Lorraine ends with "which is why most people think sexual relationships between minors and adults are exploitive." Yes, but it is also the reason that some philosophers, legal scholars, and feminists think that heterosexual relations are also coerced and exploitative. Men have power, woman have less. Hence female consent is in doubt. Assuming women are subordinated, how do we then argue against pedophilia but for adult heterosexuality?

I'm not sure that the questioner is seeking an excuse or explanation to "explain away" the condition. The words "wrestled" and "compulsion" suggest some psychic pain about the questioner's transvestism. If that is so, the pop-psychological advice to "be who you are," to accept yourself in the face of the negative assessments other people make about the condition, is short-sighted. According to the American Psychiatric Association (see DSM-IV [1994] and DSM-IV-TR [2000]), "fetishistic transvestism" is a sexual mental disorder if the condition [the sexual desires, in part] is accompanied by psychic pain (or, which we can ignore for our discussion, functional impairment). The goal of therapy is to cure the patient by eliminating the psychic pain/distress (this is a modification of the medical model of physical ailments). This elimination, however, can be sought and/or attained in two very different ways. The root problem is a conflict between the patient's desires and the patient's own negative belief...

Allen, Louise Collins's earlier essay in Social Theory & Practice bears the title "Emotional Adultery," and she argues (not merely reporting her feelings) that cybersex might indeed be morally and pragmatically suspicious for the sorts of reasons you mention. I have always been struck by how deeply conservative her arguments are, especially because much of her essay is also "feminist." I have elsewhere argued that religious and secular conservatives, on the one hand, and some feminists, on the other, are sexual-philosophy "bed partners" (i.e., are not having mere at-a-distance phone sex), and both make sure to keep away from megaphones so as not to spill these potentially embarrassing beans too widely and loudly.

Jerrold's reply is nicely done. Philosophers and legal scholars have been addressing these questions. If you want to explore them in more depth, take a look at Louise Collins, "Is Cybersex Sex?" in A. Soble and N. Power, eds., The Philosophy of Sex , 5th edition (Rowman, 2007), pp. 115-131. In an earlier paper (in Social Theory and Practice ) she deals more directly with the "cheating" issue (see her note 24 for the bibliographic information). Other essays worth reading are listed in her notes as well on pp. 497-98 of POS5e . The most interesting, perhaps, are Aaron Ben-Ze'ev's Love Online and John Portmann's chapter "Chatting is Not Cheating." Portmann, by the way, argues that cybersex is not sex because it lacks physical contact (a necessary condition). Collins makes the point that a condom on a penis prevents contact, so if Portmann is right, any coitus in which a condom is used is not sex. Hmmm. We need to do some philosophical work on "contact." Other problems with Portmann's account are...

Let's see. Does this count? Ludwig Wittgenstein, Zettel #504: Love is not a feeling. Love is put to the test, pain not. One does not say:"That was not true pain, or it would not have gone off so quickly."[Liebe ist kein Gefühl. Liebe wird erprobt, Schmerzen nicht. Man sagt nicht:"Das war kein wahrer Schmerz, sonst hätte er nicht so schnell nachgelassen."] [ Zettel , ed. G. E. M. Anscombe and G. H. von Wright(Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1970), pp. 89, 89e.] Probably not. There has been gossip, some perhaps mildly confirmed, about his homosexuality (e.g., his taste for rough trade), and the possible influence this had on his ethics. Beyond that--you're right. Nothing. Still, take a look at "Wittgenstein, Ludwig," by Wendy Lynne Lee, in Soble, ed., Sex from Plato to Paglia: A Philosophical Encyclopedia , vol. 2, pp. 1076-1081 (Greenwood, 2006). Lee does admit at the outset that she will be discussing three "Wittgensteinian themes" that bear upon sexuality. I doubt we can do...

This is a large question with many different answers. Much, a ton, has been written about it, by scholars and by polemicists. The best I can do for you, without merely repeating myself (a tedious task), is to send you to my books Pornography, Sex, and Feminism (Prometheus, 2002) -- which is reader-friendly, i.e., I stay away from jargon and present the views in a comprehensible way -- and my much earlier and quite different (yet still accessible) Pornography: Marxism, Feminism, and the Future of Sexuality (Yale Univ. Press, 1986) -- a rather pretentious title, I must admit now. You might also find interesting Chapter 6 ("Pornography") of my Sexual Investigations (NYU Univ. Press, 1996). I'm sure other panelists can send you to their own favorites on the topic, including Catharine MacKinnon's Only Words . A helpful bibliography on porngraphy is listed at the end of my Philosophy of Sex , 5th edition (2007) -- a wide spectrum of views is represented. Good luck.

Dear Question-Asker: I am preparing another reply to your question. It is an issue that always arises in my Philosophy of Sex course. My students provide different answers to it, and many disagree with Sally Haslanger's stringent "inalienable right" response. I can at this time give you only a promissory note (an IOU) to answer your question, or show you various answers to it. Stayed tuned. Thanks for your patience.

I'm back, after only three days of teaching, grading, and occasionally goofing off. Here are a few thoughts about the issue and Professor Haslanger's reply to the question. (1) Professor Haslanger writes, “Certainly there is noobligation to have sex with someone you don't desire outside of marriage, sothe source of the obligation must be marriage.” This claim nearly begs thequestion. What holds for marriage might hold also for longstandingrelationships, or for couples who live together without a formal marriage, andvice versa. So the “certainly” is suspicious. Martha Nussbaum, for one, inraising a different question (one about how to attenuate noxious sexualobjectification), sees no relevant difference between sexual relations in alongstanding relationship without formal marriage and sexual relations in onewith formal marriage. (“Objectification,” in my Philosophy of Sex , 4 th edition, pp. 381-419.) Indeed,Haslanger’s “rights” answer to the question applies equally to marriage,nonmarital...

What is this question, the confession of a character in Desperate Housewives ? Glad to serve as your priest, or shrink: (1) "I am having an affair with a married man who ismy coworker. I did not begin the affair, he pursued me." What does this matter, that "he pursued me," if you ended up in bed together? Why mention something irrelevant? I suspect because it might not be true; you are engaging in rationalizing exculpation ("it's not my doing!") to evade responsibility. Are you conveniently forgetting or suppressing your attempts (either conscious or unconscious) to get him interested? Men very often approach only a woman who has already sent them subtle inviting messages. You ask, at the end , "Are his actions more unethical than mine?" This, too, suggests, that you are concerned with apportioning responsibility. ("He's worse than I am!") (2) "His wife doesnot know." How do you know this? Because he told you that he didn't tell her? Maybe he's lying. (He's...

Instead of my rehearsing the arguments surrounding the Catholic prohibition of contraception (and its permitting, contrary to the teachings of St. Augustine, "natural family planning"), allow me to send you to the literature you should read to get a handle on the philosophical and theological issues. If you want to focus only on the 20th Century (bypassing Clement of Alexandria, Augustine, and St. Thomas Aquinas), you have to start with Pope Pius XI, "On Christian Marriage" ("Casti connubii"), Catholic Mind 29, 2 (1931): 21–64. Then read Pope Paul VI, "Humanae Vitae," Catholic Mind 66 (September 1968): 35–48; reprinted (pp. 167–83) in Robert Baker and Frederick Elliston, eds., Philosophy and Sex , 2nd edition (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus, 1984). For criticism of Paul VI's encyclical, see (originally from Ethics ), Carl Cohen, "Sex, Birth Control, and Human Life," in Robert Baker and Frederick Elliston, eds., Philosophy and Sex , 2nd edition (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus, 1984), pp. 185–99....

A few additional remarks. Kant's explicit condemnation of homosexual (or same-sex) sexual relations can be found in his Lectures on Ethics (the Vorlesung ). His arguments are grounded in the Second Formulation of the Categorical Imperative (not the First, as suggested by the question), but mostly on his claim that homosexual acts are unnatural, "crimes against nature." For two essays on this apsect of Kant's views, see my "Kant and Sexual Perversion" The Monist 86:1 (Jan. 2003), pp. 55-89 -- also available at http://fs.uno.edu/asoble/pages/kmonist.htm -- and Lara Denis, "Kant on the Wrongness of 'Unnatural' Sex," History of Philosophy Quarterly 16:2 (1999), pp. 225-48. Finally, John Corvino's essay " In Defense of Homosexuality" (in A. Soble, ed., The Philosophy of Sex , 5th edition) includes this passage: "A Roman Catholic priest once put the argument to me as follows: 'Of course homosexuality is bad for society. If everyone were homosexual, there would be no society.'...

The idea can be found in Augustine. In the early 5th Century, he wrote, "A man turns to good use the evil of concupiscence . . . when he bridles and restrains its rage . . . and never relaxes his hold upon it except when intent on offspring, and then controls and applies it to the carnal generation of children . . . not to the subjection of the spirit to the flesh in a sordid servitude" ( On Marriage and Concupiscence , bk. 1, chap. 9). But the idea did not originate with him. I'm sure (in my intellectual heart) that it can be found in the ancient Greeks (late Plato?) and maybe even the Hebrews, in the West. (I dare not speak about Eastern thought, about which I am untutored.) But I cannot, offhand, provide sources. If we restrict the question to Christianity, the idea occurs earlier than Augustine --- not in St. Paul (note the absence of any talk of reproduction as the purpose of sex in 1 Corinthians 7) --- but in the once-sainted and controversial (and de-sainted) Clement of Alexandria (ca. 150-215),...