A virtue ethical approach to banning child sex robots

Abstract

This thesis argues that one of the ways that child sex robots can be restricted, is through a virtue ethical framework. Since there is no empirical evidence that their use does harm to actual children, this thesis does not rely on other-regarding arguments. Instead, it argues that using child sex robots is morally harmful to the user because it habituates perverted sexual desire and therefore undermines their flourishing as a human. The thesis then connects this individual harm to moral ecology and argues that legal restriction can be partially justified through moralistic legal paternalism.