Is Virtual Sex Real Sex?

I get this question a lot. Usually people ask it indirectly, like:

• If I’m in a relationship and have sex online, is that cheating?
• Is it unhealthy if all the sex I’m having is online?
• If I’m going online and having sex as a different gender, does that mean there’s something wrong with me?

All these questions and many others connect to this larger, central one; how does virtual sex fit into our other ways of understanding sex? Or is virtual sex real sex? The problem with this question is that most people ask it as if it’s a concrete question with a simple answer. They don’t recognize that it’s a philosophical question and that the answer reveals much more about the person answering than it does about the nature of sex in virtual spaces.

Confronting these philosophical questions about reality, identity, and consciousness is one of the things that’s so exciting about talking about virtual spaces. Unfortunately while there are lots of thoughtful people trying to address these issues in complicated ways (particularly on sites like Terra Nova) most of them remain silent or simplistic when they talk about sexuality.

What, for example, is the relationship between my sexual interactions in virtual spaces and my sexual fantasy life? For many sex educators and therapists the division between fantasy and reality is a crucial tool in helping people unpack their sexual desires and identities. People ask “does it make me X if I fantasize about Y?” And the response is often “well, if you’re fantasizing about it it doesn’t necessarily make you anything. It may just be a fantasy. If you want to bring this fantasy into real life it may have more significance.”

But what about when we want to bring a fantasy into virtual life? Should that be considered a move towards making it “real”? And if it’s happening with a real person and everyone involved is having real responses, isn’t that enough to make it real?

The future of interactive technologies is only going to lead to further blurring of the lines between virtual and real, fantasy and reality. What I hope is that sexuality doesn’t remain on the sidelines of interest to professionals who are thinking, writing, and talking about these issues. As long as it does the conversation will be left in the hands of the media and the courts; two systems that I’d argue are particularly ill suited to deal with sexuality.

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