365rio Does My Wife Need to Know About My Porn Habit?
This is the fifth and last installment in a series for this column, answering readers’ thorniest questions about sex and love as part of a special magazine issue on relationships.
My wife and I have been together for almost 10 years. We met in college, and our relationship is wonderful overall. Our sex life is generally good, but we have mismatched libidos — I have a much higher sex drive than she does. We’ve talked about this discrepancy but never articulated a formal compromise on it. Early in our relationship, I confessed that I struggled with watching pornography on a regular basis; she was upset, but I assured her that I was working on it. Unfortunately, I still watch pornography and masturbate to it almost daily.
I am aware that the mainstream pornography industry is widely seen as one that preys on people who are vulnerable, or that takes advantage of women, and that there are questions surrounding the ethics of porn more broadly. To that end, I restrict my viewing almost entirely to amateur and homemade pornography,66br casino so I don’t feel that I am being unethical in the act of viewing it.
My wife is unaware of my porn consumption, but I view it as a compromise between upsetting her or having a conflict over our sex drives. What do I owe to her and to myself? — Name Withheld
From the Ethicist:
You seem to have come up with a successful coping mechanism; if you thought it interfered with your enjoyment of sex with her, or her enjoyment of sex with you, I’m sure you would have said so. And many would consider this solo activity as within the realm of personal privacy, even in marriage.
The classifications have been questioned by athletes like the American Olympic rugby player Ilona Maher, whose B.M.I. of 30 technically puts her on the cusp of obesity. “But alas,” she said on Instagram, addressing online trolls who tried to shame her about her weight, “I’m going to the Olympics and you’re not.”
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