Masturbation is normal. Masturbation is healthy. 

According to Planned Parenthood, masturbation can reduce stress, relieve sexual tension and improve body image. Neglecting to teach girls about something so natural from a young age exacerbates the shame that society perpetuates about female bodies. Neglecting to teach young women that their bodies and their pleasure belongs to themselves is a fundamental failure of the education system — it perpetuates rape culture, teaching children that sex and pleasure belong to men alone. 

The “orgasm gap,” according to NBC News, refers to the disparity that exists in the average number of orgasms experienced by men and women in sexual encounters — while heterosexual men typically orgasm 95% of the time, heterosexual women do so only 65% of the time, according to a 2016 study of 52,500 U.S. adults. 

Masturbation is the safest form of sexual exploration and allows individuals to better understand their bodies and sexual preferences. If people with vaginas are not taught about masturbation, or if they are taught to believe that it is shameful, they will never learn how to please themselves sexually. Thus, we have the orgasm gap — the coalescence of the shame, embarrassment and neglect of women’s bodies that materializes in the form of a disparity in the pleasure that heterosexual women feel. 

The stigmatization of the female body permeates every aspect of our lives — from pornography as an institution that capitalizes on the objectification of the female body for male pleasure to, ironically, the hesitation of us as writers to write this column alone; in some ways, writing with a friend is a way to preserve a sense of anonymity and avoid stigma and shame. In order to destigmatize the female body and end rape culture, the female body needs to stop being treated as a shameful, erotic fantasy. Girls need to learn that those detailed anatomical diagrams of their vaginas are a map that will teach them the biological workings of their pleasure, because sex is as much for women as it is for men. Only until our education system stops being ashamed of female masturbation will there be societal acceptance. 

Masturbation is normal. Masturbation is healthy.

It’s time we start acting like it.