SEX OUTSIDE OF MARRIAGE

What are the underlying issues?

Are

sexual relations a matter of a contract OR

A matter of historical existentially grounded human
beings?

The central issue for me is the vulnerability that

occurs during intimacy.
Reminder: This is a PHILOSOPHICAL discussion
[religious precepts may base a prohibition of premarital sex on the bible, or other religious teachings.]

BELLIOTI: Sexual Intercourse between

Consenting Adults is always Permissible
He argues that Sexual Relations are
contractual in nature
This

means the act is morally wrong only if

it involves
deception
promise-breaking
exploitation

Bellioti
argues from a KANTIAN position
1. It is never right to treat another human being as a
mere means.
To treat a person as a mere means is to make
them into an object.
People are to be equal subjects of experience.
2. Sexual relations are CONTRACTUAL in nature.
This involves the notion of reciprocity = that none of
us is self-sufficient
voluntary agreement of both parties to satisfy the
expectations of the other.

Bellioti continued.
3. Voluntary contracts incur a moral obligation to
provide/fulfill that which they have agreed to.
4. And that promise-breaking and deception are
immoral actions.
One argument against the contractual view is that
the feelings of intimacy involved make the contract
a bad model.
Belliotti replies that all this shows is that it may well
be the most important contract that people make.

Bellioti continued.
He says we need to be careful in
assuming what the other has offered.
His conclusion:
Sex is immoral if and only if it involves
deception, promise-breaking and/or
treating the other party as a mere
means to ones own ends.

Examples:
Rape is intrinsically immoral because the participation of
one party is involuntary.
He argues that rape is possible within marriage.
Because of lack of consent.
Bestiality raises the question of whether an animal is an
object, or whether it has interests that are not advanced
by the act.
Necrophilia is immoral because of involuntary
participation
Some argue a dead person is an object
But we do honor requests beyond the grave and
also this object once was a person- so it is not a
mere object.

Bellioti: Final comments

The role of religion: Belliotti is not providing a
religious argument, but he notes that religious
convictions have become part of societys moral
code.
Note: Remember that Kant has shifted the
command of the moral law from God to human
reason.
On Belliottis analysis teasing without the
intention to fulfill is immoral on his contractual view
of sexual relations.

PUNZO: Sexual Intercourse Should

Always Be Confined to Marriage
Punzo argues that sex is different from other
human activities because it involves
EXISTENTIAL INTEGRITY:
What does he mean by existential
integrity?
He asks whether having sexual relations is no
different from any other event-choice that we
make like choosing a dinner from a menu or
which movie to attend?

Punzo argues that

1. There is a distinctive nature to sexual
relations that makes them different from
other activities or relationships we
engage in. It is a matter of CONTEXT

In sexual relations you give your bodies

over it is not a contractual relation

Punzo argues that ...

2. The reason we can say all human
activities are alike is the acquisitive
character of our society.
The

contract model works, if this is the

way we view human sexual relations as a
form of acquisition.

Punzo continued.
He believes that we need to face the
nature of sexual relations squarely
and directly.

The human self is historical as well as

physical the role of the past and the
future.
This is an existential understanding of
the human self.

If we agree that the human self is

historical then
It is not possible to amputate our bodily existence from
the most intimate expression of our selfhood.
To do this is a form of depersonalization.
Sexual relations are not simply a PHYSICAL
merging, but a merging of the non-physical
dimensions of the partners.
Without a commitment to marriage there is an
amputation of their physical being from their historical
being.
The union is depersonalized
Sexual union is not simply a matter of being honest
[the contract model]

Marriage as a total human commitment

Punzo makes a distinction between pre-ceremonial
intercourse and pre-marital intercourse.
People can be morally married without a
ceremony BUT
The ceremony is part of the historicity of the
relationship this acknowledges that they do not
exist in a vacuum.
The marriage ceremony roots them in the world
in which they live. [Hence the gay/lesbian desire
for marriage.]