The Man Who Doesn’t Masturbate and the History of Masturbation

I know this may sound like an urban myth or as if it belongs in the realm of the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus.  Honestly it is hard to believe that anyone, male or female, in the 21st century doesn’t masturbate.  It is even more unfathomable to conceive that there are men who will have sex, premarital sex at that, yet will not pleasure themselves.  Well, they do exist…apparently. I have a guy friend who does not do this human, innate act.  Sure, we all don’t really talk about it much or at least girls don’t, but usually when someone denies doing it we know it’s a lie.  I obviously do not follow my guy friend around 24/7 to monitor his self-touching level but I did see his facial expression when his girlfriend told me that he does not.  After getting over the initial embarrassment of the explicit details of his sex life being exposed to his girlfriend’s friend, he was seriously grossed out at the thought of masturbation.  So as he displayed a look of disgust, I reciprocated with a look of shock.  I did not know such men were real and I to be honest, I find it very strange.

I remember about a year or so ago getting in a debate with a group of friends as to how often men masturbate.  We all began texting our guy friends and I won in saying that it was approximately once a day.  While for women it may be a few times a week/once a week thing, for men it is often a daily occurrence much like brushing one’s teeth.  Wake up, beat off, shower, get dressed, do hair, brush teeth, spray cologne, put on shoes, and go to work.  I just cannot imagine there being a guy out there who does not incorporate self pleasuring in part of his life.  As gross as it is, it’s also natural and a hell of a lot safer than banging prostitutes or taking home different random girls from bars for wasted, unprotected sex.  I also feel as though, seeing as it is natural, how does a boy not ever try it or do it only to decide that he doesn’t like it?  If you like the feeling of hand job it shouldn’t really matter whose hand it is.  Obviously it’s preferably a hot chick but in a pinch one’s own hand should do.

So, what kind of trauma would have to happen to frighten someone away from masturbation?  In this instance I believe that trauma was religion.  Yet, how one can pick and choose what aspects of faith and what peices of the Bible he will follow (be against gay marriage) and selectively ignore those that he does not like (sex only for procreation) is beyond me.  When challenging his notions I was shot down as a liberal hedonist simply because I follow the laws of society and my own moral compass as opposed to the one dictated for me by a cult.  Yet, this is in no way a religious debate so let’s get back to the topic at hand, masturbation.

Well I decided to do some research and add some science backing to this article.  First of all, masturbation is strongly believed to have origins with early man as there were depictions of men masturbating painted on the walls of caves which date back to the cavemen era.  So, even back then men were drawing pics of penises on public property and looking at dirty pics in their homes–wow, some things never change.  Male masturbation was also an important process in ancient Egypt.  When performed by a god it could be considered a creative or magical act: the god Atum was believed to have created the universe by masturbating to ejaculation, and the ebb and flow of the Nile was attributed to the frequency of his ejaculations. Egyptian Pharaohs, in response to this, were at one time required to masturbate ceremonially into the Nile.  Wow…disgusting.  I much prefer them doing it behind closed doors with a tissue box handy.

Well, Egypt wasn’t the only ancient nationality to do it.  The ancient Indian Hindu text Kama Sutra explains in detail the best procedure to masturbate; “Churn your instrument with a lion’s pounce: sit with legs stretched out at right angles to one another, propping yourself up with two hands planted on the ground between in them, and it between your arms”.  Again, gross…”churn your instrument?”  You are beating off not making butter.  Lastly, the ancient Greeks had a more relaxed attitude toward masturbation than the Egyptians did, regarding the act as a normal and healthy substitute for other forms of sexual pleasure. They considered it a safety valve against destructive sexual frustration. The Greeks also dealt with female masturbation in both their art and writings. One common term used for it was anaphlan, which roughly translates as “up-fire”.  Ahh the good old Greeks, finally one culture to not make it totally creepy.

So that is the abridged history but what about today…how common is masturbation?  An old joke says that 98 percent of people masturbate–and the other 2 percent are lying.  A 2009 Psychology Today article reported on a study that was performed based on a representative sample of American adults which found that only 38 percent of women said they’d masturbated at all during the past year. The figure for men was 61 percent.  This was just one study however and I don’t buy it.  Of course people sitting in a room by a two way mirror are going to lie about touching themselves.  So, I looked further and found some more information including frequency data.

Wikipedia’s masturbation page (check this out in case you don’t know how to do it or you just want to see creepy pics of people doing it) states that:

Frequency of masturbation is determined by many factors, e.g., one’s resistance to sexual tension, hormone levels influencing sexual arousal, sexual habits, peer influences, health and one’s attitude to masturbation formed by culture. Medical causes have also been associated with masturbation.

Different studies have found that masturbation is frequent in humans.  Kinsey’s studies in the US in the 50’s showed that 92% of men and 62% of women have masturbated during their lifespan. Similar results were been found in a 2007 British national probability survey. It was found that, between individuals aged 16 to 44, 95% of men and 71% of women masturbated at some point in their lives. 73% of men and 37% of women reported masturbating in the four weeks before their interview, while 53% of men and 18% of women reported masturbating in the previous seven days.  Now here are some stats I buy.  I feel as though men are raised to believe it’s not only social acceptable, it’s habitual.  Women aren’t ever told to do it or that it is ok and they don’t talk about it with their girlfriends until they reach college and start talking about which vibrators work the best.  Many girls are afraid or weirded our by doing it while to men it is natural; so, these study results would substantiate that line of thinking.

Well, I know what the research says…but what about my readers?  I know this is a crazy topic and somewhat X rated compared to my usual intellectual, romantic ramblings but I am curious, how often do you masturbate or at least what are your thoughts on anything in this article?