We Know “NoFap” Is Misleading Men About Masturbation. It Might Be More Dangerous Than That.

Derrick grew up playing football, basketball, and video games with his friends. * This outcome would appear counterintuitive for a community intended to “help” its users with the “addiction” of porn-watching and masturbation, but for men like Derrick, NoFap ideology tends to breed much bigger problems. “But when you use it to refer to a disorder, it has a very specific meaning that pornography just does not fill.” This means, in Prause’s eyes, that the same mental models, including concepts like “streaks and relapses,” which help thousands of people every year quit substances like opiates or alcohol, shouldn’t be applied to people trying to get a better handle on their compulsive pornography use —and choosing to use them can have significant consequences. But the men in Prause’s study who attempted a “Reboot,” an extended period of not masturbating or viewing erotic material, reported significantly more issues with erectile dysfunction than those who didn’t, despite watching less pornography. The primary factor which correlated with ED among the study’s participants was anxiety around sexuality, or what’s known as “sex negativity.” And anxiety is the very thing that, in Prause’s eyes, gets fueled by NoFap’s quasi-religious demonization of masturbation.