Assignment #1 – Aristotle
Virtue or Vice: Aristotle’s Ethics of Friendship and the Ethical Problem of Prostitution
Aristotle and the Ethics of Prostitution
The best way to think about prostitution in an Aristotelian way is to think about whether or not a prostitute is a friend. In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle spends a considerable amount of time on thinking about what constitutes friendship. However, can someone one procures sex for money be a friend? Furthermore, is prostitution a virtue or a vice? These are issues when thinking about these issues in terms of the Aristotelian tradition.
In thinking about the issue of prostitution, two concepts emerge. The first concept to think about comes in the form of an “If then.” If a prostitute is a friend then what level of friendship are they? Secondly, prostitution, since it is essentially an exchange of sex for money, it is useful to think about the transaction in terms of appetite or virtue. Is procuring a prostitute, a virtue or a vice?
Is the Prostitute a Friend?
It would seem at first glance that the relationship between someone who procures a prostitute and the prostitute constitutes a “Friendship between unequal” (1158b11). Aristotle spends a lot of time thinking about equality when he thinks about friendship. It is interesting the range that Aristotle places this kind of friendship: a father and a son, and ruler and those the ruler rules. However, what all of these relationships have in come is the idea of superiority. They are indeed different from one another. The superiority dynamic between a prostitute and the one who procures a prostitute is different than that of the superiority over a father with his son.
As Aristotle says, what defines a friendship between unequal is that “each one does not get the same thing from the other” (1158b20). This is true for the economy of prostitutes as well as for the economy of most unequal relationships. In many cases, the prostitute does not live with his or her clients. The friendship only exists in the context of the contract. For example, a prostitute would not visit a client unless there was an agreement to do so. For the prostitute to visit his or her client outside of the purview of the contract would no longer make the relationship unequal. If both wish to be friends, then the contract that binds them together would also have to be absolved.
In the prostitute/client relationship the gap between the two is either associated with money, or with need. The client wants some kind of sexual encounter, while the prostitute wants restitution for providing the sexual service: usually in the form of money. If the relationship yields no benefit for either party it is more akin to a slave/slaver relationship where there is “no exchange” A slave cannot say no; a slave is limited in his or her ability to retaliate, to seek restitution, et cetera.
It would seem as if the prostitute relationship can only be a friendship of utility. It is also a friendship of pleasure. More specifically, the relationship is one of both “utility and pleasure” (1162a24). Just because it is a relationship of utility, as Grunebaum argues, these kind of relationships can last a very long time “as the employment continues” (167). Without the threat of exploitation, friendships of utility can exist because they have “extrinsic value.” The prostitute earns something in the transaction. Maybe he or she needs the money to pay for school, or it is logically possible that outside of coercion, they enjoy the work.
It would seem that at the worst level, prostitution lacks the quality of a true friend where
the person loves one another in the same way that a friend loves another’s soul. If the prostitute is one’s only friend — Aristotle does not say — but certainly he agrees that friendship is harder to acquire. If one is able to have an amicable friendship of utility then it is better than having no friends at all. For Aristotle, isolation is the worst state a human being can have. The moral nature of prostitution means that while it has qualities of a friend, it can easily slip into a non-friendship relationship if the person is coerced or forced to be merely an instrument.
Sex, Appetite, and the Relationship Between Virtue and Vice
Aristotle writes that the “appetite for nourishment” is natural and those who are hungry seek food and those who are thirsty seek liquid (1119a10-12). Eating too much would be in excess of the “quantity that accords with nature.” Having sex is pleasurable. Just as much as eating or drinking is associated with pleasure. Of course sex between friends does not have to be economic. What would sex be if it were just a transaction? Aristotle does not say much about sexual activity in the Nicomachean Ethics, but he says enough about it to infer several points about prostitution.
If one looks at the issue merely from the point of view of friendship (or lack thereof) it is possible to see it in terms of other ways.Aristotle sees it as an interplay between virtue and vice. It is not just the young who have an “appetite for sex” (1119a13). For Aristotle, having an appetite is inherent in what it means to be human. All of us have appetites.
The issue for Aristotle is what is called “the golden mean.” The golden mean is always between virtue or vice. Virtue is an action that leads toward a good, while vice is an action that is a deficiency (or lack) of the good. For Aristotle “virtue is a mean; but from the point of view of the best and of the good generally” (qtd. in Hartmann 255). If prostitution is a virtue then it would have to lean toward something that aims toward a good. For Aristotle, this entails looking at the motivation that determine the act. As Hartmann states “in every virtue two points of view stand over and against each other” (Hartmann 255).
As Soble says, people might seek prostitution “because they have healthy sex drive” (282). In this case, the act of prostitution would be ethical because it would go along with the satisfaction of a normal sexual appetite. Most people crave sex, and in the case of someone who needs sex, and is not looking to exploit the other person, they would be prone to treat the other fairly. To give sufficient remuneration for the act and to not go over the expectations of the relationship. In this way, prostitution could provide a social service (Oakley and Cocking 148). In this way, the prostitute would be virtuous for they are in good faith providing a good for another person.
Interestingly, Aristotle does not talk about prostitution per se in his Ethics. He does briefly mention men who have sex with other men, and he lists other forms of sexual encounters. Sex is just seen as a natural need that can either serve to meet natural desires, or when brought to excess it can lead to love of desire for desire’s sake. Certainly, in the Ethics the main point is what makes people happy.
What would prostitution look like as a vice? It would look like something very different from a satisfying a natural sex drive. It would something like the opposite of happiness. It would look like someone who is more interested in what motivates them than looking at the relationship as a relationship. The analogy is to the relationship between a waiter and a person who goes to a restaurant. At a restaurant, the diner would be normal in asking the waiter to provide food and nourishment and at the end of the transaction some kind of payment in kind would be rendered. In this relationship, there would be no real virtue, for the person who uses the other person for sex, would be doing it to satisfy his or her excess desires.
However, one has to look at the prostitute as well and analyze their motivations. Imagine if the relationship were of a different kind. The person in the restaurant demanding the waiter do things that go beyond the original understanding. This would constitute an abuse of the relationship. In a same way, a person could have a vice that makes their appetite for sex uncontrollable. Aristotle would argue that the person would need to temper their desires. It is not always possible to sate one’s desire. In fact, even in married relationships the partner may not be in the mood for sex. It would be wrong to demand sex just for the sake of appeasing an appetite. In the same with a prostitute. The prostitute would want to engage in the transaction if and only if it benefits them; and vice versa. In this way, then, it is possible to see Aristotle’s view of prostitution based on his concept the golden mean—between virtue vice.
Conclusion
Based on the argument of friendship as utility, and the argument based on virtue and vice, it is evident that Aristotle would approve of prostitution as long as the excess is not in favor too much of one party over another. The danger of prostitution is that in terms of friendship it can cease to be friendship and turn into slavery. In terms of virtue and vice, the issue of prostitution is one of appetites. Since prostitution is simply an economic means for a person to satisfy their appetite, prostitution can be thought of in terms of this way.
However, as this paper has attempted to delineate, prostitution also deals with the intricacies of human relationships so it cannot be thought of just in terms of a transaction. Nor is it just a vice. Prostitution is surprisingly an activity that can either lead to someone’s unhappiness, or it can be a good. In this way, the issue is never just one or the other because it relates to a larger philosophical issue that this paper cannot touch upon. The question asks us to think about human relationships and their deeper meaning.
Works Cited
Aristotle, and Terence Irwin. Nicomachean Ethics. Indianapolis, Ind: Hackett Pub. Co, 1985. Print.
Grunebaum, James O. Friendship: Liberty, Equality, and Utility. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003. Internet resource.
Hartmann, Nicolai. Moral Values: Volume 2 of Ethics. New Brunswick, N.J: Transaction Publishers, 2003. Print.
Oakley, Justin, and Dean Cocking. Virtue Ethics and Professional Roles. Cambridge [etc.: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Internet resource.
Soble, Alan. A - L. Westport, Conn. [u.a.: Greenwood Press, 2006. Print.
