Do you need sex?

Tax may not have the traditional relationship and some of you may not believe a thing he posts. Isn't it a bit mean though to gang up on him?

I guess it depends first how you define "need". I think some people have a definition of "need" in their head that constitutes basic survival. Other than food and water therefore what other "need" is there? Everything else after that is just things you would be better off with but do not even "need". For example a home.

If we define "need" in terms of not just survival but also maintaining some minimum standard of well being - things become a little more open but also a little more subjective. Many of us might feel we "need" a home and sex and love. But a contemplative who has cut themselves off from civilisation and is sitting in a cave in endless meditation and isolation might disagree.

As I said in my first post in that sense I would like to think I am above certain pleasure of the flesh and mind - but quickly when going any length of time without some of them and I find my well being impacted. So it certainly feels like I "need" them. But without them I would likely train myself out of that need too eventually.

But whatever else - it is certainly clear that the impulse and compulsion towards sex can be as close to "need" as it gets and is at times completely deranging to the individual. Which everything from the success of the porn industry - to the existence of rape - to the strange machinations of INCEL culture would seem to attest. If sex is not a "need" - it seems pretty damn close.

Thanks for that :) - but they would either need to come in far greater numbers - or come with some actual decent material - before I would feel ganged up on. The most they achieve is to pointlessly derail a thread.

Leaving a thread on a subject like Gun Violence or Age Difference Relationships - to side swipe at me somewhere else where context makes a substantive reply from me more difficult without making it look like I am the one derailing the thread - is not "ganging up" on me.

It is pure cowardice on their part and a failure of substance. If there was something about either me - my opinions - or my actions - or my parenting - on those threads they were capable of confronting me about - they probably would have done so. Getting triggered and then lashing out out of context with entirely irrelevant one liners - just shows they cant/couldnt do so. Someone might be bothered by - for example - my thinking training a child how to use a gun is a bad thing. But if they can not articulate a coherent comment in context to that effect - the failing there is far from mine.

"Pattern" and "placebo" are not mutually exclusive though. It is entirely possible for placebo to show a pattern of effect or behaviour in any given individual. Even - some studies have suggested - in people who you have actually told are taking a placebo. It seems placebo can be effective even when the person being treated knows it is only placebo.

Against the placebo comment however I would also note - there are other possibilities to explain why some small number of people see physical and mental health benefits from abstaining from sex or masturbation though.

One example: As you note yourself sexual activity does modify hormonal levels in the body. You mention two of them above as good examples. If you were to have some underlying undiagnosed issue in your metabolism or hormonal system - it is entirely possible that events that cause a short term stark modification of your hormones exacerbate that issue and leave you compromised - less energy, focus or whatever. Just like while most people can have a few beers without any massive effects - some people who do so suffer massive loses in physical energy or emotional well being.

So just like alcohol - if you have definitively recognise sexual activity as a trigger for harmful side effects in your system then by all means avoid it. It could be even that your reaction to your own hormones is acting very much like an allergy. So the hormones that affect you after orgasm have similar effects to - say - someone with a grains allergy feeding on a loaf of bread.

As another user notes however there is a whole "alt science" realm of "semen retention" that is not at all supported by your anecdotal experience. Scientifically they would have a lot more to do than extrapolate a hypothesis from an anecdote as you have done above. So when any of them move from "Well this works for me" to actively advocating such abstinence to others - they have crossed into the realm of snake oil salesman really. It would make no more sense than someone with a common food allergy advocating that entirely normal people avoid the same foods they have to.