Download Personal Relationships

Plain sex. Goldman
Goldman’s definition of sexual desire:
“a desire for contact with another person’s body and with the pleasure such
contact produces”.
Goldman argues that his “plain sex” definition is better than so-called
“means-ends” definitions. What these definitions have in common is that
they consider sex as a means to an end, not as an activity that is an end in
itself. The two most important versions of this view are:
1) The view that the purpose of sex is reproduction. Obviously reproduction is the
biological purpose of sex, but should it be the sole purpose? Goldman doesn’t
think so. He claims that with the introduction of effective contraceptives sex has
de facto been divorced from reproduction. One consequence of this view is that
any sexual activity that is not undertaken for the purpose of reproduction is
deemed perverted, sinful, or at least morally wrong.
2) The view that the purpose of sex is the expression of love or affection between
partners. Goldman doesn’t deny that this can be an important part of a sexual
relationship, but he argues that a) sex doesn’t have to involve the expression of
love, and b) love can be expressed in many different non-sexual ways. One way
Goldman thinks the difference can be brought out is by considering the difference
between fleeting sexual attraction and love. For him love is a more or less
permanent deep emotional relationship that is typically exclusive. Fleeting sexual
desire on the other hand is not exclusive in this sense. So if people choose to live
in monogamous relationship this often involves suppressing such fleeting sexual
desires.
Again there is a connection between the love model and repressive sexual
morality; if you argue that only among married couples can sex express the right
kind of enduring love and friendship that is its true purpose, then any kind of
extramarital sex can be condemned.
The Christian-Platonic Tradition.
Goldman argues that both models fall short of accounting for sexual practices. The
reproductive model will ban oral sex as perverted, but doesn’t recognize holding hands or
kissing as sexual activities. The love model seems to characterize much sexual activity as
wrong or degrading because it is not accompanied by the right emotions. Furthermore the
conflation with love and sex can work in the other way as well. You might get the idea
that love is nothing more than sex.
Goldman identifies both means-end models as coming from a Platonic-Christian moral
tradition that regards the purely physical and animal aspect of being human as something
base and a source for immorality. Plain sexual desire is seen as an expression of our
“lower self” or vulgar animal nature.
The morality of sex.
Goldman’s position is that there is nothing moral or immoral about sex as such. Moral
considerations only apply to sex as they do to other activities. For example, if sexual
activity somehow does harm to others, then it’s wrong, not because sex is involved, but
because harm to others is involved. Rape is wrong because it involves coercion and harm,
adultery is wrong because it involves lying and deception, not because it has to do with
sexual activity per se.
Perversion.
Goldman has a strictly “statistical” view of perverted sex. Perverted sex is whatever
deviates from the norm. Perverted sex is basically sex that is abnormal or unusual
because the sexual desire involved deviates from the normal. It follows from Goldman’s
view of the relationship between morality and sex that just as there is nothing immoral
about normal sex as such, then there is nothing immoral about abnormal sex; it’s just
different from the norm.
Love again.
Goldman points out that even though his definition of sexual desire brings out the
pleasure the individual gets from sex, and that this is important to many people, that the
satisfaction of this desire should have its proper place in a rational life-plan. The intense
pleasure derived from the satisfaction of sexual desire is brief and repetitive, it’s not
cumulative. In this sense you have to find a balance between other desires and interest to
live a fulfilling life, for example the kind of permanence and interest in another person’s
well-being that love sustains.
Same sex marriage
Bennett and Sullivan present arguments against and for legalizing
same sex marriage respectively.
Bennet.
Con:
1) Same sex marriages will undermine the institution of
marriage.
i.
ii.
iii.
iv.
It will pave the way for other unconventional forms of marital
arrangements, it’s going to be a free for all, because we then no
longer have a principled ground to prohibit such arrangements. So,
if somebody’s sexual preference leans towards a harem of
hermaphrodites, this person could demand to be married to his/her
harem.
If you start to recognize sexual orientation as the legal criterion for
who you want to marry, then you endorse sexual relativism as a
criterion for marriage.
Promiscuity is part of the homosexual lifestyle and is incompatible
with traditional marriage.
Marriage is not an arbitrary arrangement; it is based on natural
teleology. Its primary purpose is procreation and child rearing.
Anything that threatens the institution that protects these vital
functions in society should be rejected.
Sullivan.
Pro
2) Homosexual marriages do not threaten the institution of
marriage
i.
ii.
There is a difference between sexual orientation as a state and
polygamy as an activity. Same sex marriage stays within the
confines of marriage between two unrelated adults.
Marriage will serve to curb promiscuity by allowing homosexuals
to live in monogamous relationships.
iii.
iv.
Marriage is an institution that has changed radically through
history, so there isn’t anything strange about expanding it to
include same sex couples.
Denying this right to homosexuals is a kind of discrimination.
Is Adultery Immoral (Wasserstrom)
Wasserstrom wants to examine why most people consider adultery to be immoral. On
the face of it an extramarital relationship involves two consenting adults having sex
with each other, but one or both happen to be married to somebody else. Why is it
immoral?
First Wasserstrom considers moral reasons; secondly he considers non-moral reasons
that might be used independently of moral concerns.
1)
i) Adultery involves breaking a promise. When you get married you promise to
remain faithful to your spouse; so sexual intimacy is limited to your spouse and
exclusive of all others. Having extramarital sex breaks this promise. Furthermore,
there seems to be aggravating circumstances: a) The non-adulterous spouse might
have showed a great deal of self-restraint in order to stay faithful, this is then for
naught; b) the non-adulterous spouse might feel a powerful sense of rejection and
betrayal (How could you do this to me!). This feeling is partly caused by the idea that
the cheating spouse knows full well how devastating the actions are for the spouse,
but goes ahead anyway. Furthermore, cheating also implies that the adulterer no
longer has the same affection for the non-adulterous spouse but has affection for
somebody else. So, cheating involves the intentional infliction of substantial
psychological pain on the person they are married to.
ii) Adultery involves deceit. Even if the adulterous act doesn’t involve lying directly,
at least it involves deceiving the other spouse about the state of their marital
relationship, and as such it breaks the trust between spouses. Adultery might also
involve deception at a deeper level. While it is true that sexual desire or arousal isn’t
exclusive in the same sense that being deeply in love with somebody is exclusive of
others, and while it is also true that love can be expressed in many ways other than
sexual intimacy, it could be that cheating is widely considered to negate or question
both the commitment and the feeling in a truly loving relationship (if you really loved
me you wouldn’t do this!). So, in this sense the adulterer is being deceitful in a way
that goes to the core of the bond between married people, maybe even to the point of
deceiving him or herself.
Wasserstrom argues that the tighter the connection is between sexual intimacy and the
expression of love and affection, and the tighter the connection is between love and
exclusivity, the more objectionable cheating seems to be. However, he also admits
that if you have people that marry without having these expectations, i.e. it’s agreed
between the spouses that you can be promiscuous, then the elements of deception and
promise breaking are eliminated right away and then it seems doubtful that
extramarital sex is morally wrong.
2)
Finally Wasserstrom considers arguments to the effect that a prohibition on any kind
of non-marital sex, including extramarital sex, will strengthen the institution of
marriage. He calls such considerations “instrumental” because they are means to an
end, i.e. ways to promote and safeguard the institution of marriage. He doubts that
such considerations should count as moral considerations, because they seem to hinge
on whether there are moral reasons to defend the institution of marriage in this way
(we don’t normally consider it immoral if people remain unmarried for example).