Archive for the 'Masturbation' Category

Some further thoughts on relationship, fidelity, porn use and how we negotiate boundaries: UPDATED

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on May 3, 2007
in Masturbation, Porn and Relationships
. 43 Comments

My post on Monday on Ethan and his views on porn is getting more hits than any other post I’ve put up since writing about Cho Seung-Hui a few weeks ago.

There’s a good debate about the male sex drive and porn use in the comments section below my post and Ethan’s original one at Crucial Minutiae. Lynn shares her own contribution to the discussion here. Clearly, a lot of us are taking issue with his original thesis that there were only three possible options for men “overwhelmed” by the hornies.

Ethan was a bit less than enthusiastic about my views on radical intimacy and relationship. He writes in a comment:

The other issue is that I’m a real relativist when it comes to relationships. This mostly comes from my mother, who is a psychotherapist and feminist. I believe that the presence of pornography in a relationship–or its total absence–is something that should be discussed and agreed upon within a relationship. As in, there is no outside morality that holds any sway within the confines of your relationship. Only what you and your lover agree upon matters. That’s my view.

Yikes. That makes me very uncomfortable. As several other people immediately pointed out, no “discussion” takes place in a vacuum. Let’s say a man — like an Ethan — brings into his relationship his belief that the male sex drive is an overwhelmingly powerful force. Let’s say he also brings in his steadfast belief that he can compartmentalize, meaning that he can “use” porn (read: masturbate to it, let’s be honest, boys) without having the images he see have any deleterious effect on his relationship with his girlfriend.

Let’s say his girlfriend brings in what many women bring in: the strong and powerful desire to be “different from the other women”, the ones who “are too uptight about porn and strip clubs.” So boyfriend brings his story of his tsunami-force libido, and girlfriend brings her desire to be pleasing, and then they have an “open discussion” without “any outside forces” influencing the relationship. They ignore “outside morality.” Sounds very progressive and mature, no doubt, but it ignores completely the reality that we all bring our people-pleasing, our control issues, and our pre-determined views into the discussion.

With all respect to Ethan, I’ve seen a lot of these discussions go down. Often, but not always, girlfriend says that boyfriend’s porn use makes her uncomfortable. Boyfriend explains that using porn isn’t really cheating, because as Ethan says, “thoughts are not actions.” (Masturbation, brother, is an action.) Boy explains his remarkable male ability to compartmentalize, to move seamlessly between spending an hour on his computer hunting down the next exciting image or video and seeing his girlfriend as a complete human being. Girlfriend isn’t really convinced, but since she’s not a guy — and since boyfriend seems so emphatic — she starts to wonder if maybe this kind of compartmentalization can work. At this point, boyfriend points out that using porn is much better than having an actual affair, and he sometimes (if he’s got the chutzpah) suggests that girlfriend should be grateful that this is “all” he does. Boyfriend usually structures a false set of options, typically in which porn appears as the Least Bad Thing. He tells girlfriend she can:

1. Have more sex with him (or “different” sex) with him to meet his needs
2. Have him go crazy with horniness and be miserable — and just maybe, prone to infidelity
2. Let him use porn “on the side”

Obviously, not all women fall for this argument. But plenty do. And so it’s not enough to say that “every relationship can define its boundaries for itself”; we need to acknowledge the myths, assumptions, and needs that each person brings to the discussion. And when both parties to the discussion consider the discourse of the overwhelming male sex drive to be an incontrovertible fact rather than a myth, than the entire subsequent conversation will take place under false premises. And the outcome will not be the best.

Note: I’m quite aware that there are some very stereotypical assumptions in the scenario I paint here. My goal is not to reinforce those stereotypes, but to expose as fallacious the idea that “outside morality” (or cultural discourses) can ever be successfully excluded from a relationship discussion.

UPDATE #1: Let me be clear, Ethan’s writings were not about his actual relationship with his girlfriend. He writes at his place: …I do want to make the point that I was writing about what I see as the general condition of porn and men in relationships, and the role of compartmentalization, NOT the specific conversation/framework that my girlfriend and I have on the subject… Fair enough, and I’m happy to clarify.

UPDATE #2: Let me link with enthusiasm to No Porn Northampton, which has been kindly linking to me. They’ve got some good stuff up.

Some very long thoughts on fantasy and masturbation

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on March 29, 2006
in Faith, Masturbation, Relationships and Sexuality
. 58 Comments

Second hot-button post ot the day, and the last one.

I’ve been promising a post about masturbation for a couple of days.  This is especially important because what I’m about to write may seem to at least partially contradict what I wrote last year; I have reread that post several times, and my own views have (as they sometimes do) evolved.  There were some things I wasn’t ready to write back in August 2005 that I am ready to write now.  What I wrote then was largely based on what I was comfortable teaching; I didn’t touch much (sorry) on how it is that I seek to live my own life.  Now, I’m ready to do that.

First off, I’m not writing to titillate or to offend.  I’m trying to balance several things together here as I write: my feminism, my faith, and my ever-evolving understanding of human psychology and sexuality.  But in the end, this post is going to be written from a spiritual perspective, one that will be sharply at odds with conventional feminist thought.

Below this post on Monday, my reader and student "Mermade" asked:

Is it possible to masturbate without lust involved? My boyfriend, who has struggled with porn and masturbation, says that it is impossible to masturbate without using some sort of lustful stimulation (except in the cases of children, which is an entirely different topic). Anyway, we know lusting creates many problems, problems which I have personally witnessed and been VERY hurt by. Therefore, if it is impossible to masturbate without hurtful lustful thoughts, should masturbation itself be endorsed as healthy if it cannot be done without damaging thoughts?

I have always wondered how feminism views women masturbating to porn depicting naked men (Playgirl, etc.) I am firmly against the sex industry and I wholeheartedly agree that men must give up their lust after women in order to be pro-feminist. However, I have scarcely heard about how people feel regarding women lusting and masturbating after men and whether or not feminism sees that as wrong. Granted, the porn industry is mostly aimed at men’s interest. However, many women lust after porn as well, and I don’t believe that’s right either. (That kind of fits in with "me too" feminism). I would like to hear yours and other people’s thoughts on that.

It’s at this point that a great many of my secular readers, particularly feminist progressives, will start to get annoyed.  (I almost said "hackles up", but caught myself in time.)  In the secular feminist world in which I was marinated for years and years as a child, a college student, and a periodic activist, no one ever expressed any negative feelings about masturbation. 

And this always struck me as odd, frankly.  I’ve written a lot about pornography and the sex industry,and I’ve critiqued them using both a Christian and a feminist perspective.  I readily concede that feminism is divided on the ills of pornography; some feminists see all porn as problematic, while others prefer to draw distinctions between porn that demeans and objectifies women and erotic imagery in which women’s pleasure matters, and in which women are active agents.  But here’s what got me when I was in college, and what I could never fully understand when I was in discussion with my fellow anti-porn feminists: why is it wrong for men to purchase, view, and masturbate to pornography, but not wrong for those same men to masturbate to demeaning fantasies of women in their heads? If we aren’t just objecting to the industry of porn, but also to the way in which men and women objectify each other, shouldn’t we consider also consider the ethics of masturbation"?   That’s what I intend to do here.

Mermade asks some serious questions, the sort that generally only get asked in religious circles (where the healthiness of masturbation is not taken for granted, as it is in the secular world).   Her first question is critical: Is it possible to masturbate without lust (or lustful fantasies)?  I suppose it’s possible, but I don’t think most people do. If there are folks who masturbate to orgasm while balancing their checkbooks, or while contemplating the Sensenbrenner immigration bill, I suppose that they’ll write in to refute me, but I am fairly certain most people, men and women, use sexual fantasy as a key part of their masturbatory routines.

I can hear the chorus now:  Sure, Hugo, everyone fantasizes! It’s natural and healthy, though!  Are you seriously going to question whether or not it’s acceptable to masturbate?  Do you want to give all of your students a massive guilt complex?   Well, hold on a bit, folks.   I’m not denying that sexual fantasy is a powerful part of most of our lives, and a part of our lives that most secular voices insist we ought not even try and control. In the secular world,  ethics is about our actions, not the substance of our thoughts.  Fantasy, therefore, is nearly universally regarded as harmless; as long as we don’t act on all of our fantasies (particularly when they involve boundary violations of one sort or another), we’re told to enjoy our private reveries (with or without masturbation.) 

But if there’s one overwhelming thing that most of the world’s great spiritual traditions agree on, it’s this: our thoughts do matter.  In the Abrahamic religious tradition, the tenth commandment is "Thou Shalt Not Covet."  To "covet" is to long for, desire, lust after, envy, etc.   This commandment comes after earlier commandments about theft and adultery.  To borrow language from our Buddhist friends, It’s clear that God is calling His people not only to right action, but also to right thought.  Jesus continues the theme in Matthew 5:28:  But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.  It’s difficult to look at Scripture and continue to insist that masturbatory fantasy is harmless!

Fleeting thoughts are impossible to control.  But it’s one thing to have a fleeting thought, and another to "entertain" the thought for any length of time.  To paraphrase the famous line from Martin Luther, "I can’t stop the birds from flying over my head, but I can stop them from building nests in my hair."  Fantasy and lust — for anyone other than my wife — is letting the birds build a nest on my head.  And I am convinced that that fantasy life is at odds with my spiritual and physical commitments.

I remember, several years ago, meeting two very different men who helped develop my views on masturbation.  One was a Dominican brother who was studying at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley; the other was a very advanced yoga practitioner I met when I was in grad school at UCLA.  I became good friends with both, though I never ended up becoming either a Dominican or a yogi (hey, there’s still time!)  The Dominican was just a few years older than me; the yoga teacher was in his forties.  And at different times, in different ways, the subject of masturbation came up.  Both men, despite their disparate religious traditions, were celibate in the truest sense — they not only didn’t have sex with other people, they didn’t have sex with themselves.  The Dominican told me he hadn’t masturbated since he was 17; the yogi had gone more than a decade without ejaculating.  (There is a school in yogistic thought that is big on sperm re-absorption and celibacy, but I can’t remember which one it is.) 

As you might suspect, I had a hard time believing either man!  At first I though they were lying. Then, choosing to believe them, I began to suspect they were stark raving nuts. I argued with my Dominican friend, pointing out that God says nothing about masturbation in the Bible; I argued with my yogi friend, saying that it simply wasn’t healthy to go that long without orgasm.    Both men were patient with me (they’d heard this sort of thing before).  My Dominican friend emphasized what I emphasized above — our obligation to honor God with our minds as well as our actions; my yoga friend emphasized the extraordinary physical and psychic benefits of restriction and self-control. I wasn’t convinced by either man, though I’ve never forgotten what they shared with me.

I’ve come to the following conviction in my own life: for me, as a Christian man on a radical spiritual journey, masturbation at this stage in my life falls short of the mark.   All of my sexual energy (in thoughts as well as behavior) goes towards my wife.  Now, that’s easy for someone in a relationship to say, of course.  I haven’t posted on this before for that reason!  First of all, it’s an intensely private subject.  Second of all, I know that my words in a public forum such as this have considerable power.  My goal is not to shame anyone. Please know, I don’t tell the teenagers that I work with in my youth group not to masturbate; when the topic comes up in my courses on gender, I never make the suggestion that I think that masturbation "falls short of the mark."&nbsp. Indeed, I know that masturbation can be redemptive, as my Clitoris and Corinthians post makes clear. But when it comes to my own restriction, this a private conviction that I’ve arrived at — and yet, it’s such a vital part of so many people’s lives and it’s so intimately connected to other issues that we discuss on this blog — that I felt compelled to address it here.

More recently, I’ve met several young men and women in a variety of spiritual traditions who have chosen not to masturbate as well as refrain from sex outside of marriage.  I’ve seen young celibate men (at their stereotypical sexual peak) choose to channel all of their sexual energy into other aspects of their lives; some are Kabbalists and some are Catholics but all are convinced that is indeed humanly possible to live without masturbation.  As one young man I know who studies Kabbalah put it, "I believe that the purpose of sex isn’t necessarily procreation — I believe it’s sharing.  Sex is only truly appropriate and sacred when it is an act of sharing light and joy with another human being.  Masturbation is all about me, and my goal is to think less about me and more about the world I am called to serve.  It’s very difficult to restrict, but it isn’t impossible."

Do I think masturbation is a sin?  No.  Do I think folks ought to be ashamed of masturbating, or of sexual fantasies? Of course not.  But have I seen very real benefits in my own life and in the lives of others from giving it up?  You bet.  At nearly forty, I still have a strong and vibrant libido, thanks — but today, all of it is directed towards one other human being, and that human being is not myself.  On my spiritual journey, I’ve come to the point where I find tremendous liberation not in following my impulses but in sublimating them.  (I’m just the latest in a very long line of men and women who have come to that same conclusion, of course.)

In the end, I chose to let go of masturbation and sexual fantasy because they were at odds with my vision of what it meant to live a life of servanthood and discipleship. I believe today that everything I do and say is an ethical issue. How I spend money, how I eat, how I vote, how I share my time, how I love, how I think, how I fantasize, how I use sexuality. It’s easier, of course, to live up to these commitments as a married man — but I have a large number of friends of a wide variety of ages who have made the same decision, and many of them are single.  They are not bitter and angry; indeed, though their lives are not without struggle, they seem more joyous and energetic than many of their peers who have not made the same decision.

I am convinced that good people can disagree strongly about this issue.  I am convinced that one can masturbate and be psychologically healthy. (Masturbation can even be a tool, for some, to achieve greater emotional and sexual health.) But from time to time, folks like Mermade have asked me what my personal feelings were about masturbation and fantasy.  And at long last, I feel comfortable and confident enough to offer my true answer in a public forum.

The Clitoris and Corinthians

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on October 20, 2005
in Body, Christianity, Favorite Posts, 2004-2006, Masturbation and Sexuality
. 26 Comments

I posted this morning about the happy compatibilities between vibrant faith and activist pro-feminism.  I believe everything I wrote, of course, but sometimes, sometimes, sometimes… I wander into what I worry are unfortunate contradictions.

This will be long:

My lecture in women’s history this morning was about nineteenth century attitudes towards women’s sexuality.  It’s the same lecture I wrote about in this April 2004 post.   In addition to talking about clitoridectomies, and the shift to the "medicalization of morality", we wandered on to the topics of sexual ethics, masturbation and "contingent happiness."  (Hey, they were awake and interested, and I was on a caffeinated roll!)  We talked about the difficulties 19th century medicine had with the clitoris, as it represented women’s capacity for their own pleasure, unrelated to either a man’s delight or (at least directly) to reproduction.  We talked about the biological determinism problem: if all of our sexual organs are for reproduction, and sexual pleasure is about reproduction, why is the clitoris placed to be easily reached by a woman’s fingers — but not by a man’s penis during intercourse?  (I did not suggest that this was a problem to be solved, rather that it threw the proverbial "wrench in the works" of many 19th century theories!)

I shared with my students the classic feminist argument (ala Betty Dodson et al) that the clitoris is symbolic of women’s right to pleasure and fulfillment without being dependent upon another person.  While traditional sexual mores, and a considerable amount of religious teaching, stress that our sexual happiness ought always be contingent upon relationship with another (usually our spouse), some feminist theory sees the clitoris as the small, powerful, and physical manifestation of the larger truth that women as well as men have the capacity for pleasure "uncontingent" upon another.  The anti-masturbation screeds of the 19th and 20th centuries have always emphasized that our sexuality is not our own, that it belongs to God and our spouse.  The clitoris, with no direct function other than a woman’s delight, stands (sorry!) in stubborn defiance of the notion that our sexual happiness should always be contingent upon relationship with another.  In a very real sense, one can thus argue that female masturbation is an inherently feminist act!

At the same time that I say all this, teach all this, and believe all this, I’ve got 1 Corinthians 7:4 (which I mentioned in this morning’s post) running through my head:

The wife’s body does not belong to her alone but also to her husband. In the same way, the husband’s body does not belong to him alone but also to his wife.

I’ve loved that line from Paul for two reasons.  One, as a pro-feminist, it is a reminder of radical equality in marriage.   Men and women both surrender their autonomy over the most precious part of themselves, and they are to do so equally.  It’s a nice counter-balance to other areas where Paul seems to imply the superior position of the husband in the family. 

But I also like the verse because it reminds me that in Christian marriage, we are called to live sacrificially for one another.  This doesn’t just mean sexually; as Cait points out, it’s 1 Corinthians 7:4 that allows her to have veto power over her husband’s desire to do dangerous things, like ride a motorcycle without a helmet.  It’s what gives my wife the right to demand that I see a doctor when I am ill; it is not merely my body that is ailing, but hers as well.   At its best, this ideal summons up a magnificent image of devotion, reciprocity, and mutual care.  It’s both deeply romantic and profound holy, and as a newly married man, I find it inspiring.

I don’t lecture to my women’s studies students about Pauline images of marriage!  My lectures in class are classically feminist in their emphasis on the notion that women’s overarching right to pleasure, individual happiness, autonomy and independence is the sine qua non of the movement.  In my marriage, however, and in my faith life, I’ve long since given up the notion that autonomy and personal pleasure ought to be the highest goals for myself or anyone else.  To the best of my clumsy and sinful ability, I am embracing sacrificial living.  My sexuality is no longer my own; I did surrender it to my wife as she surrendered hers to me.  We are not each other’s jailers, mind you, but we are committed to a joint vision of sexuality that is ours (rather than hers, or mine).  No, I’m not sharing any more details than that, but I can say it is a practice that is modeled on what I read in Paul.

So what do I want for my students of both sexes?  I suppose I reconcile the secular feminist ideal of autonomy and the Christian ideal of sacrificial loving in my own mind by suggesting that the former is a necessary precursor to the latter.  After all, we can only really give to another what we first know to be ours! Thus, I think I believe (note the hesitancy in my tone) that a healthy model of sexual development encourages young people, boys and girls alike, to take ownership of their sexuality and delight in their own bodies as sexual creatures.  They will experience their bodies as their own, a gift of God for their own wonder and delight.  I hope they will do so without shame.  Then, after a suitable period (which will vary from person to person), my hope is that they will find one person to whom they can make a lasting commitment.  In the safe and loving context of that commitment, they will offer their sexuality — their very body — as a gift to their partner.  They will live out the vision of 1 Corinthians 7:4 regardless of their individual religious beliefs.  Their sexuality will be freely and lovingly surrendered to a partner who offers his or her sexuality in return.

Is this hopelessly muddled?  Is my psychology of the human person woefully defective? Am I mixing secular morality with Scripture and ending up with an incoherent mess?    Or does it make as much sense to anyone else as it seems to to me?

Do I post too much about my doubts?  Do I post too much, period?

Time for a short lunch break.  Jello awaits, and that is a happy thought.

Masturbation, take two: further reflections on sexuality and dialogue

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on August 26, 2005
in Christianity, Faith, Masturbation and Sexuality
. 31 Comments

I’ve been thinking about the discussion of sexuality and masturbation that has taken place below this post and elsewhere, all stemming from this offering from Bonnie, a conservative Christian.

I’m pleased that the few comments below my post have been civil, and sorry that not everyone who has weighed in at Bonnie’s has been equally polite.  This "hot-button" (sorry) issue is one of those that forces reasonable people to confront the very real gulf that exists between secular progressives and religious conservatives.   I was raised as the former, and spent a period in my life living as and among the latter, so I’m keenly aware of just how difficult it can be for folks on one side to truly understand where the other side is "coming from".

It is axiomatic among feminists and progressive sex-ed workers that masturbation is a good thing.  Check out the (work-safe) archive on the subject at Teen Wire (sponsored by the folks at Planned Parenthood).  Here’s a typical response to a question on the subject from a teen girl:

It is completely normal for both women and men to masturbate — it is not "dirty." Masturbation is a perfectly healthy activity. Although some people may worry that masturbation is harmful, it actually is one of the body’s most effective ways to relieve stress.

It is too bad that so many people worry about masturbation. The majority of people masturbate. Women and men masturbate throughout their lives, whether or not they are in sexual relationships with other people. But because masturbation is so misunderstood, the majority of people who masturbate have unnecessary guilty feelings and shame about it. This shame and guilt can lead to difficulties in a person’s sense of self-esteem and in a person’s relationships with other people.

I’ve taught sex-ed at All Saints for the last four years, and on more than one occasion, have given almost this exact answer.   For folks steeped in a liberal understanding of human sexuality, nothing could seem to be more pointless — and needlessly guilt-inducing — than trying to discourage kids (and adults) of either sex from masturbating!  Indeed, in my work as a sexuality educator (going back to my days at Cal as a volunteer with what was called Peer Sexuality Outreach), I’ve generally taken a "pro-masturbation" position.  I’ve defended that take on sound psychological grounds.

Yet when I read Bonnie’s piece, I was provoked, in a good way.  She doesn’t write as a "prude"; she doesn’t suggest that masturbation is "dirty".  Rather, she constructs an argument, using spiritual principles, that makes the case that our sexuality is always about connecting with another human being.   Though she writes as a Protestant, Bonnie isn’t far off from John Paul II’s famous "theology of the body".  Like JPII, Bonnie argues that sexuality is misused when we direct it towards ourselves alone.   Men and women alike, according to this argument, are given the gift of sexuality to create unity and passion and life.  Folks like Bonnie take the euphemism "making love" with real seriousness - sexuality is intended to bind two people closer together, to make love stronger, and in ideal circumstances, to produce children.   

A progressive might say, but how does masturbation, especially in singleness, harm that lovely vision?  "Theology of the body" folks make the case that when we masturbate, even in adolescent singleness, we are training our bodies and our souls to see sex as something that is entirely about us.   Each act of masturbation makes us, in a sense, more self-centered.  It’s not that sperm will be wasted (that argument is never used any longer by any serious folks, and besides, it ignores the reality of female masturbation); it’s that spiritually and psychologically we are conditioning ourselves to think of sexuality as being exclusively about our own satisfaction, pleasure, and release.

As a progressive Christian, I take that argument seriously.  For the reasons I gave yesterday, I reject it.  But it’s one thing to thoughtfully reject a moral position, and another to dismiss it as the ravings of a wingnut!  To publicly take an anti-masturbation stance for the reasons that she does is, frankly, a brave thing for Bonnie to do; she risks ridicule and opprobrium.  I’m sorry to say she’s had some of both directed towards her.  That disappoints me.  Perhaps because I have spent so many years working with youth around issues of faith and sexuality, I’m eager to listen to those whose views are radically different from my own.  Bonnie didn’t sway me, but she challenged me — and I enjoy a civil and robust challenge to my worldview.

To be sure, my own annoyance gets kindled when I think about some of the kids I’ve worked with in the college and the church over the years.  Though the vast majority of All Saints youth come from fairly liberal households, every once in a while we do get teens in our Wednesday night program who do come from very conservative backgrounds.  I’ve privately comforted a 16 year-old boy who told me that his parents had raised him to believe masturbation was a sin.  He had tried and tried to refrain, but never with success.  He was worried, quite literally, about going to hell; he was also worried that everyone else could somehow "tell" his secret by looking at his face.  As I reassured him, gently, that masturbation was not only normal but a gift, I had to quiet the anger that grew inside me at his parents!  To my liberal mind, his guilt seemed such a colossal waste, and his parents deserved a good shaking!  Sometimes, I still feel that way.

But though I will continue to teach and advocate a progressive approach on the subject in my work with young people, I have gained a fresh understanding in recent years of the legitimate theological underpinnings of the anti-masturbation position.  Where I would have once dismissed Bonnie’s post out-of-hand, I am now eager to engage in dialogue.   We are, after all, both committed to Christ and committed to young people. We want joy and fulfillment for the children with whom we work.  And our radically different approaches to this most sensitive of subjects are both motivated, I’m convinced, by profound faith and profound love.

Longer post on sexuality, masturbation, and honoring God

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on August 25, 2005
in Faith, Masturbation and Sexuality
. 40 Comments

Chip, who is an infrequent but invariably eloquent and charitable commenter here, writes in response to yesterday’s post on modesty:

I can agree with you when you talk about not giving into the Abercrombie-type image, Hugo, but I can’t agree fundamentally with the concept that "their sexuality [is] theirs." Heck, my sexuality is not my own — my use of it is called to be a picture of Christ and the church. Just as Christ gave his life for the church and was totally faithful to it, so the apostolic teaching inspired by the Holy Spirit asks me to reserve myself for one woman and to be faithful to her … and to give sacrificially for her.

But to broaden the issue: From a Christian POV, I can’t see ANYTHING in our lives to be our own. "You are not your own; you were bought with a price. Therefore honor God with your body [or your talents, or your mind, or your emotions, or your thought life, or your work … you get the picture]." "And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them and rose again." Impossible commands? Sure, in our own human strength … but it’s still something we are called to grow into by the power of the Holy Spirit. And we are to live with the ultimate goal of pleasing God.

I need to do a better job of explaining myself.  Chip’s use of 1 Corinthians 6:20 is an important one, given that it comes at the end of an extended meditation about the importance of avoiding sexual immorality.  But let me be clear — arguing against the rhetoric of the "modesty movement" is not a defense of sexual immorality!   

When I say "I want the women with whom I work to see their sexuality as theirs", I am not encouraging them to use that sexuality recklessly, abusively, or self-destructively.  What I am arguing is that our sexuality is a gift from God, a gift with more than one purpose: Christians are indeed called to honor God with their bodies, but we are also called to take our own delight in living as embodied creatures.   Pleasure is part of God’s gift; to receive and to give pleasure can be honoring to God.  All Christians believe this; conservatives believe that pleasure should be limited to heterosexual marriage, while progressives believe in a more liberated and inclusive ethic, but we are united in our conviction that God intends us to have sexual pleasure, and that experiencing and sharing pleasure can be profoundly honoring to our Creator!

My body is a gift to me from God, and I am called to use that body as I believe He would have me use it.  That’s not the same thing as saying "my sexuality does not belong to me".   I said:

"it doesn’t belong to their fathers, their future husbands, the leering boys in math class or the older men at the bus stop.  It doesn’t belong to the church, or to MTV, or to the magazines, or to their peers, or to their parents."

God was quite deliberately NOT on the list of things to which the body ought not belong! (Sorry for the double negative.)   I think it’s quite possible to teach young men and women that their bodies are their own, gifts from God to be used to honor God; by the same token, their bodies do not belong to the culture, their families, or their peers.

*************

On a related topic, here’s a lengthy, thoughtful, Christian argument against masturbation at Bonnie’s blog. (You may need to scroll down).   She’s making an argument that may be similar to Chip’s (though Chip, I don’t presume to know your stance on masturbation).   It’s difficult to summarize her argument fairly, but here’s a key section:

Sexuality is a valuable treasure, a great gift. We give our very best gifts – our figurative gold, frankincense, and myrrh – to God. In so doing, we give our sexual gold, frankincense, and myrrh to our spouse. We do not “spread the wealth” around; to do so is to cheapen its worth and dilute its significance as well as to make a mockery of the gift itself and the covenant of marriage. Adultery isn’t referred to as “cheating” for no reason; adultery cheats a spouse of what ought to be theirs and theirs alone. Autoerotism also cheats one’s spouse (current or future) out of a portion of one’s sexuality.  (Emphasis in the original; it’s Bonnie’s call to use "autoerotism" as a synonym for masturbation.)

Masturbation is a provocative subject.  I share with Bonnie the belief that in healthy, monogamous sexual relationships, I ought to do all that I can to share my sexuality with my partner.  For many couples, that may mean making the decision not to be sexual except when they are together; refraining from masturbating thus allows sexual desire to build for one’s beloved.  I’ve known of more than one relationship where one partner regularly masturbated and then professed little interest in or energy for sex with the other; that, I think, falls well short of the mark for "sharing" and "giving"! Other couples may come (pun somewhat unintended) to different agreements about solitary sexuality within the context of their relationship.  I don’t think there’s a "one-size fits all" answer here.  The key thing is to be clear and honest, with the other’s pleasure and delight one’s foremost concern.

I don’t intend to turn this post into a paean to masturbation.   Though there is much to disagree with in Bonnie’s post on both theological and psychological grounds, at places she makes very good sense.  But I am interested in rejecting the notion that if our bodies belong to God and to our partners, then they do not also belong to ourselves!   Here, I’ll take the "both/and" stance: our bodies are intended both for God’s purposes and for our own pleasure (indeed, more often than we realize, these may be congruent!); our bodies are intended both for our spouse’s delight and for our own.

Ultimately, when it comes to sexuality, I think far too many people fail to distinguish between what is selfish and what is self-honoring.   Selfish sexual expression is anything that robs another person of their dignity, their value, and what is rightfully theirs. Adultery is selfish, and even masturbation can be selfish when and if it deprives one’s partner of one’s entire energy and excitement.  But as created beings, whose bodies — like all creation — are fundamentally good, we are right to honor ourselves.   On the one hand, self-honor doesn’t mean narcissism; even when we delight in our own bodies, we are giving thanks to the Creator who gave us our flesh.   And it’s worth pointing out that self-honor need not always be the same as self-denial!  When we eat to satiety, and delight in the taste of rich foods, in a very real sense we honor both our bodies and God’s gift of sustenance.  When we explore and enjoy our bodies sexually, we are similarly honoring both the gift which was given and He who gave it.

It’s no accident that so many people call upon God at the moment of orgasm!   When we do so, wittingly or no, we are perhaps giving thanks and praise to Him for the extraordinary gift of our sexuality.   As spiritual people, as believers, we must avoid twin pitfalls: on the one hand, we must be leery of a secular ethic that devalues sexuality and sees it as something to be squandered; on the other, we must be equally leery of those who, with the best of intentions, wish to too narrowly limit the time, place, and manner of sexual expression.  We must always approach our own sexuality with a sense of awe and responsibility, and if we do so, we will neither use it recklessly nor unreasonably constrain it.

If the personal is political, than I need to be accountable

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on April 19, 2004
in Faith, Masturbation, Men and Masculinity and Porn
. 10 Comments

Judging by the hits on Saturday night’s piece, folks like to read and write about porn. No big surprise there. What is more uncomfortable — especially in Christian circles — is to admit to using it. Even the phrase "using it" is euphemistic; what we generally mean is "viewing it and masturbating to it." Just typing those words in a blog that so many of my friends, parents, and students read is difficult! And yet as with so many things, our silence feeds our shame and our sin.

In order to research, teach, and lead on gender issues, I don’t need to be perfect or flawless. However, given that one of the basic tenets of feminism is that the "personal is political", I do have a moral obligation to seek to match my language and my life. I owe that to myself, my partner, my family, my students, my church, and (above all) to God. That means that on an issue such as pornography, I need to be clear that I have struggled with it — particularly since the advent of the Internet!

For those who might be interested, I use (and hereby endorse) two different bits of software that help me to honor my commitments while I work online. On my home computer, I have Hedgebuilders software installed; it’s a very effective server-based filter, reasonably priced. It allows me unlimited access to virtually everything legitimate I could want, while blocking porn completely. (It can also be configured to block gambling and white supremacist sites; I rarely have the urge to visit either). On my work computer (on which running Hedgebuilders is technically problematic) I have put up X3 software (a free program from the excellent guys at XXXChurch). X3 doesn’t block anything, but it reports my user history to a guy friend of mine who has agreed to be an accountability partner.

I recommend both with enthusiasm. They work. Like all humans, I am deeply flawed. Like Paul, I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. But I do have a vision for the kind of work I feel I am called to do (vocationally and avocationally) around faith, sexuality, and masculinity. And in order to do that work, sometimes I need some help and some accountability. And (all thanks to God), I am not ashamed to publicly proclaim that I — like most men — need that help; I am also grateful that I have been given the strength to ask for it.