Article - Is casual sex immoral? - on sex positivity and its effect on women

Why do men need monogamy to pass on their DNA?

I've come from one night stands BTW. But sex is more than orgasms.

Evolutionarily its more effective for both men and women to be in a monogamous relationship which is why I think its too simplistic to say women have more to lose.

The physical cost to an individual woman is higher, but without monogamy most men would not get to pass on their DNA so monogamy suits men too

I just read the article. Am I weird in that I don’t have the feelings of moral ick about someone having sex with a dead chicken (and certainly not about someone masturbating over a shoe) that the author takes for granted? Weird but harmless.
On the other hand I’ve plenty of moral ick about any form of pressure on women on girls to engage in sexual activity they’re not enthusiastic about,
Nope, agree. I dgaf about any sexual activity an adult does that doesn't harm anyone else. None of my business.
However coercive sex is wrong.

1. Did everyone consent?
2. Did anyone get hurt?

The fact that these questions can be answered, 1. before the event*, and 2. after the event means there's a gap. For example, you can answer "look, all's fine" if a woman gave consent, had sex that made her feel uneasy, but didn't actually get hurt.

All was well, right? Actually, no. There needs to be more than consent and a lack of harm.

• the fact that during the event a woman can withdraw consent doesn't remove the problem

Also I have thought in the past that it would do women a world of good if most men were aware of the fact that most women do not orgasm on a one-night stand.

I haven't done the scientific study but I've asked about 30 of my female friends and I don't know a single person who has. That's not to say there aren't any women who have - of course there will be - good for them.

However, curiously when I ask men - I've yet to find a single man who thinks that any woman he's slept with on a one night stand has failed to orgasm.

I've often thought that putting posters or stickers up in men's toilets saying "Less than x% of women orgasm on a one night stand" (I need to actually do a survey to find out what X is) might make men think a bit.

Stripes you're absolutely right. The moral framework is bizarre. Under what other circumstances would we apply such a low bar to a social interaction?!

It's not an exaggeration though, many of my friends are still single and doing the Tinder thing and the stories are just awful. One friend found out a guy she'd been sleeping with for 6 months had 5 other women on the go as well. She said "well I guess I didn't specifically ask him if we're exclusive...I just assumed".

So now we're all allowed to be arseholes to each other if we haven't specifically said "can you confirm you're not being this type of arsehole?".

Stakes are always higher for women with sex. Due to biology, more repercussions lie with us. Risk of pregnancy, consequences of taking hormonal contraceptives if we do (weight gain, depression), vulnerability due to physical differences, cystitis (happens to many women regularly due to sex), pressure to endure painful practices. What stakes are there for men that are comparable?

As far as I can work out, what the author is arguing is that the current liberal sex positive framework on sexual morality is as follows:

1. Did everyone consent?
2. Did anyone get hurt?

Once those two questions are answered appropriately, there is no further morality applied to questions about sex. In fact BDSM can be viewed as more ethical in that limited framework because the questions are answered more fully (allegedly. I would dispute that).

Under that limited moral framework there is no actual way of making a moral distinction between a committed couple attempting to conceive and someone having sexual with a dead chicken. They become morally equivalent.

The author is arguing against consent being a useful moral measure for most ethical issues around sex. She points out that someone else has used the consent argument but she doesn’t think it is the right framework.

I found that article quite irritating. I said it's infantilising. It's the idea that a woman might think she consented but she didn't really and here's a feminist to feministplain why the feminist knows better.

‘I just read the article. Am I weird in that I don’t have the feelings of moral ick about someone having sex with a dead chicken (and certainly not about someone masturbating over a shoe) that the author takes for granted? Weird but harmless.
On the other hand I’ve plenty of moral ick about any form of pressure on women on girls to engage in sexual activity they’re not enthusiastic about,’

The author isn’t talking about a moral ick though. She mentions disgust, but that is different to morality. What she is saying is that liberals use thin principles when making moral judgements. You deciding that someone having sex with a dead chicken is doing something weird but harmless is applying fewer moral principles to your moral decision making about sex than someone more traditional would do. That’s the author’s point.

As with all this stuff, there's what should be the right answer - women and men can enjoy casual sex as equals in a climate of safety and mutual respect - and there's what actually happens in the society we have today, which is too many men see bedding women as a game in which they win and the woman loses, so a woman having casual sex risks losing the respect of her sex partner and possibly her wider social group.

Unfortunately, some people (sometimes with the best motives) think we can move society from the latter to the former by only telling young women about the first and ignoring the second. Result - women are conned into sex by men who hurt and shame them for having it.

I really struggle to understand why people tie themselves in knots about this issue.

Is casual sex immoral? No
Is telling someone that you're in love with them to get them into bed rape? No
Is it a shitty thing to do? Yes

If you're having sex with someone who thinks you're doing it because you love them and you're doing it for a one-off shag then you're a dickhead. If your plan is to ghost someone the morning after then you're also a dickhead. If you haven't bothered to consider why this person is having sex with you, and whether they could get hurt by it, then you're an uncaring bastard.

We should all be treating the people we have sex with with kindness and respect. Not because "otherwise it's rape" but because it's the non-arsehole thing to do. It doesn't seem complicated to me.

• on women or girls

I just read the article. Am I weird in that I don’t have the feelings of moral ick about someone having sex with a dead chicken (and certainly not about someone masturbating over a shoe) that the author takes for granted? Weird but harmless.
On the other hand I’ve plenty of moral ick about any form of pressure on women on girls to engage in sexual activity they’re not enthusiastic about,

I think all this casual no strings attached sex hadn't really been advantageous for women as a whole

I dunno there have been some advantages ive found. If I hadn't found myself in sone kind if casual hook up situation I'd have never known it could actually be enjoyable the first 2 times with others had been painful or just really bad.

Course on the flip side it did set an impossibly high standard that took years to be lived up to...

I have enjoyed casual sex, I didn't want a committed relationship for a long time. What's interesting is the idea that women are looking for commitment. I found men much more clingy. I had sex on my terms and I took care of my health and well being.

We should teach our daughters to be assertive and teach our sons to be less needy, so if women chose to have a fling then they can be accommodated without a load of baggage

I’m now reminded of the Glen Close character of Basic Instincts.....🤔

I think all this casual no strings attached sex hadn't really been advantageous for women as a whole.

‘The concern for me about any person who did this would be would they do it to a live animal? Is this an indicator of possible, future harmful behaviour?’

In the scenario nobody else knows about it so whether it is an indicator wouldn’t matter. The moral questions would be if carrying out the act had an impact on the person that increased the likelihood of them, and if acting that way was harmful to that person’s mind in the moment they committed it. Adherents of traditional morality would answer yes to both.

‘But we assume that morals are rational, we should be able to philosophise, reason our way through to morals. Doesn't seem to have room for instinctive disgust.’

Well yes exactly. Traditional morality gives reasons why it is wrong. For example sex should be about being open to life, which sex with a dead chicken is not. Or sex should be about loving relationships, which sex with a dead chicken is not.

It is only people who have rejected traditional morality and rely on fewer moral principles who are left grappling with attempting to justify their disgust.

For me, women having the freedom to choose means exactly that - to choose how they live their lives based on their preferences and what they feel suits them best.

Expecting all women to be virtuous virgins until marriage and shaming those who don't want to follow such constraints by labelling them sluts isn't good.
Neither is it good to expect all women to embrace and enjoy casual sex and shame those who don't want to follow such unconstrained practices by labelling them prudes.

What seems to happen is women following the crowd one way or the other, and finding it difficult to avoid peer pressure, and then finding themselves unhappy about things they might have done or not done.

It's important for women to know their own minds and to be able to be honest with themselves about what they really want.
Most people are somewhere in the middle - enjoying casual sex at certain points in their lives, usually in youth, and then preferring the stability of sex in a long-term relationship as they get older and find someone they love.

I don't think the point of the article is a out whether casual sex is immoral.

It's about whether it's immoral to encourage girls and young women to unquestioningly believe a narrative about casual sex that may be damaging to them, while clearly benefiting males.

I haven't read the article (or the thread) but always thought casual sex was when one of those involved (or even both) was perhaps leaning on one elbow leafing through a Littlewoods catalogue, flicking through TV channels, eating a crusty cheese roll, puzzling over a crossword or maybe on the phone to their mother.

Well that's what it's like in our house.