Critics of controlled intercourse (during which men don’t ejaculate) sometimes lump the practice in with solo semen-retention. Such practices are touted by both rational people and extremists. Critics then spread the absurd talking point that “semen retention is macho and misogynistic”.
This is very odd. How can semen retention during partnered sex be any more misogynistic than ejaculatory sex? To suggest otherwise smacks of propaganda from the sex/porn industry. This industry glorifies spurting ejaculate, and discourages everyone from experimenting with sexual self-control lest explorers discover its potential advantages.
From the trenches
Recently, I saw an exchange on this subject in an online forum. One forum member said, “To me the “semen retention” crowd symbolise a sort of macho mildly misogynistic state of mind which very obviously I find revolting.”
Another forum member responded,
I would disagree with this. Sure, there’s a few knuckleheads on YouTube proposing it, etc. (I’ve watched some of them myself.) But just because they’ve appropriated something that has ancient and spiritual roots going back thousands of years doesn’t mean the thing itself is macho or whatever.
I think many critics of “semen retention” (often the same “scientific community” that says porn is okay) just yell out macho and misogynistic as vacuous ad hominems to shut off any kind of discourse. Or, they’ll say my favourite, semen retention is of the far right, as if a man having control of his sexuality somehow determines his political philosophy. But all of this does make one wonder: why the f*%k do these people care so much about what we men do with our sexual energy?
I love semen retention for the sense of utter control it brings to my life. If a man can control this about himself, that is, the greatest urge in humanity as far as I’m concerned, then he can control anything else life throws at him, including porn addiction. I’m not doing this to get my mojo back or anything of that nature, so it’s well beyond recovering from porn.
I’ll be doing this for experimental reasons and track what it does for me as the days go on. I also have many goals that I’m working on, school mostly, and I want to use that sexual energy to conquer them. I’m planning on a month at the moment, as that’s the agreement my Lady and I have.
We always have a lot of sex when I’ve done this in the past, but it is a different kind of sex, in fact, a sex that isn’t quite as “macho” as the other kind of sex, so I feel I alone shouldn’t be making the calls here because it affects both of us. If this is going great, which I think it will, then I would like to go two or three months because I’ve never done that before, but then again I would have to convince her of that.
Mood meds?
Perhaps some people think that, because a 2002 study reported that women’s moods benefited from unprotected sex, men are being misogynistic if they don’t ejaculate during sex. However, there are many fluids exchanged during intercourse even without ejaculation. Why would it be presumed that mood benefits derive from sperm? Sperm make up only 2-5% of an ejaculation.
How do we know the mood benefits don’t arise from the abundant lubrication present during any kind of unprotected penile-vaginal intercourse, non-ejaculatory or ejaculatory? We are unlikely to learn the truth about this any time soon. This is because sexology researchers insist that they can’t study non-ejaculatory sex using a proper control group.
Meanwhile…
Let’s close with a further description from the forum member quoted above:
It does take a while to get used to this type of sex, partly because we’ve been culturally inculcated that getting “off” is the greatest thing ever etc. However, it does have some benefits that I’ve really come to appreciate over the years as we’ve done this here and there. Probably the greatest thing that I’ve come to love is this, it’s quite a different thing to have sex and NOT be thinking only about busting a nut! Let’s be honest, no matter how sexy or how much we love our partners etc. so much of that drive for sex is to just get to that last ten seconds. Thus, to put it bluntly, sometimes sex is just a very sexy sexy substitute for the palm of your hand. Think about it, what do us men do when we finally get off? It’s game over, and everything is good and blissful etc. Practically speaking, it’s mission accomplished. Now of course, I try very hard not to do this, but that’s often how I feel about it afterwards. Thus, when I do this SR and don’t get off, it seems I focus more on her, and I don’t mean other skillful digit activities, I mean just emotionally. Obviously both kinds of sex are great, but I have come to appreciate this as much as the other.
Be honest. Does that sound remotely misogynistic?
Be slow to accept any talking point that claims Synergy-style sex is “misogynistic” or “macho”. It may reflect either gullibility or a powerful bias bearing no relation to reality.
