Friends, I've been on a bit of a serious kick lately. My last four pieces have been a disquisition on religion, a meta-column about the editorial page, a lame attempt at surrealism and an impassioned defense of MLK Day. In short, I've been terribly pretentious, and I apologize. As penance, here is a column about jerking off.
In his last column, Emin Hadziosmanovic observed that "hooking up is not nearly as wide-spread at Duke as people make it seem." He's absolutely right. I can't provide any statistics, but I'd guess that male sexual frustration at Duke has reached near-Biblical proportions. And all that unused semen isn't just going into storage. Admit it or not, quality-of-masturbation is absolutely essential to our collective happiness.
But most men won't even acknowledge that "quality of masturbation" exists: it seems that we're horribly goal-oriented even when it comes to self-abuse. Take Andy Johnson, a Trinity sophomore: "It's really sad when you think about it," said Andy after I got him drunk, steered our talk to masturbation and turned on my concealed tape recorder. "If I have two free minutes before class, bam, I'm done. I don't even think I enjoy it anymore."
And is it any surprise? After all, the qualities that make a good lover-- responsiveness, sensitivity, patience--are pertinent no matter how many partners are involved in the sex act. And those qualities have trouble coexisting with a 3.9 and a killer internship. Masturbation-as-break-between-problem-sets is certainly a viable option, but it breeds a whole lot of unhappy investment bankers.
And not only are we in a rush to get ourselves off--we take masturbation completely for granted. Many of us have been ejaculating consistently for nearly a decade. And with unprecedented access to pornography, masturbation becomes yet another automatic bodily function, rather than the magical erotic ballet God intended it to be.
"I really reminisce about sixth grade sometimes," says Pratt senior Devon Bishop. "You go your whole life and then one day you realize your penis can do that--it's like waking up and discovering you're Superman! It was just me with a flashlight and the Sears catalogue, terrified my mom would walk in on me, but, damn, it was incredible. Now I have a single and high-speed internet. Where's the challenge?"
I suggested to Devon that the difference between the hopeful, carefree masturbator of middle school and the hardened, cynical masturbator of college is that the latter has come to view himself as a means to an end. For all our swagger, when it comes to self-love we treat ourselves no better than cheap whores to be used up and wiped off.
"Honestly, I've been trying to mix things up in the bedroom," says Sam Gherkin, a Trinity junior. "Sometimes I'll surprise myself and dress up like a French maid, or other times I'll pretend I'm a policeman and handcuff myself to my desk. But I just feel so dirty afterwards."
If, as Woody Allen said, the best part of masturbation is afterwards, when you get to cuddle, the missing ingredient at Duke is self-respect. But what reasons have we been given to respect ourselves? Our male role-models are appalling, perhaps deliberately so.
Consider Papa Bear, the head of the fictional Berenstain Bears family with which many of us were raised. Here's what the official Berenstain Bears website has to say about Papa Bear: "He is often wrong but never in doubt. He is a woodsbear and rough carpenter--very rough."
Gee, thanks. Consider Homer Simpson. Consider Al Bundy. How can we help feeling worthless when maleness is presented as one vast sea of incompetence? How are we expected to cope in the academic pressure-cooker without literally taking it out on ourselves?
Guys, this is serious: it's time to stop the cycle of self-abuse. It's time to learn self-respect. It's time to treat ourselves right. We deserve more than two minutes.
So do what I do. Take yourself out to a nice dinner at the Washington Duke. Have a bottle of wine. Light some scented candles. Put on the Luther Vandross. And then--only then--go at it. Don't treat yourself like a piece of meat. Treat your piece of meat like yourself.
Rob Goodman is a Trinity junior. His column appears every other Wednesday.
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