Re “Masturbation: Scientific Evidence and Islam’s View”: Evidence to support a negative relationship between masturbation & health was not scrutinized, & evidente to support or a non-negative relationship was largely ignored

Response to “Masturbation: Scientific Evidence and Islam’s View”. David Speed, Ryan T. Cragun. Journal of Religion and Health, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10943-018-0627-x

In a recent article entitled, “Masturbation: Scientific Evidence and Islam’s View”, the author Hoseini (2017) set out to discuss the harmful effects of masturbation and how it was prohibited within Islam. Generally, Hoseini’s arguments appeared to have started with a conclusion rather than arriving at one based on all of the available data. Overall, Hoseini’s argumentation suffered from three recurring issues: (1) Masturbation was inexplicably portrayed as deviant; (2) Evidence to support a negative relationship between masturbation and health was not scrutinized; (3) Evidence to support a non-negative relationship between masturbation and health was largely ignored. Each of these points will be addressed in turn.