Quarantine
Quarantine
means time to
means time to
make use of
make use of
our hands
our hands
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
statement
BY GRACE TUCKER, STATEMENT COLUMNIST
Wednesday, December 9, 2020 — 11
C
an anyone else, like, not stop jerk-
ing off?”
Our respective Zoom boxes lit
up in a staggered glow as my group of friends
and I erupted into laughter. It was April,
and we were enduring what would be the
second month of a long, monotonous, 2020
thing called quarantine. That one endearing
question had elicited possibly the first pang
of hysterical joy I had experienced in weeks.
My friend’s inquiry was met with the muf-
fled commentary of an agreeing crowd:
“Yeah, oh my god, I thought it was just
me.”
“I can’t stop!”
“Yeah, what the hell, I’m doing it so much
more often than usual.”
It turns out she wasn’t alone.
In the months following that Zoom call, I
continued to notice, on various forms of both
traditional and social media, an enduring
theme of solo sex as the favored quarantine
activity; the premier pandemic antidote.
Despite the arguably designated stages
of quarantine trends, from whipped-coffee
recipes and “Tiger King” marathons to the
slew of controversial transitions to in-person
schooling and University-outbreak-hysteria,
one quarantine trend has carried consistent
cultural relevance amid masks and mara-
thons, vacation-shaming and TikTok-mak-
ing: the “m” word.
Yes, masturbation.
I was unsurprised to find that most people
I talked to about masturbation as the quaran-
tine pastime met me with blushed faces. The
act carries a significant, religiously-bound
history of stigmatization.
In a 2020 study by Planned Parenthood,
researchers discussed how masturbation
as a means of self-pleasure actually carries
historical controversy: It was once associ-
ated with “pathological origins and negative
physical and mental health consequences,”
including a so-called “post-masturbation
disease” popularized by 18th-century medi-
cal practitioners. In his 1711 editions of the
Treatise of Venereal Diseases, medical en-
trepreneur John Marten identified some
of the symptoms of the “uncleanly” condi-
tion, which included “meager jaws and pale
looks” and “legs without calves.”
The taboo nature of the act also carries
a significant religious basis, specifically
with ties to early Christian teachings. Even
though the Bible makes no explicit refer-
ences to masturbation, the act was heav-
ily condemned by fathers of the early
church, who considered it sinful due
to its non-procreative nature.
But, by the grace of some brave
friends and an anonymous Google
form, I was able to break through
this sturdy, historically-con-
structed stigma against solo
sex and hear about their expe-
riences with mid-pandemic
masturbation.
My friends’ Google Form
responses seemed to echo
what I had initially heard in
that mid-April-Zoom-call:
Friend 1: I was so bored
in March that I masturbated
mindlessly all hours of the
day. I didn’t need a reason. It
was literally mind-numbing.
Friend 2: (During quar-
antine, I masturbated) so so
much!!! Like I was just bored and
horny ALL THE TIME.
Friend 3: I definitely did it way
more out of boredom, like, I had nothing else
to do.
Through the Statement’s annual sex sur-
vey, I was able to quantify the wave of mid-
pandemic masturbation sentiment I was
gathering from friends. It seems as though
we really are all making use of our hands
while spending more time at home.
The survey, which was sent to over 48,000
undergraduate and graduate students at the
University of Michigan and received over
3,700 responses, included various questions
on the frequency and motivations behind
masturbation.
Under the question, “On average, how
often have you masturbated this semester,”
students did, in fact, demonstrate increased
rates of masturbation during these pandem-
ic-stricken months, when compared to sur-
vey data from the Fall 2018 Semester, which
had around 1,700 responses.
The number of women who masturbated
five to six times per week nearly doubled,
from 2.7% in 2018 to 4.4% in 2020; for wom-
en who masturbated once or twice per week
the rates increased from 22.3% in 2018 to
29.7% in 2020. The masturbation rates for
men also increased in a similar manner as
those for women.
When it came down to the reasons why
people masturbate, 56.5% indicated “for
pleasure,” 49.3% said for stress-relief and
there was significant mention of boredom
as a reason in the free-response section.
Similarly, in the free-response section for the
question, “How has the COVID-19 pandemic
affected your sexual activity?” multiple peo-
ple mentioned increased masturbation as an
effect.
It doesn’t take an expert to deduce how
this wave of self-pleasure during the pan-
demic came to be. The equation looks like
this: More time at home + stressful circum-
stances + possibly less time spent with sexual
partners = we make do with what we can do
for ourselves, with something that’s proven
to have multiple mental and physical health
benefits.
Megan Fleming, a clinical
psychologist at Cor-
nell University
specializ-
ing in
sex and relationships, offers a more sophis-
ticated explanation when she said, during
times like these, “all of our nervous systems
are on high alert for danger.”
“The good news is that masturbation
can act as a reset button,” she said. “It tells
your brain that things are OK, that you can
breathe and relax.”
Masturbation holds the same position in
public discourse that it has occupied for a
while; it’s something we do behind closed
doors, nothing more than a stress-reliever
and, thus, a favorable way to pass time in
quarantine.
However, at the end of March, a public
health guide issued by the New York City
Health Department seemed to motivate
a considerable shift in the ways we think
about, discuss and culturally approach mas-
turbation. The department’s guide read:
“Have sex only with people close to you. You
are your safest sex partner. Masturbation
will not spread COVID-19.”
No longer an idea met with blushed faces,
the “m-word” was now formally delineated
and even encouraged via a government-is-
sued advisory document.
And suddenly, something once so severely
stigmatized was catapulted into the public
narrative. Major news sources like The New
York Times, the Los Angeles Times and the
Chicago Tribunewere not only reporting on
the benefits of mid-pandemic solo sex but
were also highlighting the booming sale of
sex toys and increased pornography viewer-
ship that they attributed to increased rates of
self-pleasure.
In the weeks following the New York City
Health Department’s “Safer Sex and COV-
ID-19” guide, the Chicago Tribune published
a piece in direct response titled, “‘Masturba-
tion will not spread COVID-19’: Solo sex is
best option for pleasure during quarantine,
especially if you live alone.”
In the piece, they declared that quaran-
tine “doesn’t mean sexual pleasure is over —
it just looks different, like engaging in more
masturbation.”
The article went on to quote a Los
Angeles Times report stat-
ing that there has
been a 30% to
100% in-
crease
i
n
sex toy sales since the onset of the pandemic.
The consumers had spoken: We’re mastur-
bating more!
The New York Times joined this conversa-
tion in the following weeks with their piece
“Sellers of Sex Toys Capitalized on All That
Alone Time,” which highlighted the massive
spike in sales sex toy companies were see-
ing. Among the more notable trends include
the 200% increase in sales both We-Vibe and
Womanizer were seen since April 2019.
All the while, Pornhub, the world’s lead-
ing free pornography site, cashed in on this
quarantine masturbation craze with its
launch of #StayHomeHub in March. Italian
citizens were their initial audience as Italy
was the first European nation to be affected
by the virus.
A media study distributed by the U.S.
National Library of Medicine noted Porn-
hub’s tactful offer, stating that the plat-
form, “... made headlines worldwide …
because it gave quarantined Italians free
premium access to the platform for one
month. The offer was so positively re-
ceived that Pornhub immediately expand-
ed it to Spain and France and eventually
the whole world.”
At the end of March, Pornhub nar-
rowed in on the same “You are your safest
sex partner” narrative the New York City
Health Department first introduced to us.
The platform tweeted: “Stay home and
help flatten the curve! Since COVID-19
continues to impact us all, Pornhub has
decided to extend Free Pornhub Premium
worldwide until April 23rd. So enjoy, stay
home, and stay safe … #StayHomehub.”
Over the course of a few weeks, sex toy
sales, porn viewership and Pornhub ratings
in particular shifted from symptoms of “sin-
ful practice” that we previously refused to
acknowledge on mainstream platforms to
favorable, commercialized prevention meth-
ods against COVID-19. Now, we’re not just
masturbating behind closed doors, we’re
masturbating and flattening the curve behind
closed doors.
So, what kind of effect might this shift have
on the public discourse surrounding mastur-
bation? In a post-COVID world, will news
outlets continue to report on and distribute
information surrounding the ways we’re
pleasuring ourselves? Will the destigmatiza-
tion of masturbation prove to be an enduring
cultural byproduct of the pandemic?
Laurie Mintz, a psychologist and Univer-
sity of Florida professor, expressed in the
same Los Angeles Times report that, yes,
change is coming:
“People are scared,” Mintz said.
“People are lonely, and I think there’s
been enough talk [about the topic
that] it’s destigmatizing sex toys
and masturbation — finally — and
that could be one of the very few
positive outcomes of all this.”
In a phone interview with
The Daily, Hollis Griffin, an as-
sociate professor in the LSA
department of communication
and media, felt more unsure
about any prospective change.
“I think it’s hard to say what
kind of effect (increased news
media coverage of masturbation)
will have,” he said.
Read more online at
michigandaily.com
ILLUSTRATION BY MAGGIE WEIBE