Jump to content
Objectivism Online Forum

Sex without love

Rate this topic


Recommended Posts

From an Objectivist perspective, is there any value in having sex with someone whom you aren't in love with? Suppose that for whatever reason, it just isn't a match, but you find the person attractive and still admire him or her enough to go for a roll in the hay. Is there a contradition there?

Edited by happiness
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Dr. Peikoff actually talks about this in one of his podcasts, and I more or less agree with him. Someone can be a valuable sexual partner (a source of values for you and also the kind of person you wish to express those values with), without you being completely in love with them.

I also think that it's necessary to learn about sex and your own sexuality/enjoyment/desires as well as those of your proposed partner before you can go all out and say, "I'm romantically in love with this person", and the ultimate way to do this, of course, is to give it a try. I don't believe in Platonic love, and I think that when people say "I'm so in love with this person" but they don't have an actual relationship with that person (and they certainly haven't had sex), what they mean is "I'm infatuated with this person". You have to bring the relationship into actual expression and then you can determine whether it's full romantic love or something else valuable but not the Full Monty.

That's not to say you should have sex with just anyone on the off chance that it might be valuable to you. You should be reasonably sure going in (as sure as you can be about a volitional person's character) that you're going to derive value and satisfaction from the experience. You just don't have to know beforehand whether it'll be Ultimate Value or not, because, well, you really can't.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

From an Objectivist perspective, is there any value in having sex with someone whom you aren't in love with? Suppose that for whatever reason, it just isn't a match, but you find the person attractive and still admire him or her enough to go for a roll in the hay. Is there a contradition there?

Nope.

Any different from this thread?

Yep. In that thread, people are trying to separate sex from our highest values altogether. Here, the question is whether you should have sex with someone you like (and even admire), but not quite love.

Edited by Nicky
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yep. In that thread, people are trying to separate sex from our highest values altogether. Here, the question is whether you should have sex with someone you like (and even admire), but not quite love.

Well, several of my posts in that thread address both questions (which are nearly identical questions anyway).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

sorry, I tried a search but the term "sex" isn't long enough

There's a Google search box on the bottom right of the forum pages which uses the Google engine to search OO.com (where "sex" isn't too short a term).
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Value is what you perceive by Your own mind, Your own reasons. And sex is only a part of the Love equation. When you see the value of having sex with somebody you don't love, and s/he is informed or clarified, then there's nothing to stop you. At a certain stage when you no longer see the value of having sex without love, you will know it's time to change.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...