As a society, I think we declare many unwanted or suboptimal behaviors into diseases or addictions and this is also true of sexual addiction. There was a quote from the t.v. show News Radio a few years back when one characters was describing himself as a sex addict, the character Dave responded with, "I'm sorry. I'm from Wisconsin. Does that mean you were getting a lot?"
But even if I'm willing to agree that we as a society probably over-diagnose sexual addiction, it seems to me that nearly all of the possible definitions from these type of addictions (sexual, alcohol, nicotine, etc) depend on normative distinctions. As you say "Which experts get to make judgments about acceptable sexual behavior? Exactly where do their criteria come from?" Isn't that also the case for alcohol? Or drugs? Why isn't that modifying those behaviors just about "controlling their impulses"?
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As a society, I think we declare many unwanted or suboptimal behaviors into diseases or addictions and this is also true of sexual addiction. There was a quote from the t.v. show News Radio a few years back when one characters was describing himself as a sex addict, the character Dave responded with, "I'm sorry. I'm from Wisconsin. Does that mean you were getting a lot?"
But even if I'm willing to agree that we as a society probably over-diagnose sexual addiction, it seems to me that nearly all of the possible definitions from these type of addictions (sexual, alcohol, nicotine, etc) depend on normative distinctions. As you say "Which experts get to make judgments about acceptable sexual behavior? Exactly where do their criteria come from?" Isn't that also the case for alcohol? Or drugs? Why isn't that modifying those behaviors just about "controlling their impulses"?
June 8, 2009 - 4:04pmThis Comment
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