I keep meaning to do this post and have finally found a rainy day. A month back I saw an old friend, my age, 53,who looked great, young. I said, How do you do it? His family was there and he said, "Three orgasms a week." Laughter. Later I emailed him to ask what he meant–he's a serious guy, an econometrics prof–and he told me he was only half joking: "there was a
particularly dumb study on the determinants of longevity. They simply
correlated all sorts of behavioral variables (one at a time) with life
span. Flossing your teeth came out the highest with an additional 3
years, more than one orgasm per week was second with 2 years…"
I looked around on line and found that this "knowledge" is reflected at Oprah's website, where in a questionnaire on fighting aging, she suggests that men should have four orgasms a week, women two.
The differential between husbands and wives gets at an unspoken issue in modern life: masturbation. When I went on Stephen Colbert's show last spring for a piece I did for New York Magazine on male sexuality, I asked in the green room if I could mention masturbation and the producer said, Go ahead, we'll see if it gets bleeped. As it turned out, Colbert made the masturbation reference that night, a joke–"if you can't find it, grind it." But the point here is that masturbation is an important part of sexual behavior and would seem to be the way that many married people of my age deal with sexlessness in a marriage–a very real phenomenon of married sexuality–and for that matter with meeting Oprah's quota. Hey, you better masturbate if you want to extend your life.
From a man's standpoint, the alternative for the orgasm-discrepancy is prostitution, the hetaera class, Spitzer's solution, which I have no problem with but which is illegal and frowned upon even in haut bourgeois circles. Actually, all circles; it goes against American norms, by and large. I think it's a better answer than the masturbation solution, but I'm not making the norms here; and my point is that married men are expected/encouraged to have many orgasms, and expected to get them at home, regardless of the source. (And yes: studies show a behavioral difference in sexual frequency between men and women.)
One of the best quotes in my New York piece came from Mark Penn's book Microtrends, the jolly pollster of Hillary Clinton fame (my Harvard classmate, son of a Kosher poultry man, and supporter of rightwingers in Israel). Penn said,“[P]orn is the norm." In ways we don't fully comprehend: the marketplace for porn is gigantic, dwarfing the national
pastime of baseball. “And when women realize it, will it change the way they
view their colleagues, bosses, husbands, and boyfriends?” It’s not just men.
Erick Janssen of Kinsey Institute wrote, “Relatively large numbers of
married men and women indicate using the Internet for sexual purposes … but the
impact of this on marriages has, as yet, not received much research attention.”
Again I turn to the social consequences. Marriage is apotheosized in this culture, so nothing can go against marriage. But if your marriage isn't that sexual, you must be sexual, so you find sexual surrogates on the web. We have objections to prostitution on exploitive grounds, among others, but what about the exploitation of the porn industry, in which from the looks of it there is a lot of pressure on young attractive women to perform for older men? Porn means pictures of prostitutes; I think it's an accurate description.
I don't have a conclusion. I'm for the loosening of social norms on this issue because I'm a liberal, and there's a ton of repression, shame, and hypocrisy that seems to be weighing down the human condition here. I wonder how healthy the solution our society has arrived at really is, or whether it's just the way we've found to keep the central economic unit of the society, the family, intact, using an unspoken industry. Now let's talk about dental floss!
The pay-for-porn industry is currently in MAJOR decline as more and more people use the internet to find free porn and websites like www.youporn.com become more popular: hello Porn 2.0 —
“>link to portfolio.com
*
I moved to a midwest state.
Smaller town than Obama city.
If I married (shudder) one of the monstrosities that walk the streets here and had to get sex at home (shudder) and orgasm (impossibility) I would rather kill myself.
Seriously.
This is the land of chunky women.
I am usually walking through the town and thinking to myself Holy ****, I am disgusted, how could anyone let themselves go all the way to a tonne?
An interesting site
It doesn't matter where you get your appetite, as long as you eat at home…
'Spitzer's solution, which I have no problem with but which is illegal and frowned upon even in haut bourgeois circles'
It's also expensive and so off limits to many people who would otherwise partake.
'In ways we don't fully comprehend: the marketplace for porn is gigantic, dwarfing the national pastime of baseball.'
I have heard that it's America's biggest industry outode of defence. How to, er, measure it?
'so you find sexual surrogates on the web'
And someone buried deep in an office in Langley or Herzliya runs a report on the web usage of 'persons of interest' and finds potentially useful proof of the porn consumption of a hitherto crusading journalist, or a Congress member crucial to the outcome of certain upcoming votes. Certainly they CAN do sucha thing; it's a question of whether they WOULD. We can all have our own views on that.
'Now let's talk about dental floss!'
That's apparently what Brazilian men call the thong.
There was a study that showed high masturbation rate in adolescense goes with low cancer rate in old age. Forgot whether it was in prostate or balls. Explanation was that it flushes out the system.
Yes Glenn the blackmail factor makes sex lib necessary. I cant understand why Spitzer quit and can only surmise he was into something kinky that would have freaked out his wife. The asshole should have divorced her.
I was never married and I cant understand why you should do it if you dont have kids.
If I was in a sexless marriage I would certainly go looking for a good lay. The wife should be overjoyed if it is only with a ho. If hos are exploited it is only because they are illegal. If they were legal a girl would not need to turn to parasitic handlers.
The coming thing on internet is videophone sex, and this is a cottage industry rather than capitalism. The means of production are totally in the hands of the workers.
Porn videos will survive by blurring the line between porn and mainstream movies. It must go beyond purely sexual interests. Clearly home movies on youtube have not hurt Hollywood much.
Ha! I will LIVE FOREVER!!!!!
PW says "but what about the exploitation of the porn industry, in which from the looks of it there is a lot of pressure on young attractive women to perform for older men?"
But what about the exploitation of the airline industry, in which from the looks of it there is a lot of pressure on airline pilots to get up too early in the morning?
I never thought that Phil was so badly pussywhipped. But from the looks of it this may apply to many yuppies in this PC society.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/08/14/ernest-borgnine-i-masturb_n_118938.html
Looks like it's true
In Holland prostitution, porn, and pot have long been mainstream.
There's a general national cable channel in my area of the USA that, on Sunday nights, regularly has a one hour infomercial show wherein two clean-cut beautiful young ladies, poised, articulate, and elegant, sell dildos of every kind and style imaginable; their spiel is totally casual with every sort of use of the products they pitch, one by one. Presentation is as on the most chic of the shopping network.
I think a more accurate version of my previous reducto ad absurdum would be:
But what about the exploitation of the airline industry, in which from the looks of it there is a lot of pressure on airline pilots to land and take off.
Because hardly anyone wants to get up too early in the morning, but from the looks of it lots of people like to fuck on camera.
Officials: 5 killed in northern Lebanon explosion
By HUSSEIN DAKROUB (Associated Press Writer)
From Associated Press
September 29, 2008 4:17 AM EDT
TRIPOLI, Lebanon – A car bomb exploded Monday near a military bus carrying troops on their way to work in northern Lebanon, killing at least five people and injuring 25, Lebanese security officials said.
A senior military official told The Associated Press that four soldiers were among the dead and the security officials said 22 of the injured in six area hospitals were soldiers.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is happening more and more. And Obama wants to create more terrorism by sending more soldiers to Afghanistan. In many ways he is worse than McCain. I would never vbte for such a pig, even if he was chartruse.
Posts aimed at spiking my ad revenue
Interestingly, both ad link blocks are missing in this space. At least for me.
Combined wisdom of many a talk with my women friends is that (for women)
good sex live is a function of women being noticed, and not only if the shirts have not been picked up at dry cleaners. There is nothing more un-appealing than being mistaken for a housekeeper with occasional hooker duties.
For all of you guys struggling with the orgasm averages, and your wife is younger, or same age as you, I propose this, bulletproof, exercise:
In the conversation with your wive's female and/or male friends, with your wife present, drop casually into the conversation that when you first met her, she was the hottest thing that you ever saw. Describe one of the dresses she wore before you married. Say that there is not a week passing by that you do not feel like that – that she has that something – even now with all the humdrum existence. Then drop the same into conversation with your wife – but make sure conversation is not held in your own house – do this couple of times one week apart. Dig out photographs of your early married years, and go down memory lane. Start paying attention to your personal hygene.
For those of you who's wife is older: don't give up on gym subscription, and you will be just fine.
What happened to eating a healthy diet, exercising, taking care of the body and keeping an active mind? Should we replace those with porn and masturbation?
Todd,
I believe that regular orgasms are adding to longevity as an independent factor, so yes, you can trade healthy diet, exercise etc, but you could also use all these factors and stack up extra years in a cumulative fashion.
I also believe there is good research showing that marriage for women subtracts years from life expectancy (for men it adds to life expectancy). Hence the best recipe for women is to live independently and have gentleman friend visit twice a week. ;-)
Obviously orgasm frequency would correlate with life expectency but is it a causitive factor?
Theres lots of evidence that testosterone turns back the clock for men. Does masturbation raise testosterone? A critical question. To do a proper experiment youd have to pay men to raise or lower their masturbation rate. And how would you know if they were lying? I guess it would have to be done with an institutionalized population who could constantly be watched.
Hey Eva would you like me to visit?
Eva,
I see your point, but healthy living leads to a higher sex drive, and usually to more desirability to the opposite sex. I just don't see how porn and masturbation have a place in the discussion.
I recently read a study that says that men fare worse in marriage. I don't know what the truth is, but it seems that researchers of each sex set up arguments supporting the healthful benefits of multiple partners. Go figure.
I think I'm better off going to the gym and trying my luck with the ladies than I am sitting in front of the computer and playing with myself. I'll ask my friends what they do. :.)
Paul, I appreciate the complement and the offer, but after having a husband 15 years older than me, I am now, after period of widowhood, married to a husband 15 years younger. I am really working hard to catch up on my life expectancy…..
Todd,
I understand that the factors in the work Phil is referring to are assessed independently of each other. It is a labourious statistical exercise, and strips the influence of other factors, making the main variable stand on its own merits, so to speak. This is precisely to isolate each variable from outside influences (negative and positive). You can do the same with two variables together to see if they are symbiotic or antipathetic.
Good to see that you have a sense of humor, Eva. Go work on your life expectancy!