There is no morality special to sex: no act is wrong simply because of its sexual nature | Alan Goldman

It sounds like you’re saying we consider the sexual assault worse because we do tend have a different sense of morality when it comes to sex. I don’t think the author would disagree. They acknowledge that that’s the current reality.

The argument they present is that sex should be considered the same as any other act. That our moral ideas about sex are flawed and informed by societal and religious norms rather than some underlying truth about sex. Since we’ve been influenced by these norms, there can be feelings of shame, guilt, or embarrassment even after completely consensual and inconsequential sex. It’s those feelings that the author believes are not actually rooted in anything. The no universal truth that makes the act of sex dirty or immoral. We assigned that ourselves throughout history.

If we could separate the act of sex from how we were conditioned to perceive it, those extra feelings of guilt or embarrassment would be gone. We would see sex as just another activity and it would not elicit feelings of guilt or morality just by partaking in the consensual act. If that’s how we viewed sex, we would still perceive sexual assault as immoral but I don’t think it would be clearly worse than violent physical assault.

/r/philosophy Thread Parent Link - iai.tv