An Inclusive View In Alan Goldman's 'Plain Sex'
An inclusive view? A counterintuitive mean-end analysis argument? A counterintuitive article? In “Plain Sex”, Alan Goldman ironically taking a liberal point of view actually holds a conservative view to defining sex as contingent to the intent of fulfilling sexual desire. To prove his point, Goldman refers to a “means-end analysis of sex” using three main arguments; reproduction, expression of love and communication. I criticize Goldman for being too inclusive in defining sex, I will outline that Goldman’s means-end analysis of sex are counteractive to his argument. First, I will argue that reproduction is not guaranteed when doing the sexual acts of kissing, sodomy or fellation, in all three cases, humans are unable to reproduce. Second, expression …show more content…
For instance, what about petting my dog to express communication of friendship, here my intent is touch not for sexual desire. Goldman validates the touching of babies and sexual sports by saying that those are for the bodily function of exercising and attachment. But what about in the case of my cat? Viewing sex in this narrow view accounts non-sexual acts as sexual. In contrast to Woodhead’s view, viewing sex as a wider context such as between children, family friends and community. Also, Zukerman and manning: sex and religion: an introduction, while there exist many plurality of sex, there also exist many interpretations of sex within religious traditions. Goldman does not limit sex acts to “the venereal act” like Aquinas does, but includes any physical contact so long as it’s committed with the intent of fulfilling sexual desire. Goldman’s view is too inclusive. Moreover, while Goldman defines sex as the mere desire for sexual contact, he negates the idea of emotionless sex. This is referring to his second principle of communicative love. If he defines sex as similar to the act of the basic desire to eat or exercise, following that logic, there are no emotions in those actions and sex can be no more communicative than other acts and need not be communicative and since sex as love doesn’t account for emotionless sex. He therefore claims sex can not be defined as a means to an
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