Prepubescent Children and Informed Consent to Sexual Acts

RecoveringSO wrote:I can capitulate to that; and I actually think that's my point entirely: That the ability for children to give "informed consent" in the situation of medical treatment neither helps nor harms the assertion that "children can give consent to sexual situations"; nor that "children can not give consent to sexual situations".

I can't see it as "glossing over" anything; but merely taking each scenario on its own merits and not unfairly convolute the two.

Would you agree that it's premature of you to write off the overlap as 'unfair' without having read the studies and read Waites' account of how Alderson's work is relevant to the sexual arena? The crux of your argument here has evolved from a 'but it's different' to a 'but it's sufficiently different to make it unfair to consider significant overlap between the two'. My response would be that this is still glossing over the matter. We have eight peer-reviewed studies and another academic's analysis of the relevance of these to the sexual arena. I think it's unfair to dismiss this body of work out of hand.

didi90 wrote:Can you explain enforced ignorance?

By ‘enforced ignorance’ I am referring to the cultural practice of shielding (particularly prepubescent) children from information on sex, which should be taken to include not only information on the biological reality of reproduction but also the social and emotional aspects (and potential consequences) of physical affection and intimacy, as well as the practice of preventing them from expressing themselves sexually wherever possible. Such practices (and efforts in a similar vein) are touted as protection or preservation of innocence.

didi90 wrote:Thank you saying this, I did not consider the onset of my negative feelings.I would say that after I thought about it and processed it in my later years, I came to feel most of the way I feel. However, after the incident happened, there was a slight feeling of being permanently dirty...a kind I could not wash away....I remember feeling that as a child

I would not be surprised about the latter, given that the encounters were not born of a mutual desire for physically intimate affection that had arisen organically from a respectful relationship that had developed a frisson of romance.

I think consideration of the former is also important, because if there’s a possibility that society is partly (or in some cases, perhaps, wholly) responsible for inflicting trauma by virtue of a strident cultural narrative that insists upon a certain interpretation of one’s experiences, then we ought to be alert to this, because otherwise we could be doing people a terrible disservice. As you’ll have seen in your work, lives can be ruined over these kinds of thing.

didi90 wrote:I also completely agree with you that there were several reasons why I have the feelings I have. I did have a few other experiences of molestation and 1 incident of date rape as an young adult. Plus there were several issues within my family, mental illness in my family, I was a new immigrant to Canada at the onset of puberty and other issues as well. This was the only situation where I gave any form of consent but the incident still damaged me. As you pointed out, it was not really consent.

I’m sorry to hear about what you’ve been through.

didi90 wrote:My situation was different then you imagine, I lived in the Middle East in a very strict Islamic law country. I was very naive and innocent, at that point I had no idea that sex was performed by a penis going into a vagina. I had never encountered sex on tv or in school, no one every spoke about it around me. Therefore I did not know anything about the concept of "virginity". I mentioned that I wish I was able to wait until I was older and have my first sexual experiences at that time. I think I was not at all ready for anything sexual, I was very immature and childish. I would have liked to have held onto that immaturity and naiveness for longer, and I would have like to discover sexuality for the first time at puberty.

And that should, of course, be (and have been) respected. I think if you had been better informed (not shielded from knowledge in the name of preserving a pristine innocence, which itself reveals more about adult anxieties than it does about biological reality) then you would have been in a greater position to avoid exploitation and maintain ‘ownership’ of your body and desires.

didi90 wrote:Thank you for your comment, it made me think a lot.

You’re welcome.

Damn, I spent so much time constructing my post that I got logged out and lost it. I'll encapsulate:

First, I will read the studies in question. I have quite a list, actually. I have often made dynamically opposed shifts to my beliefs in the past. My mind can be changed with sufficient evidence.

YRR: Nice strawman you constructed there; one I almost missed. The point on the table isn't what "non-consenting children" or "anti-social offenders" look like. We already know what they look like.

The question on the table is "what do consenting children look like".

@Pro-Contacts:
WE have a great start at a framework. We have a society that no longer demonizes pedophiles and accepts it as just another sexual preference; a society that believes that prepubescent children can give informed consent and have the right to do so; a society that does not believe that adult/child sexual contact is inherently harmful; we have a guideline for determining consent (being the RMSC) and a review board that analyzes complaints and possible criminal prosecution based on those guidelines; we probably have a public school system that teaches points in the RMSC, beginning as early as kindergarten, to prepare our children for the possibility of dating a pedophile. What is missing, though, is everyday life: what this society looks like from our living rooms.

The challenge was issued in another thread and stepped over; and I think it's a worthy challenge that may help us understand better where you guys are coming from. That challenge was "we have all of this, and you see a 7 year old at a park. Okay, what next?"

While quite a vague challenge .. so vague it may be impossible to meet ... the concept remains the same. What does this look like from our living rooms? What does it look like to the parents of 3 children? What does it look like for the pedophile seeking companionship?