Truths About Masturbation
Everything You Need To Know About Your Favorite Solo Time Activity
Everything You Need To Know About Your Favorite Solo Time Activity
Masturbation.
It’s also known as ‘jerking off,’ ‘touching yourself,’ ‘self-pleasuring,’ ‘fapping,’ ‘wanking’ and a thousand other raunchy slang terms.
It’s something that almost all guys have at least tried, and many engage in on an almost daily basis. It’s something that teenage boys are infamous for partaking in seemingly night and day. It’s something that’s seen as gross, fun, sinful or healthy, depending on who you ask.
But what is it, exactly?
Like sex, masturbation is seen as both intensely private and immensely pleasurable. And like sex, it’s something that most people haven’t learned much about thanks to poor sex education and the spread of misinformation.
In order to cut through the noise and dispel the myths, here’s AskMen’s guide to the truths you should know about masturbation:
What Is Masturbation?
Masturbation is the act of providing oneself sexual pleasure, typically by touching one’s genitals — in the case of those assigned male at birth, this would be the penis and testicles.
As you touch your genitals, your penis is likely to stiffen and become an erection. Continued touch will probably feel good, and you might find yourself increasing the intensity and speed of your touches in a positive feedback loop as you get more and more excited.
The increasing excitement of masturbation often, but not always, produces an orgasm.
For people with penises, starting at some point during puberty, your orgasms are likely to begin manifesting as ejaculations, meaning semen, a liquid-like substance containing sperm, will shoot out of your urethra, the hole at the tip of the glans.
Depending on a variety of factors, this could be a little trickle of semen, or up to a tablespoon (15 ml) or more.
How Do You Masturbate?
There are many different methods of masturbation. Some are more common than others, but if it feels pleasurable to you, then your method is probably just right. However, there’s nothing wrong with experimenting with different methods and seeing what works best for you.
For most guys, masturbation will involve stroking the glans of their penises (the part that looks like a helmet, also known as the head) and/or the shaft, using repetitive movements that will render the penis erect and then slowly build to a climax.
Some guys will also incorporate other types of touch, like playing with their testicles, or stimulating their anus or prostate.
It’s also not uncommon for some guys to hump pillows, mattresses, stuffed animals or other soft, inanimate objects for stimulation.
Then, there are an incredible variety of great male masturbation toys on the market. Many of them aim to recreate the sensations of penetrative or oral sex, but there are options for basically every kind of taste and proclivity.
Today, many guys will watch internet porn while they masturbate, but other approaches — like looking at still images, listening to erotic audio, reading erotica, playing porn games or simply conjuring up mental fantasies — are all common approaches as well.
Negative Views on Masturbation
Attitudes towards masturbation have varied throughout human history, but in the recent past in Western civilization, have been quite negative. Not that long ago, masturbation was thought to cause a wide variety of diseases and medical conditions, including mental illness, blindness, gout, and even cancer.
Today, however, we know that’s not true, and over the past several decades, public perception and medical consensus has shifted in a positive direction.
However, as recently as the early 20th century, medical experts believed that masturbation was an extremely unhealthy and sinful behavior.
In his 1904 book Sexology, professor William Walling wrote about masturbation, “Viewing the world over, this shameful and criminal act is the most frequent, as well as the most fatal, of all vices.”
Masturbation is still considered morally reprehensible in many denominations of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.
Various approaches have been taken to stop people from masturbating over the years, with limited amounts of success. In the early 19th century, Reverend Sylvester Graham created the graham cracker, a bland cookie, as a means to curtail sex drive and masturbation.
Later in the 19th century, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg — the inventor of Corn Flakes — prescribed a diet of bland food for the same reason. Dr. Kellogg also recommended more extreme approaches to reduce male masturbation, including circumcision, suturing of the foreskin to prevent erections, and cages placed over the genitals that would deliver electric shocks.
Today, the remaining vestiges of these anti-masturbation beliefs persist in popular online challenges to go 30 days without masturbation or quit doing it entirely, for instance.
Positive Views on Masturbation
Online challenges aside, things have changed significantly since the days of Dr. Kellogg and Reverend Graham. Masturbation is still taboo and stigmatized to different degrees in different cultures, but people seem to be less afraid to talk about it.
Masturbation has started to find its way into popular culture in the past few decades. Mainstream movies around the turn of the 21st century like American Pie and There’s Something About Mary featured infamous masturbation scenes, and famous artists like Prince (several different songs) and Nicki Minaj’s (the Beyoncé collaboration “Feeling Myself”) have also explored the subject.
As societal views on the subject shifted, the medical community was also changing its tune. Over at least the past decade and a half or so, masturbation is now seen by experts as an expected, healthy, and even beneficial behavior.
These views are hardly new; in 1972, the American Medical Association declared that masturbation is normal, and more recently The American Academy of Pediatrics stated that masturbation is a typical part of child and adolescent development.
However, the positive aspects of masturbation from a physical and mental health perspective are now broadly understood and accepted: that it can be a healthy component of an active sex life, that it can reduce stress and promote mental well-being, that it can improve your understanding of and appreciation for your body and sex organs, and that it can reduce your risk of prostate cancer.
How Common Is Masturbation?
In short? Very common. And it has been for a long time, possibly for all of human history.
Because of sexual taboos, we don’t have robust data going back very far, but in the mid-20th century, Dr. Alfred Kinsey and his research team interviewed a few thousand Americans about their sex lives, including masturbation.
Even back then when people were much more socially and sexually conservative, 92% of men and 62% of women reported that they had masturbated. The numbers haven’t changed much since. For example, in a recent study, 95% of men and 71% of women said that they masturbated.
Masturbation was related to higher levels of education, younger age, and higher social class. The researchers thought this might be because of access to good education, in particular sex education resources, and therefore less fear and guilt about masturbation.
So based on the data, it’s safe to say that almost all men masturbate. The majority of women also masturbate, or perhaps even most, given that women tend to underreport their sexual experiences due to fear of being judged.
Even though most people masturbate, there’s still a lot of stigma and shame associated with it, especially for people with negative attitudes towards masturbation.
How Often Do Men Masturbate?
A strong 2010 study addressing this question asked a random sample of just over 2,500 American men about all aspects of their sexual behavior. This chart provides the data for masturbation frequency, by age.
As you can see, there’s a pretty even spread across the different frequencies and ages. In other words, there’s not really any such thing as ‘normal’ when it comes to how often men masturbate.
When they’re young, it may be common to masturbate many times in a row, but as they age, guys will typically find their refractory periods increasing, meaning they take longer to be ready for the next orgasm after having one.
Can You Masturbate Too Much?
Given that roughly one in five men aged 18 to 39 masturbates 4 or more times per week, frequent masturbation is hardly uncommon.
But masturbating much more than 4 times per week is also not especially uncommon, especially for teenagers. So is it possible to masturbate too much?
The answer really depends on the person in question. If you’re not experiencing any negative side-effects from your masturbation, then there’s most likely nothing to worry about.
Habitually masturbating to avoid something that you’re not dealing with — or to the extent that it’s starting to interfere with other aspects of your life — however, is a concern.
Some guys masturbate to deal with stress, anxiety, sadness, loneliness, or relationship problems.
In the moment, masturbation can provide relief, as the brain chemicals that are released following an orgasm can lead to feelings of relaxation and bliss. But as an ongoing strategy, it doesn’t make things any better; if anything, it may make things worse by preventing you from actually addressing the problem.
Furthermore, some guys may masturbate so much that they miss out on important aspects of life, like school, work, recreation, or relationships. This often increases anxiety, shame, and a sense of being alone.
Excessive masturbation can also lead to decreased sexual performance or interest, as men only have so much mojo to go around.
Again, there’s no “normal” amount of masturbation. Some guys do it a lot; some a little, some not at all. All of that is fine — masturbating regularly is not usually something to be worried about.
If masturbation has become a coping strategy to deal with problems, or starts to interfere with your life, then it might be a good idea to step back and re-evaluate your masturbating habits and what they might mean.
Masturbation is much like any other enjoyable behavior, such as watching TV, being online, eating snacks, or playing video games. In moderation, it’s great. If it starts to feel out of control to you, though, it may be a sign of some underlying problem that needs to be addressed.
On the other hand, you may simply have a high sex drive, which is nothing to be ashamed of. It’s really a question of how your masturbation habits are making you feel.
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Source: AskMen
