In the first years of the seventeenth century, William Shakespeare wrote his magisterially stormy tragedy of Scottish King Macbeth. It includes this timeless exchange:
MACDUFF: What three things does drink especially provoke?
PORTER: Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep and urine. Lechery, sir, it provokes and unprovokes: it provokes the desire but it takes away the performance.
According to a report in Britain’s The Independent:
Turns out overeating, being sedentary, smoking, and drinking booze can dampen your sex drive and improve your odds of not having any sex.
A study announced July 6 found that vices contributed to sexual dysfunction in men, and unhealthy lifestyles are more common among both men and women who aren’t sexually active.
Danish researchers surveyed more than 5,500 adult men and women, and found that unhealthy habits increase the chance of not having sex by up to 78 percent in men and 91 percent in women.
Among the men in the survey who had sexual partners, those with a large waistline had a 71 percent increase in the risk of sexual dysfunction. Hard drug users had an 800 percent increase in risk. For women, those who smoked hashish had three times the risk of losing the ability to climax during sex.
So, to summarize, if you want to avoid sexual relations, or to engage in them dysfunctionally, the way to go is to get fat, do hard drugs and smoke hashish. Don’t say William Shakespeare and The Journal of Sexual Medicine didn’t warn you.
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