Morality in the age of sex robots

The truth is that all of us at some level or another understand as if by instinct that certain desires are in and of themselves wrong. They should not be acted upon, placated, appeased, or in any sense met halfway. Most of us, one hopes, feel this way about pedophilia and bestiality (how far away are we, I wonder, from dog sex robots?), at the very least. It is the moral duty of people who want to hurt children or animals to banish such desires from their mind, to seek help, to pray — to do whatever it takes to ensure not only that they never carry out their fantasies but that they no longer have them. "Acting upon them" is beside the point; that anyone anywhere is contemplating such things is inherently evil.

Once this truth is acknowledged and it is accepted that certain impulses are immoral not simply because they have potential to lead to others' being harmed but because they are in themselves wicked, it becomes much more difficult to make the usual facile arguments in favor of everything from legalized marijuana to secular liberals' redefinition of marriage. The argument is no longer about abstract "harm" but about those old stalwarts good and evil.

Liberalism is going to need a new toolbox.

-- Morality in the age of sex robots