Masturbation is good for you

[JesusA (imported)]

Excellent article from The New Scientist on the recent Australian study. While it was widely reported in the press, this article has more details than most.

Masturbating may protect against prostate cancer

Douglas Fox, Adelaide

It will make you go blind. It will make your palms grow hairy. Such myths about masturbation are largely a thing of the past. But the latest research has even better news for young men: frequent self-pleasuring could protect against the most common kind of cancer.

A team in Australia led by Graham Giles of The Cancer Council Victoria in Melbourne asked 1079 men with prostate cancer to fill in a questionnaire detailing their sexual habits, and compared their responses with those of 1259 healthy men of the same age. The team concludes that the more men ejaculate between the ages of 20 and 50, the less likely they are to develop prostate cancer.

The protective effect is greatest while men are in their twenties: those who had ejaculated more than five times per week in their twenties, for instance, were one-third less likely to develop aggressive prostate cancer later in life (BJU International, vol 92, p 211).

The results contradict those of previous studies, which have suggested that having had many sexual partners, or a high frequency of sexual activity, increases the risk of prostate cancer by up to 40 per cent. The key difference is that these earlier studies defined sexual activity as sexual intercourse, whereas the latest study focused on the number of ejaculations, whether or not intercourse was involved.

The prostate produces part of the fluid that makes up semen

The team speculates that infections caused by intercourse may increase the risk of prostate cancer. "Had we been able to remove ejaculations associated with sexual intercourse, there should have been an even stronger protective effect of other ejaculations," they suggest. "Men have many ways of using their prostate which do not involve women or other men," Giles adds.

Macho exaggeration

Giles accepts the possibility that the men who completed the questionnaires could have lied about their habits. But he doubts this skewed the results, since questions about masturbation are unlikely to evoke the same macho exaggeration as questions about, say, number of sexual partners.

But why should ejaculating more often cut the risk of prostate cancer? The team speculates that ejaculation prevents carcinogens building up in the gland. The prostate, together with the seminal vesicles, secretes the bulk of the fluid in semen, which is rich in substances such as potassium, zinc, fructose and citric acid.

Generating the fluid involves concentrating these components from the bloodstream up to 600-fold - and this could be where the trouble starts. Studies in dogs show that carcinogens such as 3-methylcholanthrene, found in cigarette smoke, are also concentrated in prostate fluid.

"It's a prostatic stagnation hypothesis," says Giles. "The more you flush the ducts out, the less there is to hang around and damage the cells that line them."

Sexual repertoire

His findings suggest an intriguing parallel between prostate cancer and breast cancer, as recent studies indicate that lactating reduces a woman's risk of breast cancer, perhaps because this also flushes out carcinogens. Alternatively, ejaculation might induce prostate cells to mature fully, making them less susceptible to carcinogens.

"All these mechanisms are totally speculative," cautions breast cancer expert Loren Lipworth of the International Epidemiology Institute in Rockville, Maryland.

But if the finding is confirmed, future health advice from doctors may no longer be restricted to diet and exercise. "Masturbation is part of people's sexual repertoire," says Anthony Smith, deputy director of the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society at La Trobe University in Melbourne.

"If these findings hold up, then it's perfectly reasonable that men should be encouraged to masturbate," he says.

New Scientist

16 July 03

© Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993942

[JesusA (imported)]

Just in case you thought that the Australian report would go unchallenged:

http://www.whitehouse.org/initiatives/purity/index.asp

Have fun with some of the links from this site as well....

[JesusA (imported)]

In case your local newspaper was too squeamish to run today’s Doonesbury strip highlighting the issue, you can find it on the Doonesbury website: http://www.doonesbury.com/strip/dailydose/index.html. The address takes you to the day’s cartoon, so if you go on later, you need to click on the calendar to bring up the September 7 one. It displays in better color than the newspaper and larger size than my paper has it.

[Sac_mec (imported)]

I never guessed I'd be replying to Jesus on the subject of masturbation - life throws up some strange events!

Jesus I hate to be "picky" and it does sound a teeny bit unreasonable of me to

respond but I have been viewing your subject headline for days - "Masturbation

is good for you!" I have to say something!

I don't doubt the science for one moment and hundreds of millions of men will be greatly encouraged to read this. I just wish without making too much of a protest that you had toned down your headline a tad. Lots of guys here

masturbate frequently and with enthusiasm, good luck and lots of fun to you all.

A number of users of the Archive are quite happy not to indulge, that's my observation - without cooling anyone's ardour, masturbation hardly needs promoting on the "Eunuch Archive" surely?

[SplitDik (imported)]

I think the issue of masturbation is like many other things -- "all things in moderation" is the best practice.

Men or women who don't masturbate regularly probably should. The common views promoting masturbation are really aimed at the uptight, anti-sex conservative people who really should let loose now and then. If it has an added benefit of releasing toxins from the prostate then that is even better ...

However, I know from experience that overindulgence in masturbation is not healthy. Masturbation for a sex addict is like having a never-ending supply of drugs for a drug addict. I know that when I used to masturbate 10 times per day that I simply did not feel good physically or psychologically.

I believe that orgasm is a serious biochemical event in one's body. In moderation it can be healthy, overused and it becomes unhealthy again.

A really good test for habitual masturbators is to try to go three times as long as normal between masturbatory orgasms, then assess when you actually feel your best: frequent masturbation or less frequent? For me it is less frequent.