By Peter Berton

MONTREAL – The second-annual Merry Wankmas will take place this year from 9 p.m. Dec. 7 until 3 a.m. Dec. 8.

The facetious nickname refers to an event officially known as Masturbate-a-Thon Montreal. A “cum-as-you-are” occasion, the annual gathering is designed to encourage people to celebrate self-love and to show off their skills in a safe, public environment.

Claire Litton is one of Masturbate-a-thon Montreal’s organizers. She believes masturbating in public among like-minded people is a boon for sexual health.

YNOT.com: Why do you stage this event?

Claire Litton: We are expressing solidarity and encouraging protest against the suppression of masturbation as a healthy sexual act. We also want to raise money for local charities such as Stella’s, which does sex worker activism and outreach. We really appreciate and enjoy Stella’s contributions to the community. We are also raising funds for Sexploreum, an adult-education play experience based on sensual sexual education.

We also are pretty sex-positive and like providing a fun, unique event space where people can have a good time and see some sexy people. Finally, we want to provide a playful educational space where adults can learn about masturbation through direct contact. Maybe they will see new techniques demonstrated by other participants or in the projected pornography, or they will have the chance to explore a more exhibitionistic side of themselves.

How did you become involved with the project?

I’m a professional sexologist based in Montreal. My co-host, Cameryn Moore, is a performance artist, also based in Montreal. I earned my graduate degree in Perth, Western Australia, and then moved to Canada to pursue a more in-depth career teaching workshops and engaging in sex-positive activism in the local community.

The Masturbate-a-thon is a sex-positive event organized as a way to bring attention to masturbation as a healthy sexual activity. It’s also a form of protest against the 1994 firing of ex-U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Joycelyn Elders because she wanted to teach adolescents about masturbation. The first Masturbate-a-thon in the world happened in San Francisco in 1999. We hosted the first one in Montreal — and possibly all of Canada — in May 2013.

What happens — and doesn’t happen — at your events?

The event is all about self-touch and self-love, o we provide a large comfortable space with some couches and chairs. People are encouraged to bring pillows or mats if they want to lie down.

Participants can wank or watch as they like, although men who want only to watch and not masturbate must pay a slightly higher fee to ensure that masturbators feel safe and not overwhelmed with watchers. We play body-positive pornography and have a DJ for the night.

Masturbators can use toys, bring pornography of their own or even choose to ejaculate on someone, as long as the act has been pre-arranged. We definitely do not allow any nonconsensual behavior. “No touching on the masturbation floor” is our No. 1 rule — yes, even if it’s your partner. we have regular floor monitors to enforce this rule.

We also have three contests: distance ejaculation (men and women), amount of time spent masturbating and number of orgasms in a set time period.

When people ask “so … what happens?” I basically tell them “exactly what it sounds like: it’s a room full of people masturbating.” We also encourage participants to share their unique masturbation styles with viewers: We had a demonstration of female urethral sounding last year.

You have staged one Wankmas event before. How did it go?

It was very enthusiastically received. We had 55 pre-registered attendees, and the space was crowded without being too crowded, although we are expanding the masturbation area for this year.

I was expecting to have to get people started slowly, maybe play some icebreaker games. Instead, everybody who came in asked me when they could begin. Then when we finally announced the event open, after going over the rules I had to run up front to get something. I came back not five minutes later, and everyone had stripped off and was going at it like they’d just been waiting for the starting gun.

Speaking of rules: You enforce a number of rules at these events. Why?

It is very important to us to have an event where people feel safe, respected and welcome.

We modeled our event after swingers and fetish events, where consent is an essential part of every interaction. We want to make sure everybody feels safe and able to protest if someone is engaging with them in a way they don’t like, including staring at them or speaking to them inappropriately.

The rules state non-negotiable behaviors up front. We have a baseline for being able to eject someone from the premises if necessary or dealing with any situation that might arise.

What is the “vibe” like at these events? Does it feel like a self-conscious swinger’s club? A relaxed, spontaneous group sex party?

It’s more relaxed and less self-conscious, although responses range across the spectrum. We want the event to feel comfortable and permissive without feeling dangerous. We hope people will think it’s fun, too.

I would like to see sex-positive events become more common and more popular, certainly. The key to reducing stigma and shame and fear is more awareness, more knowledge and more celebration of positive sexual experiences. I’d like to see more masturbate-a-thons, more hands-on sex education workshops and more discussion of what sex is and means.

[SIZE=1]Images: Claire Litton, left in top image, and Cameryn Moore, organizers of Masturbate-a-thon Montreal.[/SIZE]