No-Fap, Porn and masturbation are out

Masturbation panic. One is not allowed to have sex with oneself now.....

http://www.nofap.com/

I just had the briefest of glances, and it seems it's aimed at porn addicts rather than paraphiles.

Porn addiction is a completely separate beast, in which masturbation becomes exactly the same thing as an addictive drug, and as the addict gets more and more desensitised to the level of imagery he/she is using, they get deeper and deeper into ever more extreme material.

Obviously this will lead to illegal imagery, and then when that no longer provides the desired rush, the addict might seek the real thing.

Anyone who's seen the lengths certain drug users will go to in order to get their fix will understand what I'm saying, and porn addiction is no different. It's all the same chemicals produced in the brain.

Telling people not to masturbate at all though... I'm not sure about that.

Graveyard76 wrote:I just had the briefest of glances, and it seems it's aimed at porn addicts rather than paraphiles.

Porn addiction is a completely separate beast, in which masturbation becomes exactly the same thing as an addictive drug, and as the addict gets more and more desensitised to the level of imagery he/she is using, they get deeper and deeper into ever more extreme material.

Obviously this will lead to illegal imagery, and then when that no longer provides the desired rush, the addict might seek the real thing.

Anyone who's seen the lengths certain drug users will go to in order to get their fix will understand what I'm saying, and porn addiction is no different. It's all the same chemicals produced in the brain.

Telling people not to masturbate at all though... I'm not sure about that.

Actually, the experts in the field do not believe either in porn or sex addiction. I forget the chaps name - David Le Vey or someone. But they also don't believe in hypersexuality - if you'd have seen what the bipolar rent boy was up to back in the day you would disagree with that view...

There was barely a corner of London I hadn't christened by the time I was 20.

But the reason for the post is that I foolishly signed up for this crap, and I received a newsletter which proclaimed "The World Needs No-Fap".

Masturbation was in the DSM once was it not? These fellows would have it back there.

In that case, I'd say they're bloody idiots then. Experts my arse. How do they get to call themselves that anyway? Porn addiction as I described it, is demonstrably real, not to mention devastating for many people.

I didn't do a very thorough inspection of the website, but having checked out the homepage, I don't think this looks like masturbation panic or an attempt to impose regulations on anyone's self-sex lives. Honestly, I find it kind of refreshing to hear an alternative voice to the sex-positive culture I've grown up in. My first experiences with porn and masturbation resulted from peer pressure, though I guess I've been seeing half-naked women in advertisements all my life.

I think the real issue this website is trying to address is the depersonalization of sex that results from having one's early sexual experiences consist predominantly or exclusively of masturbating to pixels on a screen. I read somewhere that teenagers these days are having far fewer sexual relationships than previous generations. I think the main reason is probably that porn is so accessible and offers sexual gratification without all the effort it takes to maintain healthy romantic relationships.

That's not to say I condone premarital sex. I just worry that digital media is causing younger generations (myself included) to be emotionally and socially out of touch with ourselves and each other.

Also, I don't like the way sex is sold to us and used to sell us things. I kind of wish I could go back to a time when communities were more provincial and the only people you could have sex with were the ones you'd known all your life.

I think it is too easy to be judgemental about such attempts to provide solutions to real problems. I haven't got much sympathy for the 12-step programmes, since they seem to be religiously based (but they might work), and this one is at least secularly based it seems. I think only you can decide if you have a problem with porn. If you are able to leave it as and when you decide then that might be fine, and if it doesn't affect one's sexual relationships with others, then that too is fine. For many paedophiles, porn will be the only expression of their sexuality, and if they want to stay on the right side of the law then their options will be limited, unless they are not exclusive that is.

I think there is a need for such approaches as Nofap, particularly since porn (in quantity and quality) is so universally available now - never was in decades before. And there is evidence that it does affect relationships and how many view the opposite sex, or the same sex perhaps.

If one has a reasonably happy sex life why any need for porn? As remarked, sex is just used to sell us stuff we don't really need, so we are constantly being exploited.

It is a bit hysterical to claim they want to ban masturbation when all they are saying is don't let something like porn or masturbation control your life - which is eminently sensible, and would apply to many other things like alcohol or drugs or gaming or ...

Though this post was supposed to be a flippent one, I don't agree it is hysterical to raise a concern about such things. We have had masturbation panic in the past, and this is how these things go - all of a sudden you get studies which show that porn and masturbation are bad for you (which there are on YourBrainOnPorn). Next thing people start to blame their problems on porn and masturbation. Next you get a 'crisis' - such attempts are being made in similar directions in the UK, the government has itself convinced that anyone under 18 who watches porn will become a rapist, twin this with the ongoing rise and rise in self-produced CP, a 'study' yesterday that the longer you wait to have sex the better lover you are or whatever nonsense it was - you get the picture.

My point is that such things don't really have a counter balance. It is more possible to create studies saying that porn and masturbation cause problems than it is to get studies done to demonstrate the opposite, the same is true of the AoC. We have several countries where the AoC is 14 so why are they not studied and those studies compared to the data which claims sex is damaging for 14 yr olds? The answer is because systemically it cant be allowed, look at the Rind controversy. There is a project called Consenting Juveniles but they can't get any support from the 'experts' or any funding.

So we have biased data and self-interested propagandists leading the way on theses things.

Everyone is at it. An advert is doing the rounds for homelessness. It just had to deliberately imply that all females are homeless because their fathers sell them into prostitution!

A high spirited teenager did that photo-bombing thing and ran up and gave a journalist a kiss on the cheek, this was deemed sexual assault. Two young boys were caught about to experiment with mutual masturbation and they were charged as child sex offenders (of each other) and jailed I think. Teens are being charged with making CP (of themselves).

Who knows where all this can end. Am I being unduly hyperbolic? Perhaps, but the way things have been going these past two decades perhaps not.