I’ve mastered the art of pleasuring myself,” he said.
Unlike sex with a partner, Marcus describes his solo bate sessions as one without pretense or expectations of anyone but himself. “There was a point where I was up to two to three times a day,” says Marcus, 41, an Atlanta resident and account manager who identifies as solosexual. For these men, and perhaps, many more like them, getting off solo is not a substitution for “the real thing,” their sex lives are real and so are the mind-blowing orgasms they experience multiple times a day. While this reality may not be revolutionary, especially considering the data from one study that suggests 92% of American men masturbate, these three Black gay men are doing two things the majority of the population refuse to do-they’re talking openly about their masturbatory practices, with two of the three men exclusively identifying as solosexual-individuals who prefer masturbation (or “bating” as it’s commonly called) over other forms of sexual activity. These men are taking their pleasure into their own hands.
