A load of tosh — sex addiction is not an illness!
Be warned, there’s a new disease afflicting the nation. no, not a scary infection spread by a mystery microbe. nor a recently discovered genetic condition. It’s sex addiction.
Yes, the very same thing philandering Hollywood stars claim to be suffering from when they get caught straying.
what a load of tosh. Yet this week, charities have been urging the world Health Organisation (WHO) to recognise sex addiction as a bona fide illness.
which prompts the question: has there been some new research that has suddenly confirmed it exists beyond any doubt?
Of course, there hasn’t. It’s far more cynical than that.
The WHO produces the International Classification of diseases (ICD), a manual that lists every officially recognised illness, and the signs and symptoms necessary to make a formal diagnosis. It’s the doctors’ Bible.
a new version is due shortly, and the sex addiction industry — the charities, therapists and rehab clinics — are lobbying hard to have sex addiction included.
why? Because once it’s recognised by WHO, health insurers worldwide will have to cover treatment costs, or in this country, the NHS, providing a guaranteed source of income for all interested parties.
The reality is that there is absolutely no evidence that sex addiction exists as a real illness.
I’m not denying there are people who use sex as a way of numbing themselves to the pain they experience in life, or others for whom casual encounters are a way of avoiding intimacy. Still more may have inappropriate sex to spice up an otherwise boring life or to manage stress.
But that’s not a disease. That’s simply a choice.
I find it sinister and worrying that, by classifying this kind of behaviour as an ‘illness’, people will be stripped of any sense of responsibility for their actions.
‘It wasn’t me, m’lud. It was my condition. I couldn’t help it.’
I’ll say it again: sex addiction isn’t an illness, it’s a weakness.
It’s something that people choose to do. which means they can choose not to do it, too.