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The "Sex" 'urge': Fact or Fallacy?


vega57

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She's right though. Even I found that confusing.

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7 minutes ago, Telecaster68 said:
13 minutes ago, Autumn Season said:

I'd say it's still possible to mess up though. See Serran's example with the dogs.

That just proves the instinct point though - the instinct is so strong, they'll have a go with anything. A dog that had no interest in attempting to shag anything is far less likely to have offspring than one who tries to shag everything.

But that's an impulse for sexual pleasure isn't it? That's not an instinct to copulate.

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Telecaster68
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But that's an impulse for sexual pleasure isn't it? That's not an instinct to copulate.


 

Not being a labrador, I don't know. But from what I know about animal brains, they see a thing that seems to function in a certain way and they're more or less hard wired to react in a certain way. Cats jump on string because it's similar to snakes/rats tails, for instance, or chase LED lights because they move like mice. Something about a cushion clearly looks like the back end of female dog to the male dog in this example, and instinct takes over.

 

They may then discover the feeling is pleasurable, and continue to do it out of a mixture of instinct and desire for pleasure, I guess.

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1 minute ago, Telecaster68 said:

Not being a labrador, I don't know. But from what I know about animal brains, they see a thing that seems to function in a certain way and they're more or less hard wired to react in a certain way. Cats jump on string because it's similar to snakes/rats tails, for instance, or chase LED lights because they move like mice. Something about a cushion clearly looks like the back end of female dog to the male dog in this example, and instinct takes over.

But humans aren't generally hardwired like that beyond the primitive reflexes, right?

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Telecaster68

I'd say we have the primitive reflex to shag, but then we're socialised so we don't just jump on passing pedestrians (whatever some of AVEN thinks...). But then put us in a situation where the rules we've learned mean we can get sexual, and the instinct is still there to guide us to at least PIV.

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10 minutes ago, BionicPi said:

But that's an impulse for sexual pleasure isn't it? That's not an instinct to copulate.

 It is better described as a drive, rather than an impulse.

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It seems pretty clear to me why an asexual wouldn't experience an innate desire for sex - that's essentially what it means to be asexual, at least in my eyes. The fact that asexual people exist doesn't necessarily imply that the desire for sex is a learned behavior for everyone else, so... I have to say, I'm not really sure what the argument is here.

 

Personally, I think sexuality is probably a complex trait with influence from both genetics and the environment. I believe the general drive to be sexually active is innate for many people, but cultural ideas and norms about sex are learned. Even if it could be shown to be a fully learned behavior, though, I don't see why that would be a problem - I don't think there's anything inherently wrong or lesser about being sexual. I am concerned that some asexuals are motivated to argue that sexual desire isn't innate because they view themselves as being more enlightened and "evolved" than sexual people, which is the definition of asexual elitism. I hope that isn't what's happening in this thread, but unfortunately, it seems to be a fairly common view on AVEN.

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20 hours ago, vega57 said:

I also have a vagina, Ficto.  The less I masturbate, the less I want orgasms.  Either through 'sex' or masturbation. 

How many of my responses have you actually read in this thread? I've been saying because there are people like me (and lots of us) that disproves the theory posed in your original quote (that the urge for sex is self inflicted). Just because it's different for YOU doesn't mean the way you experience it applies to all of humanity.

 

Keep in mind I was identifying as ace for ages (which is how I ended up on AVEN) because for the first 27 years of my life I had absolutely no desire for partnered sex (despite having masturbated since age 2, and having forced myself to have sex many times as an adult even though I didn't want or enjoy it, I just did it to try to fit in and to please my sexual partner and it sucked, I never enjoyed or wanted a second of the sex I had, despite being someone who masturbates and knows how to orgasm etc). It wasn't until I started exploring different forms of sex with guys online (at the age of 27!) that something inside me 'woke up' and I started actually to actively desire to screw. 

 

Partnered sex feels amazing, physically and emotionally (the emotional aspect is a lot more important for many people) which is why many people still do it even when reproduction isn't necessary/possible/wanted. That's it. The urge pushes us to seek it (or at least desire it) to experience those feelings of being wanted and desired and to experience that total vulnerability with another person. That's why people still do it even if they aren't planning on making a baby. Even people having arousal issues unable to get erections etc often still want sex because they enjoy it so much and have an innate urge to seek it, that's why viagra is so popular (and if they could design one for women, that would be popular too, I know I'd take it for stronger and more orgasms with a partner)

 

I love having sex online when I have a partner (in a distance relationship) because of the emotions (and hormones) that are created when you orgasm WITH the other person. You both masturbate at the same time and explain what you're doing and thinking and feeling to each other in the process (with pics as well of course). Plus it makes the orgasm heaps stronger, just knowing they are getting off as well, and getting off on you getting off. It's the urge to seek that emotional pleasure of shared intimacy that drives me to do that with my partner, because those emotions feel so good. Otherwise it would be easier and quicker to just masturbate on my own and I'd get the same result (an orgasm). But it's not just the orgasm I'm after, it's the emotional fulfillment that shared intimacy brings for both me and my partner and you can't get that from masturbating alone.

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18 hours ago, vega57 said:

Umm....Barbie and Ken were not exactly...anatomically 'correct'.  Ken didn't have a penis, and Barbie was...well...you KNOW that Barbie didn't exactly have nipples or a vagina! 

Well Barbie and Ken were actually what I used when I started masturbating, I remember it very clearly even though I was super young. I knew that when I rocked on the ground it felt good 'down there' so I assumed Barbie and Ken must feel the same in their privates so I'd push them together so they could both have that pleasure while I rocked on the ground and weirdly that got me off. I knew how bodies were meant to look because I'd looked at the pics in my grandma's medical books and I just figured those parts were too difficult to mold into plastic so just imagined them being there. Despite that, I had no desire to have partnered sex myself once I reached adult age and never enjoyed it when I did have it, but I always had a knowledge from a very young age that grown ups could press those parts together to feel good. It made a lot of sense to me as a kid, and I didn't have TV or anything like that, this was all my own deduction and reasoning from a young age. I did always have an underlying desire for a type of deep emotional intimacy that I just wasn't getting through 'regular' sex as an adult (ie PiV) and it's not until I found other forms of sex that I became 'sexually awakened' and could finally enjoy the sexual intimacy I'd had an underlying desire for without fully realising it. I am driven by the desire to seek that pleasure and intimacy when in love, but it doesn't actually have anything to do with my own genitals being penetrated by a male (despite the fact that adore c*ck) which is why to me it so clearly goes beyond anything I could have learned or been taught. It was something innate that drove me to keep exploring until I could have those emotional desires fulfilled and with that came heightened sexual pleasure as well. PiV never met that urge for me, but there are other forms of sex that really 'hit all the right spots'. For many sexual people it's a lot more straight forward, but it's still an innate urge to experience that sexual and/or emotional pleasure that causes them to start seeking that in first place. Like I said earlier, the urge to masturbate is already there naturally for many people (whether ace or not) but for most sexuals that urge can be directed at other people for varying reasons (both sexual and emotional).  

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NoLongerActive1234
18 hours ago, vega57 said:

Misty, please indulge me for a moment. 

 

WHY do you believe that the sex urge is innate? 

I already said what I think pretty much from my first post in here especially. I have also stated that it differs from person to person.

Don't have anything more to add at this point really so I won't indulge you, there are people here who are better at this kind of stuff than me so I'll just support their arguments by liking and I leave it to them. 

 

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Telecaster68

Vega, again... 

 

Beyond 'I just don't believe it', why do you think it isn't innate? 

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2 hours ago, Telecaster68 said:

Vega, again... 

 

Beyond 'I just don't believe it', why do you think it isn't innate? 

Tele, I will answer your question.  I promise.  But I can't answer it now, as I have to take a neighbor to church in about 45 minutes, and we'll be gone for about an hour.  After that I have a few other errands I have to run for my mom. 

 

But I will respond today. 

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3 hours ago, MistySpring said:

I already said what I think pretty much from my first post in here especially. I have also stated that it differs from person to person.

Don't have anything more to add at this point really so I won't indulge you, there are people here who are better at this kind of stuff than me so I'll just support their arguments by liking and I leave it to them. 

 

Sorry Misty, but I must have missed what you wrote earlier.  I'll look for your response a little later today.

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10 hours ago, Telecaster68 said:

Vega, again... 

 

Beyond 'I just don't believe it', why do you think it isn't innate? 

Sexual desire a.k.a the sex ‘urge’ is a combination of several different components, largely made up of the physical and psychological. 

Physical.  Most of us possess the physical ‘equipment’ to have sex.  Most women have a vagina.  Most men have a penis.  In most cases, the equipment ‘works’.  That is, if a man can ‘get it up’, he can probably have sex.   But possessing the equipment for sex doesn’t mean that we automatically, ‘innately’ or ‘instinctively’ know what it’s for.  A man can get an erection, but that doesn’t mean that his body ‘innately’ wants to desire sex, especially for reproduction. Kind of like, nature’s way of saying, “I’m here if you want to use me.”  As I explained earlier, many women can and do become aroused at times when biologically, they can NOT become pregnant, such as, when they’re already pregnant or during menopause. 

Also, physical arousal can wax and wane throughout a person’s life, which I tried to point out in my first post.  For many, it seems that the less they have sex (along with orgasms), the less they want it.  It suggests to me that libido can be ‘controlled’ by the individual, and is not some out-of-control ‘monster’ that needs constant feeding.  Some people will state that their libido needs constant feeding, but that’s only because they have chosen to constantly feed it. 

Psychological.   If we cultured a man and woman away from each other, without any outside influence about sex around, and then brought them together, they wouldn’t instinctively know what to do.  Many modern sexologists agree on this, and more and more research is being conducted daily. 

More on the sex “urge” or “sexual desire” from The Hite Report:  A Nationwide Study on Female Sexuality: 

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What is “sex drive”? Lester A. Kirkendall, in “Towards a Clarification of the Concept of Male Sex Drive,” says:

As the term “sex drive” is now used, it has become a blanket term which obscures the components with which we are actually dealing. We should distinguish between sexual capacity, sexual performance, and sexual drive … that is, what you can do, what you do do, and what you want to do.2 Kirkendall explains that although capacity (“what you can do”) has a biological base, sex drive (“what you want to do”) “seems to be very largely a psychologically conditioned component … Sex drive seems to vary considerably from individual to individual, and from time to time in the same individual, and these variations seem related to psychological factors.” In other words, sex drive (not capacity) is more a function of desires than “needs.”* A further point along this line is that even if a man has a strong physical desire for orgasm – an erection, for example – there is nothing in nature, nothing physical, that impels him to have that orgasm in a vagina. The stimulation he feels is linked to the desire for orgasm, and not to any desire for intercourse per se. The physical “urge” a man feels is a desire for further stimulation of the penis, or for orgasm – not a desire to penetrate a woman’s vagina. There is no “beeper” or sensory device on his penis that makes him seek a vagina in which to put his penis. This pleasurable connection is learned, not innate; as mentioned earlier, even chimpanzees must learn to have intercourse, although they masturbate on their own from early childhood. The definition of male sexuality as being “instinctively” drawn to heterosexual intercourse is only another example of the way we define sexuality as reproductive activity.

 

The above quote is about as close to my thinking as I can share with you. 

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Telecaster68
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But possessing the equipment for sex doesn’t mean that we automatically, ‘innately’ or ‘instinctively’ know what it’s for. 

You're right. But it doesn't mean we don't innately know about it. Just that having sex organs isn't the cause.

 

When you consider that all but the most primitive organisms reproduce asexually, that none except humans have much in the way of 'culture', and certainly none has any symbolic culture like books or films, then it's clear knowing how to have sex has to be innate to them. I'm not going to go into the evolutionary mechanisms again, which is where I and others have cited evidence and made a logical argument - my point is that clearly, species do just know, and I don't see any reason humans would be different.
 

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 For many, it seems that the less they have sex (along with orgasms), the less they want it.  

 

 

 

Again, this is just an assertion. Sources, please.

 

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It suggests to me that libido can be ‘controlled’ by the individual, and is not some out-of-control ‘monster’ that needs constant feeding. 

 

 

 

Everyone on this thread who actually has a libido has more knowledge than you on this. It's no more out of control than hunger for food, but it is that strong, and that instinctive.
 

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Some people will state that their libido needs constant feeding, but that’s only because they have chosen to constantly feed it. 

 

 

 

You might as well assert that some people say their stomach constantly needs feeding, and if they simply choose not to feed it they'd stop feeling hungry.

 

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If we cultured a man and woman away from each other, without any outside influence about sex around, and then brought them together, they wouldn’t instinctively know what to do.  Many modern sexologists agree on this, and more and more research is being conducted daily. 

You're going to have to source this. I disagree completely, and hand waving in the direction of 'many modern sexologists' just isn't good enough.

 

Modern? Really? Lester A Kirkendall was born in 1903, first started teaching in 1928, and retired in 1969, which means that quote is probably at least 50 years old.  The quote about chimps is the only bit that shows a glimmer of being more than opinion - what's the research on that?

 

About the only thing I could find about his attitudes short of piling through a load of 50-year-old sociology papers is actually in the responses to this quiz on Buzzfeed (choose an answer at random, and the page displays what he says about each question). He was very much a man of his time, and is hardly ever cited now (I checked on Google Scholar). Obviously none of this means he's wrong, but you're leaning heavily on the work of a man who thought premarital sex and homosexuality were to be discouraged, and I doubt would've had much truck with asexuality.

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It's really simple to answer this. It's fact. Just you can't help but get hungry for food, you can't help getting hungry for sex. Research completed  

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8 hours ago, Telecaster68 said:

You're right. But it doesn't mean we don't innately know about it. Just that having sex organs isn't the cause.

It doesn't mean it does we do innately know about it, either. 

 

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When you consider that all but the most primitive organisms reproduce asexually, that none except humans have much in the way of 'culture', and certainly none has any symbolic culture like books or films, then it's clear knowing how to have sex has to be innate to them. I'm not going to go into the evolutionary mechanisms again, which is where I and others have cited evidence and made a logical argument - my point is that clearly, species do just know, and I don't see any reason humans would be different.

Because humans are not the same as other species.   Elephants don't reproduce the same way as birds.  Birds don't reproduce the same way as fish.  fish don't reproduce the same way as seahorses.  Seahorses don't reproduce the same way as bees, ad nauseam.   I'd rather judge human behavior by other human behavior and not by the behavior of non-humans. 

 

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Again, this is just an assertion. Sources, please.

http://www.longecity.org/forum/topic/62553-what-did-no-masturbation-do-to-my-sex-drive/

http://www.medicaldaily.com/use-it-or-lose-it-how-age-hormones-and-masturbation-predict-sexual-health-329366

 

Just to get you started.  There are other articles--some scientific--that I've read that say basically the same thing. 

 

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Everyone on this thread who actually has a libido has more knowledge than you on this. It's no more out of control than hunger for food, but it is that strong, and that instinctive.

I DID have a libido at one time.  Albeit, it wasn't as strong (to me) as others, but I still had it.  Was it constant throughout my life?  No.  But I know that I'm not the exception in that regard.  Even science recognizes that. 

 

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You might as well assert that some people say their stomach constantly needs feeding, and if they simply choose not to feed it they'd stop feeling hungry.

The first pet peeve I have is to compare human behavior with that of non-humans.  The second pet peeve I have is to compare sex to food.  People won't die without sex.  They WILL die without food.  I'd rather find an analogy that actually compares the sex 'drive' to another kind of 'drive' that won't kill us if not satisfied. 

 

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You're going to have to source this. I disagree completely, and hand waving in the direction of 'many modern sexologists' just isn't good enough.

LOL!  I just read a scientific article about this a few days before I posted the OP, and I'll be DAMNED if I didn't save it!  I'll have to look again.  It was interesting, to say the least. 

 

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Modern? Really? Lester A Kirkendall was born in 1903, first started teaching in 1928, and retired in 1969, which means that quote is probably at least 50 years old.  The quote about chimps is the only bit that shows a glimmer of being more than opinion - what's the research on that?

So what if the quote is old?  Shere Hite did her research in the 1970s, and much of her findings/conclusions still hold up today.   Sexology is still in its infancy, but the 'oldies' still had some good things to say.  Master's and Johnson...Kinsey (who also didn't believe that sex was 'innate'), Shere Hite...even Freud wasn't completely off his rocker. 

 

Kirkendall had some interesting things to say.  I'm really interested in reading more of what he wrote.  So much made sense, it was uncanny. 

 

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He was very much a man of his time, and is hardly ever cited now (I checked on Google Scholar). Obviously none of this means he's wrong, but you're leaning heavily on the work of a man who thought premarital sex and homosexuality were to be discouraged, and I doubt would've had much truck with asexuality.

I'm not only relying on Kirkendall's opinions.  I think Shere Hite had a lot to say on this issue, too.  Although I don't share all of her feminist views, I can certainly understand how she can look beyond what would seem obvious to others.  She seemed much more open-minded, and was ahead of her time with her views.  If anything, it seemed like she was striving to expand the definition of sex, and not to limit it to strictly a reproductive process....which would include asexuality. 

 

ETA:  I hit the 'submit' button by mistake.  I wanted to add...

 

Last night I came upon an interesting thread here on AVEN.  The OP asked the question, "What is sex?" embedded in his post.  I thought, "Hmm.  That's a good question."  So, I googled it.  I came across an article that was about a (American) survey that asked over 900 people of all ages and backgrounds the same question. 

 

What struck me, was how the respondents defined what wasn't sex.  Eighty-two percent believed that sex involved heterosexual intercourse.  But 50% of the male respondents over the age of 50 believed that if they used a condom, it wasn't really, "sex". 

 

If people can't even agree on what sex is, how can we say that "sex" is innate?

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3 hours ago, vega57 said:

50% of the male respondents over the age of 50 believed that if they used a condom, it wasn't really, "sex". 

Having used a condom, I'll vouch for that. Those things are terrible.

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A further point along this line is that even if a man has a strong physical desire for orgasm – an erection, for example – there is nothing in nature, nothing physical, that impels him to have that orgasm in a vagina. The stimulation he feels is linked to the desire for orgasm, and not to any desire for intercourse per se. The physical “urge” a man feels is a desire for further stimulation of the penis, or for orgasm – not a desire to penetrate a woman’s vagina. There is no “beeper” or sensory device on his penis that makes him seek a vagina in which to put his penis. This pleasurable connection is learned, not innate

 

This makes total sense to me. The only reason I had sexual intercourse at all was (a) to please my partner and (b) to have children. I'd have been so much happier with hand jobs, but that's not what I learned reading books like The Sensuous Man, Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex but Were Afraid to Ask, and others.

 

It's too bad this site wasn't around 40 years ago when it would have done me some good.

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For the record, I had an instinctive desire to do stuff with women's vaginas at around age 8, before anyone had explained the concept of sex to me. No, not to insert my penis into them, but I'm sure with puberty and erections and all, that idea would present itself easily enough. The point being, while explicit instructions for having sex may not be given to us at birth, the basic preferences and desires are, to the point where we can figure it out.

 

You don't have any data on the effects of choosing not to indulge your libido. That's because you lack sample size, and most importantly, a sample that's selected randomly. Taking a bunch of people who voluntarily stop masturbating, is not a random sample, there's an obvious bias there. It just proves there are people who can stop masturbating and be fine, not that this is the case for everyone. And selecting a random sample and forcing them to stop masturbating to see what happens would be unethical, to say the least.

 

Lastly, no, for many sexuals, having your genitals stimulated is not actually fulfilling. For me, if I'm not fantasizing about a woman, I wouldn't feel anything while stimulating my penis, and I wouldn't be able to reach a state of arousal or orgasm. So this whole notion that the desire for sex, is just a desire to have your genitals stimulated, is bullshit.

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Telecaster68

Elephants, bird, fish, seahorses and bees all pair up and have sex to reproduce. So do humans. The differences of exact mechanics aren't important.

 

To cut through the chaff, straw men and arguments from authority, your argument is this:

 

Humans have no innate urge to have sex. In this, they are unlike
all other sexually-reproducing species on earth (apart from
chimps, for some reason).

Saying human animals are just different kinds of animals when it comes to sex for some undefined reason simply isn't borne out by what we know about evolution, biology, and most people’s every day experience. Clearly that doesn't mean it’s wrong, just that it needs examining carefully to see if the argument holds up.

 

So, some questions:

  • At what point in the evolution from previous species, did humans, en masse lose this innate urge?
  • What were the mechanisms involved?
  • Why did they lose it?
  • How did these humans hundreds of thousands of years ago with no sexual urges end up having sex anyway?
  • Why did the humans who’d lost that urge become more successful than the humans who didn't?
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15 hours ago, vega57 said:

I haven't read anything else in this thread but that second link included the quote below and I'm highlyyyy doubtful about the entire thing or ANYTHING this Walfish person says just because of it: 

 

Women who are driven with ambition to reach the top, says Walfish, have sexual libido driving that energy. These women are putting out less in the bedroom and more at the office.

 

Like, that just doesn't sound right...

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36 minutes ago, gaogao said:

I haven't read anything else in this thread but that second link included the quote below and I'm highlyyyy doubtful about the entire thing or ANYTHING this Walfish person says just because of it: 

 

Women who are driven with ambition to reach the top, says Walfish, have sexual libido driving that energy. These women are putting out less in the bedroom and more at the office.

 

Like, that just doesn't sound right...

When I read articles, I generally 'take what I need and leave the rest'.  I don't usually dismiss the article in its entirety.  Depends on what the rest of the article has to offer. 

 

In this case, I agree.  Those two sentences were a bit off-putting, but nonetheless, I thought the rest of the article offered some pretty good information.  At least it offered some food for thought, and if I had more time, I would want to explore the validity of more of the claims.   

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33 minutes ago, vega57 said:

When I read articles, I generally 'take what I need and leave the rest'.  I don't usually dismiss the article in its entirety.  Depends on what the rest of the article has to offer. 

 

In this case, I agree.  Those two sentences were a bit off-putting, but nonetheless, I thought the rest of the article offered some pretty good information.  At least it offered some food for thought, and if I had more time, I would want to explore the validity of more of the claims.   

To a certain extent I agree that it could be food for thought, but I was pretty skeptical of the rest of it as well, mainly because even if there is any truth in it, the way it was written just seems too generalised/sensationalised. The sentence about 'successful women' was especially grating... and with a view like that I can't help but doubt this expert's understanding of sex and sexuality especially if those sorts of prejudices come through in her work.

 

Also articles like this just bother me because it doesn't strike me as right to imply things like 'if you aren't having sex or masturbating twice a week it's unhealthy / you should be concerned," or "healthy couples have sex twice a week because sex and its frequency is usually reflective of communication" it's just... man... one size fits all doesn't work for human beings. Sure, they acknowledge that it's "not a problem unless the partner perceives it as a problem" but if you write something in an article like this in a medical website I'm pretty sure many people might start to question whether everything is really okay if they are happy having sex /masturbating less than once a month, which I hear is actually pretty normal, even among sexuals (anecdotal evidence, but still).

 

Anyway, I haven't been following this discussion - it's just that I clicked on the link because it seemed interesting and ended up being a little disturbed. Have fun debating, guys...

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8 minutes ago, gaogao said:

it doesn't strike me as right to imply things like 'if you aren't having sex or masturbating twice a week it's unhealthy / you should be concerned," or "healthy couples have sex twice a week because sex and its frequency is usually reflective of communication"

That always bothered me, too. Where is it written that sex is required for health? Who decided that, and why?

 

How much neurosis in the population accrues from these bizarre beliefs.

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Telecaster68

Well, tbh I certainly understand people saying that sex is healthy (because as @Telecaster68 has shown, it does have proven health benefits), but I think that articles sometimes imply that not having sex is unhealthy, which would make people feel insecure and neurotic if they aren't having as much as the article says they should.

 

Like, I don't think you really need to be concerned if you aren't having that much sex and you're happy with it, just like webmd also has a whole article about how wine has health benefits but no one talks about how people need to drink more wine and if you aren't having a glass a day you should be worried.

 

An article that says "here, this is a list of proven benefits of sex" which would make sense and be informative, isn't the same as an article which basically implies " your relationship may be in trouble if you are not having sex more than once a week", which would make people question whether things are okay even if everything is actually fine in the context of their own relationship...

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8 hours ago, Tarfeather said:

For the record, I had an instinctive desire to do stuff with women's vaginas at around age 8, before anyone had explained the concept of sex to me.

Just because no one explained the concept of sex to you by 8 doesn't mean that there weren't other influences in your life that could have driven you to the point of curiosity.  After all, we're hit with these messages and images every day.  We see our parents and/or other people kiss...we might catch a glimpse of our father 'copping a feel' of our mother's breast and notice that she doesn't run away...but smiles.  Not everyone has parental controls on their t.v., and young children can easily flip through channels only to stumble on a steamy bedroom scene.    Porn is easily accessible on the internet (what school age kid doesn't have a computer these days?).  Sex is constantly on people's lips.  And it has been like this for several decades.  Even before the internet, there were radio talk shows that would interview a sex therapist (Dr. Ruth comes to mind) occasionally. 

 

When I was 8, I didn't know anything about sex.  I didn't know what a vagina was, and never hear the word until I was 12.  I didn't even know I had a vagina, or a third hole 'down there', until I had a brief 'health' class in school. 

 

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No, not to insert my penis into them, but I'm sure with puberty and erections and all, that idea would present itself easily enough.

Maybe.  Maybe not.  We can't say for sure.  I wonder if all of the other influences in your life weren't there, what you would have done...or, not done. 

 

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The point being, while explicit instructions for having sex may not be given to us at birth, the basic preferences and desires are, to the point where we can figure it out.

Still not convinced.  We don't have knowledge of the human body when we're born, and having sex does take some knowledge.  If there wasn't some way to gain that knowledge, we wouldn't simply 'know'. 

 

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You don't have any data on the effects of choosing not to indulge your libido. That's because you lack sample size, and most importantly, a sample that's selected randomly. Taking a bunch of people who voluntarily stop masturbating, is not a random sample, there's an obvious bias there. It just proves there are people who can stop masturbating and be fine, not that this is the case for everyone. And selecting a random sample and forcing them to stop masturbating to see what happens would be unethical, to say the least.

I went into a few threads on other forums.  The threads were discussing the effects of ceasing all masturbatory practices.  Some of the men were addicted to sex (at least, orgasms) and part of their 'therapy' was to stop masturbating for no less than 3-6 months.  Others simply decided that they didn't want to masturbate anymore, and still others simply tried it as an 'experiment' just to see what would happen.  No one was 'forced' to stop masturbating.  Even if they were in a program for sex addiction, they had a choice to stop or not stop.  There was no gathering of like-minded people BEFORE their individual decision to stop.  One person stopped.  Posted about his experience, and sought out others to see if anyone else stopped and what their experience was.

 

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Lastly, no, for many sexuals, having your genitals stimulated is not actually fulfilling. For me, if I'm not fantasizing about a woman, I wouldn't feel anything while stimulating my penis, and I wouldn't be able to reach a state of arousal or orgasm. So this whole notion that the desire for sex, is just a desire to have your genitals stimulated, is bullshit.

Forgive my crudeness for a moment, but if you are a heterosexual male (for example) and you stuck your erect penis through a hole in a wall...and you were told that a 'gorgeous woman' was going to suck you off and you were even showed a picture of her or met her in person, before she disappeared behind the wall, your penis wouldn't know the difference if it was being sucked by that gorgeous woman or an 80 year old woman with no teeth...or a 12 year old boy. 

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