Back in June I outlined how to destroy a culture in 5 easy steps:
Step #1: From Unthinkable to Radical — The first step is the easiest—provided the issue can become a fetish or the topic of an academic symposium. Since both the professoriate and the perverts have a fascination with the faux-transgressive (the truly transgressive [i.e., Christianity] tends to terrify them) all you need to do is get the attention of one of these groups. It doesn’t matter which you start with since the politics of the bedroom and the classroom inevitably overlap.
An academic symposium in Baltimore comprised of just such a cluster of professoriate and perverts is meeting today to shift the acceptance of pedophilia from “unthinkable” to merely “radical”:
If a small group of psychiatrists and other mental health professionals have their way at a conference this week, pedophiles themselves could play a role in removing pedophilia from the American Psychiatric Association’s bible of mental illnesses — the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), set to undergo a significant revision by 2013. Critics warn that their success could lead to the decriminalization of pedophilia.
The August 17 Baltimore conference is sponsored by B4U-ACT, a group of pro-pedophile mental health professionals and sympathetic activists. According to the conference brochure, the event will examine “ways in which minor-attracted persons [pedophiles] can be involved in the DSM 5 revision process” and how the popular perceptions of pedophiles can be reframed to encourage tolerance.
Researchers from Harvard University, the Johns Hopkins University, the University of Louisville, and the University of Illinois will be among the panelists at the conference.
With the euphemism “minor-attracted persons” they are also including Step #2: “From Radical to Acceptable — This shift requires the creation and employment of euphemism.”
Naturally, the pro-pedophilia crowd believes they can achieve Steps #3 and #4 by adopting the same tactics gay rights advocates used:
Berlin has similarly compared society’s reaction to pedophilia to that of homosexuality prior to the landmark 2003 Lawrence v. Texas decision that decriminalized sodomy.
B4U-ACT’s own website puts Berlin’s views front and center. “Just as has been the case historically with homosexuality,” he writes, “society is currently addressing the matter of pedophilia with a balance that is far more heavily weighted on the side of criminal justice solutions than on the side of mental health solutions.”
Remember when conservatives were mocked and derided for claiming that Lawrence would lead to the normalization polygamy and pedophilia? Now some of those same people who sneered at us are using the decision to promote . . . polygamy and pedophilia.
What we consider a slippery slope to social disruption eventually becomes a useful ramp to normalizing degeneracy.
August 17th, 2011 | 1:50 pm
Well, why SHOULD I believe that pedophilia is a mental illness, as opposed to simply an evil act? Plenty of wrongful actions have nothing at all to do with mental illness. Why should we pretend that sexual behavior is the only classification of behavior for which no social norms may be enforced? Seems to me that THAT is the truly insane position. Why should we bow down to psychiatrists to determine what actions are morally acceptable, let alone criminally acceptable? What insight do they have that any other competent adult lacks?
August 17th, 2011 | 2:23 pm
I have only looked into this briefly, but it appears to me the scant coverage here and in the media is seriously distorting the issues. B4U-ACT does not use minor-attracted person and pedophile as synonyms, as everywhere seems to be implied.
Referring to the diagnostic criteria in the DSM IV, persons defined in 1 and 2 above are not pedophiles, and I don’t see any reason for them to be considered pedophiles. It has been widely reported that those working on the DSM V are considering adding a new diagnosis (hebephilia) for attracted to pubescent children who would be classified as pedophiles if they were attracted to prepubescent children. Since the age of consent varies in the United States and Europe from as low as 13 to a high (usually) of 18, an attraction to someone below the age of legal consent varies from one location to another and can hardly be considered a psychiatric disorder. It’s basically just a matter of law enforcement.
B4U-ACT, from what I have read so far, is seeking to “destigmatize” being a “minor-attracted person” only in the context of the therapist-client relationship. They are not attempting to decriminalize sex between adults and minors. They appear to be saying that those who feel an attraction to minors and (1) do not act on it and/or (2) are not troubled by it should not fear bringing it up with a therapist they are seeing for other issues.
It seems to me somewhat analogous to the position of the Catholic Church that it is not sinful in itself to have a homosexual orientation. One of their FAQs for minor-attracted persons is as follows:
So I think it is really a distortion to talk about the symposium as a gathering of people who want to “normalize pedophilia.”
August 17th, 2011 | 2:34 pm
Somewhere our culture as a whole has adopted the idea that sex is good. I think the confusion that sex is love is related to that. I believe that sex is, in itself, neutral. It’s what we do with sex that matters. We contribute to the confusion when we buy into ideas like the common, “Rape is not about sex. It’s about power.” I believe rape is about both. We need to distinguish love from sex in our own minds before we can make sense of our culture’s current disorder.
August 17th, 2011 | 3:21 pm
What we consider a slippery slope to social disruption eventually becomes a useful ramp to normalizing degeneracy.
A slippery slope fallacy is committed when there is no reason to suppose a relationship exists.
It is an error to apply the term “slippery slope” to situations where there is a genuine either-or condition.
If you leave a barn door open, sooner or later all the horses will leave, unless there’s something holding one of them back. It is simply crazy for people to be cowed into the logic that says opening a door will obviously only allow one horse to exit, while the others will – of course! – stay where they’re put.
This is the meaning of integrity: the boundaries of a thing – whether it is a category or a barn – either has integrity or it does not. This is an either-or situation.
Abstract or physical, boundaries and walls operate according to similar rules (which is why the “systems are buildings” metaphor is so deeply ingrained – apparently in every human language). A boundary that is full of holes, or open gates, can’t function.
You can’t have categories at all without boundaries. If you want to have gates or pores in those boundaries, then you need to have some mechanism that controls what is and is not allowed to pass through those gates. Simply opening a door and arguing that only the horses will come through – but the cows will stay where they are – is not a logical argument.
Which is why left wingers who want “progress” tend to rely on ridiculing those who argue with them. Otherwise, how does one argue that cows will stay where they’re put? The whole point is that the reason people who aren’t gay – but do hate sexual boundaries of all kinds – are assuming – and hoping – that they won’t.
August 17th, 2011 | 3:42 pm
Right now, in some dark, lonely corner of the afterlife, Michel Foucault is laughing.
It seems like these folks, instead of taking a page out of the Lawrence v. Texas precedent, are taking a page out of “Madness and Civilization” or “Discipline and Punish.” Those in power, don’t you know, have always kept those benighted pedophiles down. We just need to know the true nature of things, and all will be well!
Disturbing, deeply disturbing.
August 17th, 2011 | 3:48 pm
Blake,
This thread isn’t about gay people.
August 17th, 2011 | 4:03 pm
Is this why we have the Second Amendment?
August 17th, 2011 | 4:14 pm
@David Nickol
If I understand correctly, B4U-ACT defines “minor-attracted” as a superset of pedophilia. Are the other two categories listed in DSM IV. If not, doesn’t that confirm the article Joe points to? The article reports particularly on a Dr. Berlin, an apparent spokesman for B4U-ACT, who may have failed to report active pedophiles he was treating and didn’t think he should have to. Doesn’t that suggest Joe has it right, i.e. not decriminalization but rather normalization?
Maybe what we’re missing here is the range of reporting requirements which may vary by state.
August 17th, 2011 | 4:29 pm
I agree with the first comment. This post’s premise gives WAY too much power and regard to psychiatrists. Pedophilia is wrong — an evil act — becomes it harms children period. Whether it’s a “mental illness” is irrelevant. Now, it’s true this entirely distinguishes pedophilia from homosexual acts between consenting adults. But I would respond: Why is pedophilia wrong? The only answer I can come up with is that it harms children.
August 17th, 2011 | 4:40 pm
“B4U-ACT, from what I have read so far, is seeking to ‘destigmatize’ being a ‘minor-attracted person’ only in the context of the therapist-client relationship.”
Substitute “bishop-priest” for “therapist-client”. Would this group still be ok with “destigmatizing” this unnatural sexual attraction in this circumstance?
August 17th, 2011 | 5:06 pm
The article reports particularly on a Dr. Berlin, an apparent spokesman for B4U-ACT, who may have failed to report active pedophiles he was treating and didn’t think he should have to.
Mike Melendez,
Therapists (and others) are not required to report pedophiles. One of the FAQs on the site is as follows:
I don’t see anything sinister in B4U-ACT. There message seems to be limited to saying that people can be attracted to minors without fitting the definition of pedophile and without engaging in sex with minors, and people can be pedophiles without engaging in sex with minors. (According to the DSM IV, to be diagnosed as a pedophile a person either has to engage in sex with minors, or he or she has to have intense, distressing feelings of attraction. Mandatory reporting laws do not require reporting people who have feelings they do not act on.)
August 17th, 2011 | 5:35 pm
Substitute “bishop-priest” for “therapist-client”. Would this group still be ok with “destigmatizing” this unnatural sexual attraction in this circumstance?
SteveS,
I am afraid I don’t understand the question. It seems to me a patient should be able to report all thoughts and feelings, no matter how antisocial or taboo, to a therapist. That is what therapy is often about.
Now, if a priest reports to a bishop that he (the priest) is attracted to minors, certainly the bishop has an obligation to take any action he considers necessary. If he has very good reason to believe the priest will not act on those feelings, then he may act accordingly. If he has any doubts, he may make sure in some way the priest does not have contact with minors.
In any case, B4U-ACT seems only to be concerned with the therapist-client relationship. And there is not a hint anywhere in their information that they approve of sex between adults and minors or seek to normalize or decriminalize it.
It is the same message as Christianity, it seems to me, in that it is no sin to be tempted to do something as long as you don’t give in to the temptation. Christianity assumes temptation along with the ability always to resist it.
If someone is tempted to murder his wife, he is not a murderer unless he does it. If a woman is tempted to cheat on her husband, she is not an adulteress unless she goes through with it. If a patient discusses with a therapist feelings he has about wanting to kill his wife, the therapist is not required to report the husband as a possible murderer unless he has reason to believe the husband will actually commit the murder. The same is true of a person who tells a therapist he or she is attracted to minors.
August 17th, 2011 | 5:41 pm
Blake,
A thought provoking comment. I’m mulling your thoughts over as they relate to a number of issues.
August 17th, 2011 | 7:55 pm
Does B4U-ACT want to actually remove pedophilia from the DSM, or simply revise the entry? The linked brochure doesn’t mention removing it. I’m not sure where that idea is coming from. Quoting from the brochure, these are the issues to be addressed:
I do see the question of “whether hebephilia should be considered a disorder” there. That seems reasonable enough assuming that hebephilia is construed to mean attraction to minors who have reached sexual maturity. I do not see any suggestion that true pedophilia (attraction to prepubescent children) should be removed from the DSM.
What is somewhat disturbing perhaps is the idea that the mentally ill themselves should have some “input” on the categorization of their own disorders. The seems to me to be the very definition of “the inmates running the asylum.” This presentation on “Decriminalizing Mental Disorder Concepts” seems to be closest to the sort of social activism that Mr. Carter is concerned about.
You will see as well that it is the director of B4U-ACT, a Dr. Richard Kramer, who apparently has no institutional affiliation or academic rank beyond being the director of B4U-ACT, who gets the last word, with his presentation on “The DSM and Stigma.” Dr. Kramer seeks to “present an analysis of ways in which the DSM has contributed to the stigmatization of people who are
attracted to minors (MAPs), discouraging them from seeking mental health services when they are needed.”
Now, I don’t want to discourage anyone from seeking mental health services. Dr. Kramer’s heart is probably in the right place here as he ostensibly views pedophilia as an illness, but is concerned that people are afraid of admitting it to health care practitioners. This may, indeed, lead such people to giving in to their desires, if they do not have any assistance in controlling them.
However, there may be side effects to destigmatization, such as a more nonchalant attitude toward pedophilia, which may end up increasing it overall even after the effects of greater medical attention have been accounted for.
It is possible that Dr. Kramer has not considered these side-effects; it is also possible that he is engaging in subterfuge to assault the Christian ethics he sees perhaps as neurotic and reactionary. My opinion is that he is simply trying to drum up business for psychiatrists and doesn’t care very much either way.
Let’s see what else is on the bill… we have Jacob Breslow, B.A. (hey, I have a B.A. too…) presenting Sexual Alignment: Critiquing Sexual Orientation, The Pedophile, and the DSM V. Jacob Breslow, B.A. is an LSE graduate student in “Gender Research,” so I think we can all tell where this one’s heading. “Approaches these revisions from within the critiques made by queer youth activism as well as feminist and anti-racist …” etc., etc. If you’re wondering what the connection is between psychiatry and anti-racism… well, you’re obviously not cool enough to go to this conference.
Some of the presentations here seem appropriately dry, sober, and scientific, such as Dr. Lisa Cohen’s (from Beth Israel) on Identifying the Psychobiological Correlates of Pedophilic Desire and Behavior: How Can We Generalize Our Knowledge Beyond Forensic Samples?. I guess that, rather than “youth activism” is the sort of thing I have in mind when I think of medical conferences, but I only have a B.A.
August 17th, 2011 | 8:42 pm
NOT on my watch. Now our society is willing to sell out children to the highest bidder? Oh, wait a minute, that’s already happening with internet porn sites!
Unless people who don’t buy into relativism start speaking/yelling, this is just going to get worse. Yes, I know, we thought a couple of years ago it couldn’t get any worse. Well it has!
I’m tired of hearing ‘everything’ wrong/evil is a disease or syndromne. I say, enough!
August 17th, 2011 | 9:37 pm
Any sick individual that tries “normalizing” pedophilia with my kid will get a dose of Mossberg’s guaranteed cure-all.
August 17th, 2011 | 11:27 pm
Blake – Is “consenting adults” a boundary?
August 17th, 2011 | 11:29 pm
I was reading Marcus Aurelius “Mediatations.” In his chapter on the people who had an influence on him, he makes the following comment about one of the truly great Roman emperors, Antonius Pius. Marcus stated that he admired Antonius Pius because he “overcame his desire for boys.”
August 18th, 2011 | 1:04 am
[...] . . First Things: How to Normalize Pedophilia in 5 Easy Steps . . [...]
August 18th, 2011 | 2:24 am
@ another brian
I like how we made it a whole seven posts before somebody recommended lynching people based on sensationalist reporting.
I can feel the love and tolerance.
August 18th, 2011 | 4:25 am
Call me skeptical of this post, but let us presume for a moment that this is all correct, and that allowing for homosexuals (legally) creates a building block for the (eventual / inevitable) legalization of pedophilia.
I’m interested in how you expect those pushing this agenda to breach the issue of consent. Legally speaking, one of the most important elements of a ‘child’ is their inability to give consent. Since children cannot consent, and non-consensual sex is rape, even if it were legal to have sex with a minor, it would still be rape in all occurrences, would it not?
Is there some loophole I’m missing here? Because it seems that unless we redefine children as able to give consent (a matter which is not supported by any research) or legalize rape, this should never be an issue.
I certainly understand the concern; we should be vigilant to protect children, but the wording of this post seems to be much less about pedophilia, and much more about establishing pedophilia as a necessary consequence to homosexuality, to create a (stronger) case to repeal the progress of the gay rights lobbies, and I’m not certain that this was your intent.
August 18th, 2011 | 6:01 am
[...] Well, we are slipping and sliding on that same slippery slope. That’s the point made by Joe Carter, who analyzes the latest effort to de-stigmatize pedophilia; that is, to use a more [...]
August 18th, 2011 | 7:52 am
I do find it interesting that Joe Carter, who elsewhere yesterday questioned the accuracy of “the media,” seems to take at face value an article in The Daily Caller!
August 18th, 2011 | 8:01 am
“I’m interested in how you expect those pushing this agenda to breach the issue of consent.”
Yes.
The tendency in western society, though not yet complete, and often slow, is to protect children rather than liberate their oppressors. We don’t need to exalt the anti-gay meme in order to protect minors. And we can pretty much discredit any attempts to do so.
August 18th, 2011 | 9:16 am
So far as the criminal law is concerned, there appear to have been three elements at work in criminalising sexual acts with minors.
1) Intercourse with pre-pubescent girls was considered a species of sodomy, in both French and Scots law, broadly defined as “emission seminis in vaso praepostero.” I believe this comes from the Canon Law.
2) The element of corrupting the young; in Scotland “seducing and debauching the minds of girls under the age of puberty (or young boys) to lewd, indecent and libidinous practices” is indictable. This is Roman and similar provisions are found in Article 227-22 of the Code Pénal.
3) The issue of consent: thus, in both France and Scotland, where the age of consent is 15 and 16 respectively, abuse of authority (even without violence, constraint, threat or surprise) will make sexual acts with a minor criminal).
The first element obviously could not survive the abolition of religious offences, like blasphemy, sodomy and witchcraft on 25 September 1791. The Vichy régime, however, did raise the age of consent for homosexual acts to 21, not a precedent likely to commend itself to anyone.
The second and third elements both remain important concerns of government, regardless of whether or not the offender is suffering from a recognized mental illness
August 18th, 2011 | 10:30 am
David Nickol quotes from another source: “They require only that therapists report illegal sexual behavior, suspicions of such behavior, or plans to engage in such behavior.”
Since I asked about active pedophiles, apparently there is a reporting requirement. Did you miss the word “active” in my question? My next question is does B4U-ACT want that requirement to go away so the people treated can feel less stigma? I imagine that too straightforward a question to get more than a circumlocution.
Clearly the act completes the “crime” given the act is criminalized. As long as pedophilia is a crime, how does one destigmatize the attraction? I don’t think editing the DSM will do that.
Completely a sideshow, I don’t understand why hebephilia would be a mental illness. The boundaries are just too indistinct. Otherwise, powerful males in their 40s getting a trophy wife in her early 20s would be part of it. As a crime, statutory rape and sexual harassment seem to cover it as well as it can be.
August 18th, 2011 | 10:48 am
It seems to me that during the past few decades when tolerance of gays and others formerly ostracized for certain sexual behaviors has increased dramatically, there has been an increase, not a decrease, in the severity of measure taken against offenders who have sex with minors: mandatory reporting laws, registering of sex offenders, restrictions on where offenders not in prison may live, stricter sentences, Amber Alerts, Megan’s Law. In 2008, the age of consent in Canada was raised from 14 to 16. I don’t believe in the past decade there has been any successful attempt in Europe or the Americas to lower the age of consent.
The crime of adults having sex with underage youths depends not at all on how the current DSM classifies pedophilia or the forthcoming one changes the classification.
Over the past few decades, there has been a very successful campaign to remove the moral stigma from alcoholism and treat it as a disease rather than a moral failing. However during that time, laws against drunk driving became significantly more severe, not less so.
The fear that some change in attitude in the mental health profession toward people who are attracted to minors will somehow translate into laws that will decriminalize adult-minor sexual relationships seems entirely unfounded to me.
August 18th, 2011 | 11:23 am
“Blake – Is “consenting adults” a boundary?”
Yes, just a barrier as potentially permeable as any other.
August 18th, 2011 | 11:59 am
Since I asked about active pedophiles, apparently there is a reporting requirement. Did you miss the word “active” in my question?
Mike Melendez,
Actually, I did miss the word active, for which I apologize. I had read the FAQs about reporting requirements before I read your message—obviously not carefully enough—and reproduced the “answer” from the web site too hastily to see I was not addressing what you specifically asked.
My next question is does B4U-ACT want that requirement to go away so the people treated can feel less stigma? I imagine that too straightforward a question to get more than a circumlocution.
I see absolutely nothing on their web site to lead me to believe that B4U-ACT is pushing for repeal of laws for the mandatory reporting of active pedophiles, let alone the legalization of sex with minors. If you find something to that effect, I would be interested to see it. On their web site is a statement about confidentiality that includes the following:
I suppose some might interpret this as warning the patient, “Don’t tell us if you do any of this, or we will have to report it to the police.” But it seems to me you can’t have a doctor-patient relationship if the patient doesn’t know the ground rules of confidentiality.
As I said above, people have all kinds of impulses that we expect them to resist. Men who find women other than their wives attractive need not be considered in the same class as adulterers. I would not recommend doing this, but someone who says, “If you weren’t a woman, I’d punch you,” would probably not be looked on kindly, but he couldn’t be accused of violence against women. As I am sure you are aware, the Catholic Church says of homosexuality:
I read that to say that chaste homosexual persons should not be stigmatized.
Completely a sideshow, I don’t understand why hebephilia would be a mental illness. The boundaries are just too indistinct. Otherwise, powerful males in their 40s getting a trophy wife in her early 20s would be part of it.
Hebephilia refers to attraction to pubescent young people—that is, those going through puberty. The age range would be about 11 to 14. Ephebophilia refers to attraction to those 15-19. Actually, to be psychiatric disorders, more must be present than attraction. Here are the diagnostic criteria for pedophilia:
It is B4U-ACT’s contention that there are a significan number of “minor attracted persons” who do not meet criterion B—that is, they never act on their attraction and do not find it distressing—and therefore they are not pedophiles.
August 18th, 2011 | 12:22 pm
What’s the address, date and time of this conference?
August 18th, 2011 | 12:53 pm
David Nickol writes very clearly and I appreciate his comments, which I may not convey clearly since the following is all criticism. He writes: “It is the same message as Christianity, it seems to me, in that it is no sin to be tempted to do something as long as you don’t give in to the temptation. Christianity assumes temptation along with the ability always to resist it.” This statement is true but what your wrote following contradicts the Sermon on the Mount.. You wrote that merely being tempted to kill one’s wife does not make one a murderer but Christianity is more radical than that. A man who calls his brother a fool is in danger of the fires of hell and a man who looks at a woman lustfully commits adultery with her in her heart. You seem to conflate the criminal code with Christian teaching which is a much higher standard. If the Catholic Church teaches acceptance of a nested, recurrent temptation to think and do wrong they ought to consult the Scriptures more carefully and teach a confrontation of one’s deceitful desires.
In your earliest your wrote: “They appear to be saying that those who feel an attraction to minors and (1) do not act on it and/or (2) are not troubled by it should not fear bringing it up with a therapist they are seeing for other issues” but this is an alteration of what you quoted in the same post which does not exclude those who have acted on their sexual desires for minors. I wonder why you softened their language.
Other general thoughts on this thread: The mental health solution to homosexuality was to stop calling it a problem, stranding those who want freedom from homosexual desires from whatever possible help a therapist might render, something which, of course, Freud would not have done.
It is fully worth considering whether pro-pedophilia groups will be able to make inroads using some of the tactics which were successful for advocacy for homosexuality in the eventual decriminalization of sodomy.
If “hebephilia” were no longer classified as a disorder, then that would exert substantial “scientific” pressure for decriminalization of sex with minors and whether it should be classified as a disorder is put on the table as a question in this conference. The involvement of minor-attracted persons in the classification process implies already a bias in the direction of that process. I agree with Patrick’s comment: “What is somewhat disturbing perhaps is the idea that the mentally ill themselves should have some “input” on the categorization of their own disorders. The seems to me to be the very definition of ‘the inmates running the asylum’“
The declassification of “hebephilia” as a disorder would of course cause an removal of resources for people seeking help to overcome such desires and would stigmatize them doing so, like homosexuals are now stigmatized for seeking help to overcome same-sex attraction.
I’m not sure that this is pertinent here but I think sex offender laws do need to be scrutinized. There seem to be cases proliferating where people are branded for life with the scarlet letters SO in a manner which ends up being a strange and unfitting punishment perhaps in many cases. Nowhere in the Bible does it say we should brand people with a scarlet letter and while I understand that there is something to be said for protecting the public against repeat offenders, the labeling of SO seems to far surpassing this practical purpose in its application.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:01 pm
The tendency in western society, though not yet complete, and often slow, is to protect children rather than liberate their oppressors. We don’t need to exalt the anti-gay meme in order to protect minors.
And yet gay marriage requires changing the priority of interests in child custody cases – taking away the rights of the child.
Specifically: the right to have a relationship and be supported by both biological parents, except when severing this right is deemed to be in a child’s best interest.
Another right the child loses: the right to be the one whose well-being is the first priority, at the center of, any custody decisions.
Gay marriage relies on prioritizing the rights and needs of parents as first, “over” that of the child. The child is bumped down to second class.
Right now, the norm is biological kinship, and custody decisions are done by a judge who rules according to the child’s best interest. But “gay rights” requires – is impossible without – a change whereby the norm of biological kinship is no longer viewed as a norm, and where custody decisions are not centered around the child.
The child is reduced to the status of a living commodity – with legal rights more akin to a pet than a child. Instead of having rights as an equal stakeholder, the burden of proof shifts so that parents have the right to do whatever they want to a child – even at the expense of what the child has reason to value, or at the expense of the child’s well-being – even going so far as to permit the transfer of custody-for-cash, selling babies in whole or in part – unless someone proves that the child is actually harmed by the parents’ intended actions..
And then, just to top it off, is the question of who will prove that the child is harmed? Because it’s also a tenet of gay rights that the act of advocating on behalf of the child is itself an act of bigotry..
So how can you say that making sexual desires the first priority does not threaten children? We have already crossed the line where the sexual needs of adults is legally prioritized over the well-being, legal rights, and basic human rights* of children.
*basic human rights: the right to be free from exploitation is classed as a basic human right in several systems.
The act of having a court rule on the fate of an individual becomes exploitation when the desires of the person paying cash for that individual are prioritized over the individual’s well-being. (Whether or not “harm” is proved, we all have a right to not be sold, and when we are in the care of guardians, we have a right to expect those guardians to account for our well-being.)
August 18th, 2011 | 1:06 pm
Blake,
I haven’t had a chance to read all the comments coming since yesterday, but I think this column by Ross Douthat gets at the barn door situation you talked about yesterday.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:13 pm
I’m not sure that this is pertinent here but I think sex offender laws do need to be scrutinized. There seem to be cases proliferating where people are branded for life with the scarlet letters SO in a manner which ends up being a strange and unfitting punishment perhaps in many cases.
I agree: the way we are handling these cases is bad in at least two ways. (1) it isn’t effective; it fails to protect minors; it does not stop the crime or fix the problem. (2) it brands people in ways that really destroys any ability or incentive to be anything other than a despised criminal living outside of human society.
This is a situation that has the opportunity to teach us something about what justice really is and why it’s important. It’s also a moment where Christians can think about what it means to love the sinner but hate the sin.
We must do everything within our power to prevent this crime from occurring. We must protect minors, and we cannot tolerate this as an action, nor can we simply treat crimes that have already happened as no big deal.
Yet, at the same time, simply scapegoating the perpetrator is neither effective nor just. Some sex offenders may “deserve” to be thrown into a living hell, but if that’s the case we ought to put them in prison for life – not let the man go because his sentence is served, but then try to make him keep on “paying”.
If a man’s sentence is up, then we need to let go of the part about punishing him. We do however still need to concern ourselves with the question of protecting others from him – but we need to do this in the most humane way, not in a vicious, scapegoating way. The time and place for punishment is not after a man has served his time.
At the very least, we ought to offer some alternative for the man who wants to ‘go straight’ but has no options. I have heard stories (I do not know if they are accurate) about men who have volunteered or asked for chemical cures, castration, etc. – if this is the case, then it is particularly unjust to keep using these men as scapegoats.
We must ask ourselves, “what do we expect of these men?” – to simply expect that because they bear the curse, they must therefore endure a status as our permanent jack-o-lent, is not fair. If we can’t simply feel safe letting these men go in society, then we should think about where we want him to go, and what we want him to do; we should offer him an alternative better than simply camping in a trash heap in the woods where he has no way of providing for himself beyond dumpster-diving.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:15 pm
Note on above post: I should say, man or woman.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:17 pm
Blake,
This thread isn’t about gay people.
I was speaking of sexual boundaries in general.
I assume that there are two groups: those who are in favor of sexual limits and boundaries, and those who are in favor of eradicating sexual limits and boundaries.
I see it as all one and the same. I apologize if my assumptions are inappropriate.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:24 pm
Blake:
You seem to be jumping all over the place.
I’m assuming that your concern for child custody must come from two cases: Separation (Divorce) and Adoption.
“Specifically: the right to have a relationship and be supported by both biological parents”
In the case of Separation, I fail to see how this is any different for a remarried Gay couple versus a Heterosexual one. In any case of divorce, having both parents involved in the relationship is usually considered, unless one parent is a danger.
In the case of adoption, well, the child wouldn’t have their biological parents anyway, regardless of who their adoptive parents are.
“Because it’s also a tenet of gay rights that the act of advocating on behalf of the child is itself an act of bigotry.”
Again, I’m really confused about what kind of scenario you’re talking about here — it seems to be adoption related.
I could see agreeing with you if the number of children up for adopt was very limited, but the reality is the opposite. While what you seem to be arguing is that “children should be given to Heterosexual couples instead of Homosexual couples”; but the problem is a lack of interest in adopting and so advocating against Gay couples adopting is really advocating against the Child being adopted.
I don’t know if there’s any material that shows that children are happier, healthier or more well adjusted in a Heterosexual home versus a Homosexual home, but there is a great deal of study on how well children fair in an orphanage or foster homes versus a permanent adopted home; and it’s always pretty clear that being adopted is vastly superior to growing up an orphan.
Could you maybe elaborate your points and clarify?
August 18th, 2011 | 1:26 pm
Blake,
Apropos to your points, I noted the following in an article that appeared in the Chicago Tribune recently on the state’s decision to stop referring adoption services to Catholic Charities in the wake of the passage of the IL civil union law.
Here’s a zinger towards the end of the Tribune article:
Well, well, well. From Illinois’ admission to the Union in 1818 up through a month or so ago, the best care and welfare of children allowed the church to place children with mothers and fathers. And then, in an instant, what was best for children changed completely. I’m imagining a little conversation I’d like to have:
Question for Ziegler: What changed?
Ziegler: The Illinois Religious Freedom Protection and Civil Union Act is what changed.
Question: But that law didn’t even address children or what’s best for their welfare. What happened that changed the best interests of children?
Ziegler: A gay couple in a committed civil union is just as capable of raising a child as any…
Question: I’m sorry, I’m not making myself clear. Last month it was in the best interests of children to allow the church to place them in families with mothers and fathers. Today, the state says that that is no longer in the child’s best interest. What happened over the past month that changed what was in the best interests of children?
Ziegler: The old laws were prejudicial against homosexuals and it is not healthy for innocent children to be denied loving, adoptive parents who happen to be gay.
Question: But if that’s true, then wouldn’t that have been true all along?
Ziegler: Absolutely.
Question: Ah, so nothing has changed in terms of what’s best for children; it’s just that the previous law allowing the Catholic Church to participate in adoption services was bad for children. Or to put it another way, the State of Illinois has declared that previous laws allowing the Catholic Church to participate in state adoption services was bad for children. The Illinois Religious Freedom Protection and Civil Union Act corrected that two-millennia old corruption and has officially declared the Catholic Church as universally harmful to children.
Ziegler: Look, I answered your question. I have to go.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:28 pm
“If ‘hebephilia’ were no longer classified as a disorder, then that would exert substantial ‘scientific’ pressure for decriminalization of sex with minors and whether it should be classified as a disorder is put on the table as a question in this conference.”
But your consequentialist comment begs the question as to whether “hebephilia” is a disorder to begin with.
What is meant by “hebephilia”? Someone attracted to a post pubescent but underaged teen? Someone who is exclusively or predominately attracted to them? I understand why attraction to prepubescents would be categorized as a “disorder” (and indeed it does seem to be a separate sexual orientation). But I am extremely skeptical on “hebephilia.” People have all sorts of preferences and fetishes; some are more attracted to redheads, to various races, and ethnic types, hairstyles and so on. So it wouldn’t surprise me if a fetish for underaged teens existed. However, as I understand, if one is attracted to adults as opposed to children there is no magic boundary that makes one not attracted to someone until they reach the age of consent. It’s still wrong to have consensual sex with someone under-aged because it harms the under-aged teen. But if we really want to go there with this idea of a “disorder” for lusting after an underaged teen, history is likely to disturb us. Teen marriages were not uncommon in the past. For most of “Judeo-Christian” or Western history as long as the teens reached puberty and the sex took place in the context of a marriage, it was not viewed as “disordered” or “wrong” if one or both of the parties were under late 20th early 21st Cen. ages of “consent.” And we could probably compile a shocking list of notable figures from history involved in such marriages.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:30 pm
EDB,
You write:
Where do you get your information? The demand by heterosexual couples looking to adopt babies far outstrips the supply.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:32 pm
If there is a linkage to the decriminalization of sodomy and the lowering of the age of consent, one would have expected this to have happened in Europe, where it was decriminalized in France and then in the wake of Napoléon’s armies over 200 years ago.
On the contrary, the age has been everywhere raised.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:33 pm
“Hebephilia refers to attraction to pubescent young people—that is, those going through puberty. The age range would be about 11 to 14. Ephebophilia refers to attraction to those 15-19. Actually, to be psychiatric disorders, more must be present than attraction. Here are the diagnostic criteria for pedophilia:…”
Interesting; I thought Hebephilia and Ephebophilia were the same thing. Again, I think it’s wrong to have sex with someone under the age of consent because it harms the underaged actor, but I think it’s ridiculous that Ephebophilia, by the above definition is categorized as a “disorder?” Being attracted to a 19 year old is a “disorder”? Gimme a break.
August 18th, 2011 | 1:39 pm
[...] and their apologists have now taken the first step, Carter writes in a new piece here). Share this:ShareEmailPrintDiggFacebookStumbleUponLinkedInTwitterRedditLike this:LikeBe the first [...]
August 18th, 2011 | 1:47 pm
E D B
For the fiscal year 2010, the State Department’s figures show 11,059 incoming international adoptions in the United States and 43 outgoing international adoptions. This does not include over 1,000 Haitian children admitted under special arrangements, following the earthquake
If there is a surplus of children available for adoption in the United States, why are so many families prepared to go through the arduous process of international adoption?
August 18th, 2011 | 1:48 pm
Other general thoughts on this thread: The mental health solution to homosexuality was to stop calling it a problem, stranding those who want freedom from homosexual desires from whatever possible help a therapist might render, something which, of course, Freud would not have done.
David Alexander,
You raise a number of interesting points that I can’t (or at least shouldn’t) take the time to answer right now, but your comment about Freud made me think of the famous Letter to an American Mother, which I reproduce below. I don’t think Freud’s thinking about homosexuality was dramatically different from that of the psychiatric community’s today, except he thought he knew the etiology, and few today would make that claim.
August 18th, 2011 | 2:22 pm
Ephebophilia, by the above definition is categorized as a “disorder?” Being attracted to a 19 year old is a “disorder”? Gimme a break.
I think if ephebophilia were classified as a disorder (which it isn’t), it would be for people no matter how old who found they were exclusively attracted to teenagers and could not conceive of a sexual relationship with someone their own age. So if a man and woman marry at the age of 18, and ten years later, one spouse is still sexually attracted only to 18-year-olds, that would be a disorder. In the DSM IV, it is pretty much the case that to be a disorder, something has to cause the person distress or get them into trouble. If an extreme version of Hugh Hefner found himself attracted only to 18- and 19-year-olds, had an unlimited supply of them, and was happy to dump each successive one on her 20th birthday, he wouldn’t have a psychiatric disorder. For someone else who wants to get married (or is married) and be an adult with children, it would be a disorder to be sexually attracted only to teenagers.
August 18th, 2011 | 2:57 pm
Douglas Johnson, Michael PS
A number of sites I’ve come across list that:
* A Large sum of children in foster care go unadopted every year (http://civilliberty.about.com/od/gendersexuality/ig/Lesbian-and-Gay-Rights-101/Gay-Adoption-Rights.htm)
* Only a small sum of children who are not yet in foster care get adopted anyway (http://www.chacha.com/question/how-many-children-go-unadopted-a-year)
One of the main claims I have heard is that people choose to adopt from outside the country because they wish to adopt younger children — those who have been in the system longer can be more difficult to rear (due to attachment problems, specifically). This means that older children are often passed over and thus remain in unhealthy transitive environments until they are adults.
I can’t claim the veracity of these sources, but I haven’t found much in the way of contradicting statistics anywhere else. I’d love to see something that says otherwise, if anyone has something applicable.
August 18th, 2011 | 2:59 pm
Oculus III
August 17th, 2011 | 9:37 pm
Any sick individual that tries “normalizing” pedophilia with my kid will get a dose of Mossberg’s guaranteed cure-all.
=========
The more society normalizes pedophilia, ephebophilia, homosexuality, promiscuity, prostitution, pornography, etc., the more harm there will be in general. Even if you succeed in protecting your kids, it will only increase the chance of other more vulnerable kids being abused.
The other comment I have to make refers to the particularly sorry state of liberal attitudes towards sexual violence, exploitation, etc. While some preoccupation is given when the targets refer to minors, basically many forms of exploitative, perverse, and degrading sexual attitudes and behaviors towards adults are encouraged and promoted, not to mention completely excused or denied.
August 18th, 2011 | 3:06 pm
David Nickol,
ah, well it does seem from that letter that while Freud believed some might be change from homosexuality and supposedly would be for helping persons to do this if they desired, he also was perhaps one might say therapeutically beginning its destigmatization. It is interesting how he commends Haveloc Ellis in that letter. Ellis wrote. “I foresee the positive denial of all positive morals, the removal of all restrictions. I feel I do not know what license, as we should term it, may not belong to the perfect state of Man.” Theodore Dalrymple summed up Ellis’s belief in this regards nicely:
“Once freed from all restraint—social, moral, legal, and political—man would regain his natural beauty and generosity of character. He would become again the noble sexual savage. It never occurred to Ellis and his ilk that he might become instead the prototypical caveman of the cartoonists, dragging off his mate of the moment by the hair.”
A question I have as I read this thread is whether the whole enterprise of therapy left to its own lights is a process of undermining moral stances and perhaps its greatest successes are due to a framework of morals it did not provide for itself. I think Philip Rieff was right to criticize Freud as only having a “Yes,” never, a no, never a divine interdict, to put it in crude summary. Perhaps Freudian psychology is a “universal acid” that dissolves all “No,” all “taboo.”
August 18th, 2011 | 3:26 pm
“I think if ephebophilia were classified as a disorder (which it isn’t), it would be for people no matter how old who found they were exclusively attracted to teenagers and could not conceive of a sexual relationship with someone their own age.”
Aside from the harm done to the underaged actor, the pedo, hebo, ephebo phile has another big problem. One of the many things that distinguish homosexuality from an orientation to have relations with the under-aged is a person attracted to only the under-aged could never find a soul-mate. Eventually within a few years, the under-aged actor would be of age and hence would have to be discarded for someone under-aged.
August 18th, 2011 | 3:41 pm
Could you maybe elaborate your points and clarify?
The point is that there is already a case where sexual needs are prioritized over a child’s well-being, so you can’t very well argue that it’s impossible.
There is a conflict between what gays want vs. what is best for a child. A custody decision based on what is good for the child, and based on recognizing and honoring what is in a child’s interests, cannot honestly conclude, ceteris paribus, that a gay couple is as good as a hetero couple.
You could say that a good gay couple is better than an abusive or damaged hetero couple. A particualar gay couple might be a better home for a child than a particular hetero couple. But ultimately gay marriage relies on saying more than that: it requires everyone – including the child – to deny that there is or can be any value in having both a mother and a father, as opposed to two of one and none of the other.
And that’s not good for a child even according to the same standards gays use for themselves: gays recognize the role of relationships, and of truth itself, and of how family and truth and taboo impacts a person’s identity, integrity, and, ultimately, happiness.
And that’s just in the case of adoption. In cases where gays actively use adulterous processes as reproductive strategies, they compound the lie that “mothers and fathers are identical and interchangeable” with a new one: that biological ties and links don’t matter.
Adoption is about doing what is best for a child. It is for emergency use only. Gay marriage brings up a new problem: they don’t want to adopt, they want to “have their own” baby. That means they need to find a “disposable” mother or father to use (the dehumanizing terms are “sperm/egg donor” and “gestational carrier”, but surveys of IVF kids reveal that the kids do recognize these people are their true parents).
Again: this is possible because, the argument is, “gays have rights”.
The full train of logic is something like this:
Now explain to me why that should apply to a gay person, but not a pedophile.
Did the pedophile ask to be that way? Hmmm?
BTW I do not have any problem with gays adopting, if the children in question are not likely to get adopted by an intact family. My problem is, specifically, with abolishing the distinction between those would-be adoptive families that are able and willing to do whatever is best for the child, vs. those would-be adoptive families who are not – but who justify it by arguing that (a) there are lots of kids so therefore there’s no point in having standards, and/or (b) as long as there are other, worse, bad parents in the world, making bad parenting choices is OK.
August 18th, 2011 | 3:46 pm
Blake – Is “consenting adults” a boundary?
If it is, it’s already breached.
Today schoolteachers and other “helping” professionals are actively encouraging sex between children. They pass out condoms, defend sexually explicit material aimed at children, and argue, straight-faced, that there is no point not encouraging sexuality in children, because it’s going to happen whether we accept this fact or not.
August 18th, 2011 | 3:48 pm
David Nickol
August 17th, 2011 | 3:48 pm
Blake,
This thread isn’t about gay people.
===========
What a sad case of denial.
“Naturally, the pro-pedophilia crowd believes they can achieve Steps #3 and #4 by adopting the same tactics gay rights advocates used:
Berlin has similarly compared society’s reaction to pedophilia to that of homosexuality prior to the landmark 2003 Lawrence v. Texas decision that decriminalized sodomy.”
August 18th, 2011 | 11:04 pm
Blake,
I agree with you about SO labeling. It has become a real issue, an injustice, in many cases.
I also agree with your point about IVF. It is a clear case of putting children’s rights over adults where children reasonably should receive the greater consideration. You wrote:
“they don’t want to adopt, they want to “have their own” baby. That means they need to find a “disposable” mother or father to use (the dehumanizing terms are “sperm/egg donor” and “gestational carrier”, but surveys of IVF kids reveal that the kids do recognize these people are their true parents).”
This is a clear case where our society is choosing to decadently trivialize children’s natural, good and right desire for their biological parents. The adult desire to have the experience of child bearing should not be placed over the child’ s greater need for both biological parents. IVF by means of donors should be outlawed for the sake of the children. As Theodore Dalrymple wrote, “”One definition of decadence is the concentration on the gratifyingly imaginary to the disregard of the disconcertingly real.” Trying to serve the “gratifyingly imaginary” desires of adults rather than the disconcertingly real needs of children is decadent and cruel.
August 18th, 2011 | 11:05 pm
I mean putting parents’ rights over children.
August 19th, 2011 | 12:44 am
Blake –
You can argue with the approach and results of the policies such as making condoms available, but the claim is that it’s more like airbags and crumple zones for the inevitable car accidents, rather than encouragement.
August 19th, 2011 | 3:41 am
This is a clear case where our society is choosing to decadently trivialize children’s natural, good and right desire for their biological parents. The adult desire to have the experience of child bearing should not be placed over the child’ s greater need for both biological parents. IVF by means of donors should be outlawed for the sake of the children. As Theodore Dalrymple wrote, “”One definition of decadence is the concentration on the gratifyingly imaginary to the disregard of the disconcertingly real.” Trying to serve the “gratifyingly imaginary” desires of adults rather than the disconcertingly real needs of children is decadent and cruel.
============
I would say that the gratifying aspect is very real in decadence, that’s why decadence is so intensely pursued.
It’s exactly because people pursue disoriented gratifications that they disregard other real and disconcerting aspects of reality.
With the question of IVF, I believe it needs to be assessed on a case-by-case basis.
The day society institutes a thorough evaluation system for approving all adults for having babies and being parents, it will be in a position to dictate such laws to couples or single people with infertility problems.
Why should an abusive adult be allowed to have children simply because they biologically can do so? They have no right to it. Yet, they are completely free to do so under current laws.
That is what is really barbaric about our society.
Children are abandoned to abusive or significantly bad parents and society continues to fail in a large manner to protect all children.
August 19th, 2011 | 4:03 am
Brent Bozell has a great opinion piece today about perverse cartoons on TV, watched by children and adults. This example in particular is perfect to illustrate how liberals normalize pedophilia, ephebophilia, and homosexuality.
Example on Cartoon Network:
Some were typically sleazy, and some went way beyond. In one episode of “American Dad,” eponymous character Stan breaks in on a child molester named Randy, who’s trying to seduce his son, Steve, along with other boys. Stan pulls a gun on him, but Randy stands his ground.
“Look, I’m a sex offender. I love offensive sex,” he proclaims. “I offend people with the sex I have. That’s who I am, and it’s who I’ll always be.”
Stan finds that inspiring. “My God, boys! We can all take a page from Randy the Molester’s book. He’s comfortable with who he is! And I should be as well!”
http://townhall.com/columnists/brentbozell/2011/08/19/children_sink_into_adult_swim
=============
The purpose of such scripts is to make people think sexual exploitation and abuse is something light and funny.
Clearly the homosexual propaganda meme so beloved by people with a deformed sexual psychology is presented at full intensity: “you should be comfortable with who you are” – *independently* of what you are.
Liberal ideology is geared to have people destroy any conscience of problematic aspects of their sexual psychology (along with a host of other related areas) and just focus on a perverted “feel good about everything” precept.
Obviously, they ignorantly and irresponsibly justify this quest for legitimizing all perverse and perverted sexualities with their little “born this way – can’t help it – I’m a little uncontrolled puppet of my orientations” myth.
August 19th, 2011 | 11:55 am
You can argue with the approach and results of the policies such as making condoms available, but the claim is that it’s more like airbags and crumple zones for the inevitable car accidents, rather than encouragement.
You can’t say the age of consent is absolute, then turn around and justify handing out low-tar cigarettes “because it’s safer than smoking full-tar cigarettes”.
Either they’re allowed to smoke or they’re not.
Either the rule exists or the rule is optional. Liberals don’t believe in an age of consent. They don’t enforce an age of consent, and they don’t see anything wrong with behaviors that undermine the age of consent.
They are all in favor of harsh punitive sentencing when Roman Catholics or Mormons violate youngsters, but are full of excuses for why the literally hundreds of cases involving teachers molesting students does not need to be held to the same standard. And Woody Allen still has a career, doesn’t he?
They don’t believe in an age of consent. They just believe they should have the right to bring out and use the age of consent when it suits them – that is, when it advances their political agenda.
But when it’s Roman Polanski instead of Jeff Warrens, they line up to sign petitions demanding that we drop all charges – because, after all, that little 12 year old “was asking for it”.
As I said: if that is supposed to be a boundary, it’s already breached. But I’m sure it’s all for a good cause. After all, you can’t expect the little dears to keep their pants up – because that would entail acknowledging that they are children, not adults capable of making consensual choices – and therefore we adults owe them the right to be protected from exactly the behaviors our schoolteachers are justifying and promoting as normal, natural, healthy, and inevitable.
But we don’t want to acknowledge that, and we don’t want to do that, do we?
Everyone but you is doing it, sweetie. What are you, frigid?
August 19th, 2011 | 6:57 pm
“After all, you can’t expect the little dears to keep their pants up – because that would entail acknowledging that they are children, not adults capable of making consensual choices.”
We can’t expect them to keep their pants up because they’re little animals, not dolls. Children are notoriously poor judges of future consequences, and that’s the bulk of the problem. You can tell them not to, you can keep the information away from them, but they will still get in to trouble. If you tell your kids to deny their hormones, they’re much more likely to resent and defy you than politely obey.
If you haven’t noticed, there is a very clear trend that around the US, where ever we teach Abstinence only education (like you appear to support), the teen pregnancy rates rise dramatically — the kids are told not to have sex, and they still do it. And then they end up with children they are mentally and financially unable to support, and diseases they could have avoided.
When you teach children frankly about how sex works, and how to do it safely, it doesn’t increase the amount of sex they have, it just helps to keep them healthy and prevents unwanted pregnancy.
August 19th, 2011 | 8:40 pm
When you teach children frankly about how sex works, and how to do it safely, it doesn’t increase the amount of sex they have, it just helps to keep them healthy and prevents unwanted pregnancy.
You’re wrong: children are having sex earlier – and are more likely to experience unwanted pregnancy – then the decade before we started teaching sex ed in schools.
And children nowadays are not empowered. They are having sex for the wrong reasons: because they want to be “loved”, or they want to be “worldly” (or “sophisticated”), or they are afraid there is something is wrong with them because everyone else has something (or does things) they do not have (do).
Liberals aren’t doing this because they care about the kids. They don’t care at all about the kids, and are quite obviously using the kids in this, just as they use the kids in all the political crusades they can’t win any other way except through propagandizing and proselytizing other peoples’ kids.
August 19th, 2011 | 8:47 pm
If you tell your kids to deny their hormones, they’re much more likely to resent and defy you than politely obey.
Well, if you can’t tell kids to deny their hormones, then you can’t tell them to refuse a man with candy, either.
So you and I are agreed on one point: the so-called ‘age of consent’ is no real barrier to the normalization of pedophilia.
August 19th, 2011 | 9:46 pm
“Well, if you can’t tell kids to deny their hormones, then you can’t tell them to refuse a man with candy, either.
So you and I are agreed on one point: the so-called ‘age of consent’ is no real barrier to the normalization of pedophilia.”
No, we definitely don’t agree — because the issue with consent is a burden that falls on Adults. This is acknowledgement that children aren’t capable of understanding the consequences of their actions. Adults are. Whether children are having sex among themselves has nothing to do with adults preying on children or the legalization of the actions of said despicable adults.
August 19th, 2011 | 9:57 pm
Blake:
Here’s a recent fact sheet for you. You’ll see that between ’93 and ’03, sexual activity among teens was dropping.
I also can’t make much comment on your reasons about ‘why’ children are having sex. If you have any statistics on this, I’d like the see them, but I suspect it’s just your personal speculation.
http://www.kff.org/youthhivstds/upload/U-S-Teen-Sexual-Activity-Fact-Sheet.pdf
I’ll look for additional stats, preferably more details and up to date numbers.
August 20th, 2011 | 11:36 am
Here’s a recent fact sheet for you. You’ll see that between ’93 and ’03, sexual activity among teens was dropping.
That’s not a factor of sex ed, that’s a factor of cultural disapproval.
If you want to demonstrate that sex ed is a good thing, I want statistics that compare any one decade since the teaching of sex ed, to any decade from before 1970, please.
August 20th, 2011 | 11:38 am
As Theodore Dalrymple wrote, “”One definition of decadence is the concentration on the gratifyingly imaginary to the disregard of the disconcertingly real.”
That is a great quote.
August 20th, 2011 | 11:07 pm
[...] ‘minor attracted person’ and pedophiles” — Washington Times, Aug. 17“How to Normalize Pedophilia in 5 Easy Steps” – First Things, Aug. 17“Salon Flubs Reporting on Child Predators” – [...]
August 20th, 2011 | 11:13 pm
No, we definitely don’t agree — because the issue with consent is a burden that falls on Adults. This is acknowledgement that children aren’t capable of understanding the consequences of their actions. Adults are
But you said children, not adults, are the decision-makers.
You said that parents who want to protect their children from premature exposure to inappropriate sexuality (i.e. sexual contact below the age of consent) is inappropriate because children, not adults, are the ones who are responsible for this decision.
So which is it? Is there an age of consent – and those who enable, encourage, or abet sexual activity in children below this point are accomplices to an activity that is harmful to the child – or is it “inevitable” that children below the age of consent will have sex?
Are children below the age of consent capable of consenting or not?
Or is a child’s ability to consent a factor of whether you find it convenient or not?
Maybe a 12 year old can consent in the case you approve of, but not in the case you don’t approve of, perhaps? Or it’s rape the day after the perp’s 18th birthday, but perfectly harmless, wholesome fun the day before his 18th birthday?
Please: I’m dying to know how you tie all these contradictions together into something that has a logic to it!
August 22nd, 2011 | 3:06 am
“But you said children, not adults, are the decision-makers.”
That is deliberate misinterpretation, and I’m certain you know it. Amazingly, children and adults BOTH make decisions! Consent is not about the ABILITY to make decisions. It’s about the ability to understand the implications and recognize the consequences of those decisions.
“You said that parents who want to protect their children from premature exposure to inappropriate sexuality (i.e. sexual contact below the age of consent) is inappropriate because children, not adults, are the ones who are responsible for this decision.”
I did not say that. I said that refusing to educate children about the realities of sex is harmful. I am not advocating underaged sexual activity, but acknowledging that children will attempt to explore it anyways, as it is a natural, biological urge. Shockingly, children are autonomous creatures, INDEPENDENT of their parents. They can DO things their parents don’t want them to do!
“So which is it? Is there an age of consent – and those who enable, encourage, or abet sexual activity in children below this point are accomplices to an activity that is harmful to the child – or is it “inevitable” that children below the age of consent will have sex?”
You seem to have some real difficulty with this idea of consent. To consent to something, you must agree with it, and understand what you are agreeing to. If you get someone to sign a contract written in english when they cannot read english, the contract is not valid, because the signee is unable to consent to it. (If they spoke english, then you could establish a spoken contract, however.)
To come back to your wording: “Those who enable, encourage, or abet sexual activity in children” — this is just you attempting to set a trap in wording to make any affirmation of an age of consent violate the idea of sex education, which makes it clear that you DO understand, and just choose to argue without grounds. Sexual education is not the issue here. Sexual contact between children is irrelevant, because again, children cannot consent, and so they are not accountable for sexual contact with a minor.
So let us return to the actual topic: why the issue of consent prevents pedophilia. For two people to have sex legally, it must be consensual — BOTH parties must consent. In the case of an Adult/Child pairing, the adult can consent, but the child cannot, making the act unconsensual (rape, effectively, just a specific variety of it). Even if the adult and child both make the decision to have sex, and agree, the child is legally defined as being unable to understand this decision, and their agreement would be insufficient.
“Please: I’m dying to know how you tie all these contradictions together into something that has a logic to it!”
I’m happy to explain it again if your reading comprehension continues to fail you, but I would rather prefer you take some new and novel approach to your otherwise swiss-cheesed argument. Or, if you’d like, I can clarify or explain in more detail, if you perhaps would like to adopt a less factious tone.
August 22nd, 2011 | 9:05 am
Blake –
Huh. What’s the difference between “cultural disapproval” and “social disapproval”?
‘Cause on June 17th, 2011, at 8:45 pm, you said that “the only people using [social disapproval] are the ones who use it to shame the ones they call “prudes” and “puritans”.”
August 22nd, 2011 | 12:12 pm
Huh. What’s the difference between “cultural disapproval” and “social disapproval”?
My point is that you have to hold other variables equal.
So you can’t take one random decade during which sex ed was taught, and compare it against another random decade during which sex ed is taught.
If sex ed is actually the cause of fewer pregnancies, then we should have statistics showing that pregnancy rates (disease rates, etc.) has gone down compared to what things were like before we taught sex ed.
August 22nd, 2011 | 12:16 pm
“But you said children, not adults, are the decision-makers.”
That is deliberate misinterpretation, and I’m certain you know it.
No, it isn’t.
It is the definition of “consenting adult”.
And it is an either-or situation.
Either the doctrine of “consenting adult” says that children should not be having sex – because they’re not old enough to consent – or they are old enough to consent.
You want to have it be that they’re old enough to consent when it’s Roman Polanski, but not when it’s a Roman Catholic priest.
But I don’t see any reason why we should allow people like you to continue using children that way, because it appears to be taking a dreadful toll on our children. So how about we make a decision?
Which is it?
Should we start enforcing the idea of consenting adults, or should we admit we don’t really believe in it & abandon it altogether – and let promiscuous 12 year olds accept the consequences of their actions?
Because enforcing it selectively – while essential to your political ideology – is hurting the people you’re using.
August 23rd, 2011 | 1:11 am
“Either the doctrine of “consenting adult” says that children should not be having sex – because they’re not old enough to consent – or they are old enough to consent.”
Then who exactly is guilty of what if too minors engage in sex? And beyond that, your concern seems to be oddly focused on whether people can have sex, and not at all on a person (adult) taking advantage of someone else (child).
“You want to have it be that they’re old enough to consent when it’s Roman Polanski, but not when it’s a Roman Catholic priest.”
Now you’re just being offensive. Sex with a minor is incredibly wrong, regardless of who’s involved. It’s indefensible, whether you’re celebrity or clergy; in fact, those two cases are also both equally guilty of abusing a position of power for personal gain BEYOND the abuse of a minor.
“Should we start enforcing the idea of consenting adults, or should we admit we don’t really believe in it & abandon it altogether?”
You’re presenting a false dichotomy, because you’ve developed this totally ridiculous internal definition of consent that doesn’t even remotely reflect any legal understanding of the term.
Your options include two real results — stripping children of any and all rights at all (potentially as defined by the parents, or more likely, by the government), or at the very least, you’d making children in to felons for experimenting with their sexuality. Or, conversely, you’d be allowing children to engage in any and all kinds of legal contract — hooray child labor.
Assuming you are a reasonable person (which at this point is seeming to be quite the stretch), you’ll acknowledge that there may be some sort of middle ground that doesn’t allow children to run totally free or demand that they must be controlled in an totalitarian way. Or perhaps total control of your children (and the children of others) is what you want.
August 23rd, 2011 | 11:42 am
Then who exactly is guilty of what if too minors engage in sex?
This would depend on the situation.
Just like smoking cigarettes: if a child is smoking cigarettes, it does not necessarily mean that any adult is guilty of anything (say, if the child stole them) – but if an adult provided them, then the adult is guilty of a crime.
In this case, if the kids were just “playing doctor”, then no adult would be guilty of anything. But it is possible – depending on the age of the child, the situation, etc. – that the parents or caregiver could be guilty of “failure to protect”, and if adults (such as teachers) were encouraging it, they might be guilty of contributing to the delinquency of a minor.
There isn’t much difference between handing out cigarettes vs. handing out condoms. The real difference is that we have taken to punishing adults who give kids cigarettes or liquor, whereas we are still defending and justifying adults who encourage kids to be sexual below the age of consent.
Oh – and another difference – because we actually believe that children smoking is wrong, we also stopped bombarding the kiddies with advertisements and imagery glamorizing and otherwise pushing cigarettes. But you can tell just how much liberals want to keep kids sexualized by how they shriek and moan whenever parents complain about sexually explicit images aimed at younger viewers or readers, padded push-up bras targeted at 8 year olds, or sexy images of tarted-up little girls being pushed as “sexy”.
Apparently, liberals believe advertising and imagery has an incredible power to influence young minds – but only when it comes to cigarettes and breakfast cereals: when it comes to sex, a non-stop bombardment of pro-sex messages (and also “anyone who doesn’t support sex as wholesome and fun is a prude and worse!” messages) apparently that is the only form of advertisement that doesn’t actually have any real-world impact at all.
you’ll acknowledge that there may be some sort of middle ground that doesn’t allow children to run totally free or demand that they must be controlled in an totalitarian way.
So, in other words, you believe in an age of consent, but it only applies when you say it does.
May I recommend a book to you? It’s called Parenting Your Out-of-Control Teenager: 7 Steps to Reestablish Authority and Reclaim Love .
It is the book that many places use in their court-ordered parenting classes.
I specifically would like you to look at the part where they explain that rules are not rules when they are optional. Either they are rules or they are not rules. Failure to grasp this basic point is the key point in these parenting classes – it is the key point re: how kids end up in these classes, and it is the key point re: how to stop kids from destructive behaviors such as running away and cutting.
I’m not a big fan of psychologists as a group, but I do agree with their recommended advice when it comes to discipline: whether you use a “right wing” or “left wing” approach matters less than whether you are consistent. Say that it’s okay to have sex whenever and wherever you like – or say that you can’t have sex til you’re 16, 18, 21, or 36. Whatever. Make the rule whatever works – but then enforce that rule. Consistently. Even-handedly. Across the board.
And if a kid is ready to make a decision like that at 12, she’s also ready to accept the consequences for that decision. What is really “unreasonable” is refusing to acknowledge that rights and responsibilities must be kept together.
August 23rd, 2011 | 6:08 pm
“and if adults (such as teachers) were encouraging it, they might be guilty of contributing to the delinquency of a minor”
So you feel that Sex Education is a violation of consent (as described). That’s fine, it’s a valid concern (that I don’t agree with) but it’s still separate from the validity of the concept of Consent.
“There isn’t much difference between handing out cigarettes vs. handing out condoms.”
That is a hilariously misleading statement. You’re not looking at sex, cigarettes and alcohol as dangerous activities, you see them as vice to be controlled and locked away. A child who wants to smoke, but cannot obtain a cigarette is unable to smoke. A child who wants to have sex, but cannot obtain a condom, can still have sex. They’ll have unprotected sex, where they are potentially at risk of disease of pregnancy. This is part of the value of sex education — is to inform children of the RISKS of sex, and how mitigate them (ie; with a condom).
Your comparison is distantly akin to refusing to teach kids how to cook, or providing them with health ingredients, so that they won’t cook and thus not get fat. If they don’t know how to cook, they clearly won’t eat anything except what we give them, and then it is up to the parents right? Children couldn’t possibly figure out how to cook, or get their hands on junk food, without parental knowledge. And because they won’t be preparing food, we don’t need to warn them about things like food borne illnesses and cross contamination. Again, loose metaphor, but I do hope this communicates my point.
“you can tell just how much liberals want to keep kids sexualized by how they shriek and moan whenever parents complain about sexually explicit images aimed at younger viewers or readers”
Do you want to, maybe, provide some examples of this? The only people I know of who want to promote overly sexualized material to children are advertisers, who are aware that children want to emulate adults, and advertisers have already over sexualized adults. You’ll need more than just accusations to establish the ‘evil liberals’ as endorsing this.
“Apparently, liberals”
And we can ignore everything that follows in this paragraph. Your personal quest to depersonalize and demonize people you disagree with is oozing out all over any semblance of intelligent argument you want to express. Who is endorsing this nonsense that has you outraged? Can you actually quote or otherwise attribute any of this to a person or a group? Because it certainly seems quite invented.
“So, in other words, you believe in an age of consent, but it only applies when you say it does.”
Try rereading my early posts, but pretend to read them in Sen. John McCain’s voice. You may find it more agreeable.
“I specifically would like you to look at the part where they explain that rules are not rules when they are optional.”
Ah ha! The total failure of understanding reveals itself! You seem to think consent implies some sort of totalitarian dominance over children if it exists; it is a RULE to you.
What you’re missing here is that the issue of Consent V Pedophilia (Remember that? That’s what we’re talking about), children are not the issue. This is about the legality of Pedophilia. ADULTS are the ones who are responsible — that’s why children can’t vote, why they can’t buy alcohol, why they can’t enter legal contracts, why we restrict their ability to drive. If you feel that children are responsible (or share responsibility) in a case of Pedophilia, you are also stating that you believe children should be allowed to do all of those other things. And that is insane.
Based on the way you’re arguing this, it just seems so clear that your objections to pedophilia have nothing to do with Adults taking advantage of Children; you seem to be Ok with that! It’s the thought of Children engaging in sexual activity and behavior that seems to bother you so much — a matter that I’m not entirely sure how to address.
The worst part is that you don’t even seem interested in addressing the issue of pedophilia any more. So I’ll reiterate my initial query again: “Since children cannot consent, and non-consensual sex is rape, even if it were legal to have sex with a minor, it would still be rape in all occurrences, would it not?”
August 23rd, 2011 | 7:19 pm
[...] evidence, NOM included an excerpt from a piece written by Joe Carter, editor of the First Things blog. Unsurprisingly, Carter’s piece actually [...]
August 23rd, 2011 | 7:47 pm
” Now some of those same people who sneered at us are using the decision to promote . . . polygamy and pedophilia.”
Really? Can you name those people because that sounds pretty far fetched and a lot like something one would just say because it sounds good and is extremely difficult to disprove. But if you can back it up, we’re all ears.
August 23rd, 2011 | 7:55 pm
Blake wrote:”Gay marriage relies on prioritizing the rights and needs of parents as first, “over” that of the child. The child is bumped down to second class.”
No more than do laws that allow heterosexual married couples to divorce and allow unmarried heterosexual people to have sexual intercourse… We don’t hear anyone pushing to outlaw those things though do we?
August 23rd, 2011 | 10:48 pm
Michael PS, you wrote:
“If there is a surplus of children available for adoption in the United States, why are so many families prepared to go through the arduous process of international adoption?”
I hate to tell you this, but as someone who has gone through two international adoptions, I can testify that interstate adoptions within the U.S. can be even more arduous.
First, within the U.S. the social workers who oversee adoptions have historically done everything to counter interracial adoptions, for reasons that were basically racist (“white parents cannot properly raise a non-white child in a racist society”). Their foreign counterparts have tended to lack this bias, so completing an adoption in a foreign country have bypassed this racism. This may be no longer as important, since Bill Clinton spoke out against the practice when he was President, but I assume it still goes on.
Second, legal technicalities are of greater import in interstate adoptions than in international adoptions. When I adopted abroad, unlike today, U.S. citizenship was not automatically conferred on my children. If I could not prove them to be impoverished by local standards then the U.S. government could delay their immigration by two years. If worse came to worse I’d have shuttled back and forth to a cheap apartment in a foreign country. But if I had adopted within the U.S., and my lawyer made some paperwork mistake, and I had crossed state line with my child without correcting that mistake, then the adoption would have been permanently invalidated and I would have lost my child.
Given these facts, and the fact that I would not take a child into my family with a threat of loss even after a court has finalized the adoption, then it was international adoption that made the most sense.
August 24th, 2011 | 1:19 pm
basically racist (“white parents cannot properly raise a non-white child in a racist society”).
Sorry to break it to you, but I had a friend who was really messed up by the experience of being raised by white people.
And I’m not talking about racialized victim politics. I’m talking about there being something inherently barbaric about forcing a black child to act like a white kid who just happens to have a really dark tan. This particular family was Jewish, and the reality is that Jewish families are really into their genealogy, and seriously defined by their genealogy. This poor kid had to participate in all the prayers, rituals, holidays, etc. where “we” celebrate “our” history – neither entitled to be part of the “we”, nor given any option for opting out, nor given any particular assistance for how to cope.
Then, of course, there’s the reality that even white kids in Jewish adoptive families have noted: some Jews have the hugest hearts in the world – but others view Gentiles as ‘other’.
It is not ‘racist’ to note that real cultural differences create real obstacles in adoption. There’s a reason there is growing international concern about international adoption, and whether “being rescued” really justifies dropping all the usual standards a child is entitled to.
You might argue that it’s still better than languishing in a foster home or third world country – and maybe you’re right, or maybe you’re not. But if you want to adopt a black kid, then instead of calling the social workers “racist” for observing a problem that is in fact a real problem, you could be part of finding a solution. Preferably a solution that doesn’t involve expecting the black (or foreign) kid to simply suck it up and “be” whatever the rich white parents happen to want from their bought-and-paid-for kid.
Blake wrote:”Gay marriage relies on prioritizing the rights and needs of parents as first, “over” that of the child. The child is bumped down to second class.”
No more than do laws that allow heterosexual married couples to divorce and allow unmarried heterosexual people to have sexual intercourse… We don’t hear anyone pushing to outlaw those things though do we?
That’s absolutely not true.
It’s true that we encourage divorce (because of the same erroneous reasoning: the idea that “kids are resilient”, and therefore hurting them doesn’t really hurt them all that much).
But while our divorce laws stink – and worse: are poorly enforced – in divorce children are explicitly protected against the sorts of behaviors gays claim as a “right”.
The child of divorce still has a legally protected relationship with both real parents, and custody decisions are made according to the “child’s best interest” standard.
August 24th, 2011 | 1:27 pm
I did not say that. I said that refusing to educate children about the realities of sex is harmful.
You might want to examine your motives for why you feel the way you do about the need to justify behaviors that, whatever noble motive you ascribe to them, in reality amount to encouraging and promoting the view that underaged sex is normal and can be healthy if condoms are used.
It’s not good for the kids. In fact, there is growing evidence that it’s really harmful to the kids. The reason we have an age of consent is because kids really cannot choose sex. Your arguments conspicuously ignore the fact that available evidence strongly suggests the kids who are “choosing” sex are not doing so of their own free will, but for all the wrong reasons.. And calling me “unreasonable” doesn’t change the fact that it’s really very straightforward, very cut and dried:
1. Is underaged sex good for kids? No. There is no reason to think that it’s good for kids – whether they use a condom or not.
2. Is it possible to teach kids about sex in the public schools in a truly neutral way? No: the teachers are not interested in doing so, they are pushing an agenda just like you are – and even if they weren’t, since it is part of the moral education that rightfully belongs to the parents, the teachers are inevitably setting themselves up in a contest over values with the parents, which is itself destructive to a child’s discipline
The single most important factor in disciplining a child is consistency, and the triangulation perpetrated by teachers eager to contest parental authority is probably the single biggest contributing factor to the premature sexualization of children.
But of course it’s more fun to hurl rage at the “prudes” and the evil “religious right” types (“Christofascists” is what they were called at the last public school I was involved with) than it is to actually take care of children, isn’t it?
August 24th, 2011 | 1:29 pm
“You said that parents who want to protect their children from premature exposure to inappropriate sexuality (i.e. sexual contact below the age of consent) is inappropriate because children, not adults, are the ones who are responsible for this decision.”
I did not say that. I said that refusing to educate children about the realities of sex is harmful.
Yes, because you are not contesting parental authority at all when you give out “homework” whereby the kids are to map their route from the school to the nearest Planned Parenthood.
I am so grateful this political view is finally about finished. You spend our children way too casually.
August 24th, 2011 | 3:58 pm
“they are pushing an agenda just like you are”
That is a pretty rich statement from someone who is trying to promote the idea that gay rights will lead inevitably to the normalization of pedophilia. (An agenda that is so ridiculous that you’ve clearly given up on defending it directly.) I don’t think you’re capable of identifying another person’s agenda.
“kids who are “choosing” sex are not doing so of their own free will, but for all the wrong reasons”
You seem to be mistaking the idea of free-will with the idea of making mistakes. Are children doing it for the wrong reasons, or are they being brainwashed to do it? You make it sound like there is some sort of conspiracy to put brain-control chips in kids so that they’re compelled against their will to go have sex.
“Is underaged sex good for kids? No”
I don’t disagree; I think even most young adults are insufficiently mature to handle the emotion consequences and physical risks of sex. But that’s not really a good reason create additional risk by refusing to educate. Still, this is still irrelevant to the issues of pedophilia or consent.
“disciplining a child”
Again; completely irrelevant to pedophilia AND consent, but still, let’s play with this nonsense. How exactly to you discipline a child so that they won’t have sex without your parental say-so? It’s not exactly something they’re usually going to do in the den while you watch Fox and Friends.
Threaten to take away their internet privileges? Or ground them, with the aid of a deadbolt? Oh, maybe lock them in a basement, and don’t let them out until they write a 10 page, Biblically referenced essay on purity? (Or perhaps you’d perfer ‘Obeying your parents’.)
No, no. Wait. In this modern age of the internet, I’m betting you’d just sidestep the punishments entirely. Why bother, when you can get artisan chastity belts made to deliver! Why I bet your stunning, obedient nuclear family doesn’t even poop without approval from the head of the house, right? What fantastic parenting.
Sarcastic mockery aside, do you have any clue how unfeasible it would be for you to actually control this sort of thing? And more importantly, do you even care about addressing the MANY, MANY flaws against the original topic at hand? I’ll give you some time to reread my posts — I’m sure you’ll find a few dozen salient posts to pick something from.
“I am so grateful this political view is finally about finished.”
Funny; I was thinking the same thing.
August 24th, 2011 | 8:35 pm
Sarcastic mockery aside, do you have any clue how unfeasible it would be for you to actually control this sort of thing?
“There are some issues that are too simple for intelligent people to understand. Most moral issues are like that. The problem isn’t distinguishing between right and wrong. That is not always as plain as day, but usually it is. The problem is finding a way to justify doing the wrong thing. And once you think you have found it, the people still arguing for doing the right thing may be dismissed as “simplistic.”
Emphasis mine.
August 25th, 2011 | 1:53 am
That’s great Blake; glad you found a satisfying way to convince yourself that you’re right.
Now that you’re done arguing about children having sex, can we get back to the issue of how none of that — regardless of your or my point of view — allows pedophilia to be legal, regardless of its specific criminal status, so long as age-of-consent laws continue to exist?
And how the destruction of age-of-consent laws definitely does not fit anywhere within the ’5 easy steps’ outlined in this article?
And how gay rights have no impact on said consent laws?
Or are you finally going to concede that this article is just a smokescreen tactic to try and make it easy to justify repealing gay rights on the false premise that it will legitimize pedophilia?
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