An ancient Greek philosopher, around 300 BC, challenged the rationality of prohibition of publicly engaging in sexual intercourse. See my Sexual Privacy Necessary for New Life . What would Consensual Sexual Morality – I the following classic case described the Hipparchia article in The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy?
[…] Crates of Thebes…was so passionate about Cynic ideas that, leaving behind the wealth of his father, he moved to Athens with his wife Hipparchia, who was an equally zealous follower of his doctrine. And when he wanted to lie down with her in public, and she…pulled over her cloak as a cover, she was scolded by her husband: “obviously you are not yet wise,” he said, “since you don’t dare to do in the presence of others what you know well to be the right thing to do.”
The story of Hipparchia’s Cynic marriage quickly became the premiere example of that virtue, which is based on the Cynic belief that any actions virtuous enough to be done in private are no less virtuous when performed in public. As exemplars of anaideia, Hipparchia and Crates influenced their pupil Zeno of Citium, the founder of Stoicism.
The judgment of Consenual Sexual Morality about this case is clear. Crates acted imorally since he was forcing Hippachia’s consent to public coitus. He was not respecting her sexual dignity. The type of shamelessness called anaideia is not a virtue recognized by Consensual Sexual Morality. It is clearly possible that some people’s authentic desire is for privacy in sexual activity.
But is anaideia a vice?
In the New York Review of Books August 20, 2026, I read the following in a review of John Lanchester’s Look What You Made Me Do by Laura Marsh. There is a couple Jack and Kate Hittlestones who have a way of speaking in code. One of their code terms is “Ho Chi Minh birthday.” This term stands for “the special occasions on which the Hittlestones hire an escort to have sex with Kate while Jack watches.” Consensual Sexual Morality can accommodate the consent of sex workers as authentic consent. Drug addicted victims of sex trafficing do not give authentic consent. But not all sex workers are victims. I suspect that some Consensual Sexual Moralist would commend the Hittlestones for discovering a way to enhance their sex lives. None could condemn it without evidence that some coercion was involved.