Do you equate sex with low morality?

Sex isn't a big deal. Everyone does it - everything but plants and asexually reproducing animals have it. Sex is only damaging because we *make* it damaging by irrationally placing value on it. We have artificially tied morality in with sex. Let me demonstrate:

Having sex before marriage in most cultures is considered immoral because it tainted the bloodlines and family tree. When, for example, the first born son was to inherent the family's wealth, there was no other way to ensure that the first born son was the son of the husband than to forbid sex outside of marriage.

People (such as a poster above) like to think that in more religion-dominated times, no one had sex outside of marriage and young people didn't have sex. This is patently false - there are numerous examples of men fathering illegitimate children all throughout history. (A double standard existed against women, as it still does) In addition to that, children were not coddled or protected as much as they are today. Children were treated as small adults - they worked next to adults, they fought next to adults, they drank alcohol next to adults, and they had sex with each other just as much as adults did.

As for sex before marriage, historically people didn't have to wait nearly as long to have sex. Being married off at 14 kind of negates the high-horse moral strength that anti-sex advocates have. People in the past didn't have to practice self-control or patience for years and years before being able to experience sex, as one would have to today.

The idea of virginity being "something" you can give away or have taken from you is a social structure. The idea that sex with multiple partners makes a woman "weak" or somehow takes away her strength and independence is also a cultural structure. Plenty of women and men are capable of enjoying sex without grieving for their lost virginity or "strength" or whatever other made-up thing people like to say they feel. Sex before marriage only damages you if you buy into the social morality that supports that view. If you toss it out for the rubbish it is, people get on fine and actually manage to enjoy the one life they get.

As for morality, the simplest rule is the Golden one: "do onto others as you would have others do unto you." Everyone is deserving of kindness and respect. Don't be selfish. Don't contribute to the suffering of others. And you owe it to yourself to relax about to stupid stuff (sex) and enjoy the one life you've got.

Well, the people that connect sex to morality and guilt (some call that having a conscience) probably put more meaning into the act. Having sex is a very personal act, regardless of it being casual or in a committed relationship. I personally don't care about other people's sex lives, but in all fairness, a person that has sex with 3,000 people IS NOT as sexually moral as someone who has had sex with a handful of people. People shouldn't feel guilty about having multiple partners, but they should stop pretending it's a good thing and somehow worthy of being beyond normal judgments and opinions. Clearly if a person cares when someone says "Eww! He has had sex with 3,000 people!", they themselves are ashamed or feel guilty for their actions. Everyone has their own set of morals, and to me having sex with 3,000 people is "dirty". Sex isn't like any other bodily function; it causes STD's and pregnancy. Peeing and farting do not. If people are going to live that lifestyle, I shouldn't have to condone it or pretend I think it's normal or cool.

Good point. Sex isn't the only way that someone can be a moral person. In my mind, sexual morals are a whole other area of morality than those other morals you mentioned - honesty, respect, fidelity, etc.

I can't speak for other posters, but I consider sexual conduct to be an important thing, because sex is such an intimate act, such a giving of yourself to another person. Who you do it with and how you conduct yourself speaks to your character, I think. To see someone sleeping around casually, like sex is no more meaningful than eating dinner or seeing a movie seems to indicate, in my opinion anyways, that the person doesn't care much about him/herself or has no morals where sex is concerned. They can certainly be very moral in other areas; but in that area, no.

Also:

>We all know that while food is good and has it's proper usage, it can also be abused and people can balloon up to 300 pounds. Sex is much the same. It is not inherently bad, but it has its time and its place.

That, right there. Well said.

>Can a virgin be immoral? Or a non-virgin moral? What do you think?

Absolutely yes, to both.

Morality encompasses other things besides sex. But if one has high moral standards, they should abstain from sex before marriage, and remain faithful during marriage. When enjoyed properly within the marriage bond, sex is a normal and dignified way for a husband and wife to express love for one another.

Can a virgin be immoral? Yes. A virgin can be immoral in areas such as honesty and work ethics. Also, there are some "sex alternatives" that might not technically cause one to lose virginity, but that are still immoral.

Can a non-virgin be moral? Yes again. If a married woman has sex only with her husband, then she is definitely no longer a virgin, but is still being morally upright.

Hope this answers your questions.

I can't really figure out modern morality at all. There are men who despise women for not being virgins, and there are other men who get angry because women won't sleep with them. I have given up trying to make sense of it all.

However, I think most people consider stealing and murder to be immoral as well as having sex, but stealing and murder don't seem to be mentioned much on here.

I assume that adultery would come under the general heading of having sex.

I suppose I would only equate sex with low morality when it violates another like any other form of immorality. Sexual abuse, pedophilia, rape, incest, beastiality are perversions of sexuality that actively hurt and harm one's fellow beings just as any kind of verbal, psychological or physical abuse might.

At the same time, I do think virginity is an admirable quality because I think for anyone who has been in this society long enough should know by now that there are alot of unsavoury low lifes out there who are cruel and selfish and small minded. If a person has kept their virginity it points to a certain depth and breadth of character. It is all well and good to say in an ideal utopia that there is no empirical, objective value to virginity but we do not live in a utopia. We live in a flawed world with good and bad and somewhere in between people out there. For a woman to keep her virginity at the very least indicates she is cautious, thoughtful, has a standard beyond good looks in a mate. I am a virgin at 21 and not for a lack of suitors but because I think it is bloody hard to find someone who I won't immediately regret having had sex with afterward. People put forth their best selves to get you and once they have you they are like a kid with a toy, they get bored, take you for granted, abuse you in various ways, their true colours show. If a woman keeps her virginity she gets to know the true character of a man beneath the self interest. It bespeaks a certain self respect. If I were an easy girl I would have made alot of foolish choices.

I tend to think if people are very promiscuous, they are less sensitive to life and people and human character because one does not really care whom one has sex with. There is a kind of roughness about it, a crude physicality. I know that is what our culture has turned it into but I know any man I have gotten reasonably physical with against my better judgement in the past, I have walked away from the encounter feeling like a blow up doll, ashamed, violated--the types of men that watch too much porn and want to shoot their load in virtually every woman they see. Unworthy men of bad character.

Self control and restraint when it comes to sex, I think points to a host of other things like loyalty, trustworthiness, discernment, depth, that kind of thing. So, I think at least a little sobriety where sex is concerned indicates a higher moral caliber.

Yes. It has been promoted by liberalism, which sadly has all but eliminated morals from our society. The other factors you mention are valid, but still, sex before marriage continues to devastate people's lives.

We all know that while food is good and has it's proper usage, it can also be abused and people can balloon up to 300 pounds. Sex is much the same. It is not inherently bad, but it has its time and its place. Most people today think this is absurd, but don't listen to them. Men should actually be the ones setting that standard, but fat chance you'll find one.

Obviously, there's more to morality than just saving oneself. But I do think there's something moral about whether a person chooses to have sex before marriage, and I do think there's more to it than just a personal choice.

You can argue whatever you want about virginity. You can say it's a social construct, you can say there's nothing rational about it, you can say it's just something human beings made up. But the fact is virtually all cultures have a history of placing a high importance on it. At the end of the day, what matters is that whether this was made up or not, it is something that a lot of people care about--perhaps more than there are people who are willing to admit to caring about it, in our sexually liberated society.

You can do all sorts of sexual things with the man or woman you marry. But there's only going to be one person out there who can say they have your virginity. I think it's insulting to the person you plan to spend the rest of your life with, the person you basically view as your soul mate (whether or not you believe in soul mates) if they have to put up with someone else out there having something they can never get from you. Particularly something that so many people place such an importance on. I think that's something that only the person you're going to spend the rest of your life with, and that's why I've chosen to wait for marriage, and it's why I'll expect my wife to have waited for me when I meet her. To give this up to someone else and disregard the possibility that the person you spend your life with might be bothered by it is an immoral action.

In my experience the people who make the kind of overly generalized statements you described have rarely, if ever, thought their position through logically enough to have a response to a question like this. In most cases they simply denounce as immoral any behavior of which they personally disapprove so yes, a virgin can be immoral if the one doesn't conform to some other arbitrary bench mark the speaker might care to name. Morality is simply the study of what distinguishes right behavior from wrong behavior and the criteria for making that determination are something we must all decide for ourselves. The biggest source of misunderstanding in such matters is that ever increasing numbers of people honestly don't know what the words they are using actually mean so they are incapable of making so much as a coherent statement let alone putting forth a reasoned and logical statement and defense of a philosophical position.

"It isn't doesn't matter what you do, its why you do it.

Sex can be a wonderful thing. Something you share with your partner,

or you can use it to ruin someone's life.

Look at guns,

you can share a wonderful camping trip. Teach respect and safety.

Guns don't kill people.

I used to.

Even look at that.

I have killed many people.

You might have killed people, I can't check files anymore, so I don't know.

Are we monsters?

I am very sure you have many friends/ family that consider you a hero.

Same as me.

I think sex has a bad rap BECAUSE of the fact that both genders use it to take advantage of one another.

So people place "rules" on it to judge people based of it.

The religious right put a very high rating on sexual abstinance. They equate people, mainly women, as having low morals if they have sex before marriage. This stems from an older time when a man could only be sure that his children were his own if his wife had refrained from sex before marriage. That way he knew (or at least thought) that she was less likely to stray during the marriage because she had proven that she could control her urges, and that she couldn't be pregnant before he got there. And if she didn't respect her future husband enough to stay a virgin, what other atrocities would she perpetrate?

However, now that women are known to be equal to men and are not considered legal chattel of men, this is an absurd idea to hold on to. Also, now that society is more aware, we know that people can and do stray or stay faithful, regardless of their virginity at the time of marriage. And sexual license has nothing to do with one's morals in other areas either. We each have our own guidelines of what is appropriate behavior for us, and we try to hold to them as well as we can. What those guidelines are and how we hold to them is a better guide to whether we are moral or ethical people.

I know that this was sort of a rhetorical question, but it irritates me that what I do with my vagina is considered anyone's business except mine and my partners'.