Ethics of anonymous sex stories

TwoBrains · October 18, 2020

First of all, sorry if this isn't the kind of thing this forum is meant for. I've had this ethical quandary kicking around in my head for a while ever since it came up in a conversation I was part of the other day, so I wanted to find some kind of place where I could get some fresh perspectives on it. Googling for forums with morality discussions yielded this one, among others.

Anyway, what I've been mulling over is this: if person A anonymously shares an account of their sexual experiences with person B, likewise anonymous in the account itself, but doesn't ask for B's consent before doing so, can that be considered to constitute a violation of B's sexual privacy? And, if person C then masturbates to said story, can C then be considered to have participated in some kind of indirect sexual violation or exploitation of B? Or does the fact that B cannot be feasibly identified from the account effectively eliminate the possibility of sexual violation against B on A and C's part, making the situation different than if A had identified B clearly in the account or shared B's visual likeness, and then C had masturbated to the result? Furthermore, does C in the situation change if the sexual activities in the account itself were themselves nonconsensual (if, for example, B was intoxicated or a minor at the time)?

Infidel Dog · October 18, 2020

It would depend on the context and what sort of liability you're talking about. Legal? Social? Inwardly moral?

For example if you're talking about a personal message most social media have rules against sharing what's said in PMs, but I doubt you'd have much of a legal standing if you wanted to go there.

The masturbation argument is kind of silly but it reminded me of Penthouse forum where people were encouraged to share their sexual experiences and I'm sure much tissue paper was wasted and many crusty socks were created by the readers. Would they have felt guilt? I don't know maybe...for varying reasons. Should they have? Probably not. Were anonymous characters in the stories damaged? I don't see how.

Or are you talking about cases where specific names were named. In those cases one would have to know more specifics about the cases to make a judgement, I think.

Edited October 18, 2020 by Infidel Dog