I’m a Christian who has only had sex with the woman I married, and we waited until our wedding night for that. About 8 months ago my wife took the kids and moved out, then divorced me; her excuse was that she caught me looking at porn. She bailed out of counseling, telling the counselor that it was all my fault. At first I felt she was wrong, but then I found a couple of books on sex addiction and found myself on every page. Now I’m attending a sex addiction program, but I’m not sure I’ll ever be clean. Can you give me some advice?
My advice is simple, though I’m going to elaborate on it a bit: You were correct when you thought your wife was being unreasonable, and you should work on accepting your sexuality rather than letting a bunch of profiteering prudes inflict a never-ending guilt trip on you. As I and others have written many, many times, the entire concept of “sex addiction” is bullshit; it’s just Christian morality dressed up in psychobabble. Sex is a natural function, not an outside chemical you’re introducing into your body; it’s no more possible to be “addicted” to sex than it is to be “addicted” to breathing, eating or pissing. Try not taking a crap for a few days and watch how your thoughts slowly become dominated by thoughts of pooping; after a while your concentration will probably deteriorate and you won’t be able to think about much else. Yet when your sex drives go similarly unrelieved, you actually believe people who tell you that means you’re an “addict”? This is nonsense. Studies show that so-called “sex addicts” don’t have sex (or think about it, or watch porn, or masturbate, or whatever) any more than other people do; they just feel more guilt and anxiety about their normal sexual impulses, and those bad feelings are directly correlated with the degree to which they carry guilt-inducing moral & religious attitudes about sex. Those who write “sex addiction” books, teach “sex addiction” courses and give “sex addiction therapy” are charlatans, con artists who are profiting from “treating” a condition that can never be cured because it doesn’t exist in the first place. The only way to “cure” sexual impulses is by castration (chemical or surgical), and even that’s not 100% because a lot of sex derives from regions of the brain which are going to do their thing even if your testosterone level drops to nearly zero. And of course, all humans crave touch and intimacy no matter what their sex-hormone levels; the only way to “cure” that is to die.
In your very long letter you didn’t mention when you started looking at more porn and thinking about sex more often, but I’m willing to bet it correlates nicely with a decrease in physical intimacy with your wife. I get letters with depressing regularity from Christian men whose Christian wives cut them off dry and then complain that said husbands pester them for sex or watch porn; this makes about as much sense as refusing to keep food in the house and then bitching because their husbands complain about being hungry or sneak out to McDonald’s. For whatever reason, your wife wanted out of the marriage; porn provided her a convenient excuse that would satisfy her Christian family and allow her to push the blame off onto you. The “sex addiction” industry is feeding on your guilt and will try to encourage your unhealthy sex-negativity so it can keep feeding; if you want to be cured, what you really need to do is stop believing the abusers who keep telling you that you’re sick.
(Have a question of your own? Please consult this page to see if I’ve answered it in a previous column, and if not just click here to ask me via email.)
As a Christian man, I can tell you that God created a way for a man to deal with his sexual desires and that way is through his wife. Your wife should be providing sex basically on demand, since that is the 100% approved Godly outlet for that desire. If she won’t or wouldn’t, she is guilty of defrauding you in the marriage in the same way you’d be guilty of defrauding her by refusing to provide a home or food.
I’d suggest looking in to the blog “Dalrock”, also on WordPress for additional guidance from a pro-sex in marriage Christian perspective.
“Your wife should be providing sex basically on demand, since that is the 100% approved Godly outlet for that desire.”
Uh, excuse me? This may come as a shock to you, but women are human beings, with a right to decide whether and when to have sex. Saying “I do” in a church and getting a ring slipped on your finger doesn’t negate that right.
Um, excuse me?
Last time I checked men are human beings with the right to determine what happens to their property and fruits of their labor.
Saying “I do” in a Church doesn’t entitle a wife to part of her husband’s income nor to live in his house. Getting a ring on a woman’s finger doesn’t negate that right.
That you can read my post above & come away with the idea that I’d support this notion is truly impressive.
Being familiar with the theology of Christianity goes a long way. In this case, the wife is sinning against her husband by refusing him something she sworn before God to provide. Just like a husband would be sinning if he refused to provide for his wife while only providing for himself.
Within the confines of Christianity, this is how these things are expressed.
“Last time I checked men are human beings with the right to determine what happens to their property and fruits of their labor.”
Please clarify for me. Are you saying wives ought to be required to go into the workforce and earn their keep? Or that they are to be considered the property of their husbands? Or both? Given your view that wives “should be providing sex basically on demand,” it seems you don’t think wives have even the most basic of property rights, that of bodily sovereignty, while husbands are “entitled” to control everything. And all this, according to you, is the Christian way.
Gee, I had no idea that Jesus was a Men’s Rights Activist …
Men and women have different motivations for getting married, especially in the historical/evolutionary context. Men pair off for sex and access to reproduction. Women select mates for providence and resources, because for a woman reproduction requires resources. This is how things have mostly been across history and as a result we’ve adapted to seek these things. Even if you don’t believe in God, this is plain to see and observed across Evolutionary evidence.
In the Bible, it says that the Wife’s body belongs to the Husband and the Husband’s body belongs to the Wife. Therefore it is a mutually beneficial for both individuals. The Woman gets resources a result of the Man’s labor, which was much more physically demanding of his body, while the man gets access to the woman’s body in the form of sex and reproduction. Both got something they couldn’t get easily on their own. The relationship is transactional in nature, which is just fine. It has been that way as far as recorded history shows us.
However, if one person breaks the deal and withholds from the other, it is no longer beneficial for them. If the man withholds resources from the woman, she doesn’t get what she wants. If the woman withholds from the man, he doesn’t get what he wants.
The person who breaks the deal is the guilty party.
In this case, this Christian woman withheld sex from her husband for a very long time, so the husband sought relief from other sources (in this case only porn). Now, she is claiming authority to divorce him after withholding from him one of the primary motivations for him to be married to her in the first place.
What she did was the equivalent of him withholding shelter and resources from her and then him being angry and divorcing her because she sought them somewhere else.
I told you to get lost. Now get fucking lost. This is my blog & you are no longer welcome.
I hope someone can someday cure your addiction to an imaginary sky man.
When we both finally shuffle off this mortal coil, one of us will be surprised. Your surprise will be much less to your benefit than if I am the one to be surprised.
Do you also cover your doorways with garlic just in case vampires really exist? If your imaginary friend really exists, and chooses to not interfere with all the suffering in this world, then I really don’t want anything to do with it anyway.
Because I don’t believe vampires exist, so I don’t spend any time refuting their existence.
Why would you spend any time refuting God’s existence if you were so confident He didn’t exist?
Because right now, politicians and fanatics aren’t trying to run other people’s lives based on vampire bullshit. But if they do, I’ll start calling them out on it.
Yeah, because Trump is a serious Bible scholar.
OK, dude, you’re gone. I gave you a chance & you misused it. My blog is not yours to proselytize from; this is equivalent to thinking you have the right to stand in my front yard & harangue passersby with a megaphone.
You do realize that J.R. offered nothing to the conversation? Merely that they didn’t believe in God. That’s the sum total of their contribution. Aside from directly attacking beliefs that they didn’t hold.
Dude, I’m done with you; you shot your wad on someone else’s carpet & now you’re no longer welcome in her home. Deal with it & learn your lesson.
As an ex-christian, I’d like to point out Mt 5:32 to the OP. It was written at a time when divorce could only be filed for by the husband, but still. Looking at porn might be a sin, but it is not adultery. Divorcing your husband and marrying or just having sex with another man totally is, and it’s pretty certain that your ex will be doing this, if she hasn’t done it already. A girl got needs, you know?
Her divorcing you and moving on frees you – in the eyes of God – from any commitment you had to her. She will be (if she isn’t already) an adulteress, and you are not. Mt 5:38 is part of the Sermon on the Mount. That verse was preached not by some anonymous saint or some fouth-century bishop, but by the Lord Jesus Christ himself.
OP, you are **not guilty**.
Pretty perplexed at Maggie’s response to AR10308. This is a great blog, and I’ve been reading it for years. And I’m anything but Christian….But from what I can gather, AR was describing a biblical worldview which is held by (millions?) of devout Christians. He wasn’t advocating slavery, etc. He was describing that particular religious understanding, which makes sense because the questioner is saddled with that worldview. I agree with Maggie’s advice to the questioner; spot on, well-referenced, and insightful. But to treat AR like he was doing anything other than offering an internally consistent, freewill (both parties took this religious oath with the same understanding) perspective in the terms in which the oath / agreement / contract was taken seems unlike Magige, or the spirit (contractual, consensual) spirit of this blog…Odd….Unless I’m mis-reading her booting of a different commenter altogether, and the displeasure wasn’t aimed at AR?
The displeasure was aimed at somebody who didn’t stop proselytizing when I asked him to. I have no patience with people who think my internet “home” is theirs to do with as they please. This is MY property, not a public park or street, so I expect visitors to stand down when I say so. It’s not like I say it often.
Miss McNeil
You and I have butted heads over this before, you claim that men become erratic without sex, yet I have lived 20 years without sexual contact other than what I can provide for myself. You have stated in this blog that sex is in the brain not in the body, so then therefore if I can turn this off, Mind Over Matter, I’m somehow mentally deficient. Not meaning to pick a fight but your perspective is from Men that believe that sex is important to their ego and if you did not support this View pornstars strippers and prostitutes would lose their means of income if men realized that animals have seasons and men have the capability of reason which means that we can understand the fact that this extra in life is not any kind of elimination of waste products which if we refused would kill us. Sex is not like that it is a psychological impulse that can be controlled. I speak this in knowing. Now attack my point of view.
This must be idiot day. You really think you’re going to barge into my house with a chip on your shoulder & dare me to knock it off? And you don’t even offer to pay me for providing you this argument-entertainment? Fuck you. Banned.
Joel, you’ve only provided a superficial account of your experience, so the best rejoinder would be similarly general.
First, you’ve qualified your statement of having “lived 20 years without sexual contact” by adding: “other than what I can provide for myself”. Complete sexual deprivation would also mean no masturbation, erotica/porn, or even thinking about sex.
Second, you’re not accounting for overall physical and emotional interaction. “Skin hunger” is a well-researched human need, as is social bonding. The reason many clients of sex workers pay extra for so-called “girlfriend experiences” is that they not only have needs for genital release, but physical and emotional connection.
Third, human beings are diverse. Not everyone needs the same things at the same level, and a few people on the “tail ends of the bell curve” may hardly need them at all. Maggie and I, for example, react very badly to eating certain foods that others consider necessary. So, just because you apparently need much less sexual interaction with others, it doesn’t follow that everyone is capable of the same.
To the letter-writer:
Looking at porn is a perfectly normal thing for a healthy adult male to do, _even_ when in a relationship and amply supplied with sex. Do not let anybody tell you different, they are just lying to you in order to control you (ref.: “Religion”) or sell you something (ref.: “sex addiction books and counseling”). That is also the reason you find yourself in these books: You are healthy and have normal urges and cravings.
Of course, a gentleman hides his porn and a lady does not go looking for it (and ignores it if she finds it). That is just common courtesy.
But the thing is that Maggie is perfectly right on the mark. Regulation and suppression of sex-drive is one way many religions use to make men feel bad about themselves and put them in a position where they have to feel like “sinners” and need “forgiveness” and possibly “reeducation”. Apparently you are supposed to channel the energy so freed up into prayer or something. I think you learned something valuable there, because writing your letter is a rather strong indicator that you are not really buying the BS anymore.
As to your wife, it is obvious she wanted out and this whole thing is just a pretext. That she bailed out of counseling is a dead giveaway and IMO a clear sign of bad faith on her side. (Not sure it carries any legal weight though…). The fascinating thing is that she uses the religion of “love and forgiveness” to justify being neither loving nor forgiving. The the discrepancy between claims of world view and actual acts of religious people cause me no end of bafflement.
I think you should take this as an (unduly harsh to be sure) life-lesson and redefine your outlook on existence and your goals in life. It is clear you cannot lobotomize yourself into accepting the nonsense you are told anymore, and my advice is to stop trying.
Reblogged this on dave94015 and commented:
Is #sexAddiction real? Or is it a reaction to #christianMorality?