I don't think Kirk Reid's experience was anywhere near the norm. I think he's a little deluded too when he states "he was literally risking his freedom over me." In all likelihood the guy wasn't risking his freedom for Kirk, but for his own sexual desires. EVERY adult KNOWS it is illegal and morally wrong to engage in sexual acts with anyone who is underage.
And I believe there is a distinctive difference between homosexuality and pedophilia. I believe that most homosexuals are born homosexuals. I believe it is the result of inappropriate biochemical processes. With pedophilia, I believe it is a mental illness. There is no comparing the two.
ILZ, the main thing re: consent is that it is nearly impossible to know what the effects will be without a time machine, and even then the picture is murky. What I was getting at with the child development comment is that kids are easy to manuipulate, especially by a figure who has some authority. A child may give consent in the sense of saying yes, even asking for it, while still being deeply damaged down the line.
The paragraph from Ried doesn't sway me one way or another. A good friend of my husband's had a similar experience, wrote a book about it, the concept is not new to me. But I think the brain has a way of integrating what has already happened and dealing with it. Given a separate set of circumstances, Ried might easily have said; "If I had given in to that dirty old man I can't imagine what sort of psychological problems I would have had -- I probably would have been one of those teenagers who cut themselves. Instead, I found Andrew, someone my OWN age, and we helped each other discover our sexuality in a positive, healing way."
Even if we assume that there are kids (below the age of consent) who were somehow truly phsychologically advanced enough to give consent, then what? I'm sure there are 8-year-olds that are actually ready to drive. Should we change the age to get a license from 16 to 8?
What worries me most is that if any quarter is given to the concept of "well some of them might be ready," a bunch of 8-year-olds will be put in cars and sent of to their (and others') deaths. Or, to be more clear, kids who WILL be terribly damaged but who are manipulated in whatever way into giving consent will be sexually abused by adults.
And lastly, because consent is so huge -- kids simply cannot give consent the way adults can -- it is a completely separate subject from homosexuality.
You know, greek warriors (and I think also Japanese warriors) used to engage in homosexuality with younger boy members. Just thought that was weird.
Turner - judging from what I hear, this site seems to pretty clearly not be about mature, consenting adults.
ILZ said: "Thirty years ago nobody would have ever suspected homosexuality would be so widespread. Now, with the gay rights movement in full swing, we know that there are literally millions of homosexual people in America alone. The implication is easy to see. It makes you wonder just how many pedophiles (or boy-lovers, as they call themselves) are there really out there? Hundreds of thousands? Millions?"
Thirty years ago anyone with any knowledge of human sexuality WOULD have known there were that many homosexuals.
Yes, there are many adults out there who like to prey on children - boys and girls. As far as we know, more girls than boys are abused (though as it becomes more ok for men to talk about it, this may become a more equal figure).
Some older kids MAY be able to give informed consent - just as some kids may be quite able to drive, handle alcohol, work down the mines, be a doctor etc.
The law is based on a guesstimate about the average kid - and is there to protect all kids. It cannot take into account every single variation and bend to accommodate them - nor can it stop protecting boys from male homosexual abuse, because there MAY be the odd kid who benefits. If that kid benefitted - who am I to say? Wouldn't it be great if gay kids did not have to navigate the stormy waters of prejudice and bigoted ignorance on their way to adulthood - maybe we might be focussing on that, instead of the odd instance where sexual abuse may have been positive?
Informed consent means that one knows what both the short- and long-term consequences of their actions will be. We assume, on the sound basis of thousands of years of social experience, that the pre-adolescent and the adolescent are not sufficiently informed to make judgments about what the long-term consequences of the actions will be, and in some case, not even the short-term consequences. As an adolescent, i began smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol. As a young adult, i willingly and eagerly indulged in drug-abuse as often and the greatest extent i was able to manage. I was 40 years old before i began to see all of the ramifications of those decisions, and am still being introduced to the negative consequences. Appeals to what was once an accepted norm are meaningless to me, there is much of human behavior still in need of reform--i would say most--so telling me that people once commonly did something, or "have always done that" is no sound argument, to my mind. We don't let children drive until they're sixteen years of age--but we're expected to swallow the notion that they have sufficient judgment to make an informed decision to join in a sexual relationship with an adult who is or until recently was a complete stranger to them? Please, spare me . . .
