Masturbation, Bonding and The Threat To Society

In all my study of sexuality, history and biology I've come to some conclusions which I'll (greatly) simplify for you.

Humans are different in drive from other animals. For example, we do not just breed during annual female estrus like other mammals. We also do not only have sex only for procreation; we like it and seek it even if there's no chance for conception because it is pleasurable.

I believe that sex is so pleasurable so that we'll screw more often, thus increasing our likelyhood of creating offspring, as well as create the bonds which are so necessary in the raising of our offspring. Human bonding and relationships are as vital to our species survival as sperm meeting egg. Thus, sex for humans is about our survival and as basic a need as food and water. While each individual human requires food and water to live, we must procreate or the species is doomed.

But unlike other basic drives, sex is different from food and water in that we can satisfy ourselves without actually achieving the goal of the drive. Arousal and orgasm can be achieved without contact with another human being yet be just as satisfying (at least in the physical needs department), while thirst and hunger may only be sated with water and food.

The interesting thing about all of this is the culture of sex in which we currently live. Including the matter of masturbation.

In previous history, we have controlled sex to control populations and serve societal needs. When we needed more citizens, for war, religion or the economy, we have sent messages via our religions and governments which dictated and praised sexual relations. Children were the gifts upon which we counted to perpetuate our goals. Similarly, when we have had the times in which we've needed to lower our numbers (times in which our population exceeded our ability to provide for all), we've used the same means to reverse our numbers -- and at such times we've also employed infanticide and other ugly means to ensure the same results. Sometimes we did this with foresight, realization and planning, othertimes we just followed rituals and behaviors because things were always done this way. But whether we knew it or not, we did so out of a relationship with our world. Population control is vital to our survival, and since sex is related to population, we've controlled it.

Now, one can understand in times when the society desires to increase their number that they would view masturbation as a 'waste' -- it will not beget children. (However, I daresay this is more likely with male masturbation. Female sex drive seems to increase with more sex. Female masturbation therefore increase her receptivity to coupling, not just due to the 'more in the mood' factor but her desire to orgasm within a human bonding experience, and therefore increases the likelyhood that she'll conceive.) But in times when the population seems to exceed the societal or environmental ability for viability, why then is masturbation not encouraged?

For that matter, why isn't masturbation prescribed as a method for chastity? Wouldn't matters of 'family values' such as virginity, unwanted pregnancies in single women, abstence in teens, and the like be best served by directing people to controlling their own sexual release literally putting the matter in their own hands?

Is it because masturbation, self pleasure, seems to threaten our bonds and relationships with one another which in total is the basis for society, culture and country?

Let's look to history for the answers.

There have been other periods in history in which masturbation, as well as imagination and other solo acts, have been seen as the pursuit of individualism, something to be feared. This was the 1700's, the Age of Enlightenment, when after years of religious wars, the Church was strongly in power. The security of the Church was achieved and maintained via a better flow of silver and gold trades, results of better transportation and no doubt all improved and/or received from all the wars and conquests. These improvements in central organization could then be better employed by governments. Localism was no longer the primary force in governing, nor was it to be the primary focus of people. As states gained more power and authority, one's allegiance was not just to God (Church) but to their nation state.

The prevailing notion at the time was that society was a contract between individual and some larger entity. Piety, belief and pragmatic desires culminated in creating a proper relationship between state and citizen, society and individual. Our human bonding was made leaps and bounds larger -- no longer were we to bond and care for our own children and the other individuals we lived and formed societies within, but we were to bond and care for peoples we'd never meet. While many say that these thoughts are to thank for the development of democracy and constitutional governments, it is also clear that the legacy also includes nationalism and an imperative directive for citizens to act for the greater good of state, society and God.

It is at this time, this Age of Enlightenment, that masturbation first becomes a huge threat. (Some report that it's at this time -- pinpointed at 1712, to be precise -- when masturbation is purported to be the gravest possible threat to an individual's moral integrity.) It must have been viewed as something more than a lack of self-discipline...

Clearly there's context here to show a connection between the fears of individuality and the individual's duty to carry out his contract with his nation and the fabrication of masturbation as threat. Masturbation's threat to individual integrity is larger than the fear of the moral decline of the nation; it's that in pleasing himself the individual will not care for his state. Masturbation seen as selfishness, as any sign of individualism & solitude was, would be a reason for mistrust. Seen in this light, solitary sex isn't just spilled seed, wasted procreational energies, but a cry of "I don't need you; I don't need anyone!"

So the nation state responds not just with, "Masturbation is bad for you," but rather "You must not masturbate because it is bad for the country! You must love your country!"

(Oh the weeping that must have ensued when a person was discovered loving himself more than his country.)

Is our current dislike of masturbation really a fear that people will not need, and therefore not join or aid, society as is deemed proper? The masturbating individual is pleasure and a law unto himself, the societal bonds have been broken and the individual has no need for society... In this light, masturbation is anarchy!

No coincidence then that the 60's and 70's ushered in the return of masturbation. Nothing says "power to the people!" like putting their own genitals in their own hands. (Facts were reported in the 40's and 50's via Kinsey, but it still took decades for it to sink in -- or maybe everyone was too busy masturbating.)

Since then, we've made little progress. While Annie Sprinkle, Betty Dodson, Alfred Kinsey, Masters and Johnson, Dr. Block, Fanny Fatale, Shere Hite and others have spoken up, documented, researched, written, filmed, moaned, squirted and preached that masturbation is normal and healthy (and fun), our society still doesn't seem to accept a masturbating citizenry.

(Which is pretty strange considering the current US administration must be tired of fucking its citizens all the time.)

But we do have National Masturbation Month. It's just a decade old and not a government recognized affair; but it's a start.

Use National Masturbation Month all you'd like. And when the 31 days of May are over, just keep on doing it. Be ~~wanking~~ walking proof that masturbation isn't going to destroy the human bonds, the state, or society as a whole.