The word "Rape" divides sex into two broad categories: consensual and non consensual. And it does a good job of it. The word means what it's supposed to mean: non consensual sex. And the distinction it makes between consensual and non consensual sex perfectly addresses it's real concern. What it really does is redefine what sex is. We don't refer to incidences of rape as non consensual sex, because they aren't a kind of sex at all. Sex is now, by definition, consensual.
The term "casual sex" is trying to do something similar. It wants to divide consensual sex into two broad categories: casual and non casual. But it fails. The word casual doesn't mean what it wants it to mean. And the distinction in the definition doesn't address what it's actually concerned with.
words have meaning
Casual can mean informal. You and your wife can go to a casual dinner. But when you sneak off to the bathroom for a quickie, the khakis around your ankles do not change the "non casual" nature of it. The black mass of satanism is formal in both attire and proceedings, but that doesn't make the orgy "non casual".
Casual can mean by chance. You and your wife can have a casual encounter. You can be at your separate jobs and happen to experience sudden and simultaneous arousal and happen to take your lunches at the same time and happen to go to the same restaurant which happens to be deserted and blessing the heavens for this chancest of chance encounters just happen to have the most casually "non casual" burger king bathroom sex ever.
Casual can mean indifferent, irregular or careless. You can have a casual attitude while celebrating the 40'th anniversary of a marriage that's been devoid of passion for decades. After the guests leave, and the lights are out, and the two of you have crawled onto the bed, you can mute the TV, give a sigh and a shrug and say, "you wanna?". Lying there, she can stub out her cigarette with one hand, undo her robe with the other and say, "whatever". But no matter how heart breakingly pleasureless the sex that follows is, it's still "non casual". And no matter how unpredictable the timing of these unfortunate encounters are, they're still "non casual". And no matter how long it's been since the last time you had sex, and no matter how much your wife confuses sex with love, and no matter how little you consider the fact that having sex with her again finally would send her the message that you love her again and get her hopes up unnecessarily and set her up for an inevitable disappointment that might lead to a murder-suicide, it's still "non casual".
you ain't got to lie
What casual absolutely does not mean is, "not involving a love relationship". You can have irregular lunches with your daughter, when you bump into her by chance wearing informal clothing, during which you make careless remarks while playing games of checkers toward which you feel indifferent, all with a girl that you love so dearly that you worked a job you hate for 20 years just for the privilege of feeding, clothing, housing, medicating, and educating her.
"Sex not involving a love relationship", is not what casual sex means. You can be married to some one that you don't love, but no matter how indifferent or even vengeful you are toward your spouse, the sex you have is "non casual". You can also have casual sex with someone that you do love. It could be a close friend and the two of you aren't interested in dating. You can love your friend dearly. You can have a deeper, closer, more intimate, more courageously vulnerable relationship than most couples dream of, but the sex you have is still "casual".
So maybe the definition should be, "sex outside of a dedicated partnership". But what if you and your friend get married. But you don't change your relationship at all. You don't move in together. You don't stop seeing other people. You don't have a marriage relationship by any standard definition of the word. The only thing that changes is the label on your relationship. Magically, your sex isn't "casual" anymore.
The definition of casual sex ought to be something like, "sex outside of a relationship that is publicly labeled as a dedicated partnership". You can call it marriage or civil union or domestic partnership or boyfriend and girlfriend or whatever. What's important is the label, not the relationship. It doesn't matter if you love each other, you just have to get it stamped.
final thoughts
I would like a word that does what casual sex fails to do. I want a word that means "sex without intimacy". I want a word that's so good that its mere existence redefines sex as "sex with intimacy". Sex without it is just enhanced masturbation. If you have no intimacy with your partner, then you're just using the person like a jelly sleeve or a video game. There isn't anything necessarily wrong with it. There's nothing wrong with masturbation. But I want a word that makes it clear, as concisely and indisputably as "rape" makes its point clear, the stark contrast between sex as a celebration of mutual admiration and sex as an autistic hobby. I invite your suggestions.
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