[This is Chapter 13 of Murphey’s book Emergent Man:]

Chapter 13

THE FAMILY AS A BASIC INSTITUTION: THE ETHIC OF SEX

One of the great voids in the intellectualism of our time is found in the lack of any significant and intelligent discussion of the ethical norms that should apply to sex. There is a large volume of literature performing the very beneficial task of demolishing the old attitudes and overly restrictive inhibitions. This, however, may hardly be considered a satisfactory substitute for affirmative suggestions as to new ethical standards that would be appropriate.

In a certain sense, I am reluctant to undertake this discussion, which others have so studiously avoided. It seems to me that there is nothing that may seem so sophomoric and academic as a discussion of sex. In its essence it is something that must be lived. All talk about it seems to have a certain sterility. This is not to say that we shouldn’t verbalize about it, but only to say that when we do there must necessarily seem a certain artificiality in what we say. [Note in 2005: As I have typed this chapter for inclusion in my collected-writings Web site, I have been oppressed by precisely this feeling. The sterility and artificiality of discussing sex is added to, for the reader of the chapter, by the fact that I was trying to think in a very structured way that would place my thinking within the context of the “philosophy of liberty” as I had formulated it earlier in the book. This caused me to stress at perhaps undue length the initial presumption that any behavior is acceptable, a presumption that can be overcome only by considerations relevant to the needs of a free society. Marriage, I said, is central to those needs. The rest of the chapter is largely a review of several forms of sexual expression to see whether they are compatible with a strong marriage system. This structured approach was necessary to the formal analysis, but adds to the seeming sterility of an intellectual analysis of a subject that loses its spontaneity when put examined clinically. I have found, also, that the discussion was far too repetitive and wordy. This was a result of my having dictated the last 300 pages, whereas the first part of the book was much tighter because it was written on a typewriter. I have wanted to leave the chapter as I originally wrote it in order to preserve the integrity of my intellectual history, but it has been impossible to resist the temptation to do some minor editing to reduce wordiness. Before I end this note, let me point out that this chapter illustrates how in my thinking about a free society I have always thought it necessary to care deeply about the cultural, moral and institutional preconditions of the society. I have thought the philosophy must concern itself about whether these things exist and are truly workable. This is what has separated me from most “libertarian” and even classical liberal thought. I meant my theory in Emergent Man to be deductive from starting principles, but I have always wanted those principles to be formulated out of a full consideration of what will make a free society most workable.]

And not only is there this separation between the process of living itself and the mental constructs that we may create about it, but also there is the element that human sexuality is intensely personal and, even to the most humanistic among us, may often seem to be something that is best left unmolested within the private lives of the individuals involved, than being something to be spread out for public discussion.

It remains, however, despite these feelings of reluctance, true that there is an important intellectual function to be served in the formulation of ethical norms in this regard which will aid in strengthening the institutional preconditions of a society based on liberty and will thereby help create the framework within which the human life-process may go on within the limits of its own judgment and discretion. Surely, whatever our inclinations, we cannot abandon this area to a complete non-intellectualism. As with all significant areas of life, ethical considerations are important in determining the direction of human behavior and the consequences to be derived from it.

The lack of affirmative suggestions for a new ethic to replace the old is apparent in a general reading of the literature of our times. At several places in this book I have mentioned the great respect I have for D. H. Lawrence’s “philosophy of touch,” which involves a definite appreciation for the value of sexuality to human beings. He points up what seems to me to be the very important lesson, which is easily overlooked in our usual differentiation between the physical, the intellectual and the spiritual, that it is precisely in the most carnal physical aspects of sex that its greatest value and poetic beauty may lie. Such a view is certainly shocking to the type of mentality that seeks to impute a separation between “good sex” and “bad sex” by the degree of its sensual expression. In the earlier portion of this book dealing with the several attributes of emergence, I have referred to the spiritual importance of a man’s vital physical connection with the existence about him. This physical connection, however it arises, whether from the exhausting effort of climbing a sheer rock face using ropes and pilons, or from a long day of work in a garden, or from a close relation of intimate touch with another human being, adds “a thousand times” to the color of life and makes it manifestly richer.

Yet, while this is true of Lawrence’s philosophy, so that it has great validity in its poetic aspects and in respect to our general attitudes about human sexuality, it unfortunately cannot be said that Lawrence has led the way as to affirmative suggestions about ethical norms we should follow. He has set an excellent mood, but the specific content to be given that mood has yet to be stated. Certainly this is apparent when we consider that his leading book on the subject, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, builds its plot around adultery, and that there is virtually no discussion of the ethical implications of the adultery. Surely we may, with a very intense human feeling, understand the feelings of both Lady Chatterley and her lover. But it is important that we realize as we do so that the poetic beauty of their carnality is not a substitute for ethics. To a large extent Lawrence avoided the ethical implications of his story by painting Lady Chatterley’s husband as a despicable character, for whom most readers would develop little real sympathy. This is a weakness in Lawrence’s own perception, since there is much that he might have said in mitigation so far as Lord Chatterley was concerned. I do not wish to get off into this, however. The point is that the ethical ramifications of the story would have been far more apparent if the person hurt by the adultery had in fact been made the hero of the story, or at least someone for whom we might feel sympathy. Then it would have been much easier to see that adultery does not merely involve the question of the strongly poetic and humanistic relationship between the two people directly involved. It is a matter of the greatest social import. Adultery has violent repercussions in the lives of those other persons, such as the abandoned spouse and any children of the marriage, who are themselves deserving of humanistic concern. But even these personal repercussions, considered individually, do not represent fully the matters to be considered. While an individual instance of adultery may represent a tragedy in a singular sense, its widespread existence in society becomes an important social problem involving the stability of marriage and the cohesiveness of the family.

These are matters about which D. H. Lawrence and most modern authors seem oblivious. They can report in the most realistic fashion the fact of adultery, or of other sexual experience, without the slightest sense of intellectual responsibility to discuss in depth the general rules that men should follow in this aspect of their lives; that is, moral rules to which they should adhere and behind which they should place their moral conviction so as to give them all the sanctions that are attendant upon an effective moral control. From the obliviousness of such writers, it would almost seem that they wish to express themselves as against any such moral considerations. In any event, theirs is the intellectual responsibility for the lack of a formulated ethic that may affirmatively compete with the older attitudes for present-day acceptance.

Ayn Rand is another modern author who has had much that is serious to say about sex. She has made valuable contributions here, but has unfortunately done so within a generally unsatisfactory framework. It remains to be seen whether she had added more to than she has detracted from the philosophy of sex. Her most important contribution, found in her various novels, but most particularly in Atlas Shrugged, has been in pointing to the vital connection between the broader values a person holds and a specific expression of sexuality in that person’s life. There is certainly a large portion of truth in pointing out that a person’s sexual choices largely reflect his own image of himself. There is really no separation of this part of life from the remainder. If a person loves beauty and intellect and grace as a part of his values, it is almost inevitable that this will be reflected in at least the overall expression of his sexuality. Ayn Rand points out that sex is the expression of ones “highest values.” In helping to make clear the close connection between an individual’s deepest esthetic, spiritual and intellectual attributes and his sexuality, she has helped contribute to an integrated view of sex and to a proper appreciation of its place in life.

Anyone who has read her books, however, would immediately see that the violently athletic sort of sexual expression manifested by her characters, a type of expression that is basically muscular and involves very little of the soft and tender, may hardly be taken as a sound representation of the full scope of expressive human sexuality. The range of expression is much broader than her characterizations would seem to imply. This is not to deny the value of extreme passion manifested in a violent collision, but is rather to make explicit the fact, seemingly overlooked by Ayn Rand, that there are other forms of the physical expression of sex that are at least equally appropriate.

But this is a minor criticism compared with that that we have yet to make. The much larger criticism is that Ayn Rand apparently fails completely to understand, especially in regard to sex, that morality is not merely “intelligence applied to action,” but rather is a tightly woven fabric of conformity to social norms arising out of a general acceptance of those norms and out of the all-pervasive interpersonal sanctions that operate to enforce those standards. Some violations of the moral code are in fact punished by law, which operates with outward coercion against the greater infractions of the moral principles the society accepts. Thus, the moral code is not a matter of individual judgment decided upon personally by each of the many millions of individuals to whom it applies. Those persons may certainly vary their behavior within it, and they may break the accepted standards upon occasion, but no morality, as such, can exist as the purely personal standard of a given person.

Nor would it be desirable that the matter be placed upon such an atomistic level. It is certain that the morality must be rationally conceived or at least rationally justifiable, so that it will receive the approval of the great mass of persons who are to live according to it, but this is far different from recognizing the moral validity of each person’s individualized exercise of judgment as to the matter of moral concern.

The heroes in Ayn Rand’s novels are men and women of the highest intelligence and presumably of the highest responsibility, as as applied to them an individualized judgment, as a replacement for a socially enforced morality, might be reasonable. But this reasonableness would only apply if they were the only persons to be considered. [Note in 2005: Ayn Rand’s own conduct as described in Barbara Branden’s The Passion of Ayn Rand, where it is told that she had sexual liaisons with Nathaniel Branden while her husband and his wife simply cooled their heels, is an excellent case in point as to why a moral code ought not to grant carte blanche to an elite, which I have surmised here might be feasible. Those sexual episodes disparaged two marriages, the respect and love each spouse should have for the other, and any larger concern about morality in the sense of behavior that, when generalized, would produce a satisfactory way of life for everyone within a society.] However, the function of moral rules lies to a very large extent in how they exercise a “civilizing” influence upon the non-exceptional person. While the heroic characters in Ayn Rand’s novels might be expected to carry in the most responsible manner the child-raising responsibilities they may incur [Note in 2005: Rand’s example throws this into doubt, however], it is not at all certain that this would be the result with the great bulk of mankind of each person were left to devise his own moral principles and philosophically to create his own sense of responsibility. [Note in 2005: The widespread move into premarital cohabitation since I wrote this chapter marks a movement precisely toward such a system of individual judgment without regard to norms. The effects of this and other social developments have been devastating, and would be a lot worse if it were not for the fact that many couples who first cohabit do eventually marry. In doing so, they show how much they are riding on the cultural and moral capital built up by prior generations. Marriage remains the ideal, but that will not inevitably remain so. It would be sufficient to end this 2005 note at this point were it not for the fact that the world is changing so rapidly that the future of monogamous marriage will almost certainly be put into question by the impending changes. As I make clear in the rest of the chapter here, I have agreed with a sexual morality that has given central place to monogamous marriage. Such a morality may become impossible in the future when people live considerably longer than they do now and when the economic basis for living will be far different from what it has been in the past. In my book The Emerging Crisis of Economic Displacement, I deliberately refrained from exploring these possibilities, because it seemed I had already raised an array of issues that was bound to bewilder the reader. I didn’t even broach the issue, but rather left it for those who face those conditions in the future to ponder how they should be treated.]

I do not wish to repeat everything I said in my chapter discussing the need for morality and the nature of moral principles. From those remarks it should be apparent that morality is one of the great cohesive forces which, while conservative in its causing of people to act together according to a common principle, is nevertheless a very important tool for the improvement of the human condition through the conscious direction of the intellectualism that plays so large a part in formulating the ethic that eventually will become accepted. To destroy morality, even if only in the sexual sphere, by advocating a completely atomized individual judgment unguided by general norms, would be greatly to undermine the moral prerequisites of the free society. Not only would morality in general be weakened, but also the purposes of sexual morality would not be accomplished. We will examine these purposes in greater detail here.

What is needed is a full discussion by those who are seriously interested in the appropriate development of sexuality as part of the religion of emergence and of the propriety of specific types of sexual conduct. The discussion should be a continuing one, taking into view the various changed that may take place from time to time in human culture. Moral principles are always means to certain ends, such as the strengthening of the institutional preconditions of a free society, and should be reviewed through a continuing discussion to determine whether they are satisfactory to the achievement of these ends. They are necessarily based on an understanding of how certain types of behavior will affect certain other types of behavior. If, because of a change of attitudes or otherwise, the behavior that the moral code approves no longer produces the desired effects, or if the behavior the moral code disapproves were to stop producing the consequences expected from it, changes in the moral principles may very well be called for.

I think this is especially true for sexual ethics. One of the great difficulties in forming propositions of general validity here is to be found in the fact that it is not at all easy to say just how a given type of sexual behavior will affect the strength and stability of family life, and of the role it plays in society. Dogmatic assertions of cause-and-effect are, in the nature of the subject, especially subject to criticism and doubt.

As we begin our discussion of the affirmative aspects of this subject, we note that there are some things that are not nearly so tentative. The first is that the initial presumption of the philosophy of liberty would necessarily favor the most complete sexual freedom, just as its presumption favors freedom in every other aspect of life. There should be no coercive control, legal or moral or otherwise, unless there is palpable justification for it. Such justification must not be strained or fabricated to arrive at a preconceived destination. The sexual aspect of life is not different than other aspects of life so far as the great value of personal self-determination is concerned. So intimately does his sexuality touch the very quick of a person’s life, perhaps even far more intimately than other things he does, that the freedom to apply ones own values, personality and choices to it is at least as necessary, if not more so, as in any other connection. As elsewhere: liberty is a great value per se.

This initial presumption is contrary to the approach that is ordinarily given to the subject of sex. It is a presumption, however, that is strongly in keeping with the philosophy of Lawrence and Rand, and of the others who have expressed so well in modern times the very great significance of sexuality in the overall lives of human beings, not merely as a “healthy function” or as something “sublime and on a pedestal” or as something “physical and off by itself,” but as probably the most expressive manifestation of that sensuality that ought to tie man in a raw flesh-and-bone form to the existence of which he is a part. Necessarily, the presumption in favor of sexual freedom with which we start is a different beginning than that made by certain Christian theologians, shared in by every pornographer and prude, that sex is essentially ugly and unworthy and may rise above that unworthiness only if it is masked over by some veneer that seeks to make it less carnal, less sensual. It may be that from these different beginnings the ethical suggestions may turn out to be much the same, but that is something we will have to see as we go along.

Starting with this presumption, then, without having gone any farther, we must say that it is initially presumed that sexual relations of all types are normally permissible. I would ask the reader to visualize virtually every type of sexual activity. It is this broad scope that our initial presumption of morality encompasses. Only when we think of it very specifically in terms of the forms of sexual behavior themselves does the full impact of our initial premise make itself felt.

This is not to say, of course, that this initial presumption of liberty constitutes an affirmative command. It does not say “This is what everyone is expected to do.” It merely says “this is what everyone could do, without coercive restraint, if they chose to do so.”

But this initial presumption is hardly more than a beginning. The next question is the crucial one. This asks, “What, if any, are the justifications for inhibition?”

We will not be able to answer this question satisfactorily unless we make explicit, and (as with most everything else) appreciate not only intellectually but also with emotional depth to lend color to what we are saying, the vitally significant role of the family as a basic institution of a free society. By far the most important reasons for the moral control of sexual behavior lie in the need for such control as a way to make family life more satisfactory and stable. Such inhibitions as may be called for under a proper morality would have as their purpose the strengthening of the marriage of people of opposite sex in a lifelong relationship in which they will be united in their feelings, their undertakings, their aspirations, their overall values, and in which they will each lend strength and completeness to the other. In the poetic terms used in the earlier chapters of this book, we might say that the purpose is to cause individuals to come to share, as a family, the obscenities op each others life, in a way that will mean that the internal reality of a person’s experience, as distinguished from the extroverted and sterile outer reality which is full of meaningless trivia, will be shared through an intimacy that far surpasses anything that otherwise could be achieved among human beings.

The controls called for by sexual morality must to some extent be an effort to make possible this type of permanent, dependable connection between individuals. So high is the value of this sharing of the otherwise hidden and unseen intimacies of a person’s life, which although unseen are nevertheless the most significant part of his or her life in a subjective and even intellectual sense, that if it is necessary to restrain certain types of activity to make possible the widespread existence of this stable human connection, the philosophy of liberty will approve such restraints as a way to make possible on a much wider scope the full and satisfactory expression of sexuality itself. Sexual restraints that tend to strengthen marriage are of this sort. The desire should not be to limit the forms of sexuality, but rather to work things out so that the people involved will have the most meaningful possible alternatives. One of these alternatives, at the very least, should be the possibility of a permanent marriage with another person, a marriage in which there are the strongest possible ties of loyalty and a very great sense of personal responsibility commensurate with the vast significance of the relation itself.

If it is not possible to say as a general moral statement that “it is permissible for persons to do whatever they may wish, at whatever time or place, or regardless of the undertakings they have made with another person, so far as sex is concerned,” and still to say that we want marriage to be strong and dependable, it becomes necessary to choose between these two inconsistent alternatives. A determination that complete sexual freedom is not compatible with strong marriage leads to the decision to restrain sexual freedom in order to construct the setting for a more meaningful human sexuality.

I believe this is the exact situation we face. I do not believe that marriage and complete sexual freedom, either premarital or extramarital, are compatible. Anyone who comes from a broken family and who has observed at first hand the tortures and tragedies involved in divorce or in the continuation of an unsatisfactory relation, will tend to understand the full import of the responsibility involved in marriage. It cannot lightly be undertaken by responsible people. So intimately connected are the people involved, and so great is their dependence upon one another, that it becomes apparent that there is much more involved in “marriage” than the mere entry into a legal relation or the saying of vows. It is not a casual relation.

Those who enter into marriage with one another have every right, by the very nature of the relationship, to expect that the sexual connection is a mutual expression by each of the partners of their unique tie to one another. Sex is not something that they or either of them can bring into the marriage as merely a casual thing that is commonplace and that would be just as appropriate if done with any other person as with the marriage partner.

If I may refer again to the poetic imagery of the earlier chapters, I would say that marriage is essentially oriented around the fourth dimension of human sexuality. It is not sex in the abstract, nor is it merely sex as personified by two flesh-and-bone individuals appearing to one another in a merely three-dimensional fashion. A strong and satisfactory marriage goes far beyond either of these and involves virtually all that is significant in human life and in the values of the persons who are married together. If we seek to promote, or at least make possible as a dependable thing, such a relation, sex must serve the purpose of this fourth dimension, must aid it and strengthen it in relation to the sexual partner to whom the person is married, and must not throw the sexual preoccupation upon either a casual, extroverted level of lesser meaning or encourage the continual forming of new interpersonal ties, even if each of them may approach the fourth dimension, if such ties erode or destroy earlier ones to which significant responsibility has become attached.

It may be true that people can become conditioned through their upbringing and culture to accept non-exclusive sexual relations, so that the married person may feel no repulsion or hostility so far as sexual relations by his or her husband or wife may be concerned. But while this may be true, there are, from what we have said above, great human justifications for the jealousies and other centrifugal forces that so commonly result, especially in our culture, when the sexual expression of the persons is not confined to their marriage itself. As an ordinary matter, people who are married to each other will reasonably expect that their sexual activities will express their mutual tie. Activity by one or both of them outside of that tie may reasonably be interpreted as either a cheapening of it or as a possible forming of new ties that will tend to diminish the affections and loyalties upon which the marriage rests and that may encourage the breaking of the responsibility that has been entered upon.

While pointing to the importance of marriage as a highly satisfactory form of human connection that is to be encouraged, we shouldn’t fail to appreciate that it is an essential institution in a free society very largely because, involving as it does the sharing of the most private aspects of the partners’ lives, it is the way by which children are brought up to reflect the qualities of their parents. It is true that stable family life provides the cohesion a free society needs for the education of new generations and for inculcating in them of the values and moral principles that are so important to the society, but it is also true that, equally beneficially, this education is not performed by a central agency. It is performed by millions of family units, each involving such differences as it may possess. If a child is closely related to his mother and father, and learns from them the larger portion of what later is to make up his intellectual and moral character, it will be more difficult to impose upon a people the conformity of a totalitarian state. To the contrary, a strong family system is most likely to offer the best possibility for developing a richness of difference that will make us less conformist and give us the benefit of greater independence and strength of character.

Needless to say, the family as an institution is only one of many factors to be considered in this connection. Much of this benefit will be lost, for example, if we institute in the United States a centrally controlled system of education in our schools, under the Federal government. Indeed, the full effect of family orientation in an individual manner could only be felt if we were to adhere to an exclusively private educational system, under which the parents would send their children to schools that would reflect their own values. A public school system goes a long way toward homogenizing the influences upon the children being raised in a given generation.

These are considerations that could involve us in a long discussion. Such an undertaking is beyond the scope of this book. However, we must at least take passing note of the place the family as an institution plays in the free society so far as the raising of children is concerned. This, when added to our considerations about the importance of marriage as a type of voluntary behavior that ought to be made possible as a significant category of human action to broaden and make more meaningful the uses to which liberty may be put, helps us appreciate with even greater force just why it is that we must be very careful not to allow the desired forms of human sexuality to be of a type that would undermine the family and the marriage upon which it is based.

Therefore, I would not have us look upon marriage casually. There is a tendency by some people in the United States today to consider marriage as essentially something that is to last only so long as its preservation suits the pleasure of the parties. For all of the reasons we have expressed, such a view should be strenuously avoided. We ought to do all that we can to cause the people involved to enter upon it with the utmost seriousness, with the full expectation that it is permanent, and with a dedication to the fulfillment of its responsibilities.

From these considerations, then, might we not draw the conclusion that adultery, or sexual relations by a married person outside of the marital relation, is to be morally censured by an ethic, such as that that would be involved in a philosophy of liberty, that would have as its purpose the strengthening of marriage? While there are many things to be said on this subject, both pro and con, I believe that, considering the overall prospect of the effect that can be expected from adultery upon marriage generally, the first limitation upon the complete “sexual freedom” that we initially state to be presumptively permissible is to be found in the ethical proposition that adultery, or extramarital sexual activity by those who are married, is immoral and should not be approved.

This may seem a conclusion that is very easy for an American to reach, in light of our past attitudes about adultery. But the issue is not as clear as it would first seem. For example, this moral principle that proscribes adultery will in innumerable individual cases have bad results quite opposite to those we would intend in general. We have already brought to mind the story in D. H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover. That is a story involving an impotent husband and the adultery of his wife. A strong argument can certainly be made in favor of permitting sexual relations outside of marriage where the sexual relation inside the marriage has proved unsatisfactory or even impossible. The problem raised by such an argument is made to seem even more real as a matter to be seriously considered, when the sexual difference between men and women is pointed to as indicating that, on the whole, the sexual desire of men is much greater than that of women, and that for this reason in a number of marriages there is a lack of fulfillment so far as the husband is concerned. This difference between the sexes is an important and realistic basis for the “double standard” of sexual morality that some people favor.

We are dealing with human beings, and therefore the answers are never easy. I wouldn’t have us oversimplify the problems involved in drawing any of these conclusions, even when for the most part they seem obvious from the point of view of our past ethic. The problems I mentioned in the preceding paragraph are not to be ignored; they are significant, and new ethical standards must be hammered out only after a full consideration of them.

It isn’t apparent, though, how we can “have our cake and eat it too” in connection with adultery; that is, how we may have a socially enforceable ethic that will both eliminate the disintegrating effects of adultery while at the same time leaving the spouses, and particularly the husband, free to engage in extramarital activity. If we judge each marriage individually, considering the satisfactoriness of the sexual relation involved in it, before we can exercise a moral judgment as to the validity of the adultery that may arise, it becomes impossible, as a practical matter, for anyone outside the marriage itself to judge it and then to exert the moral pressures that are essential to effective morality. Nor does it seem that we could merely state, as a general thing, that “men should have extramarital sexual freedom, while women may not.” I am not personally persuaded that in a highly developed culture women would find this at all acceptable and that it would be compatible with stability in marriage. If I were wrong in this regard, of course, perhaps a modification of the ethical proscription against adultery could be made.

Extramarital sexual activity is not the only area to be considered. There remain millions of people, of all ages, who are not married. Careful thought should be given to whether there should be inhibitions upon their sexual lives, and, if so, what these should be. A general agreement upon any reasonably justifiable ethic would be preferable to the cloud under which all such activities lie today. At the present time, highly contradictory tendencies co-exist. In the first place, there is something of a restrained freedom among young people that operates upon virtually no philosophical foundation. On the other hand, an amorphous moral code hangs in the background and condemns all such activity as improper. This seems an intolerable situation. If the general proscription is sound, it should be adhered to. If it is unsound, then it is a restriction on freedom in a very meaningful area of life and, in addition, serves only to make more difficult a life process that is already difficult enough as is.

The conclusions we draw about new moral standards here should be based on a full consideration of whatever destructive and limiting effects may arise from a complete premarital sexual freedom. Such restraints as are suggested should have a palpable connection with eliminating or reducing such effects. The restraint should go no further than this. It could not do so consistently with the ethic of liberty, which must necessarily look upon individual self-determination in sexual matters as being as inherently important as is liberty in any other sphere. When I say this, I do not mean to be taken as suggesting a general promiscuity. In the self-determination that would be involved in the area of permissible sexual freedom there should be a great deal of self-imposed discipline so that the sexual life of the individual is compatible with the totality of his values, which themselves should lead the way rather than to be controlled by and made a virtual slave of sexual desire and satisfaction.

There are important reasons premarital sexual activity should be morally restrained in certain ways. It seems almost too elementary to have to mention that there are strong human interests to be protected against sexual assault, as with any other type of assault. It is only if sexual relations are based upon consent that they may be considered voluntary by the parties associated in them. And it is to be noted that, although the assault of the male upon the female is the primary form that sexual relations take among animals lower than man, the consent of the woman is inseparably tied to our recognizing and respecting her human personality. This respect for the individual is, of course, the central concern of the ethic of liberty.

Another important interest related to the subject of restraint upon sexual activity outside of marriage is found in the need for children to be born into a stable marriage. The reason this is personally very important to the child is apparent. There are, in addition, social reasons of considerable magnitude connected with the need for the raising of the child in a satisfactory family unit. It is too shallow to point merely to the problem of juvenile delinquency. The ramifications are greater than this and involve the entire character and education of the child, as well as much of the satisfactoriness of his childhood and perhaps even of his adult life. The relation of this to the problem of human liberty is certainly great, since, as we have seen at virtually every turn in this book, the success or failure of free institutions depends quite largely upon the character, education and emergent sense of individuals, who must necessarily get these qualities to a large extent during their childhoods from those who care most for them. And there is no adequate replacement, so far as the free society is concerned, for child-raising by a system of family units based upon marriage. It would be extremely dangerous to pass this function to the state.

This same question as to the inculcation of multiple values of families into the individuals comprising the future generations is probably the main issue involved in the debate over education presently being waged in the United States. Homogeneous public education itself tends strongly to deprive the parent of the opportunity to instill his own differences into his children. The centralization of public schooling in the Federal Government, under its control, which must necessarily occur when the financing of the schools is turned over to the Federal Government, is an even further debilitation of the central purpose behind the family system so far as the upbringing of the child is concerned. I cannot help but feel that the question of federal aid to education is closely related to the issue of sexual ethics. They are both part of the larger picture involving the satisfactory raising of new generations in a manner compatible with liberty.

The interest that society has in the satisfactory raising of new generations is, of course, inseparably connected with the interest, which is nevertheless a separate interest that must be considered here, in the strengthening of marriage as the primary sexual relation. The problem related to the raising of children is not merely a problem of illegitimacy, but also involves the stability and satisfactoriness of the marriage between the parents who are to raise the children.

It may be surprising for me to remark that illegitimacy itself, if we may stop to consider this narrower problem first, is a direct effect of the unsatisfactory ethic under which we have been living. There is, in fact, no reason why there should be any such phenomenon as illegitimacy. Physically, people do not need to have children outside marriage. For the most part, they would not do so if it were not for our ethical principles against contraception and abortion.

There has been considerable debate in America over contraception. It is primarily waged between those who adhere to the doctrine of the Catholic church and those who adhere to what they call a more “modern” point of view. There are vast theological questions involved in examining the validity of the viewpoint opposing contraception, and we cannot attempt within the scope of this book an extensive review of them. The problems are not great, however, for anyone who does not accept as authoritative the dogma of the church. For those who may make up their minds independently, and feel inclined to do so upon grounds of human well-being and upon a general view that human sexuality is as properly a subject of conscious human control as any other aspect of our lives, there are the most impelling reasons why contraception should be accepted as a type of beneficial control upon sex. It is true that contraception may make the sex act itself easier in the sense that a pregnancy may be avoided, and thereby may lead to less restraint upon premarital sex, but it is also true that contraception is an important limitation upon one of the most destructive consequences of premarital sex. Certainly a general acceptance of the use of contraception would tend greatly to reduce the problem of illegitimacy.

The contraception issue is now being debated more in connection with the propriety of its use within marriage. Here, it is important as a vitally significant technical or physical method for people to exercise conscious control over their lives. As with all control over our physical environment, the control of birth and of the number of children according to the desires of a given family, while at the same time such control does not require a perhaps unwanted abstinence from sexual relations, must have a liberating effect as a broadener of the opportunities available to people. They have more from which they may choose. They may better determine the entire course of their lives, without that course being dictated to them by uncontrollable physical forces of nature. It would seem that the ethic of liberty should actively support the acceptance of contraceptives, and should oppose any ethic that classifies birth control as immoral.

I am surprised that there has not been a more widespread and fundamental discussion of the validity or invalidity of abortion. [Note in 2005: This certainly changed after Roe v. Wade in 1973.] I know that to many it will be shocking when they read my conclusion that abortion, legally and morally accepted and therefore available under medically satisfactory conditions, should be considered a valuable supplement to contraception as a part of birth control. For the most part, the same arguments pro and con that are involved in the question of contraception are also involved with abortion. There is, however, at least one additional aspect of considerable importance that should be discussed. This pertains to the moral issues raised by the killing of a human fetus during its gestation. There will undoubtedly be many who will raise the argument that this is the filling of a living “human being,” and is therefore murder or its equivalent. To some extent, this will turn upon their theological conclusions about when the human “soul” comes to inhabit a living human being. Because of their nature, such considerations may be endless, and may give rise to virtually any conclusion. But for those of us whose concern is primarily for the well-being of human life that is conscious and aware of its existence, the problems will again not appear to very difficult. If it is a question of compassion for the feeling of a living thing with respect for its personality or intelligence, then it does not seem to me that an unconscious child still within its mother’s womb has developed to a point at which any of these concerns have become relevant or material. With abortion, we are not dealing with a “human being” in any developed sense, but only with the rudimentary beginnings of a person. It is true that by abortion, as by birth control through any other means, or even by any failure we might have to maximize the number of children women bear, we are depriving a possible human being of a chance for life. But can we honestly say that such a possibility has any moral claim upon us? If we were to answer this in the affirmative, the logical consequences would be ridiculous. It would mean that we would be under a moral obligation to keep all women pregnant after puberty. Without this maximizing of birth, we would be violating our moral responsibility to all those “persons” who could, within the realm of physical possibility, be born. In light of this, it is necessary to make an intelligent decision about when it is that human life takes such a form as to bring a moral claim upon our attention. It seems to me most reasonable that this line should be drawn to exclude the unborn fetus.

The ethical acceptance of contraception and abortion would remove most, if not all, of the problem of illegitimacy. In regard to illegitimacy, I would say that when the control of birth becomes generally accepted, it should be considered immoral for parents to allow a baby to be born outside of marriage. We might even consider it immoral not to use contraception and abortion as part of birth control. [Note in 2005: I have written virtually nothing on the abortion issue since this was written in the early 1960s, primarily because no editor to whom I have submitted material has wanted to touch the issue. In the highly charged aftermath of Roe v. Wade, I would be much more inclined to lend a respectful ear to the opponents of abortion than I thought necessary in Emergent Man. I would do this, however, out of respect for their opinions and because it would be well to mix a greater portion of compassion with the analysis, and not because I would wish to change direction from the secular humanist outlook I have held for so long. (The fact that “secular humanist” is a term uttered with contempt by “religious conservatives” today doesn’t keep it from being, in fact, a good description of people like myself, who seek to arrive at principles and policies that will reduce suffering and improve well-being as people would perceive those things if a theological filter were not applied.)]

Such solutions to the problem of illegitimacy, however, are far from removing the main problem involved in premarital relations. There is a vitally important interest, both for the purpose of making stable marriage possible as a dependable form of sexual relation and for the purpose of assuring the proper setting for the raising of children, in strengthening marriage by providing it with a powerful sexual incentive. The need to strengthen marriage is the primary reason there should be limitations upon sexual activity outside of marriage. We have already considered this with regard to adultery. We now need to consider it with regard to premarital sex.

If we were to allow a complete sexual freedom by unmarried people, and were to say “you may do what you wish,” and this were to become generally accepted and acted upon, what would be the consequences of such a permissiveness so far as marriage is concerned? I cannot help but think that to a great many individuals – so many that, indeed, they would form a very significant portion of the people – there would appear no impelling reason to accept all the manifold responsibilities of a permanent relation with one member of the opposite sex, as in marriage. For many, the sexual and broader interpersonal relations between the sexes would become casual. A permanent bond would not be created. This would make it more and more difficult for those who wished to create such permanent bonds and to accept the responsibilities of marriage. The sexual freedom of the unmarried would, in fact, be a strong incentive for divorce after a marriage had been contracted. It would tear to pieces much of the dependability of what should be one of the most sound relationships between human beings. It is probable that the effect would be disastrous to marriage as an institution. [Note in 2005: In my note earlier in this chapter, I commented on how during the past 45 years precisely this sort of deterioration has occurred, with “cohabitation” (an unmarried couples’ living together in a sexual relationship) becoming commonplace and almost universally accepted. There is now almost no moral stigma attached to it, and no social enforcement of a taboo discouraging it. We know, of course, that the situation involving broken marriages, single-parent families, children who grow up without steady parentage, illegitimacy, and the like, has been quite desperate for several years, leading to a whole complex of social problems. Thinking farther ahead, there is a question whether, as people get more and more removed from a profound reverence for marriage, marriage will remain at the center of our society. Contrary to general opinion today, I consider cohabitation a much greater threat to monogamous marriage than is homosexuality, which is often seen as a major threat to marriage in light of the “gay rights” movement seeking public acceptance and the pressure by activist judges to legalize homosexual marriage. It isn’t likely that homosexuality will ever attract more than a small part of the population, which means that it will necessarily be a peripheral issue, no matter how dramatically it is presented. Cohabitation, on the other hand, can over time become a marriage substitute.]

But if this is so, we have yet to answer the question of precisely what restraints are needed. [Note in 2005: The discussion in the rest of this chapter of desirable restraints on sex outside of marriage seems archaic today, since restraints have long-since been abandoned. Many people today think that the only grounds for restraint come from religious doctrine. If they give small weight to the religion, they reject the restraints. It is worthwhile to read the remaining pages here to see what someone theorizing about the needs of a free society on purely secular grounds, and writing before the current everything-goes mores, would think about that.] And this question, although the most practical because of the specificity it entails, is perhaps the most difficult to answer in any satisfactory way. I will merely suggest answers. For the most part it will be necessary for each society to evolve its own answers in light of the attitudes and mores of the time. It isn’t possible to say precisely what restraints are needed without an intimate knowledge of the effects any particular restraint will have upon a given population. It is possible that one degree of restraint will be effective to give marriage a strong sexual incentive at one time and place, while the same degree of restraint may not be nearly so effective at some other time or place. At all times, the ethic should be formulated to the end of strengthening marriage.

Before we review particular types of sexual behavior, we should make explicit at least one other criterion. It is that some forms of sexual expression before marriage may be beneficial to the people involved by giving them the experience and maturity they need to select the best possible husband or wife. Premarital sex between those who are contemplating marriage may, to be candid, help them determine their compatibility in the broadest possible sense.

At the present, we have no well-defined ethic among those who are unmarried about what is and is not morally proper. There is extensive moral confusion, and a consequent tendency toward amorality, in this area.

Modern conditions have eliminated entirely in the United States the chaperone system. It has thus become almost impossible that there be any effective social control over any of the forms of sex short of actual intercourse. If two people who are dating each other desire physical intimacy, their opportunity to find the needed privacy is almost unlimited. It is true that the attitudes of parents and friends can exercise some remote control. However, more explicit social control of it is impossible. This is important in formulating the ethic. If at all possible, ethical standards should be framed in a way that will make social enforceability possible. A restriction upon such intimacy wouldn’t tend to be workable as an ethic.

This, of course, has assumed that restriction here would be desirable. But I can’t see justification in inhibiting sex short of intercourse. There is no possibility of its becoming a substitute for marriage. Its only likely danger is that, as with any strong sexual desire, it could induce people to marry too quickly for sexual reasons, brushing aside much else that should be considered. But this possible objection is hardly substantial enough altogether to rule out intimacy between people in a courtship. The chances are great that the benefit would outweigh the tendency toward haste. There can be no mechanistic formula by which to solve the difficulty in selecting a husband or wife. [Note in 2005: The preceding sentence shows how much my thinking was rooted in the culture I knew. I have since known university students from Korea or India, for example, who consider “arranged marriage” totally acceptable. This raises a very broad question that pertains to this entire book: How much is a “philosophy of liberty” to take into account differing cultural contexts, relating not just to sex but to all other matters? My analysis of the “philosophy of liberty” was ahistorical, relating to a philosophical model rather than to actually-existing societies. Accordingly, it occupies much the same place as intellectual constructs of all types: not descriptive, but heuristically helpful and valuable as an instrument of critique.] There would seem no basis for a dogmatic conclusion that this sort of intimacy is, in net balance, detrimental to courtship and marriage. I see no justification for its inhibition.

Surely we can’t restrain it, in our ethical theory, for the mere reason that some people will consider it ugly or unworthy, in line with an otherwise ascetic conception of sex. People who feel this way would certainly have the right to abstain themselves, but the ethic should not impress their values onto other people in the absence of palpable reasons connected with the overriding purposes necessary to the institutions of a free society.

As to sexual intercourse itself before marriage, it isn’t at all easy to state a satisfactory ethic. For the reasons given earlier, there should certainly be a very extensive restriction here. But should it be excluded entirely? Should we consider shameful and immoral any act of premarital intercourse? If not, where is the line to be drawn?

I don’t want to state an ethical principle in this connection that will open the door to abuse and become mistakenly the rationale in many people’s minds for a complete freedom here. And yet, I don’t think that if in a given society the people, because of their character and self-discipline, are able to keep a limited ethical allowance here within the bounds intended and are able to live according to the spirit of their restraint as a whole, it is necessary under such conditions to have a total proscription. Occasional acts of sexual intercourse between people who are for some reason, perhaps economic, unable to marry until after a long waiting period, or even between people who have been dating for some time and are close to marriage would seem to be, in fact, very worthwhile, with possibly good consequences to their relationship and in helping the selectivity of courtship. If the principle were not extended beyond this point, it would avoid the dangers that a generally permissible intercourse would have on the incentive to marry. I have used the word “occasional,” because there should be a lack of complete fulfillment so as to preserve the impetus toward marriage. A regular setting-up of housekeeping would certainly go far to encourage a substitution of an uncommitted quasi-marriage for marriage itself. There is much to commend these conclusions. They are in keeping with what we may realistically expect to be able to enforce socially among ourselves. A full setting-up of housekeeping by unmarried couples is, even under modern city conditions, hard to obscure from friends and family. The workability of the ethic is important.

So far we have only spoken about heterosexual activity. Because the old ethic expressing a general view of the ugliness of sex has cast its long shadow in virtually every area, and because there has been so little intelligent discussion, in specific terms, of what a satisfactory new ethic might provide, it is perhaps just as well to consider here the ethical acceptability of homosexuality and of masturbation. In some ways, I regret that a complete discussion requires us to become this specific. But the function of this book is to say what needs to be said about many different types of human affairs as they are touched by the present ethic and ought to be touched by an ethic of liberty. I wouldn’t seek to make this a “polite” book by avoiding important ethical questions.

When we stop to consider it, what can be the conceivable justification for an ethic that will tell us that masturbation has destructive social consequences that call upon us to consider it immoral? To a person who does not consider sex bad, per se, it is hard to conceive of a justification for an inhibitory ethic here. Certainly it is true that this type of activity is not by itself nearly sufficient to provide the satisfactory sex life that is important to living an emergent religion. Something much more complete and satisfactory is needed for the fullest expression of an individual’s life. But while this is the concern of religion and of everyone who seeks to fill his or her freedom with a life of substance and meaning, it is nevertheless not the concern of morality in the sense that we have been using that term. Rather, it lies within the area of permitted freedom, subject to whatever course individuals wish to take with it. Moral restraints, socially enforced, are only properly invokable in those areas where restraint is necessary to provide the precondition for a more general freedom.

What are we to say about homosexuality? This is not nearly so easily resolved, because it is not altogether determinable what the result would be if we were to say, as an ethical matter, that homosexual behavior is permissible. Even if it were entirely acceptable, would there be enough people who would desire it that it would become a significant threat to the primacy of marriage? Although to some extent we can only speculate in this regard, it would seem most reasonable, in light of our general observations of sexuality as manifested throughout nature, to think that homosexuality, even if altogether permitted, would never become the form of sexual expression for more than a minor portion of any population. The attractions between male and female seem far too strong for homosexuality to provide any significant challenge to the heterosexual relation. If this is so, then there would appear to be no very palpable justification for our present laws and moral attitudes that are so hostile to homosexuality. If such restraint can’t be justified on reasonable grounds, we have another instance in which the multiplicity of human beings has been repressed contrary to an ethic of liberty, which would permit all such multiplicity upon the widest possible scope consistent with an ordered liberty. [Note in 2005: The reader will note my libertarian conclusion here about homosexuality. It is still my preferred position. But almost since the day this passage was written, American culture has, under the impetus of the ideology of the 1960s, made something of a mockery out of people’s use of their freedom, leading to consequences that have been far beyond my contemplation in 1960. I would much prefer that an acceptance of homosexuality occur at a time when morality is at its best and the family not disastrously eroded (an erosion to which the push for homosexuality simply adds another element). The rise of HIV/AIDS, and the political-ideological protection given to those who spread it with little regard for the rights of innocents to whom it is passed, has been so serious, too, that a philosophical acceptance of homosexuality under recent circumstances has been out of the question. See my more recent writings on homosexuality. Perhaps the day may come when the reasoning I’ve given in this passage will find comfortable application.]

In this chapter, I have spoken openly and without the slightest sense of shame about matters that the intellectualism of the twentieth century has sought to ignore. I hope that, as with the chapter on the monetary institutions needed for a free society, what I have said will help lead the way to a more complete discussion. We should not abdicate the possibility of moral and intellectual control in such areas. In particular reference to the subject-matter of this chapter, it can be said that there is much to be done to develop a sound ethical framework to give human sexuality its proper place as an integral part of the life and spirit of emergent man.