Atlas Shrugged: Who knew maps could be sexy?

I was talking to a friend early this morning who was surprised that I hadn't read Ayn Rand. She's been on my reading list for a while, but I just haven't had time to get through everything on my list to get to her. Anyways, he sent me a teaser in regards to her work which I have found both entertaining and intellectually stimulating.

DISCLAIMER: I am only judging this as an isolated selection. I haven't read the rest of the book, although Atlas Shrugged is on my to-read list.

[Some people] think that sex is a physical capacity which functions independently of one's mind, choice, or code of values. They think that your body creates a desire and makes a choice for you -- just about in some such way as if iron ore transformed itself into railroad rails of its own volition. Love is blind, they say; sex is impervious to reason and mocks the power of all philosophers. But, in fact, a man's sexual choice is the result and the sum of his fundamental convictions. Tell me what a man finds sexually attractive and I will tell you his entire philosophy of life. Show me the woman he sleeps with and I will tell you his valuation of himself. No matter what corruption he's taught about the virtue of selflessness, sex is the most profoundly selfish of all acts, an act which he cannot perform for any motive but his own enjoyment -- just try to think of performing it as an act of selfless charity! -- an act which is not possible in self-abasement, only in self-exaltation, only in the confidence of being desired and being worthy of desire. It is an act that forces him to stand naked in spirit, as well as in body, and to accept his real ego as his standard of value. He will always be attracted to the woman who reflects his deepest vision of himself, the woman whose surrender permits him to experience -- or to fake -- a sense of self-esteem. The man who is proudly certain of his own value will want the highest type of woman he can find, the woman he admires, the strongest, the hardest to conquer, because only the possession of a heroine will give him the sense of an achievement, not the possession of a brainless slut. He does not seek to gain his value, but to express it. There is no conflict between the standards of his mind and the desires of his body...

Observe the ugly mess which most men make of their sex lives -- and observe the mess of contradictions which they hold as their moral philosophy. One proceeds from the other. Love is our response to our highest values, and can be nothing else. Let a man corrupt his values and his view of existence -- let him profess that love is not self-enjoyment but self-denial, that virtue consists, not of pride but of pity or pain or weakness or sacrifice, that the noblest love is born, not of admiration but of charity, not in response to values but in response to flaws, -- and he will have cut himself in two. His body will not obey him, it will not respond, it will make him impotent toward the woman he professes to love and draw him to the lowest type of whore he can find. His body will always follow the logic of his deepest convictions; if he believes that flaws are values, he has damned existence as evil and only the evil will attract him. He has damned himself and he will feel that depravity is all he is worthy of enjoying... Then he will scream that his body has vicious desires of its own which his mind cannot conquer, that sex is sin, that true love is a pure emotion of the spirit. And then he will wonder why love brings him nothing but boredom and sex nothing but shame....

Only the man who extols the purity of a love devoid of desire is capable of the depravity of a desire devoid of love.

This selection interestingly uses sex as the means by which one would define an individual's life philosophy and self-image. Which makes me curious as to whether this is an accurate method of life analysis or not. I mean, surely the way people value themselves and think often run parallel to the sorts of relationships they involve themselves with, romantic or otherwise. But is sex really so easily the judgement of self?

As Ayn Rand writes, "He will always be attracted to the woman who reflects his deepest vision of himself, the woman whose surrender permits him to experience -- or to fake -- a sense of self-esteem. The man who is proudly certain of his own value will want the highest type of woman he can find..." I agree that man (as in mankind) specifically looks for those who reflect a particular desire, even a reflection of self-esteem and image, like that of a woman who has been raped who may enjoy the role play of a similar scenario or someone who is very cocky (no pun intended) who wants a very confident and strong partner. However, I am uneasy to say that is the sole angle to be observed. There are those who are complete opposites in and out of the bedroom, being submissive in one and bold in the other, or those who have particular fantasies which may not correlate to their personality or self-image, rather they are acting as it was written "selfishly" by going after their desire; " sex is the most profoundly selfish of all acts, an act which he cannot perform for any motive but his own enjoyment". How is that supposed to reflect an individual's philosophy or self-image?

I could be completely misunderstanding the piece, but really, how can sex be the foundational aspect to be judged when analyzing someone's life philosophy and self-image when it isn't necessarily an akin point to one's personality?

Another aspect of the philosophy of sex is the morality of sex. One part of Alan Soble's essay "The Analytic Categories of the Philosophy of Sex" in The Philosophy of Sex: Contemporary Readings looks at the morality of sex, labeling certain philosophers who look into this topic as metaphysical sexual "optimists" and metaphysical sexual "pessimists". Those who are labeled pessimists, i.e. St. Augustine (in his book Confessions he writes something to the effect of G-d please grant me the ability to be chaste, just not yet), Kant, and occasionally Freud, view sex as "something nearly always, if not necessarily, unbefitting the dignity of the human person," and "that the power and demands of the sexual impulse make it a danger to harmonious civilized life... and... also a threat to his or her own humanity." The optimists, i.e. Plato, occasionally Freud, Bertrand Russell, and Albert Ellis, "... view human sexuality as just another and mostly innocuous dimension of our existence as embodied or animal-like creatures... and they applaud rather than fear the power of an impulse that can lift us to high forms of happiness."

Flat out, I don't think sex is either moral or immoral but, similar to really most objects or acts (i.e. money, power, etc.), is amoral. It is how we as individuals and partners in a relationship approach sex that is moral or immoral. As people, we can have sex be that selfish act that Ayn Rand discusses, which would be observed as metaphysical sexual pessimism, or have sex be an act NOT ONLY for the self, but also your partner, as well as a deliberate act demonstrating its biological purpose to conceive.

Thoughts on the morality of sex? Agree? Disagree? Also, consider Ayn Rand's stance on sex being the point to judge life's philosophy and self-image. Is that an appropriate item for judgement? Is it the only one or what else is there?