A Critique of Sexual Morality
After being put off by my detractors for an interval of time and having the priceless chance of introspection and the distance and the time to "judge", I let myself be possessed with a number of troubling thoughts that fought and struggled, screamed and yelled at each other, all in the space where my poor mind is, till one voice articulated itself so clearly, so convincingly I decided I will listen to it.
And while listening to 'Coming Home' by KD Lang, (and at the risk of sounding like the typical cliche), it dawned on me, the apparent defeatist attitude that rang throughout the song.
A note I personally identified with.
And the fact that KD Lang was singing it, made all the more significant.
The love of my life, the person who singlehandedly altered the structure of my brain and the very molecules that swim in its every nook and cranny, once told me, on the eve of his impending new reformed, heterosexual life:
"You will never win, the scene will always be the same, what makes you think you can change it?"
And while my gentleman was a worthy intellectual opponent, a fact I now decry the complete lack of such an opponent, the words once ominously prophecised, sound to me more true than ever.
With the series of recent, extremely unfortunate events and after five whole years of this bullshit, to quote Jasmine Sullivan, where am I standing? How far was I from the exact situation he so eloquently described?
Far for me to ever turn heterosexual, or born-again Muslim, I never left my faith or my culture, I keep them like a vile of poison attached to my neck, my seemingly deadly salvation in the most extraordinary, unexpected of ways.
But if I should meet him now, what would I tell him?
How did the scene change since he last was here?
Did people really change? To the better?
Do I have different friends from the ones me and him once knew?
Am I happy?
And in one last attempt to defend my position from within the gutter, as Oscar Wilde puts it, our so called ghetto, I will argue for my case, one last time, before I retire and finally exit "the scene".
We rather arrived at the same exact condition through the complete opposite route.
If its a penis and it has a pair of testicles attached to it and it can preform the function of fornication, then it belongs to everyone. Every queen has a claim, more of a right.
In our world a penis belongs to everyone.
(i.e. queens, insatiable bottoms, alleged versatiles, curious tops, not-so-curious tops,... etc)
In a way that disconnects the penis from the body.
The person, the body, no longer exists.
Its a penis and it belongs to everyone.
Everyone and their sister (metaphorical sister that is) has a right to the penis.
Its exactly like saying, if its visible, its beautiful.
"Beauty" is a qualifier, a characteristic of a condition that is perceived in an object after a particular mental process, in which its "regarded" or "judged" as sensorially pleasing.
Same goes for our argument, "right" as in morally correct, is a condition we arrive at after applying a certain moral scheme that thoroughly examines such and such a condition rendering it "right" or "wrong".
Something might be inherently wrong or right, but we still do not arrive at this truth except after we apply our minds to it.
Therefore, we can not say if its consensual, its right.
If its responsible, its right.
Responsibility here in the sense of giving oneself the capacity to choose and hence foresee consequences of such a choice and consciously decide to undertake this particular course of action, being completely aware of these consequences.
Attending to the consequences of that choice.
Far from the sexual choices everyone seems to be making (myself included) these days, in this scene.
This capacity, this moral agency, activating this moral agency is what emancipates one as full-reasoning human.
Take it away and we lose an essential aspect of our humanity.
The ability to see choices, choose and foresee consequences.
Dehumanizing in an unimaginable ways.
Now that is true Evil, with a capital E.
Like I always say humans are complex creatures and exhibit complex behavior, we can not reduce a human to his penis, ass or restrict him to "consent".
Responsibility does not lie in using a condom or saying "is that good for you baby?" or "Do you want me to go slower?"
These are merely sexual preferences and moral bioethcial necessity for survival.
Moral in the sense of conferring harm on an unknowing subject while being aware of it, and being aware of the subject's ignorance (the wide range of sexually transmitted disease is an elusive kind of information)
But the responsibility I speak of goes beyond the moral pathological discourse of STD and HIV.
As determinantal as those conditions are, my notion of responsibility precedes the sexually transmitted diseases discourse.
I am speaking about the human being as an active moral agent.
The only "active" I see, is being "on top".
Thats a winner if you ask me.
One dude says that and everyone in the room shuts up.
Its Darwin at his best and worst.
Biological determinism (the notion that we can not escape the rules of our biology) is not only fascist, its silly.
If chimps are polygamous or elephants are polyandrous, what does that have to do with humans?
Evolution explains a lot about our history, place in the environment, the choices we make consciously and unconsciously, but what the hell does an ape's sexuality has t do with humans?
Black Swans form lesbians pairs to raise their young, so?
It does not mean that we share the same environment and ecological system as the Black Swan or that we have the same genetic make up.
Nothing in our genes dictates our moral choices per se.
We are prone to certain states of mind, but unless we are completely mentally incapacitated (in case of brain damage or an integral part of brain is malfunctioning) we have full control over our bodies and the choices we make concerning those bodies.
Men or Women are not promiscuous by any nature.
Because of the simply fact that there are human choices and conditions even evolution can not explain (like homosexuality for example), its very clear that not every social arrangement humans get into has the ultimate aim to help humans procreate or produce off spring (for some people though, that is slightly true).
Of all the animals, animated beings, and multicellular organisms, producing an offspring is the byproduct of fornication, not the sole product.
A big hole in the evolution paradigm appears.
If men do not fornicate with the biggest number of sexual partners to increase their chances of producing offspring to propagate their species (the main and only reason why all animals mate), then why do they mate with all these sexual partners?
The motivation of pleasure is a tempting rationalization, but then we would have to take "nature" out of the discourse.
Nature has nothing to do with this.
Seeking pleasure, is a complete mental, rational choice, it has nothing to do with "our nature".
How can "nature"/evolution/biology explain phenomenon like altruism, infanticide, faith, betrayal, love, melancholy, hate,.....etc?
Evolution stops short.
Anthropology, philosophy, neuropsychology,....etc step in.
And all try to explain and never fully succeed to adequately explain all these complex states of being.
Now come tell me about monogamy.
Until they map the genes of homosexuality, I think that blaming "nature" or "biology" is the most pathetic excuse for immature licentious sexual behavior that has nothing to do with chimps, elephants or the praying mantis (which devours its mate after mating).
If wo/man wants to be faithful, s/he will be.
S/he does not want to, s/he won't.
As simple as that.
I know it sounds like such a disappointment, but is completely our choice.
No Brian Kinney, Emperor Hadrian, no Oscar Wilde, in the end its our choice.
We choose to attach a penis to a body.
We choose to be responsible for our decisions.
We choose to be faithful or not.
Its a choice.
And like the darling Charlotte (in Sex and the City), "I choose my choice", I choose not to be part of "this".
Whatever "this" stands for.
And while listening to 'Coming Home' by KD Lang, (and at the risk of sounding like the typical cliche), it dawned on me, the apparent defeatist attitude that rang throughout the song.
A note I personally identified with.
And the fact that KD Lang was singing it, made all the more significant.
The love of my life, the person who singlehandedly altered the structure of my brain and the very molecules that swim in its every nook and cranny, once told me, on the eve of his impending new reformed, heterosexual life:
"You will never win, the scene will always be the same, what makes you think you can change it?"
And while my gentleman was a worthy intellectual opponent, a fact I now decry the complete lack of such an opponent, the words once ominously prophecised, sound to me more true than ever.
With the series of recent, extremely unfortunate events and after five whole years of this bullshit, to quote Jasmine Sullivan, where am I standing? How far was I from the exact situation he so eloquently described?
Far for me to ever turn heterosexual, or born-again Muslim, I never left my faith or my culture, I keep them like a vile of poison attached to my neck, my seemingly deadly salvation in the most extraordinary, unexpected of ways.
But if I should meet him now, what would I tell him?
How did the scene change since he last was here?
Did people really change? To the better?
Do I have different friends from the ones me and him once knew?
Am I happy?
And in one last attempt to defend my position from within the gutter, as Oscar Wilde puts it, our so called ghetto, I will argue for my case, one last time, before I retire and finally exit "the scene".
- Homosexuality = Sexual Communism?
We rather arrived at the same exact condition through the complete opposite route.
If its a penis and it has a pair of testicles attached to it and it can preform the function of fornication, then it belongs to everyone. Every queen has a claim, more of a right.
In our world a penis belongs to everyone.
(i.e. queens, insatiable bottoms, alleged versatiles, curious tops, not-so-curious tops,... etc)
In a way that disconnects the penis from the body.
The person, the body, no longer exists.
Its a penis and it belongs to everyone.
Everyone and their sister (metaphorical sister that is) has a right to the penis.
- If its consensual, its right
Its exactly like saying, if its visible, its beautiful.
"Beauty" is a qualifier, a characteristic of a condition that is perceived in an object after a particular mental process, in which its "regarded" or "judged" as sensorially pleasing.
Same goes for our argument, "right" as in morally correct, is a condition we arrive at after applying a certain moral scheme that thoroughly examines such and such a condition rendering it "right" or "wrong".
Something might be inherently wrong or right, but we still do not arrive at this truth except after we apply our minds to it.
Therefore, we can not say if its consensual, its right.
If its responsible, its right.
Responsibility here in the sense of giving oneself the capacity to choose and hence foresee consequences of such a choice and consciously decide to undertake this particular course of action, being completely aware of these consequences.
Attending to the consequences of that choice.
Far from the sexual choices everyone seems to be making (myself included) these days, in this scene.
This capacity, this moral agency, activating this moral agency is what emancipates one as full-reasoning human.
Take it away and we lose an essential aspect of our humanity.
The ability to see choices, choose and foresee consequences.
Dehumanizing in an unimaginable ways.
Now that is true Evil, with a capital E.
Like I always say humans are complex creatures and exhibit complex behavior, we can not reduce a human to his penis, ass or restrict him to "consent".
Responsibility does not lie in using a condom or saying "is that good for you baby?" or "Do you want me to go slower?"
These are merely sexual preferences and moral bioethcial necessity for survival.
Moral in the sense of conferring harm on an unknowing subject while being aware of it, and being aware of the subject's ignorance (the wide range of sexually transmitted disease is an elusive kind of information)
But the responsibility I speak of goes beyond the moral pathological discourse of STD and HIV.
As determinantal as those conditions are, my notion of responsibility precedes the sexually transmitted diseases discourse.
I am speaking about the human being as an active moral agent.
The only "active" I see, is being "on top".
- Homosexuals are promiscuous by nature, Men are polygamous by nature
Thats a winner if you ask me.
One dude says that and everyone in the room shuts up.
Its Darwin at his best and worst.
Biological determinism (the notion that we can not escape the rules of our biology) is not only fascist, its silly.
If chimps are polygamous or elephants are polyandrous, what does that have to do with humans?
Evolution explains a lot about our history, place in the environment, the choices we make consciously and unconsciously, but what the hell does an ape's sexuality has t do with humans?
Black Swans form lesbians pairs to raise their young, so?
It does not mean that we share the same environment and ecological system as the Black Swan or that we have the same genetic make up.
Nothing in our genes dictates our moral choices per se.
We are prone to certain states of mind, but unless we are completely mentally incapacitated (in case of brain damage or an integral part of brain is malfunctioning) we have full control over our bodies and the choices we make concerning those bodies.
Men or Women are not promiscuous by any nature.
Because of the simply fact that there are human choices and conditions even evolution can not explain (like homosexuality for example), its very clear that not every social arrangement humans get into has the ultimate aim to help humans procreate or produce off spring (for some people though, that is slightly true).
Of all the animals, animated beings, and multicellular organisms, producing an offspring is the byproduct of fornication, not the sole product.
A big hole in the evolution paradigm appears.
If men do not fornicate with the biggest number of sexual partners to increase their chances of producing offspring to propagate their species (the main and only reason why all animals mate), then why do they mate with all these sexual partners?
The motivation of pleasure is a tempting rationalization, but then we would have to take "nature" out of the discourse.
Nature has nothing to do with this.
Seeking pleasure, is a complete mental, rational choice, it has nothing to do with "our nature".
How can "nature"/evolution/biology explain phenomenon like altruism, infanticide, faith, betrayal, love, melancholy, hate,.....etc?
Evolution stops short.
Anthropology, philosophy, neuropsychology,....etc step in.
And all try to explain and never fully succeed to adequately explain all these complex states of being.
Now come tell me about monogamy.
Until they map the genes of homosexuality, I think that blaming "nature" or "biology" is the most pathetic excuse for immature licentious sexual behavior that has nothing to do with chimps, elephants or the praying mantis (which devours its mate after mating).
If wo/man wants to be faithful, s/he will be.
S/he does not want to, s/he won't.
As simple as that.
I know it sounds like such a disappointment, but is completely our choice.
No Brian Kinney, Emperor Hadrian, no Oscar Wilde, in the end its our choice.
We choose to attach a penis to a body.
We choose to be responsible for our decisions.
We choose to be faithful or not.
Its a choice.
And like the darling Charlotte (in Sex and the City), "I choose my choice", I choose not to be part of "this".
Whatever "this" stands for.
Comments
Though I am entirely d'accord with your conclusion, I find this John Locke concept of 'moral agency' in of itself self-defeating. Maybe even contradictory to your point. Morality is not an objective sphere - what someone allows themselves to do 'morally' is based almost entirely on what they've been told and how they interpret a filing cabinet of social/cultural expectations and religious garbage. In effect, your moral compass can very easily turn you.
I say stop blaming your promiscuity on other people or 'nature', but also take morality out of the picture.
I believe that going through this life in search of your TRUE best interest, regardless of morality or nature, actually makes your life and the world much more of a success. The reality is, unfortunately, that finding out what it is that is in our best interest is very difficult and requires wisdom that only life and its many experiences can give you.
The world around you exists despite your morals.
The scene around you exists despite your convictions.
It really does not matter whether you can change it or not. What matters is what role it plays in your life. Is it furthering your true best interests? Though we don't always admit it, maybe a little bit. It's nice to joke around, go to a mindless party once in a while. But be it London or Cairo, the reality is the further away you are the better from all this mess. Love will come to you if you await it with an open mind, not open legs.
Spheres, agencies and what not, this relativism of values is not only dangerous, its nihilistic.
In the sense that makes any basic human life impossible.
Not to mention a life with dignity and respect.
Morality is not an objective or subjective sphere.
And to judge is not wrong.
We have to moralize and we have to judge or else we will be eternally plagued by one Holocaust after the other, and one Apartheid after the other.
No, there are choices and actions that are wicked and evil.
And they should be seen as such, and they should be regarded as such and we should do everything in our power to ensure that they don't happen again.
Whether they do or not, thats something else.
But its our duty, no its our obligation to publicly admit to ourselves and others, that as humans we can not live without these ideals, these morals, these values, no matter how context changes or time and space changes.
While your Nietzschean proclivities are all good and well, Nietzsche himself decried any form of human incapacity or need that would subject the "perfect man" from realizing his perfection.
How can you be your own God, when you are a slave to your vulgar desires and petty resentments?
While I find Nietzsche's morality charming and very much in context, and despite the fact the he wanted to destroy the Western scheme of values as we know it, he did it with moral fervor and indignation, its hard not to call him a staunch moralist in the end.
The world around me exists, with me or without, and with my morals or without, but the world would be such a poor place without such notions as respect, tolerance, compassion and love.
Hackneyed or not, slave morality or not, I do not subscribe to notions that jeopardize the well being of my fellow humans. And if I don't lead by example, I certainly have every obligation to try.
My darling M, I choose the Lovingkindess of a benevolent deity than the vengeful wrath of a corrupt, selfish God.
kisses
I concede that in 'ignoring morality' and pursuing my own self interest I am, ironically, giving birth to a new moral system (nietzschean, agreed), but I do maintain that this new morality is the only one that should exist, and the one upon which judgments as to one's own best interest are made. Judgments, I agree, must be made- but only when they are necessary. (Judging people that do not play any part in your life is a waste of time and karma).
You say: "Morality is not an objective or subjective sphere"
Where is it identifiable then?
Only a few lines later: "No, there are choices...that are wicked and evil."
Though I can understand the touchiness of the subject, I find that your thesis, like this past sentence, is driven more by emotion and passion than reason. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. But in attempting to resolve this matter on a purely logical basis (there's another subjective sphere!)I will once again point to the shaky foundations of this 'common morality' we all need to subscribe to.
I submit that because it is impossible to establish a universal morality, we shouldn't be trying to adhere to one. Finding a rule-book for humanity, however basic and simple, is an inevitably doomed expedition. God in His infinite wisdom has made it ironically so that if you seek your own answers and self-determination you will eventually tap into a wider harmony.
But, after all, we're not here to talk about abstractions. We're here to talk about the scene and how frustrating it can be. You have a concern, a complaint, and you are seeking to deal with it. We wouldnt be having this converation if you weren't; and that in of itself is a step towards the answer.
I guess I'll repeat what I said before. It really does not matter what the de facto situation is around you, but only what you make of it.
Peace
M
You leave nothing but examine it, dissect it to pieces and strangle it to death, till there is nothing left that you haven't devoured and interrogated!
Brava! :)
Two words, defeat the impossibility of a universal morality, and I can not believe you were the one to use them!
"Karma"
"God"
I have nothing else to say.
I rest my case.
kisses
I.
ps I definitely think that there should be a proper theory of emotions that explains human motivation, Sartre attempted that but never finished it. Derrida has a few allusions, not enough.
David Wiggins makes an interesting case for universal "sentiment of solidarity" in trying to defend the objectivity of ethics.