The ethical dilemmas that surround the concept of sexual act make it more challenging to determine its intrinsic value. In fact, there is almost certainly no chance of escaping issues like consent, marriage, procreation, preference and gender when discussing sexual act or behavior. Some may argue that to determine if a sex act is intrinsically right or wrong, good or bad, requires a total separation of it from morality or ethics, an idea that is not impossible but very challenging to do.
The use of the word intrinsically in this case, makes it more difficult to formulate a specific answer to the question. The concept of intrinsic can be complicated. For instance, it can be argued that any sexual act is an intrinsic part of the human experience; on the other hand, some claim that perverted sexual act is intrinsically wrong. Views about sexual act vary and often depend on an ethical stance, thus it makes it more difficult to consider whether a sexual act is intrinsically wrong or not. Evaluating a sexual act’s extrinsic value seems more straightforward. Zimmerman (2010, para. 6) suggests that we talk of extrinsic value because “we say that certain things are good, and others bad, not for their own sake but for the sake of something else to which they are related in some way”. A good example is the claim that good sexual activity equals good marriage. There are many claims about the validity of extrinsic values and some philosophers maintain that intrinsic value causes extrinsic value, but Zimmerman (2010, para 6) is quick to point out that “extrinsic value, in all its varieties, is to be understood in terms of the concept of intrinsic value”. So therefore, to present the extrinsic value of a sexual activity, the intrinsic value of the act should be clarified primarily.
There is a multitude of reasons why people engage in sexual activity. Although for evolutionary purposes, sex is essential for the reproduction of species, majority of people engage in sexual activity because of pleasure, individuals obtain enjoyment from participating in different kinds of sexual activities. If pleasure is the ultimate rational for performing a sexual activity, then for the hedonists, a sexual act is intrinsically good. Hedonistic principles, “when applied to sexual ethics generally holds that there are no absolute wrongs or rights, so long as the actions result in pleasure for people, without unnecessary pain” (Nicholls, n.d., p. 2).
Other studies also claim that sexual activity has a central role in all social species’ interaction, which can also be regarded as its extrinsic value. Roughgarden (2004) claims that sexual activity facilitates many functions, such as bonding and dispute resolution, amongst social species and therefore, sex can only be good. The Liberalists positive view of sex, in a way, supports Roughgarden’s views. Liberalists look at sex in a positive way, stripped of any religious or moral connotations. Their view is that sexual activity is used to express love, but not in any context such as marriage or procreation. In fact, the liberalist view is to get rid of any limitations and traditional fears that surround sexual activity: that a sexual activity is performed only in marriage for procreation and that sex itself is immoral (Liberal Thinking, 2006).
Sexual activity, for most religions, is regulated. Different religions developed their own moral codes of sexual morality to regulate and control situations and influence their followers’ sexual practices. A good example is how the Roman Catholic views the function of sex. Nicholls (n.d., p. 1) claims that “Christian morals are approximately derived from Natural Law Theory, where what it would seem things were intended for is the only acceptable way to use them”. For Roman Catholic, the ultimate function of sex is procreation and therefore preventing it or using it other than that, is wrong.
Many cultures also attempt to regulate sexual activities, outside of religion, amongst their people. Majority of the regulations are often put into rules, which are also extended outside of their culture but under the scope of their laws. For instance, majority of Islamic states enforce severe rules with various punishments, to implement Islamic sexual morality codes on their citizens as well as non-Muslims who are members of their societies. The same can be said for previous European Christian regimes. Indeed, the sexual norms of a society can be related to religion or social and environmental conditions. Sexual activities are judged and regulated for different motives. This is so because sexuality and reproduction are both essential elements in human interaction and continued existence.
A sex act can be evaluated in two ways: morally and non-morally. The way it is evaluated has a major impact in judging whether any sex act is intrinsically right or wrong. We have presented how different groups, religions and cultures regard sexual acts, depending on the various fundamental views they hold, some may view any sexual act as simply an activity, like any other activities such as swimming, which can produce pleasure or not, whilst others impose moral codes and judge sexual acts according to their accepted rules and laws.
It can be argued that any sexual act, a type or particular occurrence, is often evaluated morally. As social creatures, we, individuals, are often curious whether a sex act is morally good or bad. According to Soble (2009, para. 4), we judge “sexual acts to be morally obligatory, morally permissible, morally supererogatory, or morally wrong”. For instance: spouses have moral obligation to have sex with each other, using contraception can be morally permissible in some instances, pleasing one partner through sexual act might be considered morally supererogatory, and prostitution, incest and rape are sexual activities which are considered morally wrong. Soble (2009) strongly points out though that the circumstances dictate on whether a particular sex act is right or wrong. The operative word here is particular. For example, two couples are engaged in heterosexual coitus in different situations, one couple is doing it legitimately, that is both spouses are engaged in the act, on the other hand, the other couple’s act is adulterous because one, or maybe both, is married to someone else. Therefore the latter’s sexual act is morally wrong, however, it does not make coitus, as a general activity, morally wrong. Therefore, when a sexual act is evaluated morally, it is usually the circumstances around it that dictates whether the act is morally right or wrong.
When a sexual act, a particular occurrence or a specific type, is evaluated nonmorally, the focus is on the experience of the activity, and nothing else. Soble (2009, para. 5) describes a nonmorally good sex as a “sexual activity that provides pleasure to the participants or is physically or emotionally satisfying”. Therefore, a nonmorally bad sex is the opposite: a sexual activity that is not pleasurable. Evaluating a sexual activity this way, takes out all the moral implications that most human beings attach to this particular activity. A “sexual activity can be nonmorally good if it provides for us what we expect sexual activity to provide, which is usually sexual pleasure, and this fact has no necessary moral implications” (Soble, 2009, para. 5).
The relationship between moral and nonmoral evaluation of a sexual couldn’t be more distinct even though there are some associations between them. A sexual activity that is nonmorally good, for instance, when it satisfies all the individuals involved in the act, does not make that act morally good, too. Such is the case of individuals committing adultery. Adulterous sex may be nonmorally good, but it is considered morally bad. At the same time, a nonmorally bad sexual activity does not equate to morally bad sex act. If it’s the first time that individuals engage in a sexual act and it was not pleasant for them, it doesn’t mean that they have performed a morally bad act. What these evaluations demonstrate is that when judging a sexual activity in a nonmoral way is clear-cut: either the activity is bad or good depending on the pleasure that the individuals involved in the act have experienced. On the other hand, judging a sexual act in a moral way rests on the individuals’ dogma, making it more ambiguous especially because, as we have pointed out early on this discussion, different religions and cultures have their own codes sexual morality.
Knowing what we know about how to evaluate a sexual activity, how do we decide if any sex act is intrinsically wrong? What fundamental laws should we base our answers on? Surely, there couldn’t be any specific and direct answer. Liberalist will claim that a sex act, as long as the individuals engaged in it derive pleasure from it, is intrinsically right. In the secular liberalist’s view, there is an emphasis on the values of self-choice and pleasure in formulating moral judgments about sexual behavior. Therefore, a sexual activity is only wrong if an individual is coerced to the act, such as rape, otherwise, if individuals are voluntarily engaged in the act, then it is intrinsically and morally right.
On the other hand the Thomistic Natural Law view supports “a more restrictive sexual ethics by invoking a divinely imposed scheme to which human action must conform” (Soble, 2009, para. 14). Natural Law agrees with the Liberal view that sexual act between two people who are engaged in the act voluntarily is intrinsically and morally right, however, the buck stops there. Natural Law‘s main argument, derived from Thomas Aquinas’ philosophy, is that only heterosexual coitus, used in the preservation of species, is intrinsically right. There are many philosophers who agree with this central rule. However, many also disagree with some of Aquinas’ viewpoint about other sexual acts, such as sodomy and masturbation. Still, Natural Law philosophers, contemporary or not, maintain that only natural sexual activity is intrinsically and morally right, the rest may be permissible in some cases, but intrinsically wrong.
We have established that it is improbable to arrive at a definite and straight answer to the question, is any sex act intrinsically wrong? Even if we try to be objective about it, as human beings we are bound to be influenced by the belief and the rules that we have grown accustomed to.
Personally, I prefer to make a nonmoral judgment on this occasion, and conclude that any sex act, which brings pleasure to all the individuals involved, no matter how many of them may be, is intrinsically right. I believe that pleasure is an important aspect of life and that if individuals derive pleasure from any sexual activity it can only be intrinsically right and will eventually produce good extrinsic values.
References
Liberal Thinking. (2006, May 27). New Thoughts of Sex (with poll). [Web log comment].
Retrieved from http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/05/28/213889/-New-Thoughts-of-Sex-with-Poll
Nicholls, P. (n.d.). Sexual Ethics. Retrieved from http://resources.r9paul.org/ASA2/RS/Essays/Ethics_SexualEthics.pdf
Roughgarden, J. (2004). Evolutions Rainbow: Diversity, gender and sexuality in nature and people. London: University of California Press.
Soble, A. (2009). Philosophy of Sexuality, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Retrieved Zimmerman, M.J. (2010). Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Value. The Stanford Encyclopedia ofPhilosophy (Winter 2010 Edition).
Retrieved from http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2010/entries/value-intrinsic-extrinsic/
