The Puritan Fallacy is a 'rat term given to a fault in reasoning by which one which assumes that, because a thing is unpleasant to endure, it must be beneficial. By extension, the Puritan Fallacy assumes that if a thing is pleasurable to endure, it must be harmful.
While this is sometimes coincidentally true, as some pleasurable experiences can certainly be harmful, and vice-versa, it is folly to believe that all things pleasurable are necessarily harmful, or that one can gauge the malevolence or benevolence of a behaviour according to the enjoyment of the participant(s). I counter that most pleasurable behaviours are actually beneficial, and I further theorize that this is due to evolutionary programming; that we are actually built to find beneficial behaviours rewarding. It is nonsensical to believe that our evolutionary ancestors could have survived finding harmful behaviours pleasurable.
As an example of this fallacy, I offer the oft-cited argument that foods that are good for us taste bad, and foods that are bad for us taste good. I simply do not believe this is true; I personally find that widely varied fruits, vegetables and legumes are the most richly rewarding foods to eat. In my life, the healthier I've eaten, the more I've enjoyed my food. I think this confusion stems from the fact that a change in diet can be jarring, and most of us are raised on a rather unhealthy diet.
I also offer as an example the idea that masturbation is a harmful practise, when we have every reason to believe it a harmless activity to engage in, and no reason to believe it to be harmful. The stigma against it is based almost entirely on the premise that it is simply "too" pleasurable and must therefore be harmful somehow (the "how" in this argument is often conveniently overlooked).
This 'rat concept is related to the
Machiavelli Fallacy.