By the way guys, did you know you have a potentially untapped sexual organ?

Hey @manimal, a friend of mine was scarred for life because his father caught him masturbating, (then proceeded to beat the shit out of him), and now he refuses to do it. Now he has a literal case of BLUE BALLS, as in, his sperm are dying because his genitalia aren’t getting any use and the tubes are backing up. The doc gave him 2 options: Get his sperm frozen (sperm-cicle ftw) or never have kids. My friend can only get off through actual sex or a girl doing it for him, but his girlfriend broke up with him and now everything has been backed up.
Not masturbating for men is unnatural. *we evolved with long enough arms for a reason people! ;) haha* It might contain nutrients, but a little bit of jizz doesn’t contain all of your protein, I’d be willing to say less than 10 mg, because the ejaculations for a day is only 2-3 ounces at most for a day, all it carries is the genetic material by a few million sperm, what they need to survive until they can reach the fallopian tubes, and excretions from the prostate and other glands. After that, the female feeds and nurtures the growing fetus. 98% of the work is done by the woman in a pregnancy, we just give the other half of the dna. So it isn’t “every sperm cell has the stuff needed to become a new human,” in all technicality. Just a little bit of dna. I lose more dna when i get my hair cut than I do masturbating 100 times.
I can’t find anything about what minerals and vitamins are in sperm, although everywhere I go they usually say most ‘elements’ are TRACE amounts, meaning barely noticeable. Albeit, some things are bound to be more abundant.
I average taking in 50-60 grams of protein a day, if a jizz of 10 mg, that isn’t a problem. I’m not sure how many mg you can fit into 15 ml, but i’m going to guess not too many, no more than 500 at the most, and thats a stretch i would think. matter of fact, 15 ml of anything in the body (except maybe spinal fluid,) isn’t that much of a change.
I agree with Manimal on one thing, stretching of the anus/damage could be (likely is) a bad thing, but that would only happen from hardcore use >_>
also other proofs that masturbation isn’t terrible. Opinions or otherwise. But hey, personal choice is fine by me.

Where I’ve learned my stuff: Health class, 10th grade, lol.

@Manimal Nothing you say makes any sense. Anyone who has studied and researched sexual health and been to a University and majored in medicine or biology like you claim to have done would know some of the following things (since they are taught in fucking high school sex ed and plainly common sense)
The male body is constantly, again, CONSTANTLY, producing sperm (as in your body is using nutrients to make the stuff whether you like it or not). You may have heard of a little thing called a “wet dream”. This is where the male body gets rid of excess sperm, which is basically your body telling you “hey if you’re not going to get rid of this I’ll do it while you’re asleep since you obviously don’t enjoy it”. Oh but I’m sorry, you’ve probably never had a wet dream because your so manly, so you have sex all the time with “real” girls and not your hands because that’s fucked up. Oh…wait…in having sex aren’t you ejaculating? Hm, I guess your going against your own bullshit advice.
A little side note here: you say jacking off isn’t exercise because it “doesn’t make you strong”. Sorry to burst your bubble, but any time your body uses glucose (hey biology major, here are some fancy biology terms I learned way back in high school for you) to move (i.e. turn the potential energy in the glucose to kinetic energy in the movement of your body) you are performing work (as in Work=Force x Distance). When you move a significant amount you burn calories (aka the amount of energy needed to raise 1 cubic mm of water 1 degree Celsius). It is generally accepted that the burning of calories in a significant amount is exercise. You see, there’s a little thing called cardio you may not of heard of because it doesn’t make your muscles big and make you “stronger”, but it’s exercise nonetheless and actually more important to your health because it keeps your lungs and heart (which supply oxygen to the brain) healthy. Jerking off is obviously not at the same caliber as running, but it is nevertheless (although depending on if you can only last a couple minutes it may be pretty insignificant) exercise.
Now I’m not one for putting things up my ass either (I’ve got nothing against it, just not my cup of tea), but your main arguments, as far as I recall, are as follows: It makes you sterile, and it stretches and destroys muscles that shouldn’t be stretched and destroyed. On the sterility issue, it’s complete bullshit, ’nuff said. On the muscle part I’m going to break this down into two sections. Section 1: The stretching and destroying muscles part. Now by your comment about exercise needing to make you strong to count as exercise, I am assuming you have lifted weights before (and if you haven’t I’m assuming you agree it is healthy). I don’t know if you know this, but when you lift weights, you are *gasp* stretching your muscles and producing micro tears (aka destroying) muscle. It is when your body rebuilds and repairs this muscle that you become stronger. So if anything, putting shit in your ass is only making your inner ass muscles stronger. (So basically if some dude A rapes dude B, if dude B has strengthened his butt muscles buy putting stuff up there, he would be more successful in refusing entry–irony anyone?) Oh, speaking of shit, let’s move on to, Section 2: The your butt muscles aren’t supposed to be stretched and destroyed part. Have you ever taken a shit? Shit is waste that travels from the colon to outside of your ass. Have you ever seen shit? It’s bigger than your closed asshole. Hmmm. How did it get out? Eureka! Your ass must have stretched to allow it to pass through. Well looks like the only difference between shitting and putting stuff up your ass is the direction.
As for the part about plastic being absorbed by your body. This is partially true. Plastic water bottles are evidence of the fact. However, as you said before-only concerning dildos and the like at the time-toys can be made of different materials. Such as metal, or glass. Oh hey, even if metal and glass get absorbed by your body (which they practically don’t since any amount is so trace it wouldn’t do anything) aren’t you just giving your body nutrients such as the plethora of metals that are healthy for you, or silicon (aka glass) which makes up part of your body anyway.

So to conclude, I’m not trying to get you to masturbate or shove stuff up your ass. As you said before, it’s all a matter of opinion. However, DON’T make up bullshit to try and justify the fact that you are an asshole who likes to hate on stuff that you don’t agree with. Oh wait, I may have just stated my opinion that you are an asshole was a fact. Sorry.

@Andrew Are you a genetic scientist? Have you read more than one report on the claims you make? If not, then there is no sense in attacking riku’s info like that. Ejaculation isn’t the finish line, it’s the concrete wall that you run into after the finish line if you have no control. Orgasm is the finish line, and if you don’t ejaculate you cun run many more laps. And seriously, do you really think you get blueballs just because you don’t burst?

@Alex E Blue balls require more than just abstaining from nutting. And like you say, dead sperm gets reabsorbed. In a healthy person, blue balls are taken care of automatically during sleep, often through ejaculation. This guy has more problems than a mental block against turkey choking.

And how is it unnatural to not masturbate? That’s a very weird statement. It’s a choice. There is no instinct that makes people masturbate, it’s a chosen entertainment.

The part about a haircut is just ridiculous. Those are dead cells that aren’t being reproduced rapidly all the time. 2-3 ounces is also a small load, the result of ejaculating too often.

Frequent masturbation does reduce fertility. The 2-3 ounces is one piece of evidence. Another is the sperm cell content and quality. Look at some statistics, you will see that the rate at which sperm cell quantity and quality has sunk, very closely matches the rate at which porn has increased and masturbation has become more accepted. Go have a look at the statistics.

People might take your opinion more openly, Manimal, if you weren’t such a dick.

Just sayin’.

No sir, he’s been a dick.

I implore you to re-read his posts.

I am just going to throw my 2 cents into this one.

First off, masturbation is NOT a completely natural thing. Sexual intercourse is the “natural thing” and masturbation has become the socially accepted form of sexual release when sex is not an option. The natural urge is for sexual intercourse in order to make babies, not to jerk off into a and the chemical release is so we enjoy the act of sex and procreate not masturbate.

If you really look at what he is saying without personal preferences, stored “facts” or biases, Manimal makes a lot of sense and has got me very curious about the points he has made. Curiosity mixed with a healthy dose of scepticism has propelled me to do my own research on the subject as it is something I have never really questioned.

As for the Manimal bashing, I do not understand why? He has expressed an opinion on something it looks like no one else here has really questioned, and who are feverently defending “facts” they learned previously (grade 10 health class? Really? I have discovered a great chunk of BS I “learned” in high school was incorrect) while demanding he cite his sources.

Go look it up yourself. Stop demanding he do the work for you. He did his homework, so go do yours.

Elaborate on why you think masturbation is unnatural please. Also, do you believe animals are thinking about having babies when having sex or are they just following their urges? Are you thinking about babies when having sex?

Natural imo is just a hollow term in this context to convey your opinion in a way that makes it look more objective. We are humans, we stem from nature, how can we ever do anything that is unnatural? Define natural.

The biological function of the organ in question determines, to me, what is natural or not. Animals having sex are following their natural urges to procreate. When a stallion has sex with a mare, it is a violent affair with a great amount of danger to both horses. The stallion is following his urges not for pleasure, but his natural and biological urge to procreate.

We humans have decided we like the pleasure of sex, and with our egos urge to recreate sensual pleasures it has enjoyed, we self-pleasure ourselves. Calling it natural or not is a matter of semantics, but from the way I defined it above, masturbation is not natural.

What irks me about Manimal is that he’s stated he doesn’t care about opinions, only facts… yet he’s failed to provide a single source of proof for any of his claims, instead only stating that he’s “studied” it. Then he asked somebody why they care what he says – it’s only his opinion. Hypocrite and troll, in my opinion (which he doesn’t care about, right?).

@Jesusbob The biological function of the organ in question determines, to me, what is natural or not.

The biological function of my sex organ doesn’t change whether I have sex with my girlfriend or with a rock.

@Jesusbob The stallion is following his urges not for pleasure, but his natural and biological urge to procreate.

Pleasure is exactly why the stallion followes this urge. There is no difference between the urge for pleasure and the urge to procreate.

@Jesusbob We humans have decided we like the pleasure of sex, and with our egos urge to recreate sensual pleasures it has enjoyed, we self-pleasure ourselves. Calling it natural or not is a matter of semantics, but from the way I defined it above, masturbation is not natural.

There is no decision making involved if we like the pleasure of sex or not. It is biologically hardwired. All people who experienced extreme pain while having sex would be extinct by now.

Also, you still haven’t exactly defined natural.

@Manimal does ejaculation necessarily lead to early death for men? Is there any way to prevent this?

I would say the whole point of this site, and consequently this post (thanks to Raphael for sparking this debate <- see what I did there) is to challenge ourselves to become open-minded, try new things and broaden our boundaries and limitations (mentally, physically, psychologically, sexually and I could go on).

For example, before I found this site, I would never have contemplated meditation, visualization, alternate sleep cycles or any of the other new and exciting experiences this site has challenged me to take on.

In light of this, I find it a bit saddening how this has changed from a topic that is supposed to concern something different and an alternative experience to try and test out (if you’re willing), to an intense argument where I sense a lot of ego and pride is ruining a healthy conversation.

So Manimal has very strong opinions and had no skaam (“shy” as we like to say in South Africa) in expressing this. Although I do not agree with the intensity and close-mindedness with which he expressed himself as well as comments of certain practices being f-ed up, everyone trying to point out how everyone else’s argument is unsupported and confronting or provoking each other is not the right way to go about this I think (even though I do like a good debate).

For me, this has been an unbelievable learning curve, and like everything else in this community has questioned something I do or don’t do and the dogmatic beliefs I still have. I’d like to think it’s all about trying something different, if it doesn’t feel right/good/pleasurable then you’ll quickly find out it’s not for you.

I would say nothing and everything is natural (a duality of life I guess) because every human-being views this world subjectively, through their own eyes (which fundamentally makes this world an interesting place). Thus different things are pleasurable to different people, just like everyone has different tastes in food, clothing etc and this way I don’t think anything like this could ever be considered “f-ed up”.

I see it as a a new experience you COULD try, just like fore exampled you never knew you would like strawberry flavoured ice-cream until you tried it out?

Much truth there Tine, also enjoyed your previous posts and I tend to agree with pretty much everything you’ve said even though I’m still trying to retain an objective point of view and keep in mind that people really can be just vastly different.

I am also extremely against radically forcing your own opinion on others, which is why I love the passive and gently enriching nature of this site – kind of like a “how about giving this a bash” approach rather than “this is wrong that is right and you can’t argue otherwise”. I find HE to emit a sense of malleable opinions and free, open-minds capable of confronting the endless amount of long-held dogma’s in today’s society which people otherwise wouldn’t even mention opposing.

I think it’s great that masturbation (to my knowledge only, forgive any ignorance) in it’s first existence was frowned upon, and has now become more generally accepted but as of this post has been challenged again! It’s pretty incredible to think what a different place this world could be if every single person adopted the traits of this blog, and also challenged their contradicting beliefs and opinions in their own minds.

What takes the most strength I would say, is to disarm yourself and everybody else with a non-aggressive nature and soft words conveying your opinion rather than exerting it, which is perhaps not what Manimal did or has done.