I’ve spent much of the last week talking about sex addiction. I’ve spoken to journalists, radio hosts, and television personalities. Some were skeptics, while others didn’t need much convincing that sex can be addictive for some people. Below are links.
1) ABCnews.com story, “Tiger Woods May Be Role Model For Battling Sex Addiction.”
2) Time story, “What Happens in Sex Rehab?”
3) Los Angeles Times story, “Woods’ Story Veers to Sex Addiction.”
4) The John Williams Show on WGN radio. Part 1. Part 2.
5) The Today Show. Watch here. (As I explained in a blog post, I deeply regret confirming the name of the treatment center.)
6) ESPN’s Sports Center. Watch here.
I can not believe we are actually having a public debate over whether sexual addicts like Tiger Woods and others like him are ‘sick’ puppies (that deserve our understanding) or simply voraciously lustful sinner deserving our contempt. Well, since when does addictive behavior of any kind exempt one from an ethical judgment? We don’t wring our collective hands over whether a pedophile is guilty of sin! It’s just a given that he’s a sinner. Whether someone is also ’sick’ or not may provide fodder for the gossip addicts; but, it has no real bearing on whether they are in fact a sinner. Tiger Woods is definitely a sinner, big time. The fact that we are having this debate is defacto proof that we desperately need a non-theistic ethical standard to judge ethical behavior. John W. McAlister
Ethical Universe