Thinking On Sunday:
Mistress Ethics – On the Virtues of Sexual Kindness

Sexual kindness is (sort of) ethical.
– Victoria Brooks

The figure of the mistress is undoubtedly controversial. She provokes intense reactions, ranging from fear, to disgust and revulsion, to excitement and titillation, to sadness and perhaps to some, love. Of course, she is a woman that you would not have as your friend, and certainly not your wife, since her ethical sense, if she even has one, is dubious at best. Dr Victoria Brooks subverts these traditional judgements and offers an unflinching look at the lived experience of the mistress. Here she is recast as a potentially loving, free, intimate ‘other’ woman.

Drawing upon feminist philosophy, contemporary sexual ethics and the current cultural moment of #MeToo, Dr Brooks moves beyond a narrative of infidelity, conventional judgment, the safeguarding of monogamy and conventional heterosex that permeates our society. She asks what happens when we let go of our insecurities, judgments and moralistic relationship philosophies and opt, instead, for an ethics of kindness. This kindness – underpinned by engaging with those deemed ‘other’ and learning from mistresses, both straight and queer – will teach us new ways of thinking about ethics and sex, and reveal how we have better sex, and how we can be better to each other.

Victoria Brooks is a writer and researcher. She is also Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Westminster, London, UK. She is author of Fucking Law: The Search for Her Sexual Ethics (2019). Their latest book Mistress Ethics: On the Virtues of Sexual Kindness will be available on the day.