Giant Sequoias – 250 feet

Topic

3

: Religious views on sexual behaviour and human relationships

• Objective: Introduction to sexual ethics and relationships

Definition:

 

Sexual Ethics

(also referred to as

sexual morality

)

Where do we get

The constellation of moral and ethical

our ideas from?

group has in the context of consensual penetrative sexual activity  morality with respect to sexual relations

IN 584 Lyon France, A Catholic COUNCIL DEBATED THE QUESTION: “

Are women human?”

After a vote women were declared to be human by 32 votes to 31.

For a long time after this many Christians believed that women had no souls and were less holy than men. Through the centuries there have been many examples of inequality and sexism .

‘Church of England votes no to women bishops’

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fz6ILmFl3zE

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HbSwSjxUeI  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lw_h_HDqzFQ&playnext=1 &list=PL5293C4B2FCFB48DF   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=shWDY0Cjves&feature=rel ated http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oftOCN1jkNo&feature=rela ted

Introducing sexual ethics

Sexual ethics

  ‘is this: that sex, like any other physical act,

is not inherently

good or bad, that it may be used to cause to cause joy. Therefore, there ought to be

no restrictions

those restrictions which suffering.’

suffering

upon sex, except only

prevent

and used

Thomas Paine

(January 29, 1737 – June 8, 1809) was an English American political activist, author, political theorist and revolutionary.

Sexual Ethics

• TASKS: 1. What issues/taboos can you think of to do with sexual ethics? Write as many of these down as you can • 2. Now highlight as many of these that are still MAJOR issues today • 3. Can you divide sexuality / sexual acts into those that are legal and illegal?

Sexual Ethics

LEGAL

• Having sex in private • Having sex with many people or partners • Adultery • Homosexuality • Prostitution • Paying for sex • Most forms of pornography

ILLEGAL

• Having sex in public • Indecent exposure (there must be

intent)

• Marriage to more than one person (polygamy) • Sex under the age of 16 (specific laws protect under 13s) • Sex without consent (rape) • Kerb Crawling

H. L. Hart (1907 – 1992)

• Draws a boundary between public and private sexual acts – separating the acceptable and unacceptable On the other hand, he suggests that no private sexual act could harm anyone

‘apart from a few neurotic persons who are literally “made ill” by it’

Sexual intercourse between husband and wife is not immoral, but if it takes place in public it is an affront to human decency’ Do you agree? What might be unacceptable?

Discuss

…In sharp contrast to misogynous  Taboos

today

 cannibalism, female circumcision, incest, paedophilia, masturbation, etc.

attributed to the lack of homosexuality in Spartan

Sparta's laws recognized women's Consider, were these always taboos or were there some societies that accepted them?.

liked sex were disdained, and men sought sexual pleasure outside of marriage with slaves, boys, and prostitutes.

Ancient Egyptian Sexuality By Caroline Seawright

 ..

Revel in pleasure while your life endures And deck your head with myrrh. Be richly clad In white and perfumed linen; like the gods anointed be; and never weary grow In eager quest of what your heard desires do as it prompts you...

 Sexuality in ancient Egypt was open, untainted by guilt. Sex was an important part of life - from birth to death and rebirth. Singles and married couples made love. The Egyptians even believed in sex in the afterlife. Sex was not taboo... Even the Egyptian religion was filled with tales of adultery, incest, homosexuality and masturbation...

Many have concluded that incest was rife.

Really…Surely not?

  The famous

Cleopatra

VII was married to her younger brother,  Roman census declarations attest to many husbands and wives being brother and sister. The most well known of these relationships were in the

royal family

.

Greek

law allowed marriage between a brother and sister if they had different mothers (3,100 bc – 900 ac)

Modern sexual taboos and their morality.

 Things today which are detested by some: masturbation, homosexuality, prostitution, paedophilia, nudity, zoophilia (sexual attraction towards animals), rape and incest.  Should we accept a doctrine simply because it was taught to us by parents and society, no matter how delicate or sensitive an issue it may be.

Michael Foucault (1926 1984) French philosopher

Argues that ‘

normal/abnormal are not meaningful terms; ethics are to be thought of as practices relative to time and place

’.

Moreover , ‘

illustrates how Western society since that time has increasingly developed controls over sex by arbitrarily defining what is normal ’.

Sexual ethics

  ‘is this: that sex, like any other physical act,

is not inherently

good or bad, that it may be used to cause to cause joy. Therefore, there ought to be

no restrictions

those restrictions which suffering.’

suffering

upon sex, except only

prevent

and used

Thomas Paine

(January 29, 1737 – June 8, 1809) was an English American political activist, author, political theorist and revolutionary.

 The

Inuit

similar "People" are a group of culturally indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic regions of Greenland , Canada , the United States , and eastern Siberia .

 Inuit tribes have altogether different beliefs about what constitutes illegal and

moral/immoral

incest

A

victimless crime

is a term

used to refer to actions that have been ruled illegal but do not directly violate or threaten the rights of any other individual.

 Some groups were especially served by wife sharing practices, as a key to the survival of their tribes, as from a social standpoint the limited population had long-before broken down the incest taboos with respect to kinship. In these villages, relations with family members were accepted, because without this kind of relationship the same people would have disappeared long ago.

Female Genital Mutilation is considered by its practitioners to be an essential part of raising a girl properly — girls are regarded as having been cleansed by the removal of "male" body parts. It ensures pre-marital virginity and inhibits extra-marital sex

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_circumcision

To think about…



The Origins of War in Child Abuse

by Lloyd deMause

Objection:

  An

objection

to a sexual act is the fact that its thought may be

disturbing

. Some people may find it disgusting that two people can

consent

to things which they find abominable. Although it is true that there may be grounds that it is

grotesque

.

no suffering

exchanging in such a sexual act, they detest it on the  This objection can quite clearly be seen: an action being ugly does not mean that it is

immoral

, just as an action being

beautiful

does not mean it is

moral

.

Natural law…

An action is either natural or unnatural.

 The question is, if something is natural or unnatural, does that actually have any impact on

moral implications?

 Such as a

murderer's

actions being natural, would that mean that they were any less immoral, or a saviour's actions being unnatural, would that mean that they were any less moral?

 

There is no reason why men should not be allowed to have sexual relations with each other.

logical

or

humane

Are there… What do you think…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYwZsp uE3pM

Key questions

1.

Should religion have anything to do with sexual behaviour?

2.

Is religion too patriarchal to be the basis of a sexual ethics in the modern world? 3.

4.

Should sexual ethics be based on what the majority of people in society think to be true?

Are religious views of sexuality and marriage hampered by backward ideas of what is natural or fixed ideas of the roles of men and women?