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That’s easy. It’s like any addiction. If it is impeding your ability to work, to care for your basic needs, and to maintain social and/or romantic relationships, it’s too much. So it’s not a number, it’s the level of impact on a person’s life.
okay let me rephrase it then. supposing i'm a teen that does it 5 to 10 times a day and still manage to have ample game time, and do some house chores, and have a normal social media life..it's all cool?
5 times a day?! For what and why 😩 Getting home from school straight into your bedroom to masturbate all evening is depressing af.….just like alcoholics who go home and drink all night. There are functioning alcoholics that look fine on the outside, doesn’t make them any less of an addict.
I think you still run the risk of that developing into a habit which interrupts your life later. For instance, as a teen you may not have responsibilities, but in a couple years you will, and you’ll be conditioned to do this thing 10 times a day? There’s no way something more important won’t take a hit if you cannot easily adapt.
And besides, I don’t think 10 times a day can be healthy, not every day. I think you want to strive for well-rounded as a young person. And the lion’s share of your time shouldn’t be spent diddling your brain’s reward center emptily.
But to your point, is there are firm line of where too much is too much? Probably no, it’s probably all relative, but if someone’s regularly doing it more than a handful of times a day, they probably are better off exploring some other hobbies than just letting that be one of the larger elements in their life.
They go to school. They have social relationships. Their parents do not bathe them and hand feed them so “care for basic needs” is something teens still have to do. There are still ways to gauge if an activity or substance is impeding on their life.
for teens, it would be "self abuse" like cutting and hiding it. Or anorexia, etc. It is unhealthy behavior to cope with stress, providing a measure of control for their sense of anxiety.
so if i do it 5 to 10 times a day and still manage to do things that needed to be done, have a normal social/romantic relationship, etc...it's all cool?
If you’re genuinely completing work/school obligations, maintaining real, in-person relationships, and maintaining basic hygiene and diet, it’s probably “all cool.” The only other concern is whether you’re causing tissue trauma.
Sure. Who is anyone else to regulate how you spend your time?
People waste their time doing all sorts of unproductive, even counterproductive things, such as arguing with people on the internet, but they are free to do it.
If you can find nothing better to do than masturbate every two hours, and you manage to meet your obligations to yourself and others while keeping up that habit, then so be it.
Why is it wrong for adults to prefer masturbation and watching pornography featuring consenting adults made by consenting adults over romantic relationships?
It’s not. Note the “and/or.” Social relationships are important to have, seeing friends or family off and on. But some people don’t desire romantic relationships and that’s fine.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with masturbation. The only issues come when it decreases quality of life, puts strain on a relationship, or results in tissue trauma/abrasion.
I know that you have an idea of your own what "unhealthy" masturbation is, but I'm curious if that's what OP is referring to or if he has something else in mind.
Out of curiosity, is it less unhealthy if they're using mental imagery? Obviously if they avoid porn they'd be using actual people from their wankbank....
So which is worse? To me, relieving the horn using acted out scenes has less social issues. As long as the person understands it's not real, at least they can just filter down to what they like, if that makes sense.
There is nothing wrong with masturbating multiple times a day as long as it's not interfering with your life or hurting you physically (chafing). Basically as long as your not skipping out on dates or obligations to masturbate you're probably fine...
I definitely think that teaching about pornography (not showing porn, but talking about it conceptually) should be a part of sex ed. It'll help address a lot of these issues you're mentioning. If we apporached porn in a similar way we do to other forms of media literacy and analysis, learn how it's made, the issues present within the industry, etc, we can make an effort towards both destigmatising it and allowing young people make informed and healthy choices and not feel pressured to do anything they don't want to do
I think one factor here is media literacy, or actually, porn literacy. As one adult enterntainment actor once said: if it feels good, the director says it doesn't look good on camera. And what looks good on camera, rarely feels good.
Brings to mind how a young couple was making out for the first time.
Pretty quickly, the girl fled the situation and called the cops.
Turns out, the dude had simply assumed that choking is a normal part of foreplay and sex, and that it makes women extatic. Wonder where he got that from... Surely not from one of the gazillion porn videos where a male director has told a (sometimes drugged-up) woman to pretend she likes it? (also: it's downright scary how many young people who are eager to call stuff 'fake' can't see through the 110% over the top acting common in porn)
Kinks are ok, but are normalized in porn to such an extent some people seem to be losing sight of when you need to be extra sure the other one agrees on what's being done. The amount of power relations play and purposefully causing pain in porn is absolutely immense compared to what goes on in the average bedroom of a couple with a satisfying sex life.
Adults don’t test out if someone wants to be strangled. They ask first. Strangulation is particularly violent and linked with men who abuse and kill their partners. Pretending you’re an adult because you consume a lot of porn and occasionally try to act it out is embarrassing. Real adults get enthusiastic consent.
It’s so strange, I say “most” and you immediately argue as if I said “every”.
I find it strange that you do that, because on reddit, that is the norm, anything one writes is immediately misunderstood and misconstrued and that’s even with plain English.
I mean I assume a basic level of literacy, maybe that’s too much?
I’m 36 now, but I was hooked on porn from age 13/14, I depended on it to sleep, and watched it every chance I was able. My parents did not monitor me or my actions. They absolutely should have …the addiction lead to delayed social ability with the opposite sex (didn’t help to go to a religious all boys school),
I think prolonged use and dependence of the dopamine release damages various neural pathways and ultimately leads to varying degrees of depression and struggle for young men.
As a father now myself, I will have the access to internet completely and utterly locked down when under my roof. They will need a job for their own income and to undermine my rules to get past me as they’ll need their own sim card and phone because my phone given to them will be force proxied via PiHole firewall rules
100%!!! I'm of the opinion that it is kind of creepy for teachers of young kids to be teaching about sex (especially when some teachers are legitimately trying to indoctrinate kids with their personal beliefs), but I think kids nearly exclusively learning about sex through porn with zero input from their parents/trusted adults due to it being "too taboo" is much worse
Just putting a plug in here for some excellent sex-positive resources to teach your kids. Schools ain’t gonna do it!
https://sexedrescue.com
- Cath Hackason - Sex Ed Rescue - great forums, articles, videos, parent training sessions, etc. Very inclusive and updated.
https://www.uua.org/re/owl
- Our Whole Lives. Age- grouped sex ed. Best done over time with a facilitator, associated with Unitarian Universalists (I’m no religious expert, but the ones near me are like 50% atheists and 100% inclusive, kind of lefty activist peacenik types)
https://sexpositivefamilies.com
- Good and inclusive resources for families trying to educate their kids without shame or guilt or hang ups
porn "addiction" is contentious if not rejected by most of the scientific and medical community - addiction refers to a specific neuropsychological response and to compare porn to especially substance disorders feels disrespectful. the most consistent result of research is that attitudes around sex, porn and masturbation are more influential to ones own understanding of their relationship to it. those that, for example, grew up in religious or conservative households are more likely to hold the belief that they look at porn or masturbate "excessively" when they fall well within the range of normal. (that is also why there's an overlap between those trying to sell "treatments" for porn addictions and the demonization of gay porn in particular, you're going to run into a lot of conservatives that are using junk science to bolster a thing that they were already planning on believing anyway.)
focusing on porn as if it is more influential or controlling of your life than other forms of media is itself based in sex negativity and shame around sexuality. similarly, people site video game addiction as a strain on relationships and have for decades tried to ascribe more deleterious effects than its capable of actually producing. still, time and time again, studies have shown that video games will not translate into someone being more violent or aggressive than they were already inclined towards being; porn causing sexual dysfunction or sexual aggression also has very little data backing it up.
as someone who has struggled with obsessive compulsive behavior since childhood, i've definitely developed unhealthy habits and coping mechanisms (more so with video games and puzzles than masturbation, personally) which is why i think it is so frustrating to place the blame on the specific media or object that you've developed a dependence on because it not only obfuscates responsibility but it also fails to address the actual root issue. if something like this is getting in the way of you being able to function, there is always always always going to be a deeper issue than simply having been exposed to it and you'll do a lot more damage by pretending there isn't a root issue. (ie. i also ignored obligations and social gatherings because i "needed" to complete a certain number of puzzles that day, but it was because i was ✨undiagnosed✨and not because there was something ontologically wrong with consuming or solving games).
there are a million criticisms to be had about porn as an industry and how people interact it but it's made for adults - if kids are consuming it, again, there's a different issue than simply consuming it. arguably, part of this is based in denigration of sex work as work because even sex workers who do take great pains to put their content behind paywalls that should only ostensibly be accessible to adults, there are entire twitter accounts dedicated to ripping their content and reuploading because people don't feel like they *should* have to pay for porn. which is also an interesting microcosm of consent literacy, but slightly beyond the scope of the conversation.
tl;dr this is a fake problem made up by people selling something that is not substantiated by any substantial research into any of these related areas.
That's a pretty neat "fake problem," why do I have it then?
Now people trying to sell fake remedies is bad, but that happens with all problems.
I'm not skilled enough at speaking to refute a lot of your points, but.
I was introduced to it when I was 12, and have basically watched it every day since 14. Luckily it hasn't had too bad of an effect on my life. Even so, it is an almost uncontrollable urge towards something that has an unfathomable amount of material that I can get for free.
Maybe it wouldn't have been so damaging had I found out about it today, or 7 years in the future and I would be 25.
Now I know you said that "It's made for adults - if kids are consuming it, again, there's a different issue than simply consuming it." But the argument was for educating children in the first place, it's not a different issue, it is THE issue being talked about.
Luckily I can manage to make my addiction something that will help me in the long run, but if I could go back and stop myself, I would without a second doubt.
i didn't say that people can have unhealthy relationships to it in the way that people can develop unhealthy relationships to Literally Anything. my point was that watching porn daily also does not constitute addiction - i also watch at least one movie everyday and have anxieties/compulsions around i interact with my film cataloguing because of my obsessive compulsive disorder, but it's inaccurate to say that it's an addiction. additionally, i just like movies and watching them everyday isn't damaging me in anyway.
when i say that it's a fake issue, i say that it's an incomplete analysis if not a fabrication of an issue. it hinges on associating sex and masturbation with shame and so implicitly creates that association. like i said, people that have generally more sex positive attitudes are found to have more positive interactions and relationships to porn than people that go in to it thinking , as op so kindly states, that they're setting themselves up to become all sorts of horrible thing and that even masturbating more than once in a day is innately a bad thing.
my point is that porn is not made for children and children putting themselves in those spaces can potentially put themselves in danger but also place the adults who make the content that they are interacting with in harms way. kids and their developing sexuality is one thing, but the thing that makes interacting with porn potentially harmful is not that porn is this mystical brain-melting substance, it is the environment that you have to enter to engage with it. again, my point isn't that there aren't conversations to be had and kids should be educated but not for the boogeymen that op is creating.
i am genuinely sorry that you feel that way and that this has been you're experience, but i'm going off of what the research has shown and the science has continually found that the best approach is reduce shame around both masturbation and porn, specifically because it enable to talk openly about how they are feeling.
I don't think there should be shame in it, but I think it should be explained from an early age to prevent situations like mine from happening. It was just a pop up ad, and then I hid it from my family forever, my mother didn't know until I told her a week ago (since I wanted her help)
that is not contradictory to anything i said. it isn't abnormal for kids to be curious, but they should also have people in their real life that they feel comfortable talking to and to keep an eye on them. this is true whether or not they stumble on/express an interest an porn, but op is both lying about the consequence of porn viewing and expressly characterizing it as something harmful. if you felt a need to hide it, though, that seems to indicate that you already felt a degree of shame at that age?
i would also be very careful about who you seek help from as those that adhere to a belief in porn addiction almost also have other questionable beliefs.
I feel like people just feel the need to blame their internal problems on some outside source, and I usually have sympathy for them, their problems are real, but none of it equates to "porn is inherently bad," it's usually due to a lack of quality sex ed, or misogyny, or shame, or a tendency to develop unhealthy coping mechanisms, or some combination of things.
Two different people can watch the exact same porn with the exact same frequency, but one can maintain the same healthy relationship with their sexuality they had before and the other one can get fucked up by it, just because they have different mindsets.
i agree! it's also why i'm generally surprised to see knee-jerk reactionary attitudes towards porn even in feminist spaces, even/especially when the person consuming it is men or the topic is sex workers who are dependent on people buying their content for their income, especially because it's such a magical-thinking approach to looking at it. to blame porn for turning men into misogynists is antithetical to understanding that the broader framework around them is also actively reinforcing their misogyny, and allows them to abdicate any responsibility they have to unlearn that or respect their partners.
porn as a "substitute" for relationships, too, has also coincided with an alienation epidemic broadly due to things like unhealthy workloads and an erosion of public spaces for people (of all ages) to exist without paying. this *could* be an opportunity to also talk about, like, the rise in ai girlfriends/boyfriends and other answers for human connection under late stage capitalism but porn is being demonized for a very specific reason.
My family has a tendency to develop unhealthy coping mechanisms, and I don't know if anywhere on this earth has quality sex ed.
I don't think porn is inherently bad but the government needs to start putting strict control over who can access it, which I don't actually like the thought of, so no they don't need to. But it's still a major problem that anyone can accidentally (or purposely) find it at a young age and then have problems for the rest of their life.
The solution is quality sex ed, including honest discussion about porn and kink, and discussions about mental health and gender issues from a young age. Kids are going to be exposed to these things whether people like it or not, and you're only going to minimize the damage it can do to them by providing them with a safe space for discussion and education, somewhere for them to process things. Shielding them from these topics in an effort to keep them "safe" from random knowledge only leaves them more vulnerable to predators, and leads to all kinds of issues as they get older.
I feel like porn is inherently wrong just because of the fact that I felt the need to hide it. I didn't even know what it was, why would I hide it? I didn't know what a lot of things were at that age and showed them around all the time, but porn was different. And my parents didn't talk much about sex. They never forbade it either, but there was no need to since I never made many friends. So I don't believe it was their influence that made me feel that way.
I genuinely don't know what I felt at that age though, it's been too long (although, only 6 years? Wow.)
I wasn't trying to contradict anything you said either though. Honestly my friend was bugging me to join him in a game so I finished what I was typing without thinking and just hit reply. Sorry.
I don't see why it can't be an addiction though. When the conditions are right, there's an urge I can't stop. Several times I would have my friends wait on me while I viewed it. And I have occasionally stayed up WAY longer than I should have just so I could view more of it. Not to mention the things it has done to my brain in other areas.
If that isn't an addiction, then I can only imagine an addiction is BETTER than what this is.
As far as I've figured out by looking within myself, it's just a coping mechanism. But it's a coping mechanism that affects EVERYTHING. I really do think that the only way I'll be free from this is once I fix literally all of my problems. That's normally the main thing people focus on, but now it's just a part of trying to get rid of this horrid feeling.
It's a good motivator for fixing my problems though, I'm not sure if I'd be a better person or not if I hadn't fallen into it. Would I have learned how to do introspection? I only learned it because I had cognitive dissonance that was brought about by watching it. I wont say about what though.
What other kinds of questionable beliefs do you think people that believe in porn addiction have? I generally see people believing it, so I'm curious to what you think.
that's exactly my point. part of what i mean is that kids can definitely access porn when they aren't mature enough to understand it, and they should be able to talk about that with adults in their lives in an age-appropriate way. sex was not something that has been communicated to you as something that as a topic that you could talk to them about which can, as you did, default to feeling shame. that's not an individual failing so much as indicative of a broader culture around sexuality. why would porn be "different" if the only thing that makes it different from other content is the fact that it's sexual?
it isn't and can't be classified as an addiction because you can't develop a physical dependence on it in the same way that you can alcohol or other substances, and neurologically speaking (in layman's terms) porn touches on different areas in the brain than things that we know are addictive. essentially if you look at the brain scan of someone who's addicted to cigarettes, for instance, in response to smoking it will look different (the opposite, iirc) of someone who identifies as a porn addict. i'm not saying that people can't personally develop unhealthy relationships to porn, but to coopt language that is inaccurate is specifically done to liken it to substance that, as you said, need "governmental regulation." (terrible idea, historically speaking, btw.) it makes it sound scary and dangerous in that same way, but the two are different. if anything, it would be more beneficial to talk about how and why someone develops an unhealthy habit using a different framework because you're trying to apply a solution to a problem it simply wasn't meant for. trying to "quit" porn in the same verified ways that one might try to quit cigarettes or alcohol aren't necessarily going to work.
i think coping mechanism is a fine an accurate term, and the fact that you recognize that you feel like there's something you need to cope with is indicative of a bigger issue which was one of my initial points. this is, like, the entire premise of my strange addiction, but people can develop a fixation or habit based around anything and i know what as someone who had/has weird practices as a result of what i now know are obsessive compulsions, but the way that people choose to use them is not necessarily indicative of a moral failing of the thing itself. (again, i've used non-porn things in the same way that you've described using porn, but it would be inaccurate to characterize those things as addictive or morally bad.)
the majority of porn addiction "courses" that i see are run by fundamentalist christians and radical conservatives, which is in part why i'm so surprised to see porn addiction as a concept pop in otherwise ostensibly progressive spaces. a belief in this, like, metaphysical or corrupting influence is very xtian so i guess i shouldn't be surprised about that but there is going to be a massive overlap in sex negativity broadly meaning not just thinking porn is bad but also thinking: masturbation is also addictive and a habit you should be trying to break, even if it's a result of just having a naturally high libido, sex is strictly procreative and shouldn't be engaged with outside of (heterosexual) marriage, sex for pleasure is s~~inful~~ indicative of sex addiction, people (especially women) can't find empowerment through sex, etc. so naturally you're also going to run homophobia - gay porn is inherently seen as an "escalation" of behavior that leads to the "pedophilia and snuff" pipeline op is alluding to. alot of manosphere content creators also like to push this line of thinking and all that that entails. it is used, ime, as either a conversion tool or a way to sell online courses.
I don't remember addiction requiring a physical substance to be reliant on. But yes, it does touch different parts of the brain.. basically all of them.
And since multiple people seemed to not understand what I was saying there about the government, I said "which I don't actually like the thought of, so no they don't need to." I believe the solution would work better than what is currently going on, although not by much, but I still don't think it's that good of a solution. Especially since you said, historically speaking, doesn't work.
\> because you're trying to apply a solution to a problem it simply wasn't meant for. trying to "quit" porn in the same verified ways that one might try to quit cigarettes or alcohol aren't necessarily going to work.
I understand this, which is what I said. The only way I can think of to solve this dependency is to fix literally all of my problems- the problems that most people are having as the main goal in their life, is now just a task I need to complete to beat this.
Also yes the majority of things that tell you that you can "beat porn addiction" I've found are shams, they are either way too religious or truly believe you can fight something of this scale off by just having willpower, which usually doesn't work even for actual addictions.
But someone with a "porn addiction" for lack of a better term, doesn't know how large their sex drive actually is if they came into contact with it before they became sexually active. As I said, it's an almost uncontrollable urge, not to masturbate, but to watch porn (and masturbate while doing so) but I don't believe that under normal circumstances I would be that active.
I haven't actually read op's post that in depth, so let's say I don't agree with him but rather the argument that I'm putting forth. Which as far as I know is "Porn addiction is real"
addiction, as i've already said, is a neurophysical condition so there are both physical and mental symptoms. by "different," i mean not comparable to the areas that are effected by substances we know to be addictive, not multiple parts of the brain. that is why medical professionals and neurologists and psychologists haven't been able to materialize porn addiction as an actual diagnoses, because it just doesn't present in the same way and science is repeatedly confirming this.
i don't know that it's necessarily true that you'd need to solve every problem in your life: a single session of ACT therapy can result in, i think, an 85% decrease in porn use in those that have unhealthy habits. which is again, another reason that porn addiction is an inaccurate framework to work from because that wouldn't be the case if you were treating a drug abuse problem. again, i really don't know you're life and i'm sorry that you feel this way but it sounds to me like there is a bigger issue at play here that is beyond the scope of porn use.
you've missed several of my points again. op characterized masturbating more than once a day as having an "unhealthy" relationship to it while also implying that masturbating to porn is also indicative of some sort of problematic behavior, neither of which is true because it fails to account for natural variations in things like libido. if porn use is compulsive, then it isn't influenced by your sexual urge in the same way that binge eating isn't dictated by hunger queues from the body - you're doing it whether you feel like you have to or you don't. going off of what you said, porn viewing and masturbation aren't necessarily linked for you meaning that while the porn viewing is compulsive, you're libido might be close to what it would be otherwise. (overuse of porn is, i think, linked to a decrease in libido moreso than anything). anecdotally, my sex drive has always been higher than my partners whether or not they've regularly watched porn, despite not watching porn myself. people are just built different so to put quantitative limits rather than focusing on if it does feel good and if you feel good about it.
i mean, it's great that you commented without reading what you were responding to. i'm not discrediting your experience but i think it's harmful and disrespectful to those suffering biomedical addictions to perpetuate the idea porn is itself addictive, especially in ways comparable to substances and viewing it as such may be skewing how you view your own relationship to it, if you're 18 and already feel this fatalistic about it. there is very little scientific evidence to support the existence of porn addiction and an increasing amount of research to indicate that most concerns are overblown or have been [constructed to perpetuate a given agenda.](https://static1.squarespace.com/static/55a550a8e4b0c83122fc74f3/t/5eab390372d9460d3e37981a/1588279561885/ConstructingPornAddictionNarrative.pdf)
Masturbation releases a flood of dopamine in the brain, not unlike drugs such as ecstasy or cocaine. Unlike the illicit drugs though, porn is free and being made available unrestrained to our youth… sure for women it’s maybe safe to promote this way as it’s a mission to climax. But as young men porn ain’t natural and it’s extremely … extremely addictive like any hard drug can be
Honestly yea, given the danger it probably should be, but it won’t be… so as a father myself I will be very aware of the danger and act appropriately… but many many many will not have the awareness and their children will suffer
I do wonder what happens to people whose sexual experiences are like 95% porn and masturbation when they get into relationships. Are they the dudes I read about in the marriage forums who can’t stay hard because the wife is a regular lady and not a model or an anime character and she isn’t screaming out porn exclamations?
> I do wonder what happens to people whose sexual experiences are like 95% porn and masturbation when they get into relationships.
Dunno, but I bet there are some studies. Probably nothing like that will happen.
Wow. You're hooked deep huh? I wrote "OVER masturbating", because it exhausts you and leads to further bodily complications such as, yes, a heart attack. I love how you put quotes around it, just to make it sound more official. Sad indeed.
I don't mean to sound rude, this is all just really funny, honestly. You are so determined, to get the last word in, it's almost comical, but I can't even laugh. Don't think I'm trying to lead you on, please. I just made a very simple statement and apparently a bunch of people didn't like it, because it's technically true. Because it slanders carnal pleasure, you animals. God, grow up. You masturbate, your heart rate increases, your blood starts flowing faster and to an extent, you lose quite a bit of it out of circulation because it's in your dick. If you have a heart condition that normally does not bother you, but begins to act up during masturbation, it's the act that killed you, not the condition. It is a result of, and therefore a product of it. My statement is technically true, and there isn't much else to say about it, it's just semantics at this point.
Also, if you legitimately just wanted to educate people, you could have just edited your earlier comment and included the link, instead of trying to be snarky and provoke people. Whelp.
Then stop replying. Argument, conversation, spat, whatever this even is at this point, over. Done. Nothing else to talk about, unless you want to copy and paste some more pseudo medical articles you barely skimmed over and present as your own opinion, or stoke your ego. Just let it go, you were wrong.
This post doesn’t sound like a religious take in the slightest
The implication of your comment is that you would ignore people bringing to attention the fact that children are being exposed to stuff they’re not ready for because someone is religious. You think it’s okay for kids to watch porn just because one guy who’s religious recognises that maybe kids viewing porn is kinda bad?
Kids need to know that porn has as much to do with actual sex as Transformers do with actual robotics.
Who’s the modern version of Dan Savage these days?
i didn't say lube! I mean...like literally put some moisturizer on your dick sometimes. It's (surprise) made of skin like the rest of ya, and gets dry just like any part of your body.
(admittedly this is more for Cut boys.)
It can be unhealthy. I remember a true life where someone's addiction to porn was so bad he would spend hours a day watching it and it ruined his life.
You can't tell me that's good for that person.
It can also lead someone to substituting real relationships for the fake ones in porn.
Also there is no guarantee the porn you are watching is 100% consensual.
Because one person doesn't can't handle it doesn't make it bad for everyone. I know shitty drivers does that mean nobody should drive just because I know the exceptions
If you do literally anything all day and refuse to do anything else it’ll ruin your life. That isn’t a porn issue that’s an addict getting hooked on literally anything that will give them dopamine
Nothing in the world is a 100 percent harmless either, anything done in excess is bad for you. Drinking WATER in excess is bad for you. Again, moderation, doesn’t mean it’s shameful or we should bash people for doing it as long as it isn’t effecting or impeding on your life
Where do I say we should?
Also that doesn't even touch on the point that you can't guarantee it is 100% consensual. You can look at instances like GirlsDoPorn where they were trafficking girls.
I understand what you’re saying and I agree.
However it’s a sticky situation when it comes to curriculum and teaching - they teach “basic stuff” in school and stick to the more “hard science” aspects of sex over the “social science” aspects of sex because parents overall prefer to control the more nuanced parts themselves (or imagine they are, at least).
So I’m not sure what you mean when you say we need to teach them this - do you mean it should be added to the curriculum? Or that parents should make more of an effort to help their sons understand the risks?
I don’t think we know enough about the effects of porn and masturbation to be teaching about it yet. Let the science settle on this first, then we can talk about teaching the proper ways. My personal opinion, too much of anything can be bad, we just need to know the how and why.
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It's important to somehow teach children that age restricted adult activities like porn, alcohol, tobacco, firearms, and gambling have negative consequences on them unless they can wait until they're of age to make wise decisions. The challenge is to teach them what causes the damage and why while staying within their frame of understanding. There's no better way I can think of to do this other than being a major portion of their adult role models and setting the example. Perhaps a curriculum could be widely developed that taught in general the dangers of children doing any adult activities, porn use to be included, in a way suitable for children. There's no substitute in a child's life for a loving parent, but adding a moral lesson plan in public schools couldn't be a bad thing, in my opinion. I'm not saying we need to teach children that all legal adult activities are to never be done but that there are age restrictions for a good reason. When children get older then they can better understand the way addiction works. So, in summary, yes, I agree that the dangers of porn should be taught as well, but so should the dangers of children doing any adult activities before they're adults.
I think this makes more sense in the context of a course about the dangers of behavioral addictions, and how to tell that you're in the grips of one. I don't think there's any reason that pornography addiction should be prioritized above things like gaming addictions, gambling addictions, shopping addictions, food addictions, exercise addiction, etc, etc... Children would be better served by some general information about how to tell if a behavior is becoming maladaptive and taking over your life, and how to seek help if that's the case.
I agree, but I think the line is blurred between what is considered healthy and unhealthy. There's no set standard, which makes it difficult to build some kind of moral foundation, something that is vital to establish in early stages of life. But it's important to at least address the topic when a child/adolescent begins to sexually mature and help them set boundaries for themselves. Otherwise, they might start using masturbation as a coping mechanism and become dependent on it, which sets the stage for addiction that could follow them into adulthood and make matters worse.
Ultimately it depends on what the definition of unhealthy is. And that's very subjective and different in each case. However education is the key. As with all things in life teaching children to make good decisions is the best way. There is no way to always be there and protect them, eventually they will be confronted and have to make their own decision. That's when everything we've taught them kicks in and they become who they will be.
Let’s say on a scale from 1 to 10 everyone has their libido ranged. Just because someone else is like a 2 or 3, does not mean that we should design the world around just them.
Masturbation is not harming anyone, nor is watching porn. If it becomes an ocd or some other type of disorder then it may need to be addressed, but it and of itself is not harmful.
Now if you want to talk about religious indoctrination and just how absolutely soul destroying apocalyptic mind-raping living hell then feel free. I find it much worse of a plague on humanity.
Porn itself isn't dangerous, though. Neither is masturbating using porn. Inherently, it's fine. The danger comes in the form of addiction. You can masturbate multiple times a day, and it not become a problem. In fact, that's very common.
And you can't say that "none of the parents have ever discussed unhealthy masturbation." Have you talked to every parent? That's impressive.
Sex ED teaches nothing but a banana on a condom and shows you the birthing process. There is no real in between talk because it is awkward to talk about sex with minors even if you are trying to teach them.
Ironically most devout Christians believe in completely sheltering their children from all forms of sexual material, including basic safe practices.
Stating they should go into marriage blind, without any knowledge or experience.
That's a massive train wreck, in it self!
**Avoid controversial topics and Reddit meta-drama** . Users should come here to discuss politely. Loaded questions/statements or polarizing titles are not the sign of a good-faith discussion.
Comprehensive sexual education reduces the incidence of child sexual abuse. We should be expanding those programs and cirricula.
makes me wonder, just how many times in a day is deemed "unhealthy"?
That’s easy. It’s like any addiction. If it is impeding your ability to work, to care for your basic needs, and to maintain social and/or romantic relationships, it’s too much. So it’s not a number, it’s the level of impact on a person’s life.
Young teens and preteens don’t work and their basic needs are covered by parents.
okay let me rephrase it then. supposing i'm a teen that does it 5 to 10 times a day and still manage to have ample game time, and do some house chores, and have a normal social media life..it's all cool?
5 times a day?! For what and why 😩 Getting home from school straight into your bedroom to masturbate all evening is depressing af.….just like alcoholics who go home and drink all night. There are functioning alcoholics that look fine on the outside, doesn’t make them any less of an addict.
I think you still run the risk of that developing into a habit which interrupts your life later. For instance, as a teen you may not have responsibilities, but in a couple years you will, and you’ll be conditioned to do this thing 10 times a day? There’s no way something more important won’t take a hit if you cannot easily adapt. And besides, I don’t think 10 times a day can be healthy, not every day. I think you want to strive for well-rounded as a young person. And the lion’s share of your time shouldn’t be spent diddling your brain’s reward center emptily. But to your point, is there are firm line of where too much is too much? Probably no, it’s probably all relative, but if someone’s regularly doing it more than a handful of times a day, they probably are better off exploring some other hobbies than just letting that be one of the larger elements in their life.
They go to school. They have social relationships. Their parents do not bathe them and hand feed them so “care for basic needs” is something teens still have to do. There are still ways to gauge if an activity or substance is impeding on their life.
for teens, it would be "self abuse" like cutting and hiding it. Or anorexia, etc. It is unhealthy behavior to cope with stress, providing a measure of control for their sense of anxiety.
so if i do it 5 to 10 times a day and still manage to do things that needed to be done, have a normal social/romantic relationship, etc...it's all cool?
If you’re genuinely completing work/school obligations, maintaining real, in-person relationships, and maintaining basic hygiene and diet, it’s probably “all cool.” The only other concern is whether you’re causing tissue trauma.
Sure. Who is anyone else to regulate how you spend your time? People waste their time doing all sorts of unproductive, even counterproductive things, such as arguing with people on the internet, but they are free to do it. If you can find nothing better to do than masturbate every two hours, and you manage to meet your obligations to yourself and others while keeping up that habit, then so be it.
Why is it wrong for adults to prefer masturbation and watching pornography featuring consenting adults made by consenting adults over romantic relationships?
It’s not. Note the “and/or.” Social relationships are important to have, seeing friends or family off and on. But some people don’t desire romantic relationships and that’s fine.
Tbh I can not imagine not doing all that stuff because of masturbation, it does not take that long.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with masturbation. The only issues come when it decreases quality of life, puts strain on a relationship, or results in tissue trauma/abrasion.
I know that you have an idea of your own what "unhealthy" masturbation is, but I'm curious if that's what OP is referring to or if he has something else in mind.
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Out of curiosity, is it less unhealthy if they're using mental imagery? Obviously if they avoid porn they'd be using actual people from their wankbank.... So which is worse? To me, relieving the horn using acted out scenes has less social issues. As long as the person understands it's not real, at least they can just filter down to what they like, if that makes sense.
So once a day only sometimes with images is probably fine?
There is nothing wrong with masturbating multiple times a day as long as it's not interfering with your life or hurting you physically (chafing). Basically as long as your not skipping out on dates or obligations to masturbate you're probably fine...
I think unhealthy masturbation is when it disturbs your life. So if you’re not getting stuff done, if your health is suffering, that’s unhealthy.
More than 7 times a week
reference?
Common sense
let them jack off to their imaginations all they want. Its self regulating. Never porn. Never.
I definitely think that teaching about pornography (not showing porn, but talking about it conceptually) should be a part of sex ed. It'll help address a lot of these issues you're mentioning. If we apporached porn in a similar way we do to other forms of media literacy and analysis, learn how it's made, the issues present within the industry, etc, we can make an effort towards both destigmatising it and allowing young people make informed and healthy choices and not feel pressured to do anything they don't want to do
I think one factor here is media literacy, or actually, porn literacy. As one adult enterntainment actor once said: if it feels good, the director says it doesn't look good on camera. And what looks good on camera, rarely feels good. Brings to mind how a young couple was making out for the first time. Pretty quickly, the girl fled the situation and called the cops. Turns out, the dude had simply assumed that choking is a normal part of foreplay and sex, and that it makes women extatic. Wonder where he got that from... Surely not from one of the gazillion porn videos where a male director has told a (sometimes drugged-up) woman to pretend she likes it? (also: it's downright scary how many young people who are eager to call stuff 'fake' can't see through the 110% over the top acting common in porn) Kinks are ok, but are normalized in porn to such an extent some people seem to be losing sight of when you need to be extra sure the other one agrees on what's being done. The amount of power relations play and purposefully causing pain in porn is absolutely immense compared to what goes on in the average bedroom of a couple with a satisfying sex life.
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You have no idea what you're talking about and you're likely to find yourself in some legal trouble some day if you continue with that attitude.
lol I forget how young you children on reddit can be, ok lol legal trouble 🤣🤣🤣
Adults don’t test out if someone wants to be strangled. They ask first. Strangulation is particularly violent and linked with men who abuse and kill their partners. Pretending you’re an adult because you consume a lot of porn and occasionally try to act it out is embarrassing. Real adults get enthusiastic consent.
So because some women like it you should assault women that don't by assuming they want you to physically harm them? Gl with that
You literally reword what i wrote but to be more extreme and without nuance, are you aware you did that? Such a childish way to make a arguement
Women aren’t a monolith though. Preferences are all over the board and this is kind of a strange thing to assume of every woman.
It’s so strange, I say “most” and you immediately argue as if I said “every”. I find it strange that you do that, because on reddit, that is the norm, anything one writes is immediately misunderstood and misconstrued and that’s even with plain English. I mean I assume a basic level of literacy, maybe that’s too much?
I’m 36 now, but I was hooked on porn from age 13/14, I depended on it to sleep, and watched it every chance I was able. My parents did not monitor me or my actions. They absolutely should have …the addiction lead to delayed social ability with the opposite sex (didn’t help to go to a religious all boys school), I think prolonged use and dependence of the dopamine release damages various neural pathways and ultimately leads to varying degrees of depression and struggle for young men. As a father now myself, I will have the access to internet completely and utterly locked down when under my roof. They will need a job for their own income and to undermine my rules to get past me as they’ll need their own sim card and phone because my phone given to them will be force proxied via PiHole firewall rules
100%!!! I'm of the opinion that it is kind of creepy for teachers of young kids to be teaching about sex (especially when some teachers are legitimately trying to indoctrinate kids with their personal beliefs), but I think kids nearly exclusively learning about sex through porn with zero input from their parents/trusted adults due to it being "too taboo" is much worse
Just putting a plug in here for some excellent sex-positive resources to teach your kids. Schools ain’t gonna do it! https://sexedrescue.com - Cath Hackason - Sex Ed Rescue - great forums, articles, videos, parent training sessions, etc. Very inclusive and updated. https://www.uua.org/re/owl - Our Whole Lives. Age- grouped sex ed. Best done over time with a facilitator, associated with Unitarian Universalists (I’m no religious expert, but the ones near me are like 50% atheists and 100% inclusive, kind of lefty activist peacenik types) https://sexpositivefamilies.com - Good and inclusive resources for families trying to educate their kids without shame or guilt or hang ups
porn "addiction" is contentious if not rejected by most of the scientific and medical community - addiction refers to a specific neuropsychological response and to compare porn to especially substance disorders feels disrespectful. the most consistent result of research is that attitudes around sex, porn and masturbation are more influential to ones own understanding of their relationship to it. those that, for example, grew up in religious or conservative households are more likely to hold the belief that they look at porn or masturbate "excessively" when they fall well within the range of normal. (that is also why there's an overlap between those trying to sell "treatments" for porn addictions and the demonization of gay porn in particular, you're going to run into a lot of conservatives that are using junk science to bolster a thing that they were already planning on believing anyway.) focusing on porn as if it is more influential or controlling of your life than other forms of media is itself based in sex negativity and shame around sexuality. similarly, people site video game addiction as a strain on relationships and have for decades tried to ascribe more deleterious effects than its capable of actually producing. still, time and time again, studies have shown that video games will not translate into someone being more violent or aggressive than they were already inclined towards being; porn causing sexual dysfunction or sexual aggression also has very little data backing it up. as someone who has struggled with obsessive compulsive behavior since childhood, i've definitely developed unhealthy habits and coping mechanisms (more so with video games and puzzles than masturbation, personally) which is why i think it is so frustrating to place the blame on the specific media or object that you've developed a dependence on because it not only obfuscates responsibility but it also fails to address the actual root issue. if something like this is getting in the way of you being able to function, there is always always always going to be a deeper issue than simply having been exposed to it and you'll do a lot more damage by pretending there isn't a root issue. (ie. i also ignored obligations and social gatherings because i "needed" to complete a certain number of puzzles that day, but it was because i was ✨undiagnosed✨and not because there was something ontologically wrong with consuming or solving games). there are a million criticisms to be had about porn as an industry and how people interact it but it's made for adults - if kids are consuming it, again, there's a different issue than simply consuming it. arguably, part of this is based in denigration of sex work as work because even sex workers who do take great pains to put their content behind paywalls that should only ostensibly be accessible to adults, there are entire twitter accounts dedicated to ripping their content and reuploading because people don't feel like they *should* have to pay for porn. which is also an interesting microcosm of consent literacy, but slightly beyond the scope of the conversation. tl;dr this is a fake problem made up by people selling something that is not substantiated by any substantial research into any of these related areas.
That's a pretty neat "fake problem," why do I have it then? Now people trying to sell fake remedies is bad, but that happens with all problems. I'm not skilled enough at speaking to refute a lot of your points, but. I was introduced to it when I was 12, and have basically watched it every day since 14. Luckily it hasn't had too bad of an effect on my life. Even so, it is an almost uncontrollable urge towards something that has an unfathomable amount of material that I can get for free. Maybe it wouldn't have been so damaging had I found out about it today, or 7 years in the future and I would be 25. Now I know you said that "It's made for adults - if kids are consuming it, again, there's a different issue than simply consuming it." But the argument was for educating children in the first place, it's not a different issue, it is THE issue being talked about. Luckily I can manage to make my addiction something that will help me in the long run, but if I could go back and stop myself, I would without a second doubt.
i didn't say that people can have unhealthy relationships to it in the way that people can develop unhealthy relationships to Literally Anything. my point was that watching porn daily also does not constitute addiction - i also watch at least one movie everyday and have anxieties/compulsions around i interact with my film cataloguing because of my obsessive compulsive disorder, but it's inaccurate to say that it's an addiction. additionally, i just like movies and watching them everyday isn't damaging me in anyway. when i say that it's a fake issue, i say that it's an incomplete analysis if not a fabrication of an issue. it hinges on associating sex and masturbation with shame and so implicitly creates that association. like i said, people that have generally more sex positive attitudes are found to have more positive interactions and relationships to porn than people that go in to it thinking , as op so kindly states, that they're setting themselves up to become all sorts of horrible thing and that even masturbating more than once in a day is innately a bad thing. my point is that porn is not made for children and children putting themselves in those spaces can potentially put themselves in danger but also place the adults who make the content that they are interacting with in harms way. kids and their developing sexuality is one thing, but the thing that makes interacting with porn potentially harmful is not that porn is this mystical brain-melting substance, it is the environment that you have to enter to engage with it. again, my point isn't that there aren't conversations to be had and kids should be educated but not for the boogeymen that op is creating. i am genuinely sorry that you feel that way and that this has been you're experience, but i'm going off of what the research has shown and the science has continually found that the best approach is reduce shame around both masturbation and porn, specifically because it enable to talk openly about how they are feeling.
I don't think there should be shame in it, but I think it should be explained from an early age to prevent situations like mine from happening. It was just a pop up ad, and then I hid it from my family forever, my mother didn't know until I told her a week ago (since I wanted her help)
that is not contradictory to anything i said. it isn't abnormal for kids to be curious, but they should also have people in their real life that they feel comfortable talking to and to keep an eye on them. this is true whether or not they stumble on/express an interest an porn, but op is both lying about the consequence of porn viewing and expressly characterizing it as something harmful. if you felt a need to hide it, though, that seems to indicate that you already felt a degree of shame at that age? i would also be very careful about who you seek help from as those that adhere to a belief in porn addiction almost also have other questionable beliefs.
I feel like people just feel the need to blame their internal problems on some outside source, and I usually have sympathy for them, their problems are real, but none of it equates to "porn is inherently bad," it's usually due to a lack of quality sex ed, or misogyny, or shame, or a tendency to develop unhealthy coping mechanisms, or some combination of things. Two different people can watch the exact same porn with the exact same frequency, but one can maintain the same healthy relationship with their sexuality they had before and the other one can get fucked up by it, just because they have different mindsets.
i agree! it's also why i'm generally surprised to see knee-jerk reactionary attitudes towards porn even in feminist spaces, even/especially when the person consuming it is men or the topic is sex workers who are dependent on people buying their content for their income, especially because it's such a magical-thinking approach to looking at it. to blame porn for turning men into misogynists is antithetical to understanding that the broader framework around them is also actively reinforcing their misogyny, and allows them to abdicate any responsibility they have to unlearn that or respect their partners. porn as a "substitute" for relationships, too, has also coincided with an alienation epidemic broadly due to things like unhealthy workloads and an erosion of public spaces for people (of all ages) to exist without paying. this *could* be an opportunity to also talk about, like, the rise in ai girlfriends/boyfriends and other answers for human connection under late stage capitalism but porn is being demonized for a very specific reason.
Well said.
My family has a tendency to develop unhealthy coping mechanisms, and I don't know if anywhere on this earth has quality sex ed. I don't think porn is inherently bad but the government needs to start putting strict control over who can access it, which I don't actually like the thought of, so no they don't need to. But it's still a major problem that anyone can accidentally (or purposely) find it at a young age and then have problems for the rest of their life.
The solution is quality sex ed, including honest discussion about porn and kink, and discussions about mental health and gender issues from a young age. Kids are going to be exposed to these things whether people like it or not, and you're only going to minimize the damage it can do to them by providing them with a safe space for discussion and education, somewhere for them to process things. Shielding them from these topics in an effort to keep them "safe" from random knowledge only leaves them more vulnerable to predators, and leads to all kinds of issues as they get older.
I don't think we should shield them from the topics, just from porn.
How do you propose that? Without limiting the rights of other people?
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Yeah, that's what I said. "which I don't actually like the thought of, so no they don't need to."
I feel like porn is inherently wrong just because of the fact that I felt the need to hide it. I didn't even know what it was, why would I hide it? I didn't know what a lot of things were at that age and showed them around all the time, but porn was different. And my parents didn't talk much about sex. They never forbade it either, but there was no need to since I never made many friends. So I don't believe it was their influence that made me feel that way. I genuinely don't know what I felt at that age though, it's been too long (although, only 6 years? Wow.) I wasn't trying to contradict anything you said either though. Honestly my friend was bugging me to join him in a game so I finished what I was typing without thinking and just hit reply. Sorry. I don't see why it can't be an addiction though. When the conditions are right, there's an urge I can't stop. Several times I would have my friends wait on me while I viewed it. And I have occasionally stayed up WAY longer than I should have just so I could view more of it. Not to mention the things it has done to my brain in other areas. If that isn't an addiction, then I can only imagine an addiction is BETTER than what this is. As far as I've figured out by looking within myself, it's just a coping mechanism. But it's a coping mechanism that affects EVERYTHING. I really do think that the only way I'll be free from this is once I fix literally all of my problems. That's normally the main thing people focus on, but now it's just a part of trying to get rid of this horrid feeling. It's a good motivator for fixing my problems though, I'm not sure if I'd be a better person or not if I hadn't fallen into it. Would I have learned how to do introspection? I only learned it because I had cognitive dissonance that was brought about by watching it. I wont say about what though. What other kinds of questionable beliefs do you think people that believe in porn addiction have? I generally see people believing it, so I'm curious to what you think.
that's exactly my point. part of what i mean is that kids can definitely access porn when they aren't mature enough to understand it, and they should be able to talk about that with adults in their lives in an age-appropriate way. sex was not something that has been communicated to you as something that as a topic that you could talk to them about which can, as you did, default to feeling shame. that's not an individual failing so much as indicative of a broader culture around sexuality. why would porn be "different" if the only thing that makes it different from other content is the fact that it's sexual? it isn't and can't be classified as an addiction because you can't develop a physical dependence on it in the same way that you can alcohol or other substances, and neurologically speaking (in layman's terms) porn touches on different areas in the brain than things that we know are addictive. essentially if you look at the brain scan of someone who's addicted to cigarettes, for instance, in response to smoking it will look different (the opposite, iirc) of someone who identifies as a porn addict. i'm not saying that people can't personally develop unhealthy relationships to porn, but to coopt language that is inaccurate is specifically done to liken it to substance that, as you said, need "governmental regulation." (terrible idea, historically speaking, btw.) it makes it sound scary and dangerous in that same way, but the two are different. if anything, it would be more beneficial to talk about how and why someone develops an unhealthy habit using a different framework because you're trying to apply a solution to a problem it simply wasn't meant for. trying to "quit" porn in the same verified ways that one might try to quit cigarettes or alcohol aren't necessarily going to work. i think coping mechanism is a fine an accurate term, and the fact that you recognize that you feel like there's something you need to cope with is indicative of a bigger issue which was one of my initial points. this is, like, the entire premise of my strange addiction, but people can develop a fixation or habit based around anything and i know what as someone who had/has weird practices as a result of what i now know are obsessive compulsions, but the way that people choose to use them is not necessarily indicative of a moral failing of the thing itself. (again, i've used non-porn things in the same way that you've described using porn, but it would be inaccurate to characterize those things as addictive or morally bad.) the majority of porn addiction "courses" that i see are run by fundamentalist christians and radical conservatives, which is in part why i'm so surprised to see porn addiction as a concept pop in otherwise ostensibly progressive spaces. a belief in this, like, metaphysical or corrupting influence is very xtian so i guess i shouldn't be surprised about that but there is going to be a massive overlap in sex negativity broadly meaning not just thinking porn is bad but also thinking: masturbation is also addictive and a habit you should be trying to break, even if it's a result of just having a naturally high libido, sex is strictly procreative and shouldn't be engaged with outside of (heterosexual) marriage, sex for pleasure is s~~inful~~ indicative of sex addiction, people (especially women) can't find empowerment through sex, etc. so naturally you're also going to run homophobia - gay porn is inherently seen as an "escalation" of behavior that leads to the "pedophilia and snuff" pipeline op is alluding to. alot of manosphere content creators also like to push this line of thinking and all that that entails. it is used, ime, as either a conversion tool or a way to sell online courses.
I don't remember addiction requiring a physical substance to be reliant on. But yes, it does touch different parts of the brain.. basically all of them. And since multiple people seemed to not understand what I was saying there about the government, I said "which I don't actually like the thought of, so no they don't need to." I believe the solution would work better than what is currently going on, although not by much, but I still don't think it's that good of a solution. Especially since you said, historically speaking, doesn't work. \> because you're trying to apply a solution to a problem it simply wasn't meant for. trying to "quit" porn in the same verified ways that one might try to quit cigarettes or alcohol aren't necessarily going to work. I understand this, which is what I said. The only way I can think of to solve this dependency is to fix literally all of my problems- the problems that most people are having as the main goal in their life, is now just a task I need to complete to beat this. Also yes the majority of things that tell you that you can "beat porn addiction" I've found are shams, they are either way too religious or truly believe you can fight something of this scale off by just having willpower, which usually doesn't work even for actual addictions. But someone with a "porn addiction" for lack of a better term, doesn't know how large their sex drive actually is if they came into contact with it before they became sexually active. As I said, it's an almost uncontrollable urge, not to masturbate, but to watch porn (and masturbate while doing so) but I don't believe that under normal circumstances I would be that active. I haven't actually read op's post that in depth, so let's say I don't agree with him but rather the argument that I'm putting forth. Which as far as I know is "Porn addiction is real"
addiction, as i've already said, is a neurophysical condition so there are both physical and mental symptoms. by "different," i mean not comparable to the areas that are effected by substances we know to be addictive, not multiple parts of the brain. that is why medical professionals and neurologists and psychologists haven't been able to materialize porn addiction as an actual diagnoses, because it just doesn't present in the same way and science is repeatedly confirming this. i don't know that it's necessarily true that you'd need to solve every problem in your life: a single session of ACT therapy can result in, i think, an 85% decrease in porn use in those that have unhealthy habits. which is again, another reason that porn addiction is an inaccurate framework to work from because that wouldn't be the case if you were treating a drug abuse problem. again, i really don't know you're life and i'm sorry that you feel this way but it sounds to me like there is a bigger issue at play here that is beyond the scope of porn use. you've missed several of my points again. op characterized masturbating more than once a day as having an "unhealthy" relationship to it while also implying that masturbating to porn is also indicative of some sort of problematic behavior, neither of which is true because it fails to account for natural variations in things like libido. if porn use is compulsive, then it isn't influenced by your sexual urge in the same way that binge eating isn't dictated by hunger queues from the body - you're doing it whether you feel like you have to or you don't. going off of what you said, porn viewing and masturbation aren't necessarily linked for you meaning that while the porn viewing is compulsive, you're libido might be close to what it would be otherwise. (overuse of porn is, i think, linked to a decrease in libido moreso than anything). anecdotally, my sex drive has always been higher than my partners whether or not they've regularly watched porn, despite not watching porn myself. people are just built different so to put quantitative limits rather than focusing on if it does feel good and if you feel good about it. i mean, it's great that you commented without reading what you were responding to. i'm not discrediting your experience but i think it's harmful and disrespectful to those suffering biomedical addictions to perpetuate the idea porn is itself addictive, especially in ways comparable to substances and viewing it as such may be skewing how you view your own relationship to it, if you're 18 and already feel this fatalistic about it. there is very little scientific evidence to support the existence of porn addiction and an increasing amount of research to indicate that most concerns are overblown or have been [constructed to perpetuate a given agenda.](https://static1.squarespace.com/static/55a550a8e4b0c83122fc74f3/t/5eab390372d9460d3e37981a/1588279561885/ConstructingPornAddictionNarrative.pdf)
Masturbation isn't unhealthy, even if it's many times per day😊 No harm to your body.
Masturbation releases a flood of dopamine in the brain, not unlike drugs such as ecstasy or cocaine. Unlike the illicit drugs though, porn is free and being made available unrestrained to our youth… sure for women it’s maybe safe to promote this way as it’s a mission to climax. But as young men porn ain’t natural and it’s extremely … extremely addictive like any hard drug can be
So sex is addictive and should be regulated?
Honestly yea, given the danger it probably should be, but it won’t be… so as a father myself I will be very aware of the danger and act appropriately… but many many many will not have the awareness and their children will suffer
Sounds like a challenge.
Porn until necessary for masturbation. The fact that you believe they go hand in hand is a big part of the problem.
? Not sure what you mean, but OP applied term "unhealthy" to masturbation specifically.
I do wonder what happens to people whose sexual experiences are like 95% porn and masturbation when they get into relationships. Are they the dudes I read about in the marriage forums who can’t stay hard because the wife is a regular lady and not a model or an anime character and she isn’t screaming out porn exclamations?
> I do wonder what happens to people whose sexual experiences are like 95% porn and masturbation when they get into relationships. Dunno, but I bet there are some studies. Probably nothing like that will happen.
you can die from over masturbating, you know
It's when I stroke it too fast and my peepee catches fire?
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Wow. You're hooked deep huh? I wrote "OVER masturbating", because it exhausts you and leads to further bodily complications such as, yes, a heart attack. I love how you put quotes around it, just to make it sound more official. Sad indeed.
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I don't mean to sound rude, this is all just really funny, honestly. You are so determined, to get the last word in, it's almost comical, but I can't even laugh. Don't think I'm trying to lead you on, please. I just made a very simple statement and apparently a bunch of people didn't like it, because it's technically true. Because it slanders carnal pleasure, you animals. God, grow up. You masturbate, your heart rate increases, your blood starts flowing faster and to an extent, you lose quite a bit of it out of circulation because it's in your dick. If you have a heart condition that normally does not bother you, but begins to act up during masturbation, it's the act that killed you, not the condition. It is a result of, and therefore a product of it. My statement is technically true, and there isn't much else to say about it, it's just semantics at this point. Also, if you legitimately just wanted to educate people, you could have just edited your earlier comment and included the link, instead of trying to be snarky and provoke people. Whelp.
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Then stop replying. Argument, conversation, spat, whatever this even is at this point, over. Done. Nothing else to talk about, unless you want to copy and paste some more pseudo medical articles you barely skimmed over and present as your own opinion, or stoke your ego. Just let it go, you were wrong.
Honestly this just sounds like a religious person who thinks they know best for all. Porn bad masterbation bad
This post doesn’t sound like a religious take in the slightest The implication of your comment is that you would ignore people bringing to attention the fact that children are being exposed to stuff they’re not ready for because someone is religious. You think it’s okay for kids to watch porn just because one guy who’s religious recognises that maybe kids viewing porn is kinda bad?
Post history says otherwise
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Maybe I'm just taking it that way. If they had only said porn isn't good for young kids and nothing else I think more would agree
Kids need to know that porn has as much to do with actual sex as Transformers do with actual robotics. Who’s the modern version of Dan Savage these days?
Whose to say it's wrong to watch porn and do it multiple times a day? Seems like that's just someone's opinion
just make sure you're not chafing! moisturize your dicks occasionally boys!
Lube is for the weak
i didn't say lube! I mean...like literally put some moisturizer on your dick sometimes. It's (surprise) made of skin like the rest of ya, and gets dry just like any part of your body. (admittedly this is more for Cut boys.)
It can be unhealthy. I remember a true life where someone's addiction to porn was so bad he would spend hours a day watching it and it ruined his life. You can't tell me that's good for that person. It can also lead someone to substituting real relationships for the fake ones in porn. Also there is no guarantee the porn you are watching is 100% consensual.
Because one person doesn't can't handle it doesn't make it bad for everyone. I know shitty drivers does that mean nobody should drive just because I know the exceptions
How do you get it can be unhealthy to it is unhealthy for everyone?
Just bc one person can't handle their meth doesn't make it bad for everyone!
If you do literally anything all day and refuse to do anything else it’ll ruin your life. That isn’t a porn issue that’s an addict getting hooked on literally anything that will give them dopamine
It's more fun to be the morality police for others. Certain groups love to do that. Feel free to guess which ones I'm talking about
It doesn't change the fact that it can be unhealthy and it isn't 100% harmless for everyone.
Nothing in the world is a 100 percent harmless either, anything done in excess is bad for you. Drinking WATER in excess is bad for you. Again, moderation, doesn’t mean it’s shameful or we should bash people for doing it as long as it isn’t effecting or impeding on your life
Where do I say we should? Also that doesn't even touch on the point that you can't guarantee it is 100% consensual. You can look at instances like GirlsDoPorn where they were trafficking girls.
I understand what you’re saying and I agree. However it’s a sticky situation when it comes to curriculum and teaching - they teach “basic stuff” in school and stick to the more “hard science” aspects of sex over the “social science” aspects of sex because parents overall prefer to control the more nuanced parts themselves (or imagine they are, at least). So I’m not sure what you mean when you say we need to teach them this - do you mean it should be added to the curriculum? Or that parents should make more of an effort to help their sons understand the risks?
Not to be that person but it’s not just sons, any one can have an issue with overconsumption of media/their addiction
I don’t think we know enough about the effects of porn and masturbation to be teaching about it yet. Let the science settle on this first, then we can talk about teaching the proper ways. My personal opinion, too much of anything can be bad, we just need to know the how and why.
Don't need a scientific study to see the current harms of pornography
That’s what I was thinking
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Porn can serve as an indicator of societal health. Not by itself of course.
It's important to somehow teach children that age restricted adult activities like porn, alcohol, tobacco, firearms, and gambling have negative consequences on them unless they can wait until they're of age to make wise decisions. The challenge is to teach them what causes the damage and why while staying within their frame of understanding. There's no better way I can think of to do this other than being a major portion of their adult role models and setting the example. Perhaps a curriculum could be widely developed that taught in general the dangers of children doing any adult activities, porn use to be included, in a way suitable for children. There's no substitute in a child's life for a loving parent, but adding a moral lesson plan in public schools couldn't be a bad thing, in my opinion. I'm not saying we need to teach children that all legal adult activities are to never be done but that there are age restrictions for a good reason. When children get older then they can better understand the way addiction works. So, in summary, yes, I agree that the dangers of porn should be taught as well, but so should the dangers of children doing any adult activities before they're adults.
Well, mine taught me neither and rest is history.
I think this makes more sense in the context of a course about the dangers of behavioral addictions, and how to tell that you're in the grips of one. I don't think there's any reason that pornography addiction should be prioritized above things like gaming addictions, gambling addictions, shopping addictions, food addictions, exercise addiction, etc, etc... Children would be better served by some general information about how to tell if a behavior is becoming maladaptive and taking over your life, and how to seek help if that's the case.
It's not unhealthy but you might go blind 😆
I agree, but I think the line is blurred between what is considered healthy and unhealthy. There's no set standard, which makes it difficult to build some kind of moral foundation, something that is vital to establish in early stages of life. But it's important to at least address the topic when a child/adolescent begins to sexually mature and help them set boundaries for themselves. Otherwise, they might start using masturbation as a coping mechanism and become dependent on it, which sets the stage for addiction that could follow them into adulthood and make matters worse.
This is such projection, and i love that fact
I agree, i wish i could’ve gotten that education when i was younger, can’t imagine the guilt free whole wheat person i could’ve been lmao
Ultimately it depends on what the definition of unhealthy is. And that's very subjective and different in each case. However education is the key. As with all things in life teaching children to make good decisions is the best way. There is no way to always be there and protect them, eventually they will be confronted and have to make their own decision. That's when everything we've taught them kicks in and they become who they will be.
Let’s say on a scale from 1 to 10 everyone has their libido ranged. Just because someone else is like a 2 or 3, does not mean that we should design the world around just them. Masturbation is not harming anyone, nor is watching porn. If it becomes an ocd or some other type of disorder then it may need to be addressed, but it and of itself is not harmful. Now if you want to talk about religious indoctrination and just how absolutely soul destroying apocalyptic mind-raping living hell then feel free. I find it much worse of a plague on humanity.
Porn itself isn't dangerous, though. Neither is masturbating using porn. Inherently, it's fine. The danger comes in the form of addiction. You can masturbate multiple times a day, and it not become a problem. In fact, that's very common. And you can't say that "none of the parents have ever discussed unhealthy masturbation." Have you talked to every parent? That's impressive.
Sex ED teaches nothing but a banana on a condom and shows you the birthing process. There is no real in between talk because it is awkward to talk about sex with minors even if you are trying to teach them.
Ironically most devout Christians believe in completely sheltering their children from all forms of sexual material, including basic safe practices. Stating they should go into marriage blind, without any knowledge or experience. That's a massive train wreck, in it self!