The Center for Sex & Culture, San Francisco’s unique sexuality information resource, has scheduled this year’s Masturbate-a-Thon for Sunday, May 27, from 10am-midnight; participants must arrive by 9pm. All genders and all orientations are welcome to explore self-pleasure in a supportive group environment at this one-of-a-kind event. 18 and over only, please.
The Masturbate-a-Thon began as part of Good Vibrations’s National Masturbation Month. Started in 1995 after then-Surgeon General Dr. Joycelyn Elders was fired for saying that “masturbation… is perhaps something that should be taught” about in the context of sex education classes, NMM was intended to get people to talk about self-pleasure, which is so frequently a silent element in our sex lives.
Every year Good Vibrations added something new to the mix: the Masturbation Hall of Fame, lists of favorite masturbation euphemisms and places to masturbate, and finally the Masturbate-a-Thon was born. In that context a private event (one person, or a couple would get pledges from appropriate people) in which money was raised based on how long people spent masturbating (comparable to the way a Walk-a-Thon is based on distance). Good Vibrations disbursed 100% of the money to its NMM charities, which focused on sex education and sexual health.
Participants may sponsor themselves at a $40 minimum level, or bring a sponsorship form with pledges they have collected from others (form will be available soon on www.sexandculture.org). All funds go to support CSC, a non-profit which subsists on event fees, donations, and fundraising events. Participants are responsible for collecting and remitting all pledges.
Awards are given for longest duration spent masturbating and most orgasms (while CSC doesn’t think masturbation ought to be competitive, this has proved to be a real crowd-pleaser). Interested people who cannot attend will be able to follow to Masturbate-a-Thon via live-blog and Twitter; of course, they are urged to participate from home.
More information: http://www.sexandculture.org/