INTERESTING - IT REALLY DOESN'T IN THE UK. BOTH TERMS CAN BE USED TO IMPLY OBLIGATIONS EITHER TO ETHICAL ISSUES OR TO OTHER REASONS. AND NEITHER CARRIES A PARTICULAR JARGON USAGE RELATED TO PHILOSOPHY.

My dad teaches some philosophy (although mostly theology), so I shall ask him about this when I see him tomorrow, to see if it's used in the same way in the UK, as it's not something I'm aware of (but then I've never studied philosophy!).

That's not exactly what this thread was started to be about. Maybe if you'd like to have talk about the transcedent ethical/moral standard when it comes to sexuality, you'd like to start a different thread?

How is it not relevant to this thread? There is certainly implied moral standards in the discussion as it pertains to how many partners one has had.

I know it doesn't happen often, but I'm going to agree. I think moral standards are perfectly relevant to a discussion about casual sex, because clearly each person has a point at which they feel someone's sexual pattern becomes unnacceptable to them, and that point is based on their personal moral standards.

As to where those standards come from... I don't think it's as simple as coming from just one place. It may come from their religion, their upbringing, their environment (peer pressure for example), and I guess a lot of people would just say they have a 'feeling' at a certain point that their sexual behavior has crossed the line between what they feel is acceptable and what isn't.

I don't personally believe that casual sex is healthy emotionally, and so I don't have casual sex, because to me (because of my upbringing etc) it feels wrong. I believe sex (and my body) is more precious than that. But I guess I'm not making that decision on a specific moral code... just on what feels right for me personally.

My question is....why does it matter to you how many people someone else has sex with? so what if they've had 100 partners or 10 partners. Why is that any business of yours to judge them because of it? I think the bigger question, rather than the original one posed for this thread, would be why it matters to so many people how many sexual partners another person has had. Even if you happen to be the next person who is going to have sex with that person, as long as they are clean, don't have any STD's, and have protected sex, why would it matter how many others they've been with? Would you just turn around and decide you don't want to have sex with that person anymore because their number of sexual partners is too high according to you?

And if your answer to that last question is yes, my question to you is "Why?"

Because people love being judgmental!

At least I admit it ;D

'why would it matter how many others they've been with? Would you just turn around and decide you don't want to have sex with that person anymore because their number of sexual partners is too high according to you?'

That would bother me, and here's why:
if I loved that person, and I knew they had a lot of sexual partners in their past, I'd be worried that (a) I wasn't good enough in bed, that they had experienced better, and (b) that they could leave me at the drop of a hat. If they have slept with a lot of people, it shows that they don't need to be in love to have sex which would make me wonder if they loved me? I question things too much and I don't think I could deal with it.

Totally, yo!! Maybe it's the narcissists in us, but if someone is going to sleep with me I want to know that they aren't giving it to any old bugger. I need to know that they are doing it with me because I am SPECIAL!! And amazing! And that they chosen me out of all the other dickheads on earth, and they have self-worth and respect for themselves and for myself, and because why would I want to go where heaps of other people's smelly genitals had gone before, yo? ;D

Lmfao nicely put!

I'm sorry but I would not sleep with someone if they had smelly genitals. Gross. Now I can't eat any supper. Thanks Ry. lol

Condoms totally smell, yo! It would be worrying if none of the guys you'd slept with had worn condoms!! :P

Of course they have. So you are saying you don't like the smell of condoms? They have all kind of flavors. lol I'm sure there has to be one that you like.

haha! They always have that underlying smell of... latex! Or whatever it is that condoms are made of. Why does nobody else seemed to have noticed this!? :-o

I'm really sensitive to smell, so maybe it's just me!! haha!

You think the latex ones stink? You ought to smell the sheepskin ones for those with latex allergies. *gag*

I think they smell like a cross between a balloon and a latex glove (no, duh, right? But you know how the powder smells?). But that's just me!
I don't mind it, but that's what it makes me think of. I always want to blow it up and twist it into a balloon animal. :] Haha.

i think they smell disgusting as well!

I've noticed the smell. Nothing that really makes me go 'woah! holy latex!' ;D

I'd have to have the thing practically up my nose to smell it.

i don't know about smell, but the taste of latex makes me want to vomit :-/

I think they smell pretty horrible too, Ryan. lol

Condoms smell? Really? I have never noticed!

GOSH, RYAN, WHENEVER YOU USE A PUBLIC LOO, YOU GO WHERE HEAPS OF OTHER PEOPLE'S SMELLY GENITALS HAVE GONE BEFORE, YO! ;D

Please don't take offense to this, because I do not mean offense in any way. But......
(a) A result of your own fear that really has nothing to do with that person, but your own feelings of inadequacy.
(b) A result of your own fear of rejection.

What's more important: Their past? Or their future?

If you found a man who had 100 partners throughout his lifetime, but he meets you and you get to know each other and he falls so in love with you he wants to be with you, would the number of partners STILL bother you so much? You COULD end up being his LAST partner, because he's trading in his past liaisons for a future with you and only you.

The only reason, IMO, to care about the number of sex partners, is for health reasons. But if they can prove they are clean and safe and won't be passing any STD's on to you, the number just doesn't matter.

I agree, my husband has been with a large amount of women, and before we had sex he got checked for any kind of std, and he was clean. Even though he had been with a large amount of women he has never got an STD. Thank God. But I didn't judge him off his past, just his future. For over 3 years now, he has never cheated on me. When I was a teenager I was someone's first, and they cheated on me many times.