Call it what you will: finger blasting, lip service, polishing the pearl, or just plain old masturbating—we all do it.
Or at least that’s what I thought. Turns out that men of all ages masturbate more regularly than females. At the very least the data tells us that men are more willing to admit to frequent hangout sessions with Jill (AKA their right hand). Turns out we can’t escape the gender gap even when it comes to self-pleasure.
We live in a time where women everywhere are claiming their right to freedom of all kinds, including sexual freedom. But while we’ve said no to slut shaming and rejected the walk of shame in favor of the stride of pride, it seems we’ve yet to feel comfortable paddling the pink canoe (I had to get at least one more in).
For a few weeks in high school, the group of guys I hung around with were completely obsessed with the idea of female masturbation. They begged my girlfriends and I to tell them whether or not we spent our nights thinking of them and touching ourselves. While I’m unsure to this day why I was friends with guys who would think this was an acceptable thing to fixate on, what I’m more worried about now is the way they would ask — as if they were accusing us of doing something dirty. Squirming in our seats, my friends and I denied the charge as profusely as if they’d accused us of kicking puppies.
But why?
I, for one, was doing all that squirming because I did masturbate. While I was imagining Nick Jonas rather than any of the prepubescent boys in my life, I spent a fair number of nights with my hand in my pants. But for whatever reason, these boys had made me feel bad about that, and my friends’ reactions of disdain hadn’t helped. So I went along with it: “Ew, gross! Why would I do that?”
Whether my friends were masturbating and lying about it (like I was) or they actually thought it was gross, I still don’t know. But what I do know, is that in this day and age we should be well past this stigma that surrounds female masturbation. It feels great, and it’s proven to have health benefits, so what’s not to like?
Masturbation shouldn’t be a taboo subject, much less a taboo act. So I encourage you all to get vibrator suggestions from your friends, because there’s (battery) power in numbers, and for those of you who have yet to flick the bean, do yourself a favor and YouTube the library scene from “Atonement” and lock the door — we’ll wait..
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