Wow I finally know what Gooning is and I hate it

  • Erika3sis [she/her, xe/xem]
    ·
    3 months ago

    I think with anything sexual there's a tendency for many people to either overstate or understate the effects, and to some extent reverse cause and effect — that because of the taboo around sex that people can't think about sex with a cool head. Like I listen to HealthyGamer's concerns about gooning, and to me it doesn't really seem like there is much of anything fundamentally new or inherently bad about it, that the main problem with gooning is really just the context it exists within of this whole patriarchal masculinity in service of capitalism. Take that context away and all you're really left with in gooning is a specific way of getting yourself off, which might cause harm under certain conditions or when done in excess, but like, you can say the same about most things.

      • Erika3sis [she/her, xe/xem]
        ·
        3 months ago

        Something that stood out to me about HealthyGamer's concerns was how he was talking about, like, if you get your sexual needs met by yourself you'll be disincentivized from getting your sexual needs met from other people — that bit struck me as kind of "allonormative" is maybe the word I'm looking for. Not that I think most gooners are a-spec or anything like that, but I still feel like the way HealthyGamer was talking, kind of implied or reinforced this idea that it is somehow necessary for people to be sexually and romantically attracted to others, and that being able to fulfill your sexual needs entirely by yourself is somehow unnatural or necessarily bad.