Masturbation

One of the hot topics on this module...masturbation. Although jokingly before the session began many people were surprised we were doing the subject because of course masturbation feels good so why not? But why is it then that we cannot seem to talk about it because it's some kinda of horrible thing.


One peice of text we read for the session was 'Portnoy's complaint' by Philip Roth. This was quite an honest and detailed account of one teenager dealing with the impulses of puberty and although quite an amusing read the realism of it makes us realise that masturbation is a very strange natural impulse. I don't know about using the liver in the fridge is such a good idea but it raises the issue discussed in class, why is it such a private thing so much that we would do anything to hide it but also do anything to do it?


One issue raised in class was that we can for some reason talk endlessly about sex but when it comes to sex with just yourself it's so much worse. The answer we mainly discussed was buried in history and for some reason it was always seen a bad thing for example the era of industrial revolution saw it as pointless because it was a waste of sperm and energy to have sex to have children which had a its purpose.


I think really masturbation is not a bad thing but I think there's something private about it that makes us weary of it and makes it different from sex. I feel really that is somewhat due to the history of it but also a general sense of privacy but we all know that people aren't going to stop doing it and I don't think they should because it's not bad just natural...but don't go blind!