Some More Arguments About HIV and Condoms

Thanks to Richard for his interesting post.  I do want to disagree with the analogy to the man in the mouth of the cave.  As I see it, the causal mechanism involved in using condoms to prevent the spread of HIV is not so much like the man in the cave, whose death is the means to remove him from the mouth and to freedom for those inside.  In the condom case, the blocking of the sperm (which I take it to be the problem with condoms) is merely a side effect of the use of the latex barrier to block the HIV virus (which I understand to be present in the seminal fluid, not in the sperm themselves).  That is, couples using condoms to block HIV transmission and without contraceptive intent would (if possible) use some barrier that would block just the HIV and not the sperm, whereas in the cave case, no such causal separation is possible, since the removal of the man is precisely what is desired.

I've taken the time to read the Benedict Guevin and William May articles that Michael Perry recommended.  Very interesting stuff, if you go in for this kind of thing.  Guevin's argument, such as it is, I find to be singularly unconvincing.  As far as I can tell, his principal point is that in the case of therapeutic use of anovulents, the choice to use the anovulent is separate from the choice to engage in sexual intercourse, but in the case of condomistic (can we come up with a better word, please?) sex, the choice to use a condom (to prevent HIV infection) is inseparable from the choice to have sex.  This is a valid distinction, as far as it goes, but I fail to see how it changes the moral character of the sexual act.  In both cases, the parties know (but do not desire) that their sexual act is nonreproductive.  In both cases, the non-reproductive nature of their act is necessitated by a desire that one of the partners not become ill.  It seems to me that the relevance of the fact that it is the party's own decision to have sex which necessitates the use of the condom in the case of HIV prevention sounds more in Richard's argument that people should use the least harmful means possible to achieve a good end.  I fail to see how it changes the moral quality of the act, and Guevin doesn't really provide an  argument in his favor.  He simply asserts that his distinction makes a difference.  I disagree.

William May's argument is more interesting.  He essentially asserts that condomistic (that word again) sex is intrinsically disordered sex.  In fact, he is so hard core, he says that even a sterile couple where one party has HIV cannot use a condom to prevent the spread of the disease.  Unlike Guerin, though, he gives us an argument.  Drawing on John Paul's "theology of the body," he argues that "condomistic intercourse . . . mutilates the language of the body, and the act chosen is more similar to masturbation than it is to the true marital act."  This is essentially an argument that the insertion of a latex barrier prevents a true conjugal union of the husband and wife.  (The image I have here is of the body-sized condoms in the Naked Gun.)  Although this is an argument, it's not a very good one, I think.  First of all, it's not clear precisely what bothers May about the condom.  Is it the latex barrier or is it that, as he puts it, "in such intercourse the male's semen [is] deposited in a vas indebitum or 'undue vessel'"?  Is it the depositing of the semen in the appropriate vessel or the barrier that causes the problem?  It's not clear to me, then, whether May would object to my porous condom hypothetical.  (Another interesting hypothetical for May would be a vaginal cream that destroys both sperm and the HIV virus indiscriminately.)

May's argument strikes me as crude physicalism.  Certainly couples where one partner has HIV would rather not use a latex barrier.  I'm sure they would agree with May that the need to rely on one renders their sex less unitive than it might be under ideal circumstances.  But I am confused by the claim that unitivity is binary in the sense that anything less than perfect sex (in the sense of some abstracted platonic ideal of the human sexual act) is not just unfortunate, but affirmatively evil.  I wonder what he would say, for example, about a couple where one party lacked any sensitivity in his/her genital area.   Would such a couple be permitted to have sex? 

In any event, it's not even clear to me that May is correct that condomistic sex between spouses where one spouse is HIV positive is not perfectly unitive in a more limited (though I think far more plausible) sense of the spouses giving to each other all that they have to give.  Obviously, for such spouses to have unprotected sex would be very wrong.  Accordingly, the only option available to them is to engage in sex with a barrier or no sex at all.  That is, on the range of unitive behavior available to them, sex with a condom is at the most unitive point.  Why isn't that enough?

[UPDATE:  Michael Perry pointed out in an email to me that getting the man out of the cave does not causally require his death, just that he be moved.  I agree that an argument can be made to that effect.  Maybe the two are the same.  The man's death (like the blocking of the sperm) would not on this understanding contribute to the desired state of affairs -- his being removed from the mouth of the cave.  I think the answer to the cave example really depends on the specific facts.   Clearly, if the only way to get him out of the mouth of the cave were to saw him in half, the DDE would not permit that.  So the question is whether the dynamite here is the equivalent of sawing him in half to get him out.  Isn't this fun?]