Sexual Pleasure

And yet I recall Paul Goodman's reply when I asked him what he thought of the issue (this was on the one occasion I was lucky enough to meet that beautiful man): that there shouldn't be sex education in the schools, there should be sex! ... Such programs should be dismantled or not allowed to come into effect. Let kids find out about sex to the degree they individually wish from books, but best of all at parties, in bars, in johns, when their parents are out, in cars, at the beach under the boardwalk, from older women and men, and even in the liberals' version of hell, 'the gutter.'

A traditional method of exploring this kind of issue is to speculate on the nature of prelapsarian man, i.e., human nature before Adam's lapse, or fall, into sin. According to St. Augustine, for example, prelapsarian man would have engaged in sexual intercourse for the purpose of procreation, but the pleasure of sex would not have been nearly as intense as it now is. Sexual lust (including the orgasm) is a consequence of original sin and was therefore unknown to Adam and Eve prior to the Fall.

To a libertarian, or indeed to any sensible person, there is no problem: if the sex was coercive, and took place against the will of one of the parties, then it was rape and if not, not. ... And finally, why not go the whole hog toward Left Puritanism and define all sex as per se coercive? That would clear up all the fuzziness and sex, or at least hetero-sex, could be outlawed completely.

Many years ago I became friendly with a woman ... She was dating a friend of mine at the time ... So one day ... I said how are you and so-and-so getting along ... And she said: "I'm actually thinking of ending the relationship." I said: "Really, ... do you feel like telling me why?" She said: "Well, it's really odd; I'm a fairly experienced woman, and he is by far the best lover I have ever known, and he is in many ways a terrific man to be with." So I said ... "Then why are you ending the relationship?" She sighed ... : "Nathaniel, he's too eager to please." ... In other words ... there wasn't enough male animal self-assertiveness in the relationship.

I say that sex is one of the most important aspects of man's life and, therefore, must never be approached lightly or casually. A sexual relationship is proper only on the ground of the highest values one can find in a human being. Sex must not be anything other than a response to values. And that is why I consider promiscuity immoral. Not because sex is evil, but because sex is too good and too important.

The most intense way we relate to another person is sexually. Nothing so concentrates the mind, Dr. Johnson noted, as the prospect of being hanged. Nothing, that is, except sexual arousal and excitement: rising tension, uncertainty about what will happen next, occasional reliefs, sudden surprises, dangers and risks, all in a sequence of heightened attention and tension that reaches toward resolution.