NPR (National Public Radio) recently joined the ever-growing list of media outlets and authors expressing confusion and poorly-veiled condemnation of what they call the "culture of hooking up" a.k.a. "sex without intimacy." According to these no-doubt middle-aged sources, intimacy-free sex is sweeping the nation.

Reminds me of someone's line (can't remember who said it): "Sluts are just people who have more sex than you do."

I think we betray our biases by concluding that this is necessarily sadder, more lonely, or in any way inferior to what it replaces.

First off, it's the journalists who claim there is no intimacy. The people they interview, by and large, simply describe these relationships as being sexual friendships. These are not glory holes in a wall somewhere.

Secondly, there is nothing inherently contradictory between having a period of life marked by casual sex with various people followed later by a more settled sexual pattern dominated by just one or a few partners. In fact, this progression is common in most societies and is likely to result in more satisfying, stable marriages later on.

It seems to me that the major difference being described is the lack of "courtship" and "dating" which are, in essence, negotiations toward marriage. But if neither party is interested in marriage in the near future, why bother with the negotiations?