A Truth About Self-Pleasuring

Suppose a woman watches a film in her home, and one of her favorite actors has a lead role.  She has always respected his acting talent--in fact, this is one of the reasons she started watching this movie.  The attractive body of the actor in question catches her eye.  As the actor delivers his lines and carries out the physical actions of his role, the woman excitedly contemplates his sex appeal.  She eventually begins pleasuring herself while watching and thinking of his body, focusing on his sensuality and on her reaction to it.  She is captivated by the actor's skills and perceived beauty.  Not once does she think that his sex appeal to her is the most important aspect of his life, nor does her respect for him as a person and as an actor wane as she masturbates to him.

This hypothetical scenario demonstrates one of numerous ways that masturbating to an image, video, or thought of someone of the opposite gender is not the same as sexually objectifying them.  It is possible for someone to consider the members of the opposite gender they masturbate to (if they indeed do such a thing) as nothing more than a useful tool for self-pleasuring, but objectification of any kind, sexual or otherwise, is far more difficult to engage in than internally acknowledging that there is no single aspect of a person that their entire being reduces down to.  Whether a person masturbates to a genuine friend of the opposite gender, an acquaintance, a coworker, or a stranger, the object of the masturbation has not even necessarily been violated or degraded in any way short of objectification.

Masturbating to attractive bodies of the other gender does not exclude a respect for the minds within those bodies or a personal respect for the skills, personalities, or, in some cases, friendship of the persons who possess the bodies.  A man can masturbate to select opposite gender friends without ever trivializing the mutual affection of friendship shared between them, just as a woman can masturbate to select opposite gender friends while still cherishing the friendships themselves.  A woman can masturbate to attractive actors while still having a deep admiration for their acting talent and personhood, just as a man can masturbate to attractive actresses while fully respecting their professional accomplishments.

It is entirely possible to use the sight or thought of a body belonging to the opposite gender as a sexual stimulus for masturbation while also remaining fully aware that there is more to that person than their subjective sex appeal (of course, someone can enjoy masturbating to someone of the opposite gender despite never feeling any sexual attraction to them, such as in the case of some asexuals or people who merely want sensual stimuli).  Masturbating to someone of the opposite gender does not make someone ignore the intellect, emotions, talents, or trials of the latter person.  Even if someone masturbates to an anonymous model they see on the internet or to a random stranger, they can be fully aware that the object of their fantasy is more than the sexual pleasure derived from them.

There is no reason for masturbating to sights and thoughts to carry any sort of stigma in the church.  Sexual attraction, physiological arousal, and masturbation are not sinful on their own (Deuteronomy 4:2), and thus combining them is not sinful on its own.  If the act is not inherently wrong even when using an actual image or a mental recreation of someone's body as an aid, there is no reason to treat the matter with any sort of prudery or default shame.  The pleasures of sexual self-stimulation do not become sinful when coupled with physical or mental imagery of the clothed or unclothed body, and many Christians would benefit from liberating themselves from the extra-Biblical constructs of legalism that hold otherwise.