The joys of solo sex

Masturbation is not popular – well, officially – with Christians. Indeed, a new website, Dirty Girl Ministries, has been launched to encourage girls to give it up! But why? As someone who has been “doing it for years”, Anne Sexton argues that it is a healthy, safe and pleasurable pursuit…

Anne Sexton, 14 Sep 2011

Attitudes towards masturbation took a bizarre turn during the 19th century. Parents, teachers and doctors were warned to be on the lookout for signs of “uncleanness” in children and some went so far as to supply their sons with a special device to be worn around the penis at night to prevent nocturnal emissions.

If you think that’s bad, women who got caught indulging in a little “self-abuse” could be declared morally deranged and shipped off to asylums or have leeches administered to their cervix and labia to curb these unnatural tendencies.

All very interesting Ms. Sexton, I hear you think, but what the hell does that have to do with us here in the second decade of the 21st century? Sadly, more than you’d think.

In Kansas, a former self-styled porn addict Crystal Renaud has launched the No Stones recovery group. Part of an organisation called – I kid you not – Dirty Girls Ministries, 26-year-old Renaud’s mission is to curb female porn addiction. What soon becomes clear is what Renaud is really aiming for is to stamp out female masturbation. According to Renaud, masturbation is an addiction akin to drug abuse or alcoholism which “in a short amount of time can end up hurting you.” Really? In that case I should have been toast years ago.

Most kids discover masturbation around adolescence but plenty start earlier. Kids explore their bodies, from eating their toes to playing with their genitals. It’s completely natural, and as they get older, children learn that certain things are best done in private.

Dirty Girls Ministries targets mostly young single women in their 20s and 30s, but preteen girls as young as 11 are invited along to their talks too. These girls report feeling tainted and perverted because of their masturbation habits. If there is anything perverted going on, it’s making pre-adolescent virgins feel they have something to be ashamed of, for having normal and healthy sexual feelings.

Renaud isn’t alone in her crusade against self-pleasure. Google “stopping masturbation” and you’d be surprised at the amount of results returned and the attendant advice on offer. Frequent masturbators are referred to as sex addicts (a much disputed category of addiction) and told to take up a hobby, call up a friend for distraction, pray or talk to a therapist.

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