Sex Was Always Virtual: Part 2

Image credit: Huccio

Yesterday, I began an exploration of Slavoj Zizek’s claim that Sex was always virtual. Being that virtual reality porn and VR sex are the name of the game in these parts, understanding the technology, content, and meaning behind VR porn should be an important consideration. Also, given that VR porn is a new sexual phenomenon that is often frowned upon, it is important to consider and defend the paradigm as it emerges. Zizek’s philosophical perspective does this. Therefore, if anyone disparages or hates on your VR porn habits, you can just say “sex was always virtual.” To find out why read on!

Žižek. Image credit: Jacques Lacan

So as I mentioned yesterday, many people view VR porn as part of the oncoming technological consumption of the human spirit. According to naturalists, anti-technology groups, and religious traditionalists, we, as humans, are becoming corrupted by our technologies both in a biological and moral way.  That said, Zizek says that “sex was always virtual.” This implies that technology is not a problem, it is not ruining the human spirit and not an instrument of our demise as a human race.

As I mentioned yesterday, to understand the importance of Zizek’s words, we have to consider that as an alternative world-view about reality. Zizek’s notion about the virtual bears repeating as it is important to his overall argument. Zizek believes reality has two halves that interact and create each other. These are virtual and actual planes of existence. I will further clarify my explanations from yesterday.

Actual

Following the earlier philosopher Gilles Deleuze, Zizek argues that reality is split between two planes of existence that shape each other. One of such planes is actual. This is the plane where things actually happen. If you meet a beautiful man or woman at a party, Zizek would say a real actual event occurred where a beautiful man or woman was met in a party.

Virtual

On the other hand, if you think about the possibility of meeting a good-looking man or woman at a party, you are thinking about the virtual plane of existence. If meeting such a man or woman was a real possibility, and you went to this party because of said possibility, then we can say that the virtual plane has real consequences.

Image credit: Bodylounger.blogspot and Exii.jp

With this new notion of virtual in mind, we can see that Zizek’s concept is more than the traditional notion of virtual reality which he says is “that of imitating reality, of reproducing its experience in an artificial medium.”

Fantasy

While arguing that reality is split into the virtual and the actual, Zizek also believes that humans fundamentally operate within a world of fantasy. Borrowing from Lacan, Zizek argues that our fantasies structure who we are and what we want. They are very much related to the virtual plane of existence. In fact, our fantasies can be said to exist within the virtual. Connecting fantasy and virtual in the past example is easy. Fantasizing about beautiful women at a party could make you attend a party right?

Antonia Sainz Hardcore – Wild Cowgirl. Image credit: czechvr

Was sex always Virtual?

Now to Zizek’s point. Zizek begins his argument that sex is not that much different from masturbation. He argues that in the case of masturbation, it is just you alone with your fantasy. In the case of VR porn, the video you watch would be your fantasy.

Zizek believes that fantasy is the most important part about sex and masturbation. In both cases, fantasy drives you. You may say, “Hey wait, if I am having sex with my girlfriend then I am not fantasizing.” Well in Zizek’s terms, you are. He argues that when you have sex with your partner, you either thinking of two things, 1) someone else, or 2) a sexual fantasy of your partner.

So even if you are thinking about the specific person you are having sex with at the time, you are thinking of the person from your perspective, an idealized version of the person, and as a result, you are thinking of a fantasy an erotic virtual version of the partner.

Next Door Dani – Wet VR Fucking. Image credit: NaughtyAmericaVR

In this sense, Zizek argues that even when we have sex with a partner, we just use that partner as a masturbatory tool to connect with our fantasies. Given that fantasies are part of the virtual plane, sex is then virtual. Taken as a whole, sex has always been a fantasy focused virtual affair. Using VR porn then is not a strange unnatural perversion that is a symptom of our modern downfall. Instead, it is a tool that we use to connect to our fantasies much like we use other people during sexual acts.