# Asserted: a fantasy, even a disgusting one, is morally neutral.
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [November 19, 2005, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799 "2005-11-19T14:51:53Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@robertliguori](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robertliguori)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/1 "2005-11-19T14:51:53Z")
In [this](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=345279) thread, the assertion was made that fantasies were moral events. I disagree. Any fantasy, no matter how detailed and repugnant, is simply a fantasy. It does not affect others in any way (as long as you’re not fantasizing on the job or some such), and even if repeatedly dwelling on the commission of evil events damages one’s internal moral health, a morally sick and diseased person whose thoughts do not escape his head is functionally identical to a paragon of virtue. As I’m a big fan of act-based morality, that’s enough for me to say that fantasies are amoral.
**lissener** , I would appreciate it if you in particular would elaborate on your views on this topic.
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### Author:  [@rfgdxm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rfgdxm)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/2 "2005-11-19T15:21:45Z")
Thoughtcrime should be illegal?
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### Author:  [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/3 "2005-11-19T15:27:19Z")
That is a really interesting question, **robert**. My husband and I were discussing something quite related yesterday, with regards to the Ten Commandments, and he used exactly that term, **rfgdxm** - he said that two (or three?) of them were thoughtcrimes. I have to go to class now, but I will try to come back and participate more fully here.
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### Author:  [@Tevildo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tevildo)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/4 "2005-11-19T15:34:45Z")
Hmm. I’m not sure I agree with the OP.
For example, if someone were to say “I fantasize about raping 8-year-old boys”, I’m sure most people would consider him to be a wicked person - he should certainly expect to be on the recieving end of much verbal, if not physical, abuse.
Would you argue either:
(a) Such a person is _not_ immoral, provided only that he doesn’t act on his fantasies? A valid view, perhaps, but not one that would be shared by the wider community.
Or:
(b) The act of _admitting_ his fantasies is immoral in itself? He would still be a moral person by your standards, provided he kept his mouth shut?
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### Author:  [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/5 "2005-11-19T16:31:14Z")
He probably should keep his mouth shut, but there’s no harm in a fantasy provided he doesn’t harm any 8 YO boys.
But that’s not what the linked thread is about at all, and I get tired of dragging pedophilia into every adult-sex-oriented debate.
I can’t think of any fantasies, not acted upon, that are immoral. That does make it through crime.
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### Author:  [@jshore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jshore)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/6 "2005-11-19T16:38:07Z")
I agree with the assertion of the OP. A similar thing applies to “wishes”. When I was younger, I used to beat myself up a lot if I found myself wishing for something that seemed bad or selfish (e.g., if a woman I liked was going out with some guy and I would wonder if I was wishing they would break up so I might have a chance with her). I have come to realize (with a little help) that what really should define one is one’s actions and not one’s thoughts. So, in the aforementioned example, as long as I am being supportive to her and not actively undermining the relationship, it would be basically irrelevant what I was wishing would happen.
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### Author:  [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/7 "2005-11-19T16:40:57Z")
There may be some distinction between fighting involuntary thoughts and indulging in fantasies of evil. For example, a guy saddled with a problem he doesn’t want–say he has an awful temper and a tendency to punch people on very little provocation, or a sexual prediliction for children he never asked for–he can either fight those impulses, work to control them and replace them with better feelings, or he can indulge them by fantasizing about shooting sprees and 8-year-olds.
The first course is considered morally better than the second. Thought tends to lead to action. If you constantly allow yourself to _want_ to punch people, you are far more likely to actually do it eventually than if you work at replacing your anger with calm. You’ve probably seen that old sequence (here are two examples):
> [@](#):
>
> Thoughts lead on to purposes; purposes go forth in action; actions form habits; habits decide character; and character fixes our destiny.
> –Tryon Edwards
>
> Watch your thoughts; they become words.
> Watch your words; they become actions.
> Watch your actions; they become habits.
> Watch your habits; they become character.
> Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.
> –Frank Outlaw
The fact is that what we are like inside does determine how we treat each other. A person can only be horrible inside and kind outside for so long; eventually he will either start treating people badly or become truly kind on the inside. We are all trying to act better than we truly are (or at least I hope so), either because we truly want to be better than we are or because we don’t want others to know how awful we really are–usually both. But we have to try to control our minds and thoughts as much as we can, since if we do we tend to improve in our actions, but if we don’t we tend to get worse. A person constantly wishing he could punch people is not likely to treat people more kindly because of it, and the longer he wishes to punch, the less he will be able to love.
Here is what C. S. Lewis has to say about the idea that our personal, inner moral state has no bearing on outside society (from _Mere Christianity_:
> [@](#):
>
> Morality, then, seems to be concerned with three things. Firstly, with fair play and harmony between individuals. Secondly, with what might be called tidying up or harmonising the things inside each individual. Thirdly, with the general purpose of human life as a whole: what man was made for: what course the whole fleet ought to be on: what tune the conductor of the band wants it to play.
>
> ```
> You may have noticed that modern people are nearly always thinking about the first thing and forgetting the other two. When people say in the newspapers that we are striving for Christian moral standards, they usually mean that we are striving for kindness and fair play between nations, and classes, and individuals; that is, they are thinking only of the first thing. When a man says about something he wants to do, 'It can't be wrong because it doesn't do anyone else any harm,' he is thinking only of the first thing. He is thinking it does not matter what his ship is like inside provided that he does not run into the next ship. And it is quite natural, when we start thinking about morality, to begin with the first thing, with social relations. For one thing, the results of bad morality in that sphere are so obvious and press on us every day: war and poverty and graft and lies and shoddy work. And also, as long as you stick to the first thing, there is very little disagreement about morality. Almost all people at all times have agreed (in theory) that human beings ought to be honest and kind and helpful to one another. But though it is natural to begin with all that, if our thinking about morality stops there, we might just as well not have thought at all. Unless we go on to the second thing - the tidying up inside each human being - we are only deceiving ourselves.
>
> What is the good of telling the ships how to steer so as to avoid collisions if, in fact, they are such crazy old tubs that they cannot be steered at all? What is the good of drawing up, on paper, rules for social behaviour, if we know that, in fact, our greed, cowardice, ill temper, and self-conceit are going to prevent us from keeping them? I do not mean for a moment that we ought not to think, and think hard, about improvements in our social and economic system. What I do mean is that all that thinking will be mere moonshine unless we realise that nothing but the courage and unselfishness of individuals is ever going to make any system work properly. It is easy enough to remove the particular kinds of graft or bullying that go on under the present system; but as long as men are twisters or bullies they will find some new way of carrying on the old game under the new system. You cannot make men good by law: and without good men you cannot have a good society. That is why we must go on to think of the second thing: of morality inside the individual.
>
> ```
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### Author:  [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/8 "2005-11-19T16:55:27Z")
But. Can we limit “acting upon a fantasy” to carrying it out more or less as fantasized? What if there is only the _potential_ to deliberately do harm?
In 1931, [some Hungarian bastard](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=321029) blew up the Orient Express and killed a few dozen innocent folks because he had discovered he could only be sexually satisfied while seeing people die.
Now let’s suppose he had sublimated his urge to the point where he was content merely to rush up to women on bicycles as if about to push them over. Most would just get a good scare and he could imagine to the point of getting his rox off. But there’s always the possibility that one would crack her skull on the pavement or careen into the path of an oncoming bus.
Ie, some fantasies, even if sublimated, have a clear potential to do harm. Somebody draw me a line here.
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### Author:  [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/9 "2005-11-19T17:26:57Z")
> [@Beware of Doug](#):
>
> Ie, some fantasies, even if sublimated, have a clear potential to do harm. Somebody draw me a line here.
The line is drawn where one starts to act on one’s fantasies. In the thread in question, I think I put forth a reasonable case that one can’t fantasize about being raped _per se_ because it’s logically impossible: if you want the sex, then it’s _not_ rape, even if it involves masks and rough play. I think plenty of people have fantasies that they honestly would not like to see enacted in the real world. If I’m fantasizing about something deviant, that doesn’t mean I would enjoy it in reality at all, or even consider trying it out.
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### Author:  [@jshore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jshore)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/10 "2005-11-19T18:23:42Z")
I think it is going about things the wrong way around to look at people who have committed bad acts and then ask whether they fantasized about them. I mean, I could also that almost everyone who has raped someone has masturbated in their lifetime. However, it doesn’t mean that masturbation generally leads to rape, because most people who have never raped someone have also masturbated.
I think particularly where sexual-related fantasies are concerned, there is likely to be a big gap for most people between fantasy and reality and only a few people will have serious problems distinguishing the difference.
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### Author:  [@Tevildo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tevildo)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/11 "2005-11-19T18:33:19Z")
> [@Anaamika](#):
>
> He probably should keep his mouth shut, but there’s no harm in a fantasy provided he doesn’t harm any 8 YO boys.
>
> But that’s not what the linked thread is about at all, and I get tired of dragging pedophilia into every adult-sex-oriented debate.
>
> I can’t think of any fantasies, not acted upon, that are immoral. That does make it through crime.
I apologise if my example skewed the debate - perhaps we can substitute “I fantasize about being the gas chamber operator at a concentration camp” for something equally horrific but non-sexual?
I suppose my point is that I would distinguish between between _being_ an immoral person and _acting_ in an immoral way. I agree that immoral actions are evidence that someone is wicked; I would, however, also hold that someone will be _described_ as wicked on the basis of their thoughts and beliefs as well as their actions. If we accept that, for example, racism is immoral, are we not justified in describing someone as immoral who thinks that black people are inferior to whites, even if they don’t take part in lynchings?
I would also make the distinction between “immoral” and “illegal”, especially as the phrase “thoughtcrime” is being used. I would fully support the rights of the paedophile or the racist to _say_ what they think, as long as they also accept that they’re being immoral in doing so, and that they can justifiably be excoriated for it.
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### Author:  [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Stamos_Left_Ear)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/12 "2005-11-19T18:41:40Z")
There was an old Twilight Zone episode where a guy who works in a band suddenly has the power to read minds. In it, he can read the mind of a fellow employee who was plotting on how he would rob the bank. The mindreader winds up confronting the guy when he was supposed to have the money on him and he doesn’t. Both are confused, but eventually the old guy who didn’t rob the bank despite thinking about it gave us the moral of the story:
“People will often think about things without ever doing them, just as we will often do things without thinking.”
This is why I don’t care what people are thinking about provided they do not share it with me and they do not act on those thoughts.
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### Author:  [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/13 "2005-11-19T19:29:58Z")
> [@Anaamika](#):
>
> He probably should keep his mouth shut, but there’s no harm in a fantasy provided he doesn’t harm any 8 YO boys.
>
> But that’s not what the linked thread is about at all, and I get tired of dragging pedophilia into every adult-sex-oriented debate.
>
> I can’t think of any fantasies, not acted upon, that are immoral. That does make it through crime.
I would go even further, and say that the inclusion of sex at all in this debate is clouding the issue. I mean, the stuff **Evil Captor** fantasizes about is pretty tame in comparison to the stuff, say, Thomas Harris writes about in his Hannibel Lector books. Is **EC** a measurably worse person because his fantasies lead to an erection, and not a movie deal? One assumes that Harris enjoys writing his novels, even if its in a non-sexual sense. Should he also be judged morally for writing disgusting novels? (That he should be judged morally for writing _awful_ novels goes without saying. 😉 )
Anyway, continuing the discussion I was having with **lissener** from the other thread:
> [@lissener](#):
>
> This still sounds like if you get away with it it’s not immoral.
I guess I’m not sure what you mean by “get away with it.” If a guy has an immoral thought, and he never tells anyone, has he “gotten away” with something? It seems that under your definition there are a lot more immoral people getting away with stuff than under mine, where only actions are immoral, not thoughts. Which is not an argument against your moral view, it’s just that I don’t see how it’s an argument against _my_ moral view. I don’t think either of us is arguing that morality is determined by getting caught at something immoral.
> [@](#):
>
> If you can watch a movie that has, for a more extreme example to make the point, a storyline of a child being raped, killed, and eaten, and you get OFF on that, then you have some personal moral issues to deal with.
Is that morally different from watching a movie that contains those scenes and enjoying it on an aesthetic level? Obviously, you’re not arguing that anyone who enjoys a movie like that on any level is immoral. I don’t really see how a sexual response suddenly turns the issue into a moral one.
> [@](#):
>
> The rest of what you say is moral-relativist tapdancing.
I suppose that’s true. I don’t believe that morality exsists independently of human thought. It’s not an objective truth, but a social construct. In a society that condones cannabalism, cannabalism is not immoral. That’s not to say that one has to be infinitly permissive. I don’t believe in an absolute morality, but I can still stake out a claim on what I think is moral, and recognize that there are other moral positions that cannot co-exsist with my own. I can’t accept the exsistence of neo-Nazism, because that moral position requires the eradication of myself and many people I care about. I can accept the exsistence of people who enjoy rape-fantasies, because rape-fantasies aren’t going to hurt me, or anyone else. If a rape-fantasist crosses the line into being an actual rapist, that’s a different story, but it is not at all a given that someone who fantasizes about rape is going to commit rape. I’m not going to judge someone until they’ve done something that is demonstrably wrong, not simply unpleasant to think about.
> [@](#):
>
> Just because your choice not to act on those fantasies prevents them from affecting other people doesn’t change that. Obviously, that’s another level of immoral. I have never said that my definition of morality in this context is measured by whether it hurts other people. The challenge of living a moral life is as much about the health of your own “soul” as it is about the souls of others. Moreso, in fact.
I disagree entirely. I’d argue that someone who has wildly inappropriate fantasies and never acts on them is more moral than someone who never has those fantasies at all. Morality is pretty easy to pull off in the absence of temptation.
> [@](#):
>
> How you can say that fantasies of rape and dismemberment are morally null is utterly beyond me, unless you can’t separate morality from action.
I would say that I _don’t_ seperate morality from action, rather than “can’t.” My moral scheme is based around harm to others, as that’s the closest I can come to an objective moral standard. No matter how much it might repulse me, I don’t think I have the right to judge someone who’s not causing direct harm to another person.
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### Author:  [@uglybeech](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/uglybeech)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/14 "2005-11-19T20:04:27Z")
Exactly what part of a “deviant” fantasy is immoral? Is it:
the fact that someone is the type of person who can be aroused by immoral acts?
- are we then responsible for our sexual response?
the sexual transgression?
- is sexual fantasy of only a certain type then permissible? Or is all sexual fantasy wrong?
the act of considering an immoral act?
- is it then immoral to consider any crime/or sin even if we reject it? what about considering it in the hypothetical as people are doing in this thread?
the (alleged) increased probablility of committing immoral acts?
- same as above
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### Author:  [@Tevildo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tevildo)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/15 "2005-11-19T20:12:50Z")
> [@Miller](#):
>
> I would say that I _don’t_ seperate morality from action, rather than “can’t.” My moral scheme is based around harm to others, as that’s the closest I can come to an objective moral standard. No matter how much it might repulse me, I don’t think I have the right to judge someone who’s not causing direct harm to another person.
Ahh, but how do you define “direct harm”? Does calling someone “nigger” or “kike” directly harm them? Does saying “A woman’s place is in the home” directly harm women, if they’re still allowed to work? Does saying “Faggots will burn in Hell” directly harm gay men? If the answer is “no” to those questions, would you say that David Duke and Fred Phelps are moral people? On the other hand, if you would answer “yes”, why does the act of _expressing_ an opinion change it from “moral” to “immoral”?
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### Author:  [@uglybeech](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/uglybeech)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/16 "2005-11-19T20:24:07Z")
> [@Tevildo](#):
>
> Ahh, but how do you define “direct harm”? Does calling someone “nigger” or “kike” directly harm them? Does saying “A woman’s place is in the home” directly harm women, if they’re still allowed to work? Does saying “Faggots will burn in Hell” directly harm gay men?
I think you’re confusing “direct” with “substantial.” An insult or harrassment or open disrespect is clearly direct harm, even if it’s not as substantial as, say, barring women from working.
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### Author:  [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/17 "2005-11-19T20:36:44Z")
> [@Tevildo](#):
>
> Ahh, but how do you define “direct harm”? Does calling someone “nigger” or “kike” directly harm them? Does saying “A woman’s place is in the home” directly harm women, if they’re still allowed to work? Does saying “Faggots will burn in Hell” directly harm gay men? If the answer is “no” to those questions, would you say that David Duke and Fred Phelps are moral people? On the other hand, if you would answer “yes”, why does the act of _expressing_ an opinion change it from “moral” to “immoral”?
From the other thread:
> [@yours truly](#):
>
> Now, I consider speech an action, so someone who goes around saying, “We should kill all the Jews,” is still evil, even if he never does any actuall Jew-killing, because he’s promoting an evil act. The difference I see here is that Evil Captor isn’t promoting rape, he’s promoting consensual sex that involves feigned rape/torture/whatever. But he’s been very clear on the consensual part. He’s not hurting anyone, and he’s not saying anyone should actually be hurt, he’s just saying he likes it when people pretend to be hurt. Which is wierd, but not immoral.
Also, what **uglybeech** said. Calling someone a “nigger” is, at the very least, an attempt to make them feel bad. Which is an exceedingly minor harm, but still harm, and deliberatly so.
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### Author:  [@Spiritus\_Mundi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiritus_Mundi)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/18 "2005-11-19T20:37:11Z")
Do thoughts have a moral character? There are a number of ays to analyze the question. For myself, one of the more interesting is to generalize the question: _do actions that affect only the self have a moral value?_
If your answer to this is “no”, then you may easily draw the dichotomy at "des the fantasy affect a person’s interactions with other humans (or animals or social constructs or to whatever extent you extend your personal empathy).
If your answer is “yes” (whether following a course similar to CS Lewis or perhaps because you believe that moral awareness carries implicitly a duty within the self), then the question is self-evidently answered “yes”.
For myself, I answer the first question: “they can”, and thus the second question “sometimes” (or perhaps “cenceivably”, since I am not making a claim for any particular instance of this having occurred.)
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### Author:  [@Tevildo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tevildo)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/19 "2005-11-19T20:39:22Z")
> [@uglybeech](#):
>
> I think you’re confusing “direct” with “substantial.” An insult or harrassment or open disrespect is clearly direct harm, even if it’s not as substantial as, say, barring women from working.
So you would argue that, no matter how repulsive someone’s thoughts and beliefs are, the person is still _moral_ if they until they _express_ these thoughts? That seems rather irrational to me, I must admit. For one thing, it would imply that lying is a moral thing to do, if one is lying about one’s beliefs.
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### Author:  [@ImaginalDisc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ImaginalDisc)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2005, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asserted-a-fantasy-even-a-disgusting-one-is-morally-neutral/331799/20 "2005-11-19T20:43:54Z")
> [@dangermom](#):
>
> There may be some distinction between fighting involuntary thoughts and indulging in fantasies of evil. For example, a guy saddled with a problem he doesn’t want–say he has an awful temper and a tendency to punch people on very little provocation, or a sexual prediliction for children he never asked for–he can either fight those impulses, work to control them and replace them with better feelings, or he can indulge them by fantasizing about shooting sprees and 8-year-olds.
What goes inside my head is none of your buisiness. What goes on in your head is none of my business. What harm does it do anyone to indulge in even the most bizzare fantasy? For one thing, police officers and pyschologists are frequently called on to reason out the modivations of suspects and the actions they might take.
Some of the most important litterature ever written is written about questionable people, Humbert Humbert in Lolita, horrific turns of events, The Man in the High Castle, or grotesque crimes, Silence of the Lambs. Our ability to understand the human conidtion and to guide ourselves does not stand on the refusal to aknowledge the existance of thoughts we consider questionable, but may actually hinge on our ability to understand them, and what they mean.
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