When I was 12 or 13, I'd get out of bed and stand my sheet in the corner.

[Cyrano]

My mother, using her magical powers, evidently knew why my sheet was as stiff as cardboard.

The next time she took me for a physical exam, the doctor gave me a once over and then asked, "Do you masturbate?" I gulped, tried to look casual, and whimpered, "Uh, um, who doesn't?" Years passed before I understood that I'd driven a stake through his chest.

So this creature wearing a white coat and stethoscope actually said, "You know that's not healthy for you and God doesn't approve."

My family wasn't particularly religious, but over the years, I've often wondered how many kids he'd had this discussion with, and how many young minds he'd damaged. Yeah, this was many years ago, but the nut was ignoring rule #1 of his profession. "First do no harm."

Anyhow, I ignored him and have figured out ways to avoid having to stand my sheet in the corner when I get up. And I don't worry that some deity's gonna' "get" me. How about you?

[Xeric]

1. You shoulda listened to the old doc

Nobody told me it was wrong and now look at me.
Posting on DU and shaving my palms twice a day.
Plus I got glasses thick as coke bottles.

[danalytical]

2. .

LOL

[Sequoia]

3. When I was a kid

we had these religous books for young people called "On Becoming a Woman", and "On Becoming a Man". I read them both, long after I knew most facts of life, and for the girls we were not to sit on guy's laps or eat spicy food and certainly not at the same time.

Boys were not to eat spicy food either, and were never to...um...let's say "amuse" themselves. Save it for the gal you marry otherwise you might lose it mentality. Well, I just had to laugh at that one mind you.

When I was a senior in high school I mentioned this to the "really smart college guy" I was dating and I was floored when he agreed with the book. Yeah, he was so smart he didn't even know that stars were differant colors. He actually thought I was wrong because I was brought up in a religous school and the teachers had to have been lame brained. About a year later he told me his professor told the class that yes Virgina, there is a star that's red, blue, white, yellow, orange.

[thereismore]

4. I read somewhere that 90% of adolescent men "amuse" themselves

and 40% of women. I wonder who the 10% were. Bush*'s base?

[Cyrano]

6. They have no need for "amusement." They've been screwing us for six years.

[charlie]

5. Well, it's true

A concerned nation rose up and sacked Jocelyn Elders for suggesting otherwise. And the upright brigades were resoundingly silent when Baffanculo Tony yammered about the benefits of orgies. So we can conclude that masturbation is the sin of not sharing. Raise your kids right, encourage communal grease-a-thons with classmates, for a better America.

[Kailassa]

8. You've got it in one there, Charlie.

"The sin of Onanism", as the Catholic churches like to call masturbation, came from the old testament story of a widow in need of a "protector." After a girl's husband died it was the duty of her brother-in-law to marry her, to make sure she still had a secure place in the family group. And marriage then was not about a ritual celebration, it was about the guy having sex with her, and preferably getting her pregnant. That is why the old testament has recitations of who "knew" (fucked) who, that was marriage back then.

As Genesis 38 tells it, Er, Judah's firstborn, erred in the god's sight; so naturally god wasted him.
Anyway, dad strides up to Onan, reminds him it's his duty to keep Tamar preggers now, and shoves him through the girl's doorway. Well, Onan knows that his father's inheritance will be split amongst any children he makes with Tamar, and is not so keen to make rivals for Daddy's wealth. But not one to miss out on a fuck, he starts out ok, then whips it out at the last minute, "spilling his seed on the ground," so god offs him as well.

And the screwed up church never says a word about coitus interuptus, just tells us god won't approve if we touch ourselves.

I wonder how many marriages have been screwed up by boys being indoctrinated with the idea that they can only do it with a girl, and girls being indoctrinated with the idea that girls just don't like that sort of thing.

Btw, the rest of this story is a hilarious account of how this spunky woman got her own back, one no church will want you to read.
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=1&chapter=38&version=31&context=chapter

[charlie]

9. Heh. Thanks for the link

I knew about Onan's story, up to the moment he was killed, but I didn't recollect Tamar's (I read most of the Bible once, spent a lot of the time bleary-eyed and distracted). That is a great story. One more bit of tawdry intrigue in the wholesome godly alternative to our coarsening culture.

[Kailassa]

7. My puritanical mother even told the wanna-be nun ,who

ran the equally puritanical college hostel I went to, that I "did it".

It didn't help that I was a frightfully shy girl with a guilt complex. But what I might do on my own was the least of her problems. Because she knew already that I was BAD, (unlike the others there, I was studying to be an art teacher, and all arty types are immoral, ;-)) I was given the worst hostel room of all, a pokey single room over a smelly generator.

The place was full of burglar alarms to prevent any girls going out after 7pm, but my window had no screens and overlooked a sloping roof with a huge tree beside it. And a branch so thick you could walk along it led over the top of the 8' high spear-topped fence.

Well, I was pretty dumb, but not stupid, so I spent my nights somewhere much more comfortable with a companion who didn't mind in the least if I had natural urges. Eventually my absence was discovered and I was sent to the principal to get expelled from college.
"Well Carol," he said, "you must admit you have been a bit of a fat-head."
I was shaking, terrified, but I never could resist a pun.
"Please sir," I couldn't help saying, despite inwardly kicking myself, knowing I should be humbly grovelling, not making stupid jokes. "Please sir, if I might make a suggestion, it would be nicer to refer to it as a broad mind."

To my amazement he laughed, and after that was very kind to me, putting himself out to get me out of a few more scrapes that could have put an end to my studies.

I found out later that me mother, who was a really vile sicko, not just a normal uptight mum, had tried to get the doctor to do a clitoradectomy on me when I was a baby, but he'd, ... thank god ... refused.

[thereismore]

10. good grief, I'm really glad you were able to grow up. nt

[NMMNG]

11. I got started rather young

Probably around 7 or 8 I began "humping" my pillow. Anytime I got caught by my mom or stepdad I'd get hell for it, but that never stopped me. Sometimes I'd just get yelled at, sometimes I'd get spanked. Nonetheless, I kept right on doing it. :evilgrin: As I got older I found better techniques of course. :P