What is masturbation in May? | Aldult Toys Blog

It seems like there are special names that coincide with almost every month of the year: February is Black History Month, October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and November is AIDS Awareness Month, to name a few. But chances are you’ve never heard of International Masturbation Month (and if you have, hats off to you). Sandwiched firmly between International Amateur Radio Month and Men’s Health Month, May’s Masturbation Month is a celebration of unabashed self-love.

May Masturbation Month, in case you haven’t guessed, is all about protecting and celebrating humanity’s goddess-given right to masturbate. May 7, 1995 was declared the first-ever Masturbation Day by San Francisco sex shop Good Vibrations as a protest against the firing of Health and Human Services Director Joycelyn Elders. canned by President Clinton in 1994 for suggesting that masturbation be included in the school sex education curriculum. Since you can’t have too many revelations about masturbation, Masturbation Day has since been extended to the entire month of May.

A story of stigma, shame… and liberation

Despite recent significant advances in sexual freedom, masturbation has a long history of stigma, shame and poor education.

In Solitary Sex: A Cultural History of MasturbationThomas W. Laqueur explores how the perception of masturbation as a “disease” requiring medical treatment was disturbingly prevalent in the early 18th century. Those of us who are completely unfamiliar with religion and some of its more obscure associations might be surprised to learn that masturbation was supposed to trigger Blindness, insanity, and a host of other disorders. In the mid-19th century, erection alarms, penis sheaths, sleeping gloves, and restraints to keep women from spreading their legs were available for purchase. The sad news is that these devices were not created for any perverse purpose.

In the 20th century, people’s associations with masturbation slowly began to change. Notably, in the 1960s and 1970s, the women’s movement embraced masturbation as an integral part of female sexuality. Feminists challenged Freud’s theory that masturbation (and clitoral orgasms in general) were childishWomen wrote books, led workshops and began selling vibrators, reversing the “anti-masturbation” trend.

“For the first time in history,” Lacquerer writes“Masturbation has been adopted as a mode of liberation, a claim to autonomy, to pleasure for its own sake, an escape from the path prescribed by society towards normal adulthood. It has gone from being the deviant sexuality of a mistaken social order to being the sexuality that founds new types of imaginary communities.”

Masturbation is therefore the inevitable modern manifestation of all the efforts, past and present, to give masturbation the credit and glory it so richly deserves. After all, the work is not finished: for one thing, women are still less comfortable with masturbation than men.

Masturbation and Gender: The Facts

Knowing that studies are very limited in the sense that a number of factors (age, class, race, culture) can influence whether or not a given group is willing to discuss their masturbation habits, here are some statistics:

1. According to According to a National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior conducted by Indiana University, among people ages 25 to 29, 5% of women masturbate more than four times a week, compared to 20.1% of men. For those who masturbate “several times a month,” the gap is less stark: 21.5% of women versus 25.4% of men. But the gap generally persists with age, with women falling at least 10 to 15 percentage points behind men in each category. It’s also worth noting that as you get older, both men and women are more likely to report not masturbating at all.

2. When asked if they had ever masturbated before, 15% of women surveyed in a Swedish study published in 2016 answered no, compared to only 1% of men.

3. Women are more likely to use sex toysWhen asked if they used “objects” to masturbate, 43% of women surveyed said “sometimes,” compared to 13% of men, while men were twice as likely as women to say they fantasized every time they masturbated.

Reasons to Masturbate (If You Need One)

There are many, many reasons to masturbate (or achieve orgasm in any way). Let’s just list a few for good measure, shall we?

1. It’s funny. Mmhm.

2. It’s good. Mmmmhmmmmm.

3. It can release happy hormones dopamine, oxytocin, endorphins and serotonin, helping to improve your mood, regulate stress and help you sleep better.

4. A study linked men aged 40 to 49 who masturbated frequently (21 or more times per month) to a better body mass index and a lower risk of prostate cancer.

5. It has been shown that in women, masturbation relieve menstrual cramps.

6. It’s probably the safest sex you’ll ever have.

7. It’s one of the best ways to learn more about your body and understand what turns you on.

8. Because knowing yourself is a great way to build your sexual confidence as well as your openness to exploring new things with a partner, masturbation can ultimately enrich your romantic/sexual relationships.

Bottom line: Self-love is all the rage, which is all the more reason to celebrate Masturbation Month. For the love of pleasure and for the love of yourself. You deserve it.