When Tiger Woods was caught having not just one but multiple and simultaneous extramarital affairs, many news sources labeled him a “sex addict.” What else could explain cheating on a gorgeous blonde Swedish swim suit model (so the reasoning went). In response to the massive negative press, Woods effectively went underground, canceling all public appearances. A few weeks later, the media storm was still raging and Woods checked himself into Pine Grove Behavioral Health & Addiction Services, a Mississippi clinic specializing in sexual addition treatment.
Months later, just as Woods was attempting to re-establish his chaste public image, Jesse James, the husband of Oscar winning Sandra Bullock, was exposed as having committed similar transgressions. After being slammed by the media James too checked himself into a sex addiction clinic, the Sierra Tuscan in Tuscon Arizona. While the use of medical/ “disease” models around sexual “deviance” is not new, the recent high profile cases raise for me the following questions:
- What role are sex addiction clinics playing in regulating discourses of sexuality?
- How are discourses of sex addiction intersecting with and reinforcing individualized assumptions of sin and redemption, in other words, conservative religious discourses of sexuality?
- Do sex addiction clinics serve as public (and for profit) confessional booths for “secular” society?
- What role do public confession and redemption scripts play in larger belief structures about “good” and “bad” sexuality (now labeled “healthy” and “unhealthy” sexuality)?
- In what ways do sex addiction discourses ignore practical (e.g. partners living separate lives) and systemic (imbalances of power and privilege) issues related to infidelity?
- How do major institutions (e.g. those related to religion, medicine, criminal justice, and business) benefit from avoiding the practical and systemic, focusing instead on individualistic, moral understanding of sexuality?
The mission statements of both Woods’ and James’ clinics clearly state that sex addition/compulsion is in part a medical matter. Pine Grove (where Woods was a resident) offers a special program called “Gentle Path” which refers to sexual addiction as a “disease:”
The Gentle Path Program offers gender specific treatment to aid men and women in regaining their freedom from the disease of sexual addiction. Most patients are simultaneously treated for mood disturbance, anxiety or other addictions, such as chemical dependency. The Gentle Path Program has a special focus on working through past trauma and family problems. The program is designed to help men and women regain freedom from compulsive behaviors and develop a sense of healthy sexuality.
While not specifically sponsored by any religious organization, Pine Grove emphasizes religious/spiritual aspects of healing. The “Gentle Path” program (an ironic name given its austere living requirements) requires members to sign a celibacy contract, including a promise not to masturbate during the course of their treatment. Clients are also forbidden to leave during their treatment the except for group chaperoned fieldtrips. Like many prison environments, the clinic appears to serve in part a punitive function. News reports appeared to take glee in the fact that Woods was retreating to a place that would cause him physical as as well as moral hardship:
“The world’s No. 1 golfer will not have an easy time of it as he tries to conquer the demons that led him to repeatedly cheat on his stunning wife with multiple women.” (NYDailynews.com)
In a recent article in Alternet.org, psychologist and psychoanalyst Michael Bader calls sex addiction a “B.S. excuse for not thinking.” Bader asks,
“If a married man has a lot of extramarital sex, is he necessarily a sex addict? If a seemingly straight man frequents restrooms for casual sex, is he an addict? How much pornography does someone have to look at, how many hours spent in chat rooms, hookers hired, to go from “hound dog” to “sex addict”
Bader goes on to explain the difference between drug and alcohol addiction and “sex addiction”:
“Traditional addictions like those to alcohol or heroin always involve the presence of tolerance and withdrawal; that is, increasing amounts of the substance are required to achieve the same effect, and in its absence the addict suffers an increasingly painful psychophysiological state as the body and brain rebound. But when it comes to sex addiction, physiological tolerance and withdrawal are usually not present, and if they are, they don’t govern the addict’s life in the same way that, say, opiates do. Sex addicts get anxious when they can’t get their “fix” — they don’t go into DTs.”
In fact, Bader argues, the addiction model for sexual infidelity ironically perpetuates pathological sexuality:
“… by viewing someone’s sexual desires as addictions, 12-step approaches can subtly reinforce someone’s own pathological view of themselves. People struggling with sexual compulsions are already afraid of their sexuality, viewing it as an alien internal beast. To imply that the addict’s sexual fantasies and sources of satisfaction are, like alcohol to the alcoholic, a loaded gun, reinforces this belief, when in fact it’s simply another fantasy. The actual psychological reality is that the so-called addicts’ desires and fantasies are perfectly understandable attempts to deal with anxiety and depression given the context of their personal histories, their painful and irrational views about themselves and about men and women, and their inability to imagine a healthier way of living. Once they’re helped to become aware of these meanings, they actually increase their self-compassion and are freer to exercise self-control.”
Bader concludes with an analysis that extends to many public sexual stories:
“Everywhere that sex enters the public arena, whether it be in education, gay marriage, Internet sex, or the hypocrisy of self-righteous politicians getting busted for their indiscretions, we see a worrisome refusal or inability to think about psychological meaning, and to instead reduce the conversation to either a morality play or a voyeuristic parade of gossip and speculation. Replacing the psychologically complex and intensely human drama of sexual behavior with two-dimensional labels like addiction is but one example of this trend.”
Bader’s analysis is needed in a world saturated with simplistic psycho/moral/medical discourses. This is a small but important step toward serious systemic analysis. Even the quintessential playboy, Hugh Hefner, understands this. When asked if he thinks golfer Tiger Woods can overcome his playboy transgressions, Hefner replied curtly:
“He can if he wants to. But this whole idea that it’s a sex addiction is a copout. Some people become obsessed with sex, but it’s not like an alcohol or drug addiction. He did it because he could get away with it.”
While Elin Nordegren may indeed not want her estranged husband, Tiger Woods, to “get away with it,” Woods’ treatment for sex addiction and his public confessional performance has little to do with Elin, and more to do with replicating and selling individualistic morality tales around sexuality.
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Referenced articles
Bader, M. Jan. 19, 2010. “Sex Addiction: A B.S. Excuse for not thinking.” Alternet.
Huffington Post, April 13, 2010. “Hugh Hefner slams Tiger Woods, Jesse James, and Sex Addiction.
Comments 5
Raluca — May 2, 2010
This makes me think of Michel Foucault and his History of Sexuality; according to Foucault,this type of discourse about sexuality, that aims to draw a line between what is "normal" and what is "pathological" originated in late XVIII- easrly XIX century and while seemingly scientific, it is merely ideological in nature (and ignoring of scientific facts if it suits its ideological purposes.)
For instance, XIX century deemed gays, lesbians, transgendered and genderqueer persons, but also people who find sexual gratification in autoeroticism or other forms of non-procreative sex as pathological/mentally ill; the reason being that, in line with the model of "rational production" of the Industrial Revolution, the purpose of sex was seen by the society as being the rational production of workforce (offsprings). You can't scientifically establish what the purpose of sex is- a statement of this kind has to be ideological. The discourse deeming certain forms of sexuality as "pathological" is an instrument of control, of the society exercing authority over individuals; and its origins are to be sought in common beliefs.
For Tiger Woods, it may be the racial element (black guy coupled with white woman- he's already above his condition, if he wants more he must be insane!)and for Jesse James it may have to see with the fact that Sandra is so famous (well, if you're coupled with Sandra Bullock and you cheat you're not in your right mind). This is very reflective of how we perceive people and relationships based on the vales that we have- and very reflective of how ideologies devellop.
Arturo — May 3, 2010
I enjoyed this post as I have been thinking about this ever since I saw a commercial for a Dr. Drew show about helping celebrities dealing with their sexual addiction. While at the one hand I can see how some destructive consequences may flow from an over-eager libido, it was curious to me how confident the good doctor was in ascertaining what was a healthy vs. unhealthy level of desire in the 30-second spot where I saw Dr. Drew intervening with 90s ex-rocker. Maybe I missed something in my organic chemistry class, but I didn’t know we could decipher such messy issues with the type of clarity and scientific precision that Dr. Drew espoused (to be fair I haven't seen the show, but I imagine the same type of narratives are used as in his other shows that I have seen) .
Now I know that perhaps in the context of treatment and milieu of therapy a counselor can’t help but make some very binary distinctions while working with a client. In the midst of a personal breakdown and emotional turmoil perhaps one needs the comfort of clarity and black-and-white reasoning that the disease model can provide, even if the world is slightly more complicated that what is being project. But then again, this is a TV show where not only the client is being sold on a message of good and bad emotions, but an entire cultural production is made of out of this message of sex as disease. Why do we need to medicalize our sexual behaviors and desires, I was left wondering?
Interestingly, the New York Times magazine did an interview with Dr. Drew a few months ago where he cites his own systemic and cultural perspective—that you say is needed—on addiction and his TV shows related to treating them. According to the article, Drew sees much of the medical addictions he sees on a daily basis as related to the broad over-consumption culture of desire and narcissism that comes out of Hollywood. In the article Dr. Drew goes on to say that in the entertainment economy our desires and feeling for self-aggrandizement are constantly being stroked, and addiction is really a natural human response to these speed-up of emotions and behaviors. I was really surprised by this perspective—similarly to how surprised I was by the psychologist who you cited above—in that it seemed that Dr. Drew has a much broader understanding of his work than I had given him credit for. While I necessarily don’t agree with his methods, Dr. Drew claims he is fighting cultural addiction with his own cultural production of treatment programs. Instead of explicitly defacing the commoditization of desires, Dr. Drew believes he can uproot the cognitive structures that have been formed by it. I’m left a little puzzled if this makes sense—using TV shows to uproot the cognitive structures generated by TV culture. Maybe it’s brilliant or maybe just a clever form of self-deception. Either way I guess it makes for good TV.
The Morning After: Sex and the City and the Hijab Edition - The Sexist - Washington City Paper — May 4, 2010
[...] * “Sex addiction”: Bullshit or no? [...]
Danielle Ketterer — May 6, 2010
Funnily enough, Hugh Hefner's quote summed up the majority of my thoughts as I was reading the beginning of this article. Hearing about the endless string of celebrities and politicians that come forth with their sexual indiscretions doesn't lead me to believe that these public figures just happen to have a higher percentage of sex addicts than the general population. I feel the explanation of sex addiction is an excuse. That is not to undermine the addiction itself; I do believe a small number of people genuinely struggle with such a disease. In the cases of Tiger Woods and Jesse James, I certainly do not believe either one of them struggles with a genuine sex addiction; to steal from Hugh's quote, it's a copout. I personally don't feel that enjoying sex is a problem, it's when a person enjoys having sex with multiple people outside of the marriage to their spouse where the line is obviously crossed. Just because these celebrities crossed this line doesn't mean they're addicted to sex. Whether they simply made huge mistakes and actually love their spouses or are simply lashing out due to unhappy marriages, I cannot attempt to guess. Yet it's obvious that the public scandal of sexual infidelity generates understandably bad press for these men, and that claiming a sex addiction allows them to transfer the blame on something other than their own wandering eyes.
Liz — June 1, 2010
Another issue -- for those who do genuinely suffer from this addiction -- is their recovery and their fears they won't have a fulfilling sex life after treatment. Alexandra Katehakis who is a sex therapist and treats those with sex addicition issues has written a book that helps to restore one's sexuality after addiction -- "Erotic Intelligence." The reader is invited into the lives of real people who have survived sex addiction. Both addicts and partners learn from true stories and real-life experiences about how to have fulfilling sexual relationships.