Though presented (I suspect) as a rhetorical question (okay, a rhetorical “wonder”, there being no question mark), if taken seriously it’s an empirical question. Some similarly situated spouses doubtless do, others doubtless don’t, and the distribution of those (and all the intermediate) degrees of toss-giving among the population (or, better, among the various populations) is something at least somewhat susceptible to scientific study. A similar situation no doubt obtains for similarly situated daughters (and sons, etc., etc.).

Absent such studies (actually, I have read some, but don’t have them at hand, couldn’t vouch for them if I did, and don’t want to risk misstating their conclusions; interested readers can find them, and pointers to others, in Kluwer’s Archives of Sexual Behavior, among other recent sources, if they are–probably rightly–too fastidious to handle Kinsey’s work without layers of latex), there is little or no value in Anton’s expressed “doubt” about the number of people who “live in” such a world as he ascribes to Elizabeth Pisani. And there is almost certainly little accurate information about peoples’ sexual behavior (even the behavior of “the people” Anton “know”s) that can be learned directly from the same peoples’ speech behavior (including their “decry”ing of “the death of right and wrong”).

For instance, today’s US news brings us the tit-bit that “At least one in four teenage girls nationwide has a sexually transmitted disease, or more than 3 million teens, according to the first study of its kind in this age group” (an AP wire story). Here “teenage” means 13 to 19, inclusive. What do you make of that, Anton?

I wonder if his wife and children “…give a toss.” And if they do, I wonder if we should care.

I doubt as many people as you claim live in the morals-free, responsibility-free world that you live in Elizabeth. Indeed, the people I know decry the death of right and wrong that you seem so glib about.