20-06-2003

I will see if I can find anything worse Rolf M8

**Channel Hopper** · 21-06-2003

Please no split knob pictures on the forum

Worst I have in the hard drive archives thats pubic domain is (and I fail to see why he woud wish to carry his keys in such a manner - what if his front door caught the wind ?)

**T_G** · 22-06-2003

Speaking with split tongue has been practiced since the beginning of time, he just gave it a physical interpretation

**Channel Hopper** · 22-06-2003

It must be cold on stage, hes shrunk somewhat

**rolfw** · 22-06-2003

Yes the wonders of bandwidth saving thumbnails, click on the thumbnail and the full penile key hanging glory will be revealed.

***BarMoo*** · 23-06-2003

The ligament that basically defines the size of our knob stops growing at about 18yrs. Any attempt to 'lengthen' your member thereafter (i.e. by suspending some local jail-house nick-nacks from the end it) will be shortlived.

So I was told when I phoned the clinic.

Anyway, what's the pr*ck done with his knee?

Mark.

**rolfw** · 23-06-2003

Probably banged it with the weights.

**T_G** · 23-06-2003

Originally Posted by rolfw

Probably banged it with the weights.

As a kid he heard rock n' roll

. Then because of that he started smoking, playing with himself and reading porn. Next of course came drugs. After that there were tatoos then bones in the nose, and before he knew he was hanging on a couple of meat hooks, dick is being stretched until it looks like a shishkabaab, someone sticks a mike in your hand telling you that in a moment someone is going to insert this somewhere where the sun don't shine

(at least not on a regular basis). And just when he thought it can't get better one of the nutters like him notices his rather immobile situation and starts chewing on his knee. There is body painting, pody pearcing, body tattoing and the ultimate: body chewing

**2old4this** · 27-06-2003

A friend of mine told me about extreme body-modifiction six or seven years ago. The tongue thing is just the tip of the iceberg, believe me. I'll spare CH the in-line image, but have a look at this site:

Main site: http://www.bmezine.com
Free samples:
http://www.bme.freeq.com/spc/galleries/other/
http://www.bmezine.com/extreme
http://www.bme.freeq.com/extreme/fre...cal/index.html
http://www.molokosynthemesc.com/risks/mods/000039.jpg
http://www.molokosynthemesc.com/risks/mods/000015.jpg

Even that is not the worse. If you have a look around that site you'll see pictures of the most bizarre modifications including deliberate amputations of limbs, DIY-castration, and even a so-called penectomy (amputation of the penis) - for no medical reason, just for the sake of undergoing an extreme body modification.

There are some seriously disturbed individuals out there.

2old

**Channel Hopper** · 27-06-2003

There are some seriously disturbed individuals out there.

who know and then proceed to provide links to sites like those ?

**2old4this** · 28-06-2003

said he who delighted us with a picture of someone hanging half a hundredweight of manacles from his knobend

**T_G** · 28-06-2003

Man, just looking at the names of the links made feel weak, so i decided I am 2old4 that sort of stuff. Yes, I am a big old softie when it comes to DIY castrations and self mutilations

etc....
And anyway, my body is perfect

, no need chopping things or holding pieces together with metal clips

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