I had been trying to come up with something similar.
As I see it (and various better writers have aid it as well), humans are capable of taking anything 'necessary' and turning it into both great good and great evil (often taking the good to excess, the difference between the gourmet and the gourmand is one of degree). We can use our social skills to achieve projects, or to raise a lynch mob. We can send men to the moon, or missiles to blow others to bits. We can use sex for joy, or as a weapon (not just rape, I'm thinking of the "keep them barefoot and pregnant" enslaving of women). We are capable of being both "better than the angels" and "worse than the demons" (and as one of the Pratchett/Gaiman supernatural characters points out in "Good Omens", often at the same time).
The difference, in the predominant Christian interpretation, seems to be that there sex is regarded as purely evil (at best a "necessary evil"). In many denominations it is still preached as something to be endured (as a duty to propagate) rather than enjoyed (and anyone who does enjoy it and says so openly is regarded as a slut). So yes, I think that the quotation which started this is a reaction to a peculiarly Christian attitude.
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momijizukamori
Re: Had much the same reaction
Date: 2011-02-15 12:43 pm (UTC)As I see it (and various better writers have aid it as well), humans are capable of taking anything 'necessary' and turning it into both great good and great evil (often taking the good to excess, the difference between the gourmet and the gourmand is one of degree). We can use our social skills to achieve projects, or to raise a lynch mob. We can send men to the moon, or missiles to blow others to bits. We can use sex for joy, or as a weapon (not just rape, I'm thinking of the "keep them barefoot and pregnant" enslaving of women). We are capable of being both "better than the angels" and "worse than the demons" (and as one of the Pratchett/Gaiman supernatural characters points out in "Good Omens", often at the same time).
The difference, in the predominant Christian interpretation, seems to be that there sex is regarded as purely evil (at best a "necessary evil"). In many denominations it is still preached as something to be endured (as a duty to propagate) rather than enjoyed (and anyone who does enjoy it and says so openly is regarded as a slut). So yes, I think that the quotation which started this is a reaction to a peculiarly Christian attitude.