The debate over a “right to sex”

Episode 96 Sneak Peek

Who is helped and who is hurt by a “right to sex”? This discussion was opened up online last week in response to a thread tweeted by former Congressional candidate Alexandra Hunt, who named the right to sex as a goal for our society to move toward as part of creating healthier social norms around sexuality and overcoming our “history of shame” on this topic.

Alexandra M. Hunt @hunt4change

We should be moving toward a right to sex. People should be able to have sex when they feel they want to, and we need to develop services that meet people’s needs without attaching the baggage of shame or criminalization.  So let’s talk about sex.

Hunt’s ideas have been received with strong disagreement by many who see this ideal — founded on the observation that young men are having less sex — as endorsement of the sexual objectification of women’s bodies for men’s pleasure. Hunt has said that this isn’t her purpose. Rather, her stated purpose is to establish safer standards of sexuality by “decriminalizing sex work, funding sex education, and creating outreach programs for young people to develop healthy sexual habits.”

This week, Alexandra will join us on KK&F to unpack her vision of destigmatized sexuality in the U.S., what policies could take us there, what a “right to sex” would look like in practice, and how she responds to the point that’s been raised about the centrality of heterosexual men in this conversation. It’s going to be an in-depth discussion on a significant and highly polarizing issue, so we very much hope you’ll join us for the episode.

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