A remarkable video from an LDS missionary Zone Conference in France was recently circulated on the internet. It depicted Mission President Allan Pratt chastising a group of missionaries at a Zone Conference over this issue of masturbation. See the video and transcript here

The specter of a late middle aged man lecturing a group of men barely out of puberty on the evils of masturbation may seem odd to people outside of Mormonism and other orthodox groups, but it is a common LDS occurrence. In this video, Dr. Pratt explains to the missionaries certain facts about masturbation:

Masturbation is a problem in their mission which has contributed to the fact that only 2 baptisms have been achieved per month. Smart, wise missionaries confess masturbation to the mission president – leaving the implication that those who do not are dumb and foolish. Missionaries cannot overcome the tendency to masturbate by themselves, but are able to with the help of the mission president. Masturbation will prevent them from getting blessings The Spirit of the Lord immediately leaves when they masturbate Using any internet email other than the church monitored site places them at risk for pornography and masturbation.

What I am going to say on this subject will take some explaining and is a bit complex so I will summarize it and you can choose to dive into details if you are curious.

These older men were young once, and masturbated under the cloud of guilt and shame that is cast by the religious teachings. They struggled to stop masturbating for their entire young adult life – doing the church prescribed things to quit: prayer, avoidance of stimulation, religious adherence, repentance, etc. After their young adult life, as they got older, their testosterone levels decreased below a threshold which made their efforts to abstain from masturbation achievable. They attribute this triumph over self-abuse to their own spiritual character rather than the natural biological waning of factors affecting libido. By this time they are in positions of authority and power in the religion due to their age. They are then empowered to chastise young men who come to them to confess their own struggles with masturbation. They mistakenly believe that sufficient religious adherence enabled them to overcome this sin and cast further guilt and shame on the young men who are trying to stop masturbating at the peak of their libido. The cycle starts anew.

See below for a more detailed explanation.

Tale as old as time

Based on numerous conversations I have had with former church members, I would say this pattern is one which is not uncommon among men in the church:

A young man hits puberty and starts to have the normal sexual developmental experiences of sexual thoughts and physical changes. Masturbation is a common part of this pubertal experience

The young man learns from church leaders that masturbation is wrong, immoral, dirty and a violation of the law of Chastity.

The young man struggles to stop this activity, but can’t seem to make it go away completely. He has periods of great success in diverting his mind and energies, but always seems to return to fall into the same behavior which he now knows deprives him of God’s Spirit and good standing. After each failure he has a powerful sense of shame and guilt and need for repentance.

His inability to stop masturbating completely makes him feel worthless and weak. The cycles of guilt and repentance continue, even through his mission, which he may or may not have had to lie about his masturbation in order to go on.

He eventually gets married and feels sure that his access to sexual expression with his spouse will put a stop to his lapses. He soon discovers that even though his masturbation has decreased in frequency, he still periodically descends into that pit of failure and is unable to stop completely.

His activity may be discovered by his spouse at some point and she may demand that he go to priesthood leadership to fix his problem. In some cases the man may choose to go on his own after feeling powerless to rid himself of the act.

He is counseled to increase his devotion and energies in scripture study, prayer, fasting and wholesome activities as well as reducing or eliminating personal private time in an effort to overcome his sin. Each relapse is a reminder of his personal weakness and failure.

The man continues to do these remediation activities for years as he struggles to overcome his weakness. While he finds periodic success, he still falls into old patterns of behavior on occasion. After several years pass in this cycle, he is soon able to abstain for much longer periods of time. after a few decades he is able to cut it out of his life completely!

His success in overcoming that sin is proof of the efficacy of the religious devotion that he has shown, the strength of his personal character and the power of the Gospel to cleanse men’s lives!

By this time the man is no longer a young man, but an older man who now has position and authority in the church and in his family. His success at overcoming this sin through the prescribed method gives him personal experience to justify the strong language that he is now in a position to use when warning the new youth against this sin.

The experience of the man described above seems to make sense. After being unable to overcome the sin on his own, his time spent in the repentance process under the guidance of priesthood leadership and focused on religious and wholesome activities, drawing upon the power of heaven ultimately helped him overcome Satan’s hold on him. But is there another possible explanation?

Biological Factors affecting sexual desire

Libido, or to use the vernacular “Sex Drive”, is a term to describe a persons overall desire for sexual activity. It is affected by biological, psychological and social factors. It should be no surprise to discover that the spike in sexual interest that accompanies puberty is heavily mediated by increasing levels of certain hormones. In males one of the strongest factors driving sexual desire is testosterone. It is not the only factor and other hormones and psychological factors play a role – but it is a primary driver of libido at puberty and through out the remainder of a man’s life.

This is reinforced by the fact that men who take androgen receptor inhibitor medications which block the effects of testosterone-like hormones experience a marked decrease in libido. Additionally testosterone supplement therapy is effective in helping men who have impaired or absent sex drives develop increased levels of sexual interest (see review article on “Hormonal Correlates of Sexual Desire” from the Canadian Journal of Human Sexuality, pg 4-5).

If you were to plot a graph of normal blood serum Testosterone (T) levels throughout a mans life, you would see a graph like this:

Graphing Sex Desire by Age

Now because Testosterone is a primary driver of libido, we can use the testosterone graph to map out generalized baseline sexual desire throughout a mans life. A graph of this would look like this:

Okay – this looks like a complicated graph and there are some things that need to be explained:

Main curve: The main curve in this graph is a plot of generalized sexual desire over a mans life. It is extrapolated from average blood serum testosterone levels. At a given age, you can see the average testosterone level for normal males and this is relatively proportional to the level of sexual desire or libido found in that age group. You can see that it is very low during early childhood, spikes during puberty and stays a peak plateau until the 30’s where after it shows a gradual decline. No units are employed in this plot because it is not meant to show absolute values but rather relative difference between men at different ages as is explained below.

The main curve in this graph is a plot of generalized sexual desire over a mans life. It is extrapolated from average blood serum testosterone levels. At a given age, you can see the average testosterone level for normal males and this is relatively proportional to the level of sexual desire or libido found in that age group. You can see that it is very low during early childhood, spikes during puberty and stays a peak plateau until the 30’s where after it shows a gradual decline. No units are employed in this plot because it is not meant to show absolute values but rather relative difference between men at different ages as is explained below. Line A: This is a threshold line dividing the pre-pubertal male child with very low T levels and very low sexual desire. To the left of this line there is generally little to no expression of sexual desire. To the right of this line there is the steepest portion of the surge in sexual interest that accompanies puberty leading into the plateau phase of early adulthood.

This is a threshold line dividing the pre-pubertal male child with very low T levels and very low sexual desire. To the left of this line there is generally little to no expression of sexual desire. To the right of this line there is the steepest portion of the surge in sexual interest that accompanies puberty leading into the plateau phase of early adulthood. Line B: This is the threshold at which male T levels start to decline after a plateau at the peak levels. After this threshold T levels gradually decrease in steady procession and there is an attendant gradual general decrease in libido. With each passing year comes slightly less interest in sexual activity overall. Note that it does not disappear completely and certainly never goes to the low levels of childhood. This explains why “business still goes down” in retirement communities of elderly men and women.

This is the threshold at which male T levels start to decline after a plateau at the peak levels. After this threshold T levels gradually decrease in steady procession and there is an attendant gradual general decrease in libido. With each passing year comes slightly less interest in sexual activity overall. Note that it does not disappear completely and certainly never goes to the low levels of childhood. This explains why “business still goes down” in retirement communities of elderly men and women. Line C: This is the Isolated Masturbatory Threshold (IMT) . It is the threshold at which sexual desire, mediated by T and other hormonal, psychological and social factors, is so high that masturbation becomes a near ubiquitous sexual outlet among males. It is designated Isolated because this is the threshold for males with no other avenue of sexual expression.

This is the . It is the threshold at which sexual desire, mediated by T and other hormonal, psychological and social factors, is so high that masturbation becomes a near ubiquitous sexual outlet among males. It is designated Isolated because this is the threshold for males with no other avenue of sexual expression. Line D: This is the Coupled Masturbatory Threshold (CMT) . Like the IMT, it is a threshold at which masturbation is a common outlet of sexual desire. The CMT is higher than the IMT, however, because this is the threshold for men who are in a Coupled relationship which allows them sexual expression other than masturbation (i.e. sex with their spouse). Since these men have regular sex with their spouse, they will find it easier to abstain from masturbation for a given level of sexual desire. If their libido is higher than that which may be limited by their spouses libido, there is still pressure which may lead them to masturbate. If sex with their spouse is sufficient to resolve their sexual desire, then there is no pressure leading to masturbation.

This is the . Like the IMT, it is a threshold at which masturbation is a common outlet of sexual desire. The CMT is higher than the IMT, however, because this is the threshold for men who are in a Coupled relationship which allows them sexual expression other than masturbation (i.e. sex with their spouse). Since these men have regular sex with their spouse, they will find it easier to abstain from masturbation for a given level of sexual desire. If their libido is higher than that which may be limited by their spouses libido, there is still pressure which may lead them to masturbate. If sex with their spouse is sufficient to resolve their sexual desire, then there is no pressure leading to masturbation. Yellow Lines: The yellow lines represent what I will call the Gap of Onan – it is the difference between the level of sexual desire and the masturbatory threshold – IMT for single men and the CMT for men with sexual partners. The wider the gap in the positive direction (sexual desire higher than the Masturbatory threshold) – the stronger the pressure placed on the individual which may lead to masturbation.

Mis-attributed Victory over Self Abuse?

There are some key observations to be made from this graph when considering the older MP or Bishop/Stake President who is lecturing young men on masturbation. Is it not possible that their own success in overcoming masturbation is actually the result of waning libido due to decreased testosterone and other factors determining sexual desire rather than their cycles of repentance? Regardless of whether or not they engage in those religious activities – their libido is gradually decreasing as an inevitable result of normal human aging. Once they cross the CMT, they may attribute their victory over self abuse to scripture study, prayer and meeting attendance – but it could also be explained though normal aging process.

The Gap of Onan

The disparity of a 55 year old man towards the end of his middle-age years berating a room full of 19-21 year old young men about masturbation is brought into a sharp focus when you compare the large Gap of Onan where Missionaries are at age 18-21 with the small or negative Gap of Onan where the Mission President is at age 55. At the age of missionaries they are at the period of their life where the Gap of Onan is highest and so there is the strongest pressure to masturbate. At the Mission Presidents age, the Gap of Onan is dramatically lower – possibly even negative where there is absolutely no pressure to masturbate.

Daily Fluctuations

If you look at the daily fluctuations of testosterone in young men compared to older men you see that for any given time of day, the young man is bathed in significantly higher levels of this libido fueling hormone.

This adds further evidence that Missionaries and other youth are under much greater stress than the men who believe they have overcome the same trials as their young charges. It’s not that they have overcome the sexual desires – it is that the libido has dropped to manageable levels due to the natural process of aging.

A Stress Test

What is a test that would make the point demonstrated here? If you were to take a man who had fallen below the CMT line in his sexual desire due to age and removed his spouse due to divorce or death, then the man would be placed back into the population dealing with the IMT. As such the pressure to masturbate would increase, and the chances that he falls back into the old patterns of behavior increase because the additional sexual outlet of his spouse is no longer available to him. His Gap of Onan would be calculated in comparison to the IMT rather than the CMT and would thereby increase significantly. Would it surprise you if a newly divorced or widowed man had a higher likelihood of engaging in self-abuse – even if he had previously stopped that activity?

The “sexual desire by age” chart above simply presents the reality of the human male experience in a visible schematic fashion. In doing so it accounts for stress tests like this as well as the differences between older men and missionaries in the challenges in overcoming masturbation.

Conclusion

This cycle of mis-attributed victory of self-abuse means that older men in the LDS church will continue to believe that it is their own spiritual strength of character and ability to draw upon the powers of heaven which has allowed them to overcome masturbation when it is predominantly due to the normal waning of hormonal drivers of male sexual desire. Because of this mistaken confidence in their own piety, they will not hesitate to preach boldly to young men about the evil of their actions and the possibility of complete abstinence from this sin. In so doing, each new generation will be shackled with the same guilt, shame, self-abasement and self-hatred that affected the prior.

This cycle is good for the church because it keeps members constantly feeling like they are broken and must turn to the church to be made whole. The remedy prescribed by the church is sure to keep those struggling members bound to it. When the victory over sin is mistakenly attributed to the Church, the man will feel even greater trust in and dependance on the church – being bound even closer than before.

The young men who are unable to lie about their activities will be the target of greater shaming and discipline by church leaders. When told to abstain from taking the sacrament, the public will know that they have sinned – adding to their shame. They may be prevented from going on a mission and then have to deal with intense negative social consequences. For some young men the pressures are so great and their disappointment in themselves for not being able to control such strong sexual desires may lead to suicide. For others, they will learn to lie to leaders and keep their shame and guilt as a personal poison in their hearts – effecting their self worth and confidence in all other aspects of their lives.

PostScript

It is intriguing to see other conversations around this topic. Here are some places on the web where this article is being discussed.

Post Script 2

On “Onan” – I am aware that the sin of Onan wasn’t masturbation per se – but his story has been associated with masturbation by longstanding jewish tradition to the extent that the term “onanism” has been a euphemism for masturbation