Why isn't jerking off more valorized as an easy dopamine hit that's also literally good for you?
people have been demonizing it for most of the AD years i think but it's quite pleasant really. are there any proven negative effects?
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Religion
I'd like to go a bit deeper.
I don't think people invented socially controlling practices because they found religion, I think they found religion to frame the invention of socially controlling practices.
Masturbation is a gratifying act that relives pressure to settle into a rigid domestic arrangement that serves to make more workers and soldiers, and create dependents that need fed, and whose well-being would be threatened if a parent became defiant and provoked the ire of elites.
Masturbation is good for the individual at the expense of the nation and its rulers. So it's inevitable that priests would decry it as an affront against god, as that's historically been their purpose.
go on...
( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Defeat the ruling class... jerk off
this is exactly the truth
Citation needed.
Which part? I think this is all subjective opinion.
Their statement started off with "I don't think" which generally means it's an opinion that may or may not have evidence. As long as they don't present it as truth and fact, it doesn't really need a citation.
That an opinion lacks evidence does not alleviate the requirement that its factual allegations be supported by evidence. "I don't think the surface of the earth is curved" may be an opinion, but it's a provably wrong assertion, and adding a disclamitory phrase to it doesn't excuse the statement from evaluation.
this is a message board not a dissertation, nobody has to do shit
Yeah, my bad. I forgot how cool it is to just spout whatever bullshit you want. Hurray for ignorance.
No wonder humanity is doomed.
Similar to the claim that god exists 🤔
Then you should simply call that person a dumb ass and move on in that scenario. And their statement was loaded with qualifiers that indicates to the audience to not take their claim seriously. This isn't debate club or a Congressional hearing. It's a niche internet forum.
Yeah, here you go: https://slrpnk.net/comment/9178525
Pretty sad when religion claims to abhor evil, happens to be the source of a lot of it. Right? I can’t name a single thing religion ever did for me other than make me miserable.
IMO, and without actual data to back it up, I reckon religion (and religious difference) is responsible for the most suffering throughout the history of humankind.
I feel like even without religion we’d find ways to make each other miserable ‘cause we’re just an awesome species like that.
Yeah, no dispute here, mate. We're pretty shocking like that. But I think religion stands out as an example of the worst, most inventive way we've come up with to subjugate and hurt people.
As a species, we've convinced ourselves that religion should be protected rather than inspected. We let lots of bad things happen in the name of religion. It's bullshit.
Amen to that!
I don't think it's the source. I think it's a tool of social control that enables the powerful to create a bare minimum willingness to be ruled. For a long time the doctrine of Christianity was the Divine Right of Kings. Now it's the Prosperity Gospel. The books did not change but the people with all the money and power ensured the church leaders who served their interest had most of the money and thus followers.
If we didn't have religion, some other social construct would arise, and I'd argue, has arisen to fulfill it's role. Modern economic theory justifies the current power order in an unfalsifiable way that reminds me of religion.
Religion could be a liberatory force in society. In fact it has been. The liberation theology movement in South America and numerous heretical movements in the late medieval period are both examples of progressive Christian social movements.
Thank you. I think anyone who spends a lot of time reading about history comes to these conclusions.
Christianity and capitalism. If it doesn't make you feel guilty the Christians don't like it and if you can provide it to yourself for free the capitalists don't like it.
You kidding? Porn is a 4 billion dollar industry.
You can jerk off without porn. Think of all the advertising and subscriptions on porn sites. Those have nothing to do with masturbation and everything to do with capitalism.
My weiner would disagree
Sorry you’re addicted to porn, G. Get help if you need it.
So, like, for the bulk of history, the people demonizing it are religious assholes.
They demonized sex out of wedlock, demonized wanking off; and any other kind of sexual release, while simultaneously deciding who you can marry (and therefore have kids with,).
It’s one of their core methods of social control, ensuring wealth is only passed on to children of wealthy and “faithful” families.
I posted a comment impulsively, then saw that you already gave the same answer better.
They also practiced polygamy, so that rich and influential men would have multiple wives and poor men would have none. Imagine the rage when you were a Shepherd tending someone else's flocks, knowing that you will never have a wife or family.
It makes sense to have occasional wars with neighboring tribes so that excess males can be removed from the system.
Masturbation is totally normal and healthy, and you're spot on that it shouldn't be demonized or shamed. In men, it might even reduce the risk of prostate cancer.
At the same time, it's important to have a balanced and psychologically flexible relationship with masturbation and sexuality. As psychologist Steven Hayes, a leading expert on psychological flexibility, explains: getting too fixated on any one activity or coping mechanism, even a healthy one, can lead to psychological inflexibility if it is used to avoid experiencing your life fully (For a thorough explanation of how this works, feel free to check out A Liberated Mind by Steven Hayes). Psychological inflexibility here means getting stuck in rigid behavior patterns to the point that it messes with living a full and meaningful life.
So while I'm totally with you that masturbation is healthy and that bullshit social taboos against it should be rejected, it's also good to be mindful about your motivation behind doing it. Are you doing it because you're escaping pain? Or are you doing it because it aligns with your values and makes your life meaningful? If you rely on masturbation too much and don't have ways of accepting your emotions and connecting with the world, it could potentially tip into unhelpful psychological rigidity and a frustrating life. The key is to be able to experience masturbation while still staying flexible enough to show up fully for the rest of your life too.
What if I'm masturbating because my body demands I masturbate when I look at porn, even though I'd rather just look at porn without masturbating?
Thanks for the response. What you're describing - feeling a bodily urge to masturbate when viewing porn, even if you'd prefer not to - is very common. We're kinda designed so that our bodies respond to sexual stimuli. Many people can relate to that internal tug-of-war between an impulse and a conflicting desire.
From a psychological flexibility perspective, the key is to approach those urges with mindful acceptance rather than struggle against them. Fighting with or trying to suppress an urge often just makes it grow stronger, like a beach ball you keep trying to push underwater - it keeps popping back up with greater force (1). Instead, psychological flexibility invites us to open up and make room for the urge, observing it with curiosity and letting it be fully present in our awareness.
This doesn't mean you have to act on the urge. In fact, by giving it space to exist without resistance, you gain the ability to unhook from it and consciously choose how to respond in line with your values (2). You might say to yourself "I'm having the thought that I need to masturbate right now" and feel the sensations of that urge in your body, while still maintaining the freedom to decide if acting on it is truly what you want.
Imagine for a moment that a dear friend or loved one came to you struggling with this same dilemma. How would you respond to them? Most likely with compassion, understanding, and encouragement to be kind to themselves as they navigate this very human challenge. We could all benefit from extending that same caring response to ourselves.
At the end of the day, you're the expert on your own life and what matters most to you. By practicing acceptance of your inner experiences, unhooking from unhelpful thoughts and urges, and clarifying what you truly value, you can develop psychological flexibility to pursue a rich and meaningful life - whatever that looks like for you. That means that there's no one "right" way to relate to masturbation and porn. The invitation is to approach it mindfully and make choices that align with the kind of person you want to be.
(1) You can check out the "rebound effect" or "ironic process theory." It's been studied extensively in the context of thought suppression. The seminal paper on the topic is Wegner, D. M., Schneider, D. J., Carter, S. R., & White, T. L. (1987). Paradoxical effects of thought suppression. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 53(1), 5–13. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.53.1.5
(2) This meta-analysis reviewed laboratory-based studies testing the components of the psychological flexibility model, and how psychological flexibility techniques increase behavioral flexibility. Levin, M. E., Hildebrandt, M. J., Lillis, J., & Hayes, S. C. (2012). The impact of treatment components suggested by the psychological flexibility model: A meta-analysis of laboratory-based component studies. Behavior Therapy, 43(4), 741-756. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.beth.2012.05.003
Mindfulness sounds like a lot of work when I'm already planning to get genital nullification surgery
EDIT: Lemmy users love to downvote trans people's lived experiences because they're transphobic
Yes, but I feel mindfulness can solve many problems. I'm not sure how many of your problems will be solved with surgery, but you might need to mix in a bit of mindfulness for good measure.
I'm mindful about lots of things, but I'm not mindful about my genitals, because they give me dysphoria. I'll be mindful about my lack of genitals when I don't have genitals.
You can't mindfulness your way out of being trans. It doesn't work, I tried.
Very well. I know it's not a fix for everything. I just found it helped me growing up and when I remember to be mindful as an adult. When I forget and get too caught up in my own head is when I need it the most.
I wish you luck on your process and hope the best for you.
Being present with yourself and learning to sit with your thoughts (mere transient, ephemeral nothingness) is probably not going to be more work than undergoing literal surgery.
And it's pretty insulting to gender diversity for you to attribute to transphobia our revulsion at seeing your level of emotional intolerance.
I'm mindful as shit about plenty of other stuff, just not my genitals. Being mindful about my genitals is bad because I have dysphoria. But I don't expect a transphobe like you to understand my medical needs when you've already made a reductive judgement about my entire psychology based on a single statement in a specific context. You're eager to judge, not to understand.
and you are eager to bemoan and cry persecution and not very eager to be understood. i cant believe you never mentioned being ace but only being trans. and yet it is our fault for not knowing this about you?
Asks question about psychology and masturbation. Gets well thought out response with source material and excellent advice. Responds to said comment in a rude way.
EveRYoNe is sO tRanSpHobiC!!
Lol. No. Your response was shitty and had nothing to do with the topic or the incredibly well thought out and empathetic response that you received. That's why you're being downvoted. Your gender does not give you permission to treat others poorly and you're acting no better than actual transphobes.
I wasn't being rude, I just gently informed the other person that they were giving bad advice, without getting angry or aggressive or belittling them in any way. You're only reading my normal, pleasant interactions with other people as rude because you want an excuse to hate a trans person.
Do you really think they were giving bad advice? They presented something really well thought-out and with flippin citations! And I can say that Hayes is absolutely a credible expert in the field who has done amazing work in mental health and addiction.
You just don't like the answer. Because you believe the answer is too hard for you.
And it's an easy excuse to say you're being persecuted for your identity, but really it is your attitude being criticized. Honestly it's frustratingly transphobic of you to try and lump in maladaptive sexual responses with transness too. Do you see what kind of damage it can potentially do to portray a hypersexual trait as something essentially trans???
It's good advice in general, but it's bad advice for me, as I already explained multiple times. And I'm asexual, not hypersexual. I tell you I'm getting genital nullification surgery and you still go and erase my very obvious queerness.
This is what is called gaslighting and it's deplorable.
No, gaslighting is when someone tries to make you question your sanity. Someone disagreeing with you isn't called gaslighting, it's called a disagreement. Obviously I'm going to disagree with you when you make up nonsense about my own actions. And if I had been as obnoxious and incorrect as you are, then I would have accused you of gaslighting when you told me my own actions were different than they really are.
Thank you... most of the responses in this thread are really immature, arrogant, entitled, and pretty fucking cynical.
I work with people with severe depression and also the occasional sex/porn addict. Sexuality can lead us to some healthy lifestyles and can function as a healthy coping skill but it's also one that's easy to overdo. There are folks out there who try to treat their depression by masturbating all day long. They're desperate for any hit of pleasure, and they have quite literally milked that cow dry.
This post reminds me of the Reddit marijuana communities, that rubber-banded so far beyond reasonable moderated consumption of a helpful medicine, but refused to see how maladaptive their ritual had become. No one in this thread is questioning the original premise. "But it's so good!" That's the immature, arrogant part. And the entitled part is the attitude that any criticism of my precious coping tool is a threat to my hollow happiness, and the cynicism is that the only reason to criticize it is because of a corrupt society! Jesus fucking christ this thread broke my brain, you all broke my brain, we all suck.
I've ended up having sex with my marijuana and smoking my semen.. And I can't help but ask myself, where did it all go wrong?
Rigid behavioral patterns like having to work 40 hours a week, shop, feed yourself, clean, do laundry, go to the doctor, pay bills and so on, over and over and over again for the rest of your life?
Bro you can't just list basically every human ADL and say it's a "rigid behavior". That's basically like saying "Oh, you claim to like variety? Then how come you spend every day ALIVE?" thats idiotic, arrogant, cynical
Well excuse the fuck out of me for not having enough free time to actually enjoy my life.
you cant compartmentalize things like that. there aren't "chores" vs "fun" and everything you have to do is pain and the fun is just the chemical rushes. you gotta learn to enjoy the little things, enjoy yourself while you're doing your job or your chores, have some gratitude that you still live and breathe. you probably are gonna wanna get screened for depression
I can't pick and choose what I do or do not enjoy doing. There's nothing engaging about cleaning or doing laundry. When I first got out on my own there was at least some challenge in figuring out the most efficient way of doing things but that's all been mastered long ago. My job mostly consists of going down a list of projects and emailing people to find out why they haven't finished things that should have been done weeks ago. Then when I leave I get to sit in traffic for half an hour. Maybe stop at one of the over crowded, understaffed grocery stores to overpay for food. Get home, work out for an hour, shower, cook food, clean up, do whatever else needs doing. There's nothing to enjoy about any of that. It's all tedious as hell. I might have an hour or two after everything else is done to unwind before bed and even then I usually have too much on my mind to really get immersed in anything.
I get how you can feel like that is a fault of the world, but don't you see any agency in changing any of this? Or you just leave it at "Well I don't like it so that's that"
Of the things I listed:
Job - I'm always on the look out for better options, so far nothing has come up that pays more and I'm already not making enough to do the things I want to do.
Cleaning - Already said I have gamified it to get some enjoyment out of it in the past but I don't see any more room for improvement there.
Traffic - I can leave work early to beat rush hour sometimes but that that only helps a little.
Grocery store - I've tried going to different ones but it's more or less the same issues at all of the ones I've tried. I've figured out which days are usually less busy but it still sucks.
Working out - I vary my routines to not get too boring but it's still more or less the same stuff over and over again. It was fun when I was making gains but now my physique is where I want it to be so it's just maintenance.
Cooking- can try making new stuff but that just takes longer and comes with the risk of waste if I mess it up or don't like it. Also sharing a kitchen with housemates that tend to pack all the freezer space with garbage they buy from costco.
Free time - I guess I could stay up later but then I'll feel like shit all day the next day.
I'm open to suggestions but you're acting like I don't think about this shit constantly.
I mean that's definitely just a checkout aisle self-help book, though. Psychology, along with nutritional science and some other softer, more survey-based fields, has been suffering a pretty massive replication crisis, where something like 50% of papers are totally incapable of being replicated, depending on the journal and subject.
So I dunno, I'd generally be pretty skeptical of anything a book like that says about how you have to live your life or what you should be doing or how you should be doing it. Even if it's something like "mindfulness", right, generally thought to be a therapeutic practice, which we're extracting from zen buddhism or whatever, just like carl jung travels around and extracts a bunch of "archetypes" from other cultures and then supposes that they're universal when really it's all just kinda some schizo bullshit canon he's coming up with on the fly.
I uhh, I don't like the scientific paint that is painted onto psychology and psychotherapy, is I guess what I'm saying. The attempt at formalization. What is just as good for one person, to be mindful, is probably something that someone else should rather not think about at all. Maybe even as a functional adaptation, a functional delusion that they can go on believing, and still end up having a fulfilling and uplifting life for everyone around them.
Hayes is not a checkout aisle self-help book lol he pioneered multiple major branches of CBT. that's like calling the Rolling Stones elevator music
I admire the skepticism but you haven't read it and clearly haven't taken time to fully understand it. he isn't making prescriptive claims. he's speaking on behavioral science. "A happens, then B tends to happen. C happens, then D tends to happen. do what you will with this info."
i understand the apprehension about psychological research but it is fundamentally a subjective science - psychology is what makes subjectivity possible, after all! and we humans clearly need treatment. if everyone listened to the ideas you planted in here, then what would we do? not try any treatments at all? not test our treatments? not seek evidence that our treatments are working and improve them? not share our findings?
the issue fundamentally is that you need to learn more about reading and interpreting scientific literature. you're presenting a pseudo-intellectual skepticism which is admittedly a healthy protective mechanism from many things online, but is not going to be a useful attitude for all kinds of growth
im sorry im being a dick but this thread has funked up my barometer for crazy and i probably misinterpreted your level of it, be well
I mean, both can be true, right. It's not uncommon for pretty popular scientists to get into kind of the grift economy after a little while. Jordan peterson has how many citations to his scientific papers or whatever? But then he still rolls around and spews a bunch of bullshit that's sort of framed under the guise of his psychological background, and you can still tell is pretty easily influenced by his jungian type bullshit. I dunno, been a while since I actually looked into him, but it shook my ability to trust psychology more as a field, after that one.
No yeah for sure I haven't read it, don't claim to have read it, I'm just extremely skeptical of that kind of book, which presents science to the public at large, because most of the experiences I've had with that sort of thing have been damaging psuedoscientific bullshit that I slowly have to talk my friends out of. Which becomes much harder when they think they know things on a topic because they've read like one book about it. I don't even try to talk them into a different stance, I just try to talk them out of the kind of, oversimplified takes which they tend to get from these types of books. Steven pinker type books, "Guns, Germs, and Steel" type books, "The Bell Curve" type books, "How to Win Friends and Influence People", "Poor Dad, Rich Dad", shit like that. Admittedly not all of those are science guys, and some of that shit's kind of old, but, you see what I'm getting at, it all blends together for the public. Pop psychology, that's probably the term for that specific type of book, and uhh, yeah, that book gave me that kind of vibe.
If I'm really being skeptical, than, not evaluating anything else, because I just got up and still haven't finished my coffee, the first study at the end of your post has two experiments. The first has a sample size of 34, the second has a sample size of 44. I dunno if I would say that you can really extrapolate anything from such an incredibly small sample size, to be honest. Especially one that's like, taken from standard college campus volunteers. I know there are lots of scientific studies that rely on sample sizes which are pretty small, and I would throw that criticism at those studies, too. Shit happens in nutrition and exercise science too, I know for sure, which is why you see shitty fad diets circulate so much. I dunno, maybe I'll read the rest of the paper, but that's just like my general, me throwing shit at psychology as a field, right? But, maybe more, like, maybe more to, I think, some sort of point, if I have it, right:
Like what do you mean by this? Because you're looking at this through "treatments", right, and I dunno if that's the correct lens with which to view most people's problems that they have in life. I mean it's not a fuckin, incredibly new take, right, but like, you have a society where you're expected to work 9-5, probably more, hours, five days a week, probably go in on a rental with your significant other, or increasingly, with your significant others, for like, 60 something years of your life? It's not a shocker when we're experiencing increasing amounts of depression at large, then, to me. That people have problems with that. I mean like, does changing society at large, qualify as a kind of patient treatment? I suppose my problem, if I'm really trying to have one, is just kind of that like, there's not really any amount of psychological help which makes it better that your fingers are getting crushed in industrial machinery. Psychological help, in that case, just looks like copium. I don't think psychology can help a lot of those problems, I think the best it can do is put a band-aid over a crippling tumor, which is nothing.
If you were to ask me what we were to do with the mentality I have, I'd probably want to incredibly balloon sample sizes and drastically increase the amount of evidence that we're collecting, compared to just like, some guy's written observations on like 50 people in some random experiment. Probably though, this is impossible, because school funding does not look to be going up anytime soon and google isn't gonna share their massive amounts of data they're collecting on people, and even if we had a glut of data to go through then we'd probably still be having to come up with and apply some sort of framework to it. At which point we just end up with a bunch of hacky bullshit, where you just take the noise and draw something in it and then say that this was somehow a natural occurrence, so you'd also need more rigorous standards for what conclusions we're actually able to draw from the noise.
Then, even if you were able to do that, you'd still have no real way of distinguishing, say, one set of noise from another set of noise, to compare the two and draw a conclusion, because we're just playing with like, one set of data, in a vacuum, compared to another set of data drawn from a vacuum, and there's too many variables which might effect one outcome compared to another. So you'd probably need to be gathering pretty rigorous data over the course of many years before you'd be able to draw a real conclusion. Even then, the data might not be good enough, I dunno if you'd have enough information.
I'd maybe lean more into neuroscience to try and cut out some of the external noise, some of the factors that might fuck your shit up, but then that's also not quite a good method because it doesn't really cut out the external noise so much as ignore it, and you can still end up finding FMRI signals in a dead fish.
So, I dunno, probably I'd just use science for maths and astronomy and physics, stuff like that, and then otherwise I'd dismiss it, in looking for philosophies and methods with which to live my life or shape my being around. Or, you know, try to take it as it comes, and not really accept claims at face value. I've tried mindfulness, and I've found it wanting, because it just caused me to dissociate whenever I encountered an outcome I didn't really like, and then instead of responding to things naturally, and flying by instinct, it causes me to kind of be like, the guy who smokes weed and then becomes hyper-aware of everything they're doing but then their actual behavior devolves into nonsense.
Then, when I got farther than that, and I started to observe that behavior in the abstract, then it just sort of struck me as like, none of this realistically gives you a particular value judgement, right. It's fine enough to just say, like, ah, well, think about it more, evaluate your life more, think about the long term consequences a little more. But, that train of thought doesn't necessarily mean I'm going to be making the correct judgements, and even over a lifetime, it might very well be that I could try everything and still come to the wrong conclusions, wrong judgements, or the right conclusions and right judgements, or whatever. I could be a hyper-conscious CEO evaluating my own life totally inaccurately and still be getting by fine and dandy, and I could be a homeless guy with accurate takes but still have a shit life. It's basically nonsense, to just be like, oh, well, think about it a little bit harder, just be a little bit more conscious, because that isn't nailed down to anything in particular.
I respect your skepticism and I can see why you would mistrust the field broadly based on those figures in it. I just don't think we need to throw out the whole field because of bad actors. Someone like Jordan Peterson is widely discredited in the field.
Treatment IS important. There are REAL problems with roots in our own psychology. It is not purely psychological, but always biopsychosocial. Disregarding the psychological is not the way to treat biopsychosocial issues. In fact, it is one of the only ones we have any real agency or control over. And the more we develop psychology, the more just our understanding becomes. Think about 50 years ago when almost everything was just called "schizophrenia" and we treated people by shocking the shit out of them. That's where we'd still be if we didn't do this kind of work.
When someone comes to me writing in pain from traumatic flashbacks, or wildly out of control of their lives due to mood swings, or losing grasp on what is real or not, or paralyzed with anxiety from the rat race you're talking about, or they just plain cannot enjoy anything anymore and want to kill themselves... it is a low priority for me to discuss systemic issues with them. We can acknowledge them as a tool for alleviating shame and guilt surrounding mental disorders, and we can brainstorm ways to work around them, but expecting a suicidal client to begin marching in the streets? That is not going to be a sustainable means of making their immediate lives better. It is often more of a distraction than anything. Systemic justice and advocacy work is the kind of thing you do for no singular client in particular, and usually done in addition to the individual work.
But mental health treatment is how we help people find peace right here and now. It is how we empower people to find agency in their own lives, and help make them strong enough people to go out and support others in the longer term. It's the people who do not treat their mental health that end up devoting themselves to bizarre causes. I mean, think about how many Q anon supporters have addictive or psychotic tendencies.
If you acknowledge that there are real mental disorders (with both internal and external etiology), and you acknowledge that treating the individual can be a positive step towards addressing systemic issues, then the question becomes what kind of treatment should we use? That's where the scientific method comes in too. Yes there will always be problems and questions, but we do what we can with what we have.
I have seen people make real progress and really turn their lives around. That includes the masturbaters too lol, who do come through from time to time. I don't care if there are swindlers out there - as long as there are real people who are really helping others. Helping people figure out what is truly important to them can help them find strength to endure the shit they cannot change. Helping people build tolerance for and even appreciation for pain can help them make decisions that give their lives greater meaning. It helps people free themselves from the grasp of addiction and start giving back to others. It helps people find reasons to live. It is doing an immediate, person-to-person good. I don't know what kind of world you dream of, but I hope it is one with room for that kind of justice.
Thank you for your thoughts on all this!
Jerking it is fine, but just like any coping mechanism, you can abuse it and get addicted to it, then it becomes a problem.
If you're doomscrolling porn, for example, then maybe it is having a negative effect on you.
Boobscrolling. Poonscrolling? Goonscrolling!
Goonscrolling is a crazy word for it, and is now what i will be using from now on lmao
Coomscrolling
Goonscrolling
Ejaculation lower the risk of prostate cancer, so masturbation should probably be medically advised to all men.
4-7 times a week is a good number according this study
Oh... there's an upper limit? Is 4 times a day not healthy then?
At least 4-7 times a week. I have not read anything about an upper limit so go for it.
Im going to live for ever!
My guess would be the benefit plateaus at that point.
There is the factor of diminishing returns.
There's an overflow and it helps others
Username checks out
7 times a week ??? honey thats an addiction...
I beat my addiction 7 times a week!
your weak i beat my addiction 14 times a week
Amateurs. I beat mine 14 weeks per day.
Pfft! 21 weeks per meat! 🍖
Could I help you beat your addiction? It helps me beat my addiction afterwards.
How do ya figure?
Because you enjoy it. If you're fixing your issues, it must be through pain and suffering. If it doesn't involve pain and suffering, then it isn't fixing your issues. The "Protestant work ethic" doesn't come right out and say that, but it's the implication.
See also: denial of LSD and psilocybin for mental health purposes.
For the seminal analysis of this topics, there's Max Weber's book “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism”. But it is really dry reading, so I would suggest finding some YouTube essay video that summarizes it.
Seminal. Heehee
What if I want a hot girl to cause me pain and suffering?
Death by snu snu!
Then it's the other way around obviously for more pain and suffering.
You can get a prescription for paid sex in the Netherlands if certain conditions apply, and other EU countries are exploring the option.
I don't know how hot she'd be though.
(Sing along with me)
Every sperm is sacred
Every sperm is good
Every sperm is wanted
In your neighborhood
Remind me to never walk barefoot in your neighborhood.
You shouldn't do that anyway.
If you bring a black light at night, it looks like the surface of the moon in direct sunlight
This mofo walks barefoot on the streets.
Not everyone grows up in places where that is looked down upon.
ewwwwwww tho
I don’t even walk barefoot in my house. I used to, but then I got a bunch of cats.
Outside though?! Absolutely not! I have different PANTS I wear when I go outside.
That last line made me change to Ray Parker Jr style funk.
"Bustin' makes me feel good!"
Puritanism bullshit.
nooo the muffins 😭😭😭
how could you encrypt them 🥲
So only I can eat them. Mwahahaha!
noooo 😭
I actually asked my family doctor at one point about the health effects of masturbation. She said that as a guy, if you are not otherwise sexually active, it's good for the prostate to keep the plumbing working down there.
Religion, capitalism. Powerful groups want more people to have more children.
Luckily I'm in a progressive enough country that even in school we were taught that masturbation is a thing and not necessarily bad.
As for negative effects - if you do it TOO much, particularly with a very strong grip, then don't be surprised if, when having actual intercourse, you're just not feeling much and might be unable to reach orgasm. You might even be uninterested in your partner sexually. A few days without masturbation will fix it though, doesn't seem to be permanent. Day 2 without doing it and I couldn't keep my eyes (or hands) off my wife's body.
Sex was very infrequent for me and my wife in the last few months of her pregnancy, so that's how I know. Soon as we started doing it on a somewhat regular basis again, I opted to quit jerking it because I wanted to enjoy the real thing more, even if it's not every single day. No long-term negative effects that I've noticed.
Capitalism is powered by fapping, the fuck are you talking about?
A lot of the power users in this thread have clearly never heard of "sex sells".
::: spoiler Title Also non-zero chance some of these guys might have an association with Mindgeek. Just a hunch, given how easy reddit like sites are to manipulate. :::
It's powered by there being enough of us wage slaves, which requires us to procreate, which is why red states in the US ban sex education, abortion, etc.
Of course, other capitalists have realized they can show ads on porn
Stop smoking what you're smoking.
A lot of religion has been to push a heterosexual couple together for the means of procreation. Masturbation has been seen as a way for people to lessen their urge to procreate in the appropriate canonical manner.
These days mutual masterbation is better for your relationship than having kids. It's not the kids fault, society has made having kids a nightmare.
And of course the reason it is demonized is that any powerfull organization/society needs peoples shoulder to stand on. So, the more people, the more power. And they don't really care if it was by rape due to sexual frustration, they just need more people to take advantage of.
Because easy dopamine hits are also easy to gain unhealthy addictions to. Because it's literally right there, easily accessible, at all times.
Couple this with how incredibly unhealthy the social relationships portrayed in most pornography are, and you're gearing up for a lot of young men addicted to wanking and having unrealistic expectations of sex. The porn young women read isn't necessarily much better, in the regard of healthy social sexual relationships.
Now, I'm not one of those weird "you shouldn't jerk it at all" folks because that's just extremism in the other direction.
Temperance and moderation are key in all things.
Porn “addiction” is a misnomer because it doesn’t have much in common with drug addiction, gambling addiction, etc. Porn “addicts”, when you show them images of porn, do not have brain responses like those of addicts who are shown images of whatever they’re addicted to.
But what is a great predictor for whether or not someone will self report being a porn addict is shame. Gay men in particular are significantly more likely than straight men in general to say they’re addicted to porn. So are straight men with a heavily religious background.
Which isn’t to say that people who report porn addictions aren’t really suffering, it’s just not the same as an actual addiction and is instead the result of living in a culture telling you that your normal sexual desires are wrong.
I actually agree. What's addicting is the hit of dopamine from sexual release, not the porn itself. I see porn as more like how people who quit smoking often still find something to fiddle with in their hands and mouth. Biting on pencils, straws, etc. because part of their ritual of using the substance involved taking out a cigarette and putting it up to their mouth. The act of viewing porn itself isn't the addiction, but it's associated with it.
Like I said, moderation is key, because there's a wide difference between masturbating a healthy amount and filling various cumjugs with figurines in them. Like if you can go out and live a normal life after jerking it, awesome, fuck yeah, that's great. If you can't make it through a workday without going to the bathroom to crank it, maybe you've got a fucking problem. I shouldn't have to deal with some fucking weirdo breathing heavily and shaking the whole stall next to me in the bathroom because they can't wait until they get home.
The porn is rather a social knock-on effect because people often seek out porn to make the pathway to dopamine release easier. The seeking of the orgasm has almost nothing to do with the societal implications of porn and its impact on relationships. However, the social impact is that people begin to associate unhealthy aspects of porn with a sex life and achieving orgasm in a sex life.
There are unfortunately deep layers of exploitation, unhealthy power dynamics, and control in porn that can be healthy between consenting adults who have achieved trust but some people really start digesting this porn before they're mature enough to know how to healthily navigate those issues (especially in a society that sure as fuck isn't teaching them, because of the aforementioned religious demonization of sex). This leads to further unhealthy experiences with sex, and I don't think the gay (and LGBTQ+ community as a whole for that matter) community is free from that exploitation or people being exposed to it before they've had to education to navigate it healthily either. In fact, as a minority group, I would rather think they're more likely to be exploited by the same people who hate their very existence... which further ingrains and exacerbates the very problems I'm speaking to, because the exploitation aspect of pornography is normalized. The areas that consume the most LGBT themed porn tend to be the most religiously restricted, and their viewpoint of that porn is almost 100% exploitative. To me it's a hard sell that that's not somehow a net negative for the LGBT community and that they're mostly being exploited in pornograhy and in sex work by the very people who want to demonize their very existence.
The feeling of chasing that high, which scientists can show physical evidence of through brain imaging, isn’t present in people who self report porn addiction. What they’re calling addiction is frequently just enjoying masturbation, which they feel shame about, and that any amount is too much. If what people are self reporting as porn addiction neurologically doesn’t behave as an addiction, then therapies for addiction are not going to be evidence based treatments.
The people you’re talking about with cum jars often don’t even see their behavior as a problem, much less labeling themselves addicts. The overlap of the circles of people who masturbate in public and those that call themselves porn addicts is near zero. Calling all of that porn addiction is basically lumping all problematic sexual behavior together with people who think they’re part of that group because they look at porn and masturbate.
The professionals that treat porn addiction are also for the most part members of religious organizations that promote religious based solutions, which also doesn’t really offer much evidence against the idea that porn “addiction” is religious based shame.
The porn industry itself being exploitative of the workers is a completely different conversation than someone being “addicted” to porn.
I get that anyone who says they have a porn addiction isn’t having a good time. But we can’t ignore that there is a huge industry of religious quackery that is more than happy to take your money and tell you that you’re oh so sick, just as your shame and guilt tell you.
I want you to go back and re-read both of my posts and tell me where I said the words "porn addiction" or alluded to porn being the addiction. I'm trying to work with you here buddy, but you've decided that I'm saying something I haven't said, after I took the time to clearly explain as much.
I literally am not talking about porn addiction nor have I used the words porn addiction, so can you take your crusade elsewhere, please and thank you.
Literally what I am talking about and why I didn't use the term porn addiction.
I’m sorry, I guess I don’t understand why you’re talking about addictions and how that relates to dopamine in your first comment if you’re not talking about porn addiction. I’m not using quotes around porn addiction to directly quote you, I’m using them because I don’t believe porn addiction is a real thing.
Dude, we're literally talking about how orgasms release dopamine. What the fuck are you smoking? I'm literally talking about the orgasm itself!
Fucking reading comprehension is dead.
If your problem is specifically me using the word porn when you’re talking about masturbation more generally, with or without porn, does it help to add the context that “porn addiction” is used interchangeably by these groups with “masturbation addiction”? I’m not really sure where this is breaking down.
What it seems you're describing is how nymphomania manifests in people without a partner. Nymphomania and porn addiction are two different things. Likewise I don't think nymphomania necessarily has the same underlying causes as say a drug addiction, it might be something like a hormonal issue. Hard to know without doing more research.
I, we all rather, are "addicted" to air, water, food, shelter, safety, rest, etc. - which as you say isn't the same as a true "addiction" at all. Wanting things that produce a healthy life is not a bad thing, and in fact quite the opposite. To the extent that religion or culture or whatever encourages the opposite (rather than e.g. moderation and consideration, like mindfulness), it is wrong and bad. Even for someone who believes in a God who is good, those false beliefs need to be cast aside, bc they hinder us from living well. I wish I had discovered this earlier in life.:-D
I don't really get this honestly. When people watch The Flash, they know that it's unrealistic for someone to move at that speed. When people read sci-fi, they know it's unrealistic to expect every problem to be solved by science in their lifetime. When people watch the show Superstore, they don't expect it to actually be a realistic representation on how a big box store runs. So I don't see why porn would be any different. They're all acting.
Probably to sell more Corn Flakes.
You realize things aren't viewed the same all over the world right? Here in Sweden it's nothing bad or wrong, we generally have good sex education and parents that are fine with it as long as we keep it private and clean. And as adults it's completely normal, not that uncommon to talk about either. There was a monthly magazine for teens when I grew up that talked a lot about sex, sexual identity and stuff like that and the readers could send it questions to get answered by professionals or other readers. Very open and helped so many with things they didn't dare ask parents or others about and it was always a better source than the Internet when that came around. Pretty sure it's still a thing too.
So it's just seen as a thing everyone does and enjoys.
There should be rules about having jerk off rooms at work. Its a human right like praying rooms!
Edit: /s
called a toilet
You pray while shitting?
shitting is the prayer!
Erm... Well, I consider myself to be tolerant of other people's practices, so you do you.
I think neither should exist.
Sorry - this was a joke
My bad!
Religion that's why. They have to control you.
because suffering is fetishized
Tbh, I've tried it. It was pleasant.
We should create a community about that, so we can tell the world how great it was.
I personally just did it it and it was great guys, hope you like hearing about it
I imagine it's similar to marihuana.
If people find out there's an easy, relaxed life, they don't work so hard, hurting corporate profits.
I think the simpler answer is, you are so right, it barely has to be valorized. It sells itself.
I think the long answer is that porn addiction is a real thing that can affect people. Also lots of people in charge of things like sex education have historically been prudes who see masturbation as some sort of gateway to promiscuity.
Orgasms are normal, healthy and necessary.
Porn addition is a myth. Stop perpetuating it.
I mean addiction colloquially. The existence and over use of porn does cause some people and their relationship some level of affects. I don't think we can just hand wave it all away.
Research seems to suggest otherwise: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/women-who-stray/201808/science-stopped-believing-in-porn-addiction-you-should-too
You are preaching to the choir here. Yes I can believe porn addiction only exists in the kinds of the those in the religious community. I'm still trying to provide a larger picture to answer the question of why the government doesn't tell you to masturbate every day.
Porn, for some people in contexts, has had drawbacks. Those people, in some contexts, have curtailed the valorization of porn writ large. Maybe this campaign has biased me to a degree as well.
I have never been to a Sex Addicts Anonymous meeting but I'm not about to write the whole idea off entirely.
Yes, yes, no.
While orgasms are normal and can potentially have some physical and mental benefits, there is no physical or mental necessity to have them (plenty of asexual and otherwise celibate people of all different kinds out there to prove it).
I don't agree, in the experience of my friend circle, if you don't release for a while:
this is not a problem which normal people face. if you are constantly thinking about sex, you may have an addiction or an otherwise unhealthy relationship with sex
Hey don't shame ppl for normal variance in sex drive. Being horny is not a disease
Well done, you've provided some anecdotal effects and benefits, which I didn't deny exist.
However none of them demonstrate necessity.
Breathing, sleeping, drinking, eating, shitting - those are necessities.
Having orgasms is not, no matter how much you try to convince yourself and others.
Sure you don't "have to" bathe but you'll have a bad time if you don't
People also demonize sodomy, but it's been proven that semen in your colon can help fight depression.
Practice safe sex, kids.
Is that causation or correlation?
Not sure... 🤔
I just remember reading an article about it years ago and even then I was like "Is it the semen, or just the fact they had sex?" lol
Same reason we practice forced male genital mutilation in the United States, religion (abrahamic) says pleasure is bad.
What has circumcision to do with sexual pleasure? Please do explain. I'm circumcised and I have no loss of sensation from not having foreskin. I also don't have a moist area for bacteria to multiply
Where you circumcized after you became sexually active?
If not, how would you know there is no loss?
Same with all of you. None of you would know the difference.
There are people that were circumcized after becoming sexually active who can (and do) report exactly that.
Separately, we can simply ask people that have foreskins to describe the sensations they feel from that body part.
The only part that we can't say with confidence is how the neutral pathways develop (i.e. how we perceive the sensations) when it's the only way we've ever experienced.
If only you could wash yourself.
About the multiplication of bacteria in a moist area, how do you handle that in your mouth ? Surgery or personal hygiene?
My hands are soft enough, thank you.
Lube is for when it starts smoking, to put out the fire.
if you need lube to tickle the gherkin you're either the victim of genital mutilation (circumcision, which is fucked up that it's normalized in the US) or your technique terrifies me.
Surprisingly, our bodies have evolved to make stuff like this perfectly doable without assistence, it even helpfully dispenses some lube if you REALLY get into it!
Yeah, not for everyone.
Because they are fools, brother. They fear what we could become if we were free to train out techniques to their maximum without societal judgment
Often times it's about control over people. Whether it's religion or capatilism sense it's something you can do yourself for free that gives you pleasure. Capatilism can't force you to pay for enjoying yourself and religion doesn't want you to do things that they don't control
For fuck sakes. Not everything has to do with capitalism. Puritanical belief exists long before capitalism, communism or whatever economic system you want to paint as the boogyman. And it will exist long after.
Yeah I don't think there it some capitalist conspiracy trying to stop people from masturbating. Kellogg is long dead
I'd be surprised if that's true. Do we have any data on this or is this just "seems to make sense" stuff.
There are anecdotal reports of antisocial behavior, erectile dysfunction, etc in many small communities. I think yourbrainonporn.com is a good primer and rebootnation is a forum with people trying and failing to stop masterbating even to their own detriment. Make your own decision though.
Sounds like some totally science-based and non-biased sources. I also recommend masturbationwillkillyourdog.com
Citation needed. I know you're trying to be funny, but there's actually a lot of evidence going back to 2012 that internet pornography addiction is an actual issue for many people.
Watching pornographic pictures on the Internet: role of sexual arousal ratings and psychological-psychiatric symptoms for using Internet sex sites excessively - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21117979/
Pornographic picture processing interferes with working memory performance - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23167900/
Neural and behavioral correlates of sexual stimuli anticipation point to addiction-like mechanisms in compulsive sexual behavior disorder - https://akjournals.com/view/journals/2006/11/2/article-p520.xml#B12
Your ideas are intriguing to me, and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
Yep the best way to start a new moral panic is by recycling tired tropes from an older one (drug / weed panic of the 80s-90s).
Ooff
It's like the video we were all shown in school about dating robots
What about this video?
Hey guys he hasn't seen the video!
You can die of a heart attack if you overdo it.
Easy dopamine isn't a good thing. Dopamine is finite but renewable, so if you run through all your dopamine on easy hits your going to end up having motivational issues.
And if your constantly chasing short term Dopamine hits your brain is going to adjust to seek behavours that give instant gratification over somthing that's just as rewarding, more productive for your personal or professional life, but takes longer to get that dopamine.
By all means deal with your libido in anyway that doesn't hurt the people around you, but maybe retiring the wankers cramp for a bit might do you good once in a while.
That sounds very scientific, do you have some sources like peer reviewed and reproducable studies from credible universities?
I was going mostly off how I've delt with addictive behavours in my life and how casualised therapists like Healthy Gamer explain how dopamine works.
It's also worth noting that this user also posted about lacking motivation to even play video games at this point, which if they're using masterbation as an easy dopamine crutch it could explain where there motivation to do anything else is going.
But yeah, I didn't prepare academic level citations for my lemmy post I made during a lull at work.
The most relevant to this discussion would be around "porn-induced erectile dysfunction". If you Google that phrase, you will find lots of studies and results.
So you're making shit up, gotcha
EDIT : "Google it lol" isn't a citation. It's right up there with "it came to me in a dream"
That's an entirely different problem to the issues with dopamine the other guy is talking about.
While I agree that it's not exactly the same, there is a lot of overlap. It's also more complicated than the OP presented.
Since everyone here is refusing to do even a basic search, here is one on the first page of Google results.
The word dopamine appears 54 times in this article, and overall seems to agree with the OP.
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5039517/
This is simply wrong. Laughably wrong.
It's more valorized than you think. There are places on the internet that are very social and masturbatory. Check out bateworld. If you're single and are a male looking for a male, be prepared to be disappointed chatting with hetero males that are married that get off on jerking off with other men behind their wives' backs. That's pretty much a major sector of the population on bateworld. I'm kinda gay, but I surmise that the hetero world and marriage makes the sex for the hetero males kind of boring. I can't say why, I'm trying to figure it out. A survey, if you will. Basically, I predict that the end result to my survey will be: men really like their dicks because major dopamine. Men get bored with their wives because whatever reasons I don't know about. Men like their own dicks and somehow society has taught them to like their dicks so much, to the point that they often send dick pics via SMS or Whatsapp. So then they start liking other dicks? Explain to me, the gay man, why hetero men enjoy seeing x-rated pornography where the dick is larger than the hole that it is penetrating. Is it connected to the dopamine? Anyway, bateworld seems to prove that men migrate towards jerking off as a dopamine hit and men in particular are very interested in socializing with other men in need of the dopamine hit, all the while getting off on the taboo against masturbation. Me, being kinda old, I remember the good old days when you went out drinking with high hopes of having your penis touched by another person, if only briefly. 2024 is a new world, in which men are seriously confused about dicks and dopamine.
I think this is a case of "The internet can take the niche 120 people out of the 8 billion on Earth and make them seem like they're normal and everyone is like them". Loud voice, itty bitty percentage of the population. If you go to "car-fuckers.com" you'll leave thinking 4 out of 10 men have sex with their car and that's why shows like Top Gear/Grand Tour are popular lol
Thank goodness.
I think you want to be right, but you should probably prove yourself right by signing up for a bateworld account and see for yourself. You're probably meaning well, being a happily married, hetero male, and don't want to believe that some of the hetero males you wave to as you drive past them, some of your cousins, or even your favorite co-worker with a wife and five kids, are probably on that web site jerking off to it. *edit: also, the web site has been making money for over 20 years. It's always been chock full of married straight males.
Why do you sound like an ad written by a chat bot?
Some people are bi+ and just aren't out yet or don't even know exactly what they are. And that's fine. I also believe it's probably a pretty small percentage of the population. Fwiw, you can be in a differing sex relationship and still be somewhat curious about the other side of the coin. I think the worst thing people can do is be ashamed of it, then hide it at all costs where it manifests as this sort of website. Instead of having conversations among friends and spouses and more healthy methods of exploring one's sexuality, such as going to pride events and making diverse, enriching friendships.
some people aren't, and they like the taboo feel. really, don't try to educate me. I know all about it. Try, instead, to be less blah. We're not talking about "some people" we're talking about men who are really into their penises. Your public service announcement, while making me yawn, also makes me think that you're really not paying attention to what I'm talking about at all! These people I'm talking about are not gay, or questioning, or curious, or obsessed over their sexual orientations. They're heterosexual. Heterosexual men enjoy their own penises. Your "intervention" is kind of stupid and uncalled for here. I'll gladly talk to you about gay rights or whatever, but this is not the place. Biologically, I'm explaining, being a man and having a penis, you basically have an easy target to get some dopamine. We are formed this way. More women might like to chime in on this conversation. Are they getting easy dopamine hits off their clits? Were they raised to do this by their parents? No. Women are still subjected to shaming for sexual pleasure. Men, on the other hand, are encouraged to be aware of their pleasure organs. I really wish I could delete your bullshit comment. It has nothing to do with what I'm talking about.
This is the most obvious "blackmailing bi-curious men" scheme I've ever read. Just say it Omeggle with consenting adults.
Because stroking the bratwurst can be addictive and lead to destructive behaviours.
Neurotypicals look down on easy dopamine hits.
I think people believe that onani leads to looking at p0rn, which is inherently exploitative to those involved (men and women) and a foul industry. Likewise, it can produce exaggerated sexual fantasies that are unhealthy and can create predatory relationships.
It's hard to imagine jerking without explicit content, and once you have gone from Swimsuit edition to Softcore, it's hard to go back... From softcore to hardcore, it's hard to go back... From niche hardcore to regular, boring hardcore... It's hard to go back...
And it leads to becoming a person who does this frequently... And then, what if you want a family? Do you really want to be taht guy who is looking at crazy stuff and rubbing one out while your infant daughter is sleeping 30 feet away in her room? Do you want to be the guy whose wife is out of action from giving birth and you are like "Oh, OK, I will just look at explicit hardcore content and content myself..."
It's a bad habit.
It also creates crazy expectations of others which may even lead to so desiring some novel experience that you have an affair or "open" your marriage.
Literally good for you, eh?
Masturbate right before gym, then go train. Note how your performance was. Especially if its a squat or a deadlift day.
Note down what time you went to sleep, when you woke up, and every meal you ate (all calories, including macros).
Now refrain from masturbation from that day until the next session you have of the same exercise, make sure you go to sleep within the same time the night before, wake the same time the day of training, and eat the same exact meals, go train the same exact exercise, same sets, reps, and weight. Note your performance.
yeah yeah down vote me.
This is pretty incel-ish. Here’s an article linking several studies which contradict your anecdotal suggestions. But you keep not fucking, I’ll cover for you!
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/325881
Positive results on a quasi-scientific self-experiment is not a good way to gain knowledge. At best it is how you specifically react to the variables introduced; however, it seems that you only performed this self-experiment on two separate occasions or perhaps only when you planned to go to the gym. Although your attempt to limit confounding variables is commendable, it is not enough to reach a conclusion. To definitely find the truth on the matter, many more participants must be enrolled and the experiment should last for at least three weeks, but hopefully much longer so as to definitely reduce any confounding variables that will influence the results. Some of the better studies regarding physical performance were running for around six months just for this reason.
Specifically regarding your self-experiment, if it was indeed performed as one session vs. one other session, there could be any number of confounding variables that could have effected your performance other then masturbation. Did you keep a sleep journal during the experiment (recording night mood, morning mood, amount of sleep)? Did you consume alcoholic beverages in the seven days leading up to the session? What was your specific workout routine?
In my opinion you should continue this experiment, but record more data for longer amounts of time; say six months of abstention, and six months of regular masturbation. Of course, this produces it's own confounding variables because it could very well be that the result you get has nothing to do with whether or not you masturbated, but rather the gains you made during the first trial period. Which is why to be able to tell people what is truth and what is incorrect, more participants must be recruited to validate the results; otherwise, it will only ever be (again) at best (i.e. confounding variables properly accounted for to the best of your ability), how you specifically react to abstention.
With only a single event, it could be something as boring as what music you listened to during a workout. That can actually have a pretty strong influence, where maturation at best has a small influence, if any. If that weren't the case, the Olympics wouldn't be full of athletes fucking, because releasing their sperm somehow has a negative effect on performance. (If you believe it's only masturbation, not sex, I'm going to need you to consider what mechanism could possibly effect this, because I can't think of any.)
I don't notice much of a difference personally and I have several years of consistent workout logs to go off.
Nobody tells this guy when to cum!
And I mean nobody!
I'm actually curious on this one, I don't have gym equipment or membership, is there something else I can do to compare performance if I were to masturbate vs if I didn't?
It's all old coaches tales. Olympic athletes not only masturbate but actively fuck each other senseless during the Olympics and you don't see any effect on their performance in the slightest. If you are such a wimp that busting a nut makes you lose your breath sooner when jogging, then you have different medical problems. Cardiac atrophy for example. Masturbating barely even burns calories to begin with.
But to be entirely fair to the guy's point:
Lots of top athletes have superstitions about abstaining from intercourse prior to events - some are very extreme, with fighters isolating themselves from their spouses and training for months without any release before their MMA fight/boxing match. Some say they do it for, say, just a week ahead of time, etc.
There are a few who have the opposite philosophy and claim to actually do it more in the week leading up to the fight.
It's really a massive point of contention because some people claim it is a mere superstition while others absolutely will not break their routine.
There is also the famous incident where Bobby Fisher says that he performed poorly at a tournament because he had sex after the first night and the experience totally removed him from his focus...
This might be why it impacts fighters and certain people whose lifting styles are really about maximized performance and not a routine... If concentration is interrupted, it can result in very poor output. Like I can see how someone who is very intense about what they are doing and requires total focus would be interrupted by any form of sexual distraction. This is probably very, very relevant to guys who are fighters...
This might also have to do with perspectives on sexuality - people who ascribe a lot of meaning to it versus those who do not...
Lots of stuff to consider, I think.
That's a problem with attitudes about sex and lack of impulse control during competition. The same could be said about doing your taxes before a tournament. It can take your focus, but it is not the taxes fault. It's your lack of impulse control to keep your mind focused on the competition. Bad coaches ignore that there is a strong psychological component to training. But it has nothing to do with the sexual nature of the stimulus, just what you do with it and what is the attitude towards it.
Still, absolutely nothing to do with any physiological element of performance. Jerking one off the night before is not going to knock off anything, much less weight in your lifting personal record, for instance.
I actually think there's an argument to be made that a lot of top tier athletes are never doing things like their taxes prior to a big match. It's just really anticlimactic to say "My spouse/manager/dad does all my paperwork and handles my finances before a fight" than to say "I isolate myslf from my spouse and don't have any orgasms before a fight."
I also think that they would make the argument that they have plenty of impulse control and focus, it's just a matter of the extent to which one has it.
It's one thing to be a man who does not look at p0rn or masturb8 and only sleeps with his wife and another thing to be a monk.
Interestingly if I refrain from ejaculation, the longer I go, the more aggressive my performance is. I was in the camp that it was all BS. This was in my late teens and early 20s. I decided to test this claim after a gym owner/coach/professional bodybuilder gave me his thoughts on his personal journey into gym training, explaining that he would not ejaculate 1 week prior to a set of specific exercises he had planned to PR (hit a new personal record).
I've gone so far from refraining to ejaculate (about 6 weeks) that I would literally urinate a mixture of urine and ejaculate - without the orgasm. Reaching this far into refraining, my aggression and focus was noticeable. More interestingly and may have been coincidental, but refraining from ejaculation even eliminated joint pain I had in my elbows from heavy bench and overhead pressing. I'm including this because apparently there's people who have arthritis (of some sort) and after ejaculation, their arthritis flares up immediately after.
I personally don't care if people want to call it a myth, but if you're an athlete, you compete, or simply take weight training seriously, you should maybe test out said myth for yourself.
I joked with my wife that I couldn't break a 685lbs deadlift, I hit a plateau there - 4 times in a row (4 different sessions) until I decided to refrain from sex for 10 days leading up to my next deadlift session where I was able to smoothly pull a 690, so smooth I debated to go after the 700 (my next milestone) but decided to save it for another time.
That is amazing - really good stuff. I will add that to my anecdotes on this topic.
Ignore a rando on the Internet?
You could do bodyweight stuff. Pushups, pullups, squats, core work, etc.
The risk of becoming a dopamine addict.
Your dick gets more and more insensitive. Some day you cannot get off inside a woman anymore, because you need such a strong level of friction that only a hand can create.
Is that actually true? I suspect not.
Most people start "enjoying their own company" years before getting to try for real.
If there was a question of insensitivity, then surely problems would be much more prevalent at ages when people are enjoying themselves more frequently. But it's not the case at all.
It's also at an age when your libido is essentially unlimited. Were the opportunity to present itself, these people could adequately perform for 15 different partners in a row.
Desensitization takes time. By the time it sets in, most people are past the age of unlimited libido. There are also different forms of sensitivity (and thus, desensitization). OP referred to physical, but mental seems to be a more common issue.
That second one sounds more like an endurance cheat code than anything else
Thinking about it, being circumcised probably reduces sensitivity a lot more than cranking the hog on the regular.
LOL
But you may want to think twice:
Endurance by reduced sensory input could also mean reduced pleasure.
Endurance by enhanced self control is what you really want, because then you can get more pleasure overall. It comes with age and practising (the real one).
I dunno man, the bitches sure seem to get a kick out of it either way!
The second one really depends on how you masturbate. Death grip is a bad thing if you want to also get off during sex.
It's also like saying that eating too much makes you not hungry, no shit einstein
if anything i'd posit that cranking the hog makes you more sensitive, because you'll be so used to it that abstaining for a week is almost unbearable, much like how most people in developed countries feel a pit in their stomach if they don't eat for half a day.
Well I'm not this guy so I think I'll be just fine
Wait until you hear about sugar if you think dopamine hits are bad lol. Also number 2 is just made up.
Christianity and Feminism.
Most of the different waves of feminisms are actually quite vocal about masturbation being a positive thing regardless of gender.
Feminists infamously had a moral panic about pornography in the 1970's as adult theaters and the nascent home video porno market started to take off.
They predicted porn would condition men to expect sex on demand and sexual assault rates would skyrocket when in fact the opposite happened.
You see this same moral panic from feminists regarding AI girlfriends and you there's a rising fundamentalist strain of feminism that still says porn is dangerous.
Reminds me of "computer games turns teenagers into killer machines" saying.
I think you're right about the porn thing, but that isn't masturbation
The current 3rd/4th wave feminism finds male sexual pleasure very abhorrent. If you can find anything in the mainstream discourse coming from a feminist that says otherwise please share.
Feminists can't even agree to be against circumcision which is clearly genital mutilation.
Thats just not true my dude, there is nothing about feminist thought that says that male pleasure is abhorrent. To think so shows a lack of understanding of feminism...
Feminism suffers from being very broad. There are a lot of conflict viewpoints living under the umbrella of feminism and people saying that their interpretation is the correct one. And there ate a bunch of waves of feminism too, each one a bit different.
So there are absolutely feminists who are anti male. They may be a loud fringe minority, but they're there.
Bah dum tiss 🥁
I won't disagree that there are definitely anti-men feminists, but there have also been anti-bi feminists, and currently there are anti-trans feminists. But none of them are worth discussing when talking about feminism as a whole because they really don't apply. Those are ideologies that should be tackled independently, and should not be considered representative of the movement in general.
But I'm talking about mainstream feminism in the public discourse right now. Think the "Barbie" movie. Male sexuality is very clearly depicted a inherently dangerous which is core mainstream feminist belief.
Did you actually watch the movie or just regurgitating a viewpoint someone else claimed the movie was about.
I haven't seen the movie. How does it depict make sexuality as inherently dangerous?
Not to mention Ken's attraction to Barbie nearly destroys Barbie land and is revealed to based on selfish social climbing and his broken psychology.
Barbie is immediately sexually harassed several times upon first interacting with human men.
Also see "Wonder Woman '84" for more examples which was directed by a feminists with explicitly feminists ideology.
Okay, post some mainstream feminist discourse that says otherwise. Highly influential feminists like Dworkin go as far as saying that any sexual intercourse with men is sexual assault.
"She is often said to argue that "all heterosexual sex is rape", based on the line from the book that says, "Violation is a synonym for intercourse." However, Dworkin has denied this interpretation, stating, "What I think is that sex must not put women in a subordinate position. It must be reciprocal and not an act of aggression from a man looking only to satisfy himself. That's my point."[1]"
Second paragraph on wikipedia...
But she posits that patriarchy is all encompassing and subordinates all women. Even the feminist that wrote the forward said that's what she meant.
Numerous feminists have said they interpreted that way. It's hard to take her denial seriously given the context of her book and the rest of her writings.
"She didn't actually say what she said in the book. Or what she said in multiple interviews. She really said whatever dumb strawman I want to make up."
First, Dworkin has never said that and did not think that.
Second, she died almost twenty years ago my dude. Intercourse was published in '87 during the second wave of feminism. Why are you misquoting her as an example of current mainstream discourse? And even if we're going to be talking about feminist views of the 80's, you're conveniently ignoring sex-positive feminism. The sex wars were like, the defining feminist debate of that era.
She did in fact say that and your link doesn't refute that. And sex positive feminism is not sex positive for men. As I've said many times before I'm talking about mainstream feminist discourse. Feminist always use this tactic of digging up some progressive strain of feminism knowing full well it's not influential.
Dworkin may have died awhile ago but her work is still regularly cites and studies by mainstream feminism and her influence can be seen in movies like the Barbie movie.
http://www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/dworkin/MoorcockInterview.html
Come now. She very clearly denies saying it in the interview I linked to:
If you want to claim she's lying about her own statements, find me a direct quote of her saying it.
This is exactly my point. This is a harsh misunderstanding at what she was getting at...
She is saying that the reality of sex for the vast majority of history has been about men dominating women, not interested in satisfying the women involved, but someone already covered that point.
Got caught beating it at work, eh?
I don't find downplaying the gentital mutation of innocent babies funny. I'm not sure why feminists do.
Downplaying the nonsense that you tried to make more palatable by putting it next to actual issues and hoping you could use it to misdirect when you got called out, while also pointing out your completely untrue claims betray that you got justly called out for some IRL bad behavior and want to blame feminists for creating a social norm where that behavior is no longer tolerated.
Christianity I can understand, but would you mind explaining why you think feminism demonizes masturbation?
I believe feminism has an issue with how women are portrayed in pornography and how that can influence men's views and expectations of women.
Feminism demonizes male sexuality.
See, that’s really interesting to me! The mainstream feminist spaces I’ve interacted with have been very sex-positive, so I’m curious how you’ve experienced this demonization.
Okay provide some links to these mainstream feminist circles that celebrate male sexuality and or are sex positive about men having sex. I'm genuinely interested.
Here’s exactly what you want: a feminist forum that’s specifically for discussing men’s issues (including sexuality) in a constructive and healthy manner.
https://www.reddit.com/r/MensLib/
For anyone on Lemmy interested in these issues there's also a ![email protected].
Lol, they do not celebrate or encourage expressions of make sexuality instead they cite is all as objectifying just like garden variety feminists.
Do you think objectification is good and healthy?
Sex positive for women collectively, not for men as a whole.
That’s not an explanation you just restated the claim they asked you to elaborate on. What have you encountered that led you to this conclusion?
Yes it is, masturbation is a part of male sexuality. If you demonize male sexuality any endorsement of male sexual expression is an explicit endorsement of the harmful male sexuality.
You’ve been clear about what you think dude, we want to know why you think it.
Feminists posit that men are inherently predatory. See "toxic masculinity" debates. Influential feminists like Dworkin have even stated that any sexual intercourse with men is sexual assault.
Mainstream media, which is deeply influenced by feminism, depicts male sexuality as dangerous "any man can be a rapist" while lying by omission about female predators.
Being male is an inalienable trait and "toxic masculinity" inherently is borne from males. Things like sexual assault are "women's issues" even though studies show men are assault at near parity to women.
The list goes on, really shouldn't have spent so much time answering because it's so glaringly obvious so you're arguing in bad faith.
You’re making a lot of claims about things I don’t think you really have a grasp on. “Toxic masculinity” is not an implication that all men are inherently toxic. It’s a criticism of societal expectations for men that harm them and their relationships.
You’re saying that feminism has seriously hindered acceptance of male masturbation but all you’ve provided here is vague unsubstantiated implications of media bias and a single author’s name. I’m not going to read the entire collected works of whoever Dworkin is to figure out why you think they’re both representative of the entire feminist movement and also hate men wanking it. Give me something tangible here. A quote, a law they supported, a speech, a video, literally anything at all that isn’t just some insinuation that’s only attributable to yourself
I would consider myself a male feminist and I masturbate daily so if the movement thinks that’s wrong I’d like to know so I can stop describing myself as feminist.
Someone needs to go outside and interact with actual feminists.
Not really.
Feminism embraces openness in society, including walking your own path.
If that includes deviating from cis male sexuality, then yes, feminism does indeed allow that to happen, if it happens naturally. In other words: feminism does not force you to take part in the toxic masculinity circlejerk.
In that way, yes, feminism probably reduces the amount of "male sexuality" which is basically toxic masculinity in the world. But it does not force that change, instead, it lets it happen.
My ass. Yes, maybe some inviduals do, but feminism itself does not. Feminists only 'demonize' male sexuality when it starts turning into treating us as walking fleshlights.
I seriously doubt it causes either of those. Source?
Read the rest of this thread.
No thanks. The question was about negative effects, and you gave your response. I'd like you to explain how masturbation turns you into a Christian and/or feminist.
Nice strawman, I didn't say it turns you into a feminist. I said Christianity and feminism demonize male sexuality and that ideology is deeply influential.
You literally did say that.
Q: What are the negative effects if any of Masturbation
A: Christianity and Feminism.
Okay whatever, I already explained my position. I'm not going to repeat myself to every bad faith actor that wants to their own personalized explanation.
You interpreted a movie about respecting women and not objectifying people as anti-pleasure for men, and you call me bad faith. You're an incel who can't understand a children's movie.
How many anti-masturbation feminists do you know personally?
Here's an example of a prominant influential feminist calling all men rapists.
One major reason is that feminism, which deeply influences culture, posits that all men are rapists in the waiting. For an example here a quote from a prominent and influential feminist.
This chills any frank discussion of male sexuality because that would be implicit endorsement of sexual assault.
Ah yes, feminism, an ideology that consists solely of extremist views. I'm not even well versed in feminism and I know that Andrea Dworkin is quite extreme and is a polarizing figure.
If you have reduced feminism to the views of a single extremist than you really need to get your shit together.
It doesn't consist of all extreme views but many mainstream feminist ideology had extremists views.
You definitely sound like a person who I would trust to tell me what "mainstream feminist ideology" is.
Where did you learn about feminism? Did you study it? Have you been involved in it? Do you actually have any touchstone with it? Or, maybe, does it maybe all come from sources that want to portray it negatively, because accurately representing it may undermine your faith in them?
Some people want you to need them, and the way the do this is by creating a monster that is theoretically attacking you. You need them to defend you from it. You just have to recognize that the monster isn't real and the problems they're telling you about are actually to cover up actual issues they are creating.
You raise an excellent point that the quote from Andrea Dworkin portrays a rather extreme and controversial view that is not representative of feminism as a whole. In fact, many prominent feminists have strongly disagreed with Dworkin's perspective.
For example, Laura Tanenbaum, a respected feminist writer, has bluntly called Dworkin's views "shit." (1) Wendy McElroy, in her book XXX: A Woman's Right to Pornography, also presents a feminist case against Dworkin's anti-porn stance (2). As the esteemed feminist scholar Dr. Dale Spender has eloquently put it, "Feminism['s battles] have been for education, for the vote, for better working conditions, for safety in the streets, for child care, for social welfare, for rape crisis centres, women's refuges, reforms in the law." (3)
This demonstrates that feminism is a broad movement focused on expanding women's rights and opportunities - not demonizing male sexuality. In fact, as Amartya Sen compellingly argues in Development as Freedom, the expansion of women's capabilities is essential for the betterment of all people. When women have more voice, choice and agency, it leads to progress in areas like health, education, and poverty reduction that benefit entire communities.
So while Dworkin's quote may get attention for its shock value, I would encourage looking to the many other feminist thinkers who take a more nuanced, constructive and less male-antagonistic approach (5). Feminism is not about vilifying men and male sexuality, but rather about advancing gender equality in a way that uplifts everyone. There is room for an open, healthy dialogue about sexuality within a framework of mutual understanding and respect between women and men.
(1) Laura Tanenbaum, "The Appeal and Limits of Andrea Dworkin," Jacobin, August 5, 2019, https://jacobin.com/2019/08/andrea-dworkin-last-days-at-hot-slit-review.
(2) McElroy, Wendy. XXX: A Woman's Right to Pornography. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995.
(3) Cleal, Olivia. "Australian ‘Feminist’s Feminist’ Dr Dale Spender AM Dies Age 80." Women's Agenda, November 27, 2023. https://womensagenda.com.au/latest/australian-feminists-feminist-dr-dale-spender-am-dies-age-80/.
(4) Sen, Amartya. Development as Freedom. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999.
::: spoiler (5) In fact, many leading feminist thinkers today emphasize an inclusive, nuanced and compassionate approach aimed at liberating people of all genders from limiting stereotypes and unjust social structures. Prominent feminist authors like bell hooks have advocated for men's inclusion in the feminist movement, arguing that patriarchy harms both men and women. Scholars like Kimberle Crenshaw and Michael Kimmel examine how rigid gender norms and hierarchies contribute to issues like violence and discrimination in a holistic way, without resorting to vilifying men as a group.
So while I understand your frustration with certain feminist ideas that can come across as accusatory toward men, I would encourage you to explore the diversity of thought within modern feminism. There are many brilliant feminist advocates out there who are working to create a more just and equitable world for everyone, men included. By considering these alternative perspectives with an open mind, you might find more points of alignment than you expect.
Ultimately, I believe we all share the same goal of wanting a society where everyone is free to express themselves fully and without fear - but getting there will require good faith dialogue and a willingness to thoughtfully engage with different points of view. :::
You do know that feminism promotes female masturbation, as well as male masturbation, right? As part of sexual liberation from religious patriarchal oppression. You know, the thing for which women were accused of being witches and burned at the stakes. The thing that it was only appropriate if a doctor did it for them.
This is insane incel bullshit and you know it.
Her and Solanas both argued men have to be castrated before a feminsit transformation of sexuality can begin.
Solanas had a lot of trauma informing her opinions and was really only mainstream for being absurdly inflammatory and shooting Warhol. Also, most feminists don’t want to castrate people, and most is an understatement…
Direct quotes are "insane incel bull****"? She really said that and the theme appears in all her writings.
Yeah, still seems like insane incel bullshit to me even after I direct quoted you. Also you're allowed to swear on the Internet lol
I don't care what one person said. Feminism will go away when sexism is gone. It's not war on men, it's a fight for equality. Using a random quote from one hurt and angry person to frame feminism as something evil is missing the point and pretty incel. Using feminism as an answer to why masturbation is not socially accepted is insane, really.
did you know that women masturbate as well lol
Also this is insanely incel