SAN FRANCISCO — May is National Masturbation Month and to celebrate, San Francisco’s Center for Sex and Culture (CSC) will host their annual Masturbate-a-Thon. The event will be webcast on the Masturbate-a-thon.com website, and, for the first time, participants from all over the world will be able to post their orgasms on micro-blogging platform Twitter.

“Most of us engage in self-pleasure, but there is so little support for doing so that it can become a source of distress,” CSC founder and sex educator Carol Queen said. “This is exactly why National Masturbation Month is needed; people need to understand that self-stimulation is common, pleasurable, healthful, and nothing to worry about." For the first time this year, the Masturbate-a-Thon has teamed up with Twitter to allow participants to post “twittergasms” to their Twitter profiles, documenting every time they have an orgasm while self-pleasuring throughout the month of May. Those who are unable to attend the San Francisco event or other Masturbation Month activities are encouraged to take part by posting on Twitter, either online or via cellphone.

Data will be collected on the frequency of twittergasm postings and eventually published on the S.F. Masturbate-a-thon site, and visitors to the site may also register for a Twitter profile in order to log their orgasms.

Some participants in the S.F. Masturbate-a-thon will collect donations from sponsors, based on the length of time that they masturbate with proceeds going to benefit the CSC. Pledge sheets and co-sponsorship links are available at the website.

“It’s a way of coming out of the closet as someone who masturbates by posting to your twitter profile whenever you come,” a CSC press representative said. “A secret handshake of sorts — only others who follow the twittergasm profile or who have read about the campaign will know, so your prudish friends will be left alone until they, too are enlightened.”

Event sponsor GamelinkLive.com is also adding a new component to the Masturbate-a-Thon event by hosting the “Pornstar Masturbation Marathon.”

Classic adult performer Nina Hartley will be the first contestant in the yearlong competition, which will pit professional adult performers against each other to see who can masturbate the longest.

Hartley will make a special three-hour appearance at the S.F. Masturbate-a-Thon and attempt to set a record, to kick off the contest. Each month, GamelinkLive.com will feature a different adult performer attempting to go the longest, as well as have the most orgasms.

At last year’s S.F. Masturbate-a-Thon, the men’s record for length of time masturbating was set by a participant that went eight hours and 40 minutes. The women’s record has remained untouched since 2004, when the record was set at six hours, 30 minutes.

The S.F. Masturbate-a-Thon will take place at 1519 Mission St. Facilities will be set up to accommodate those that wish to be separated in men-only, women-only and coed areas.

The event will be co-hosted by Hartley, Todd Orr and Robert Black.

Participants with filled out pledge sheets will be admitted for free; otherwise there will be a $20 to take part. Voyeurs may attend for a fee of $40.