Sunday, May 27, 2007

It Makes You Think

The slogan for Vic is "it makes you think", and this is a fantastic slogan and particularly applicable to the papers I have taken this semester.

I am currently writing an essay due on Friday (as well as having another due on 8 June and two tests this week!), where I must critically discuss the claim that there is nothing morally objectionable about rape. This really does make you think, because while I do not approve of rape in shape or form, the question of whether it is an embedded sexual desire for a person to need to feel power when partaking in intercourse, and they just need to learn to control it or whether it is not a sexual desire at all is interesting.

My shorter essay due on the 8th will be examining the claim that the existence of people who cross the borders of gender and sex provide support for the view that sexuality is invented - another question which is making me think.

This is really just to make people think as well and if you are at Vic and have the chance to take Pols/Phil269 Phil 369 - sex and sexuality - then I strongly recommend it. I have struggled a bit as most of the class are phil students who can think well and truly beyond the box where I have limits but I have thoroughly enjoyed the class, the lecturer is great and the guest speakers.

5 comments:

Diving into the wreck said...

interesting subject!

Anonymous said...

do you actually think people really care what you are writing a essay on?

fatfa said...

no, but when you state who you actually are and have your own blog then you can write whatever you want.

If you don't find the posts interesting don't read them.. like duh!

Libertyscott said...

The only way rape could not be morally objectionable would be if the rapists had a right to the body of the victim - a right of possession/property.

If that is accepted then not only is rape morally acceptable, but also assault of any kind and murder by extension (you can destroy property after all).

If people own their bodies then rape is unconscionable, but then people are also permitted to engage in voluntary euthanasia and ingest any substances they wish. The complicating factor are those cases of people who have been raped, and later eroticise the experience - remembering it not entirely negatively. This doesn't change the morality of it, because either one consents or does not, and there is no right to another's body if the other does not consent.

One point to consider on sexuality is where fetishes come from. Many fetishes are not inate to human beings, e.g. fetishes for items of clothing that did not exist 50 or 1 million years ago must be a result of environmental factors that use the fetish object to reflect something deeper (typically either repressed or realised desire at a relatively early age linked to the object).

Anyway enough of that! Good luck!

fatfa said...

Thank you liberty scott - it was that kind of discussion I was interested in hearing :)