{"id":9521,"date":"2014-05-22T11:22:09","date_gmt":"2014-05-22T15:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/?p=9521"},"modified":"2014-05-22T11:22:09","modified_gmt":"2014-05-22T15:22:09","slug":"designing-emotional-contraception","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/05\/designing-emotional-contraception.html","title":{"rendered":"Designing Emotional Contraception"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Over at\u00a0The American Conservative<\/em>, I\u2019m discussing a bioethicist who\u2019s done a literature review to find anti-love drugs. \u00a0He\u2019s not discussing science fiction, but drugs that currently exist which could have the side effects of suppressing lust, attraction, and\/or attachment if prescribed off label (anti-depressants are high on the list). \u00a0His ethics questions are mostly focused on the level of the individual, but I\u2019ve got concerns about how they\u2019d shift societal expectations about responsibility and relationships.<\/p>\n

\n

Treating Heartbreak With a Pill<\/a><\/h3>\n

In these circumstances, and others like them, Earp concludes that \u201cthe individual, voluntary use of anti-love biotechnology \u2026 could be justified or even morally required.\u201d Earp circumscribes this moral imperative to mean that it would be morally\u00a0wrong<\/em>\u00a0to interfere with a person choosing treatment, not that it would be immoral to refuse it, but it is worth noting that most of the examples that Earp cites are ones where the lover would not\u00a0want<\/em>\u00a0to take the drugs, at least initially.<\/p>\n

An individual\u2019s choice will be shaped by the soft coercion of friends, family, and society who decide it\u2019s finally time to intervene. Just as voluntary euthanasia has drawn criticism for the potential for weak groups (women, the elderly, the disabled) to feel pressured to die \u201caltruistically\u201d so as not to become a burden, anti-love drugs might create a new social responsibility for the romantically bereft to take their medicine and move on.<\/p>\n

In an essay for Modern Love, divorc\u00e9e Candida Pugh\u00a0describes a kind of \u201cclosure\u201d<\/a>\u00a0that presages Earp\u2019s new pharmacological regime\u2026<\/p>\n

It came to me as a revelation, one of those truisms that strike with lightning clarity when you\u2019re hiding in the dark. While she ranted, I realized that her husband, and mine, had the right to leave us. Everyone has that right, however much it may hurt the one left.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In Pugh\u2019s framework, the only obligation that marriage confers is a duty not to let your grief interfere with your partner\u2019s choice to leave. The burden is on her to salve her wounds, not on her spouse to refrain from inflicting them.<\/p>\n

Read more at\u00a0<\/em>AmCon\u2026.<\/em><\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I can praise one part of Earp\u2019s ethics wholeheartedly: his research papers aren\u2019t behind a paywall, you can read the full text here<\/a>. \u00a0(It turns out that his main concern is that people might feel pressured to use anti-love drugs to suppress feelings that society\u00a0incorrectly<\/em> frowns upon, like inter-caste romances and queer relationships). \u00a0Overall, though, the paper could be part of a viral marketing campaign for the upcoming film adaptation of Lois Lowry\u2019s\u00a0The Giver<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n

The Modern Love column which I cite also put me in mind of this C.S. Lewis lecture on sexual morality.<\/p>\nhttps:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=XBp8M8M4DMs<\/a>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you take this person until\u00a0preferences<\/em>\u00a0do you part\u201d is state of dating, not marriage, unless marriage is merely a legal way of managing hospital visits and tax filings.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over at\u00a0The American Conservative, I\u2019m discussing a bioethicist who\u2019s done a literature review to find anti-love drugs. \u00a0He\u2019s not discussing science fiction, but drugs that currently exist which could have the side effects of suppressing lust, attraction, and\/or attachment if prescribed off label (anti-depressants are high on the list). \u00a0His ethics questions are mostly focused […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":9537,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[196],"tags":[21],"class_list":["post-9521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-marriage-2","tag-healthmedicine"],"yoast_head":"\nDesigning Emotional Contraception<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Over at\u00a0The American Conservative, I'm discussing a bioethicist who's done a literature review to find anti-love 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