Masturbation
a partner can theoretically result in transmission of sexually transmitted disease by contact with semen or female sexual fluids, and such contact should be avoided with any partner whose disease-negative status you are not sure of. Objects inserted into the vagina or anus should be clean and of a kind that will not scratch or break. Care should be taken not to fully insert anything into the anus - any object used should have a flared or flanged base; otherwise retrieval can require a visit to the emergency room. Most modern dildos and anal plugs are designed with this feature.
On July 16, 2003, an Australian research team led by Graham Giles of The Cancer Council published a medical study which concluded that frequent masturbation by males may help prevent the development of prostate cancer, and that it would be more helpful than ejaculation through sexual intercourse because sex can transmit diseases which can increase the risk of cancer instead.
Masturbation in history and society
Excerpt from United States patent number 745,269, filed on May 29, 1903 by Albert V. Todd. It describes a device designed to prevent masturbation by inflicting electric shocks upon the perpetrator, by ringing an alarm bell, and through spikes at the inner edge of the tube into which the penis is inserted. View the complete patent: page 1, page 2, page 3, page 4. Patents of this kind have been filed from c. 1850 to c. 1920. [1]
As noted above, modern medicine recognizes that there is no significant harm (short term or long term) caused by the practice of masturbation, and regards it as a normal practice. In past times, however, some medical professionals taught that all sorts of deleterious effects could occur as a result of masturbation. Since the 18th century, many "remedies" have been devised for masturbation, including regularly eating corn flakes, physical restraint, electric shock, treating the genitalia with stinging nettles, or surgically removing them entirely. In later decades, the more drastic of these measures were increasingly replaced with psychological techniques, such as telling children they will get hairy hands or that their face will turn green from masturbating. In the United States and other English-speaking nations, routine neonatal circumcision was widely adopted in part because of its believed preventive effect against masturbation.
Many conservative religious groups teach masturbation to be a sinful practice. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 2352, lists masturbation as one of the "Offenses Against Chastity" and calls it "an intrinsically and gravely disordered action" because "use of the sexual faculty, for whatever reason, outside of marriage is essentially contrary to its purpose." It goes on to caution that extenuating factors could exist, such as immaturity, habit, or psychological problems.
Masturbation and circumcision
It has been argued that the practice of male circumcision for non-religious reasons, still wide-spread in some countries, arose originally as one of the most popular remedies against masturbation. See circumcision for a detailed discussion. Extreme male circumcisions, where much of the penis' skin is removed, are in fact effective against masturbation because erections can become very painful, severely restricting the sexual use of the organ. Such circumcisions would today be referred to as malpractice in a medical context, but are sometimes practiced in a religious one.
As noted above, even routine male circumcision complicates masturbation, because the glans penis, which is keratinized and less sensitive in circumcised males, can not be massaged with the help of the foreskin. Masturbation becomes more difficult to learn and may be experienced as more troublesome. Several surveys indicate that uncircumcised men and boys masturbate earlier and more frequently than circumcised men. [2] A survey in the United States has indicated the opposite [3], but that has been attributed to strong sociodemographic difference between the two groups of circumcised and uncircumcised men in that country in particular. Even in pro-circumcision circles, the negative effect on masturbation, through the painful aftereffects of the operation and the complication of the process, is sometimes cited as an advantage. [4]
Circumcision opponents like Paul M. Fleiss [5] also refer to the over 20,000 nerve-endings in the removed tissue, which are believed to contribute to a loss of pleasure. While foreskin restoration can alleviate keratinization and make masturbation using the foreskin possible, it cannot regenerate the lost nerve-endings.
In males with phimosis and other similar rare conditions of the foreskin, however, circumcision alleviates painful erections and therefore increases the likelihood that masturbation would be pleasurable.
Masturbation in non-human animals
Masturbation is common in many species of animals, including deer, monkeys, kangaroos, and iguanas.