Sex Addiction: B.S. Excuse for Not Thinking?

Now that I've gotten your attention, here's an interesting and provocative (check the comments section!) article by Michael Bader* in AlterNet:

Whether applied earnestly or as a PR gloss for bad behavior, sex addiction is an increasingly common diagnosis. In my view, it's a problematic one. It's ambiguous, hard to define, blurry around the edges, and an excuse for not thinking. If a married man has a lot of extramarital sex, is he necessarily a sex addict? If a seemingly straight man frequents restrooms for casual sex, is he an addict? How much pornography does someone have to look at, how many hours spent in chat rooms, hookers hired, to go from "hound dog" to "sex addict"?

Bader goes on to distinguish addictions from compulsions - addictions usually involve tolerance and withdrawal which are not present with compulsions - citing the example that anxiety around frustrated sexual compulsions is quite different from DTs experienced during alcohol withdrawal.

He adds that treatment modalities like the 12-step program which focus on behaviour modification alone, in the absence of any real inquiry into its underlying meaning, most often completely miss the mark.

Unlike alcohol, sex is a natural and normal part of human life. So is sexual fantasy. Unlike heroin, sex naturally engages issues of intimacy, power, autonomy, and love. Sexual arousal always has meaning. In fact, sexual excitement of any kind is impossible unless its mental and social context is specifically conducive to it. While the desire for sexual pleasure is natural, the how, where and why are not. Sexual desire actually begins in the mind and travels down. The "problem" of sexual addiction always involves the mind and the social world, never the desire itself.

Examples from his clinical practice illustrate how insights gained through examination of the underlying psychological dynamics enable clients to face their anxieties and empower them to make better choices.

The actual psychological reality is that the so-called addicts' desires and fantasies are perfectly understandable attempts to deal with anxiety and depression given the context of their personal histories, their painful and irrational views about themselves and about men and women, and their inability to imagine a healthier way of living. Once they’re helped to become aware of these meanings, they actually increase their self-compassion and are freer to exercise self-control.

He concludes:

Everywhere that sex enters the public arena, whether it be in education, gay marriage, Internet sex, or the hypocrisy of self-righteous politicians getting busted for their indiscretions, we see a worrisome refusal or inability to think about psychological meaning, and to instead reduce the conversation to either a morality play or a voyeuristic parade of gossip and speculation. Replacing the psychologically complex and intensely human drama of sexual behavior with two-dimensional labels like addiction is but one example of this trend.

Click Here for full article and comments.
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*Michael Bader is a psychologist and psychoanalyst in San Francisco. He is the author of "Arousal: The Secret Logic of Sexual Fantasies" and "Male Sexuality: Why Women Don't Understand It -- and Men Don't Either." He has written extensively about psychology and politics.
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I've got you like a habit and I'll never get enough
there ain't no cure, there ain't no cure
there ain't no cure for love
- Leonard Cohen
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