New Delhi: If you are an avid social media user, you must have stumbled upon #NoNutNovember or #NNN on your Twitter and Instagram feeds this month. Wondering what these hashtags are about? No Nut November (NNN) is an online challenge between men where they take a month-long oath of sexual abstinence. This challenge pops up every year in the month of November. It involves men giving up ejaculation for 30 days, which means no sex and no masturbation for a month!
The origin of No Nut November is unclear. However, several reports suggest that it all started in 2011, when Urban Dictionary user uploaded an entry for the phrase No Nut November. The user defined it as a challenge in which an individual must refrain from having sexual pleasure in the month of November. Internet challenges can be fascinating but seems like this ongoing "No Nut November" trend has failed to get a nod from several men.
Asked 26-year-old Anil Arora about his views on NNN and he said, "If someone offers me Rs 50 lakh to participate in this challenge, I will never accept it. I have a life to make Rs 50 lakh, but what good is money if I cannot satisfy my body."
Ahmed, 43, who has been married for 16 years, feels this challenge is extremely "silly." "No Nut November doesn't mean anything to me. It's silly. India witnesses lakhs of marriages alone in November, it would be disappointing and unfair for the young men who marry in this month if they start following this challenge," he said. According to Ahmed, "such challenges are best for men who don't have anything to do in life." "The person who started this challenge must be a loner who wanted to generate more sad people on Earth (no offence please)," he added.
Raj (Name has been changed to protect the anonymity of the interviewee), 27, has a similar opinion. "It's a stupid challenge. And it is about bringing the human need to a standstill because you want to complete a challenge on the internet. This movement was always meant to be satirical, but some idiots took it too seriously. There is no reason to go all the way for a stupid challenge and one should not curb their basic instincts," he said, strongly opposing the NNN challenge.
However, there's a Reddit user who claimed that by participating in NNN he was able to get rid of his porn addiction. Another Reddit user claimed that NNN challenge helped him in exercising self-control and claimed that he's able to workout for a longer time at the gym because of "higher energy levels." The idea of men to go without orgasm for one whole month is quite debatable.
To get a better understanding about the impact of No Nut November on health, we spoke to renowned sexuality coach Pallavi Barnwal. She described NNN challenge as a "toxic trend".
"No Nut November is a pointless trend that does no good to you. NNN is basically a countdown that pushes men to stay long with nutting/ orgasming. It's a toxic trend because it makes men to see orgasms as a sign of weakness which is grossly inaccurate. About the so-called health benefits of high energy levels because of abstinence from cracking a nut aka masturbation, there is no scientific research that supports this. On the contrary, there are so many benefits to masturbation including better sleep, better heart rate, reduced stress and a lot of increase in feel good hormones," she explained.
Pallavi also talked about how NNN distorts the perception of sexual pleasure. "They show masturbation as a release but don't talk about the pleasure that you get from enjoying your own body. If you look at posts, comments on Reddit or other social media forums, they show masturbation as something weak men fall for and the ones who don't follow NNN lack self-control and are not real men. If one develops such negative attitude towards sexual pleasure, it can lead to poor sexual health in later life," she added.
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Nandini Bhardwaj, RCI licensed clinical psychologist, also agreed to Pallavi. "There's no proper scientific data that highlights benefits to this challenge. All current research in this area is co-relational. The challenge may be tied to the belief that sexual abstinence before a sporting competition aided performance. It may also be based in the theory that semen retention is linked to an increase in testosterone and male virility," said Nandini, who is also a founder of an e-clinic Wellnesque.
Nandini, however, acknowledged this NNN challenge may be beneficial for couples who are struggling with infertility. "Temporary Abstaining can help in more sperm count... recommended for couples struggling with infertility. Sperm parameters do increase when you have a little bit of delayed time between ejaculations," she said. "It may also be beneficial for people who are consuming excessive pornography thereby desensitizing themselves to 'normal' sexual behaviours," Nandini added.
Both Pallavi and Nandini feel depriving yourself of sexual pleasure for a month in order to prove self-control to the world of web is not a smart move as it has side effects.
"It is seen for men who are having infertility issues to temporarily refrain from ejaculation to increase sperm count. But a month long challenge is something not a scientifically verified habit. This whole talk of semen retention is crap! Even though you decide to spend a month following this challenge, your body is still producing sperm and thus needs a way to get rid of excess sperms from time to time".
"Holding it for longer time will only make the area swollen. If you intentionally don't' masturbate for long periods, you can tense the muscles in your pelvic floor, causing pain and discomfort in your pelvic floor, testicles, excessive urination and constipation. If you have heard of the condition 'blue balls which happens when a man is aroused for a long time without orgasm. In 'blue balls', testicles ache after being aroused for too long without ejaculation," Pallavi explained. NNN challenge is harmful for mental health as well, as per Pallavi.
"There is a lot of teasing and taunting that goes during the challenge, some of them I have had personally on my social account where men said, a sexy picture of mine is breaking their resolve of #nnn . You see such notions are only misogynist and can severely impact relationships of heterosexual men where they think all it takes is a #nnn aka semen retention to boost a man's virility, and masculinity".
"Also demonstrating self-control over one's impulses is a very outdated puritanical construct that you should enjoy less or you should feel guilty. In fact, I have seen in forums that thousands of men diligently document their day-by-day progress and setbacks and someone who doesn't hold up to the rules is seen as a fallen member. That leads to lot of self-blaming for men who participate in the challenge to see it as an ultimate form of proving their masculinity and failing to see how shallow it is," she added.
Advising men to not participate in "NNN" challenge, Pallavi further said, "Please don't be nuts is what I would say. Masturbation is absolutely normal, natural and pleasurable activity. We are made to think that masturbation is a 'bad habit' it's bad for health, but in reality, almost every person masturbates, generally out of habit to soothe themselves."
"Masturbation is really about learning to listen to your body because each one of us have an innate sex drive. There are benefits to ejaculation such as better prostate health, better sleep, hormonal balance, reduced stress, reducing inflammation. The guilt, fear and shame around masturbation is a social construct and science does not support these claims. There are many ways to feel masculine than abstaining from pleasure. By participating in this challenge, you only end up having a conflicted relationship with sex and your bodies," she said.
Keeping with what the experts have to say about 'No Nut November', it is safe to say that it is important for people to listen to their bodies and do what suits them best rather than blindly following social media challenges out of peer pressure. (ANI)
(This story has not been edited by ETV Bharat and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
