|
Strengths
- Natural Law is religious in nature - the use of the primary precept allow a person to know whether a sexual act is in accordance of what God would want for them. Aquinas believed that good acts developed our human nature and bad acts went against human nature, assuming that human nature was common to all humans and so general principles would apply for all. For Aquinas, the purpose of sexual acts was procreation, and marriage gives the right environment to raise children. This is the view that the Catholic Church takes, that sex within marriage fulfils a unitive and procreative function.
- Natural Law would uphold that contraception is wrong as it goes against several primary precepts of living in society, procreation and education of the young. If the sex act doesn't result in pregnancy than it is unnatural, so things such as homosexuality, masturbation and conception are unnantural and intrinsically wrong.
- Utilitarians argue for the greatest happiness, but contraception leading to sexual freedom is not necessarily the highest good as we cannot predict the consequences.
- Onon in Genesis 38:9 shows that contraception is wrong as Onan's misndeed was his avoidance in producing an heir by his dead brother's wife, not the actual avoidance of pregnancy
- The Canadian Catholic Biship Conference says that believers should only to refer to the conscience on their difficult ethical decisions
|
Weaknesses
- Utilitarianism is a secular ethical theory that wishes to promote the greatest happiness for the greatest number. The theory wants people to live happily in society and so a utilitarian would want to focus on the good things about any sexual relationship, while minimising the not so good acts. A utilitarian approach to sex is often called libertarian as it allows consenting adults to do whatever they like and considers that they should be free to do so.
- A utilitarian would be concerned with the fact that in general, consensual sex creates good rather than harm. However, they would also consider the issue of consent, etc. Bentham argued that mutual consent for pleasure cannot make any sexual act wrong, unless it caused unhappiness (harm principle). However, as far as pre-marital sex is concerned, utilitarians would have to consider the possible consequences of STIs, unwanted pregnancies etc.
- On the other hand, a utilitarian may argue that huamsn will have sex no matter what, and hence contraceptives must be available to avoid seriously damaging consequences such as too many unwanted children and the spread of disease. Contraception can also provide for couples who want to limit the number of children they can support and educate without sacrificing the unitive element of their marriage
- Peter Singer, a preference utilitarian, argues for using contraception to stop population growth, even suggesting that aid to developing countries should be made conditional on the use of contraceptives.
|
|
Opportunities
- How do you define "helpful" - give clearer answers? simple to use? agree with a more universal/absolute/teleological response? Who might it be helpful for? Society? The individual?
- Utilitarianism would agree with the religious view that adultery is wrong as pre-marital and extra-martial sexual relationships would cause harm then a utilitarian would see monogamy as bringing about the greatest satisfaction and would make a general rule forbidding adultery and sexual affairs
- Pope Benedict XVII stressed abstinence as the best policy in fighting the disease of AIDs but in some circumstances it was better to use condoms if it protected human life.
- A big weakness of the utilitarian approach is that is only protects the majority and alienates the minority whereas Natural Law tries to protect everyone.
|
Threats
- Not every sexual act will result in procreation, so are non-procreative sexual acts natural to humans?
- Sex has unitive as well as procreative functions - it is a way of expressing love.
- In the utilitarian point of view, only sexual relationshios that cause harm are considered wrong
- The religious view forbids contraception and this seems irrational whent he world is overpopulated and STIs such as AIDs abound. Should preservation of life be more important than reproduction = a clash of the primary precepts.
|
Comments
Report