Monday, January 6, 2014

The History of the Age of Consent

I see it over and over again.  The idea that the age of consent must be there for a reason.  That whoever put those laws in place must have known what they were doing. 

The law is not a divine commandment.  The people who write laws are not unknowable wise men with inscrutable wisdom far divorced from the ability of the common man to understand.  The entire point of studying history is so that we can follow the progression, the whys and wherefores that lead us to the world we live in today. 

The age of consent came into being in the days of women as property.  Marriage was a business transaction between the groom and the bride's father, with the groom paying a bride-price to her father.  A virgin bride commanded a high price, and thus anyone who had sex with a man's daughter was literally diminishing the value of his property.  The age of consent was a way of protecting the investment, not protecting the person. 

Come the turn of the 20th century, a group of religious conservatives, terrified of the idea of women in the workplace, lobbied hard for the age of consent to be raised to its current level.  Their writings are still around explaining their concerns.  To summarize, they were afraid that women working outside the home might meet men and want to have sex without getting married.  They used the age of consent to push their social agenda.  That's why to this day there are still states which have exemptions in their ages of consent if the parents consent, or if the couple are married. 

After that, the age of consent was fiddled around with to discriminate against homosexuals.  Ages of consent were made different for different depending on the genders of the partners and the acts performed.  It was a way of hurting gays where legislation couldn't be passed to ban such activities entirely.  The famous Stonewall riots were partially a response to this kind of discrimination. 

The age of consent has never been the well-reasoned compromise between the twin noble ideals of individual sexual liberty and the protection of the vulnerable that its supporters claim it to be.  The age of consent is a historical accident built on a foundation of social mores our culture rejected long ago, and discrimination that even the bigots of our day at least pretend to be ashamed of. 

It's long past time we wrote a law that reflects what informed consent actually means.  Long past time we actually had the reasoned discourse that everyone who blindly accepts the age of consent as it stands assumed happened at some unspecified point in the past. 

13 comments:

  1. I find it odd that pro-pedophiles have a sense of entitlement to sex with children
    "Ageist and bigotry" tends to be the main reasoning behind it. Why must kids be available for your sexual pleasure? Many claim they care about children but you must admit you only care about their rights as it relates into sexual matters. Since you want to eliminate age of consent which is tied into adulthood I presume you want kids to have the other rights too?You aren't just figh ting for adults to use kids up sexually but all to truly remove even the title adult. Are titles like "child" and "adult" just terms used by ageists You feel development, experience, biology are just tools of bigotry? You just want humans to only consider sex without higher level thinking? 

    Since ageism is wrong I presume you fight for all things on age to be removed
     You fight for kids to drive cars? To vote in elections? To drink alcohol? To participate in pornographic? To smoke cigarettes? To adopt? To remove labels for clothing (like removing signs for whites or for colored)? Rent a car? To see R rated movies, go into adult stores, to get piercings and tattoos, enter school at any age, AARP for any age, make baby girls go to gynecology ( females that are or will be sexually active should go), remove age restrictions on medications (it is ageist to not give  person under 4 this medication), give kids power of attorney, remove age on id's so people can't discriminate, parental supervisor is ageist (nothing bad can happen if you leave babies alone or even a toddler)....I can go on. 

    You only want to bang kids and not get arrested. Just admit that. All this "kids rights and ageism" is just a facade.  

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    1. I see you overlooked my posts on suffrage, criminal responsibility, and bodily integrity. I actually do support the elimination of all age lines.

      Sexual consent just happens to be a particularly important one because it's about the right to control one's own body, without which no one's going to take any action on any of the others seriously.

      I'm the first to acknowledge that giving kids their legitimately deserved rights would have the pleasant side-effect of improving my sex life (assuming that any of them were interested in me after that point, obviously), but it is merely a side-effect.

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  2. Wehttp://youthrights.org/issues/

     http://www.kidscounsel.org/legalresources/legalresources_teenrights/legal-rights-info-for-teens-2/



    Look at the issues. Anything about how this could result in getting your dick wet? Nope thus you will never discuss them. Seriously what other rights are you fighting for? If you value a child's person one of the most powerful forms of personhood in a country is voting. Where are your post about that? Where are your posts about how it is unfair that children can't vote. If they could vote then they would be given a voice. Why would you not advocate for that first? You want to change laws and if children could vote they would help pass a law to have sex with anyone they please. They could vote on on a law to allow their "yes" to mean "yes". If you didn't support a child's right to vote but still want to fuck them it means:

    You don't care about children having a voice unless you the voice is used to express interest in sex with you

    You don't care about children deciding for themselves they want sex rather you want to change the laws without help from children. Quite one sided. You shouldn't try to pass laws without children having political power or else you are just like other adults forcing children of accept what the adult wants.

    You aren't supportive of other rights. You could support youth voting, you don't have the excuses you use for why you are anonymous for your sexuality.

    You only plan on using girls for sex thus the only rights that matter is what your dick wants. Not what the girl wants. You don't care if she can't vote.

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    1. The third post I ever made on this blog was on the subject of Suffrage.

      The whole point of putting this stuff on a blog was so I wouldn't have to constantly repeat myself over and over again. That my arguments would be laid out once and would be there for all to see forever thereafter.

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  3. You lack understanding and respect for the responsibilities of a good guardian. You only think of children in a sexual manner. If a parent had a child sexually  active at a young age here is what  some but not all the problems  could be:

    Diseases.  Children already get sick from other illnesses why add STDS and STIs? Sexually active kids would require more doctor visits and additional doctors (child gynecologist). In what world would taking a child to get treated for STDS be a good thing? Your test and those who pass won't  mean anything  because  humans fail quite often. Adults give other adults STDs. Why would you think children would somehow be immune to this? Better sex education  doesnt mean people will make better decisions just that people are equipped to. To help you understand a parent does not want a child to get sick. So if a whole group of diseases can be avoided (stds stis) they will not encourage  a child to enage in those activities.  You might get upset because  you feel entitlement to sex with kids, but a parent has the right to raise their child in ways to protect them. You pretend this is a right regarding children but a parent has the right to help children avoid stds/stis as well as not having to go on additional doctor appointments and having additional  doctors. Additionally girls have to get the shot for hpv. You want to put younger girls at risk for cervical cancer? The youngest they give the shot is 11 yet kids younger than this are allowed to take the test and pass.

    Unwanted Pregnancy.  Even though it is life threatening for younger girls they can still get pregnant. Adults have convinced  other adults not to use birth control you don't  think the same will happen with children? Birth control methods can fail. We can avoid this by not allowing girls to have sex so young.


    Emotional  issues. Your test does "measure" the fact that people lie and reject others. However  everyone has been fooled by a lie as well as being rejected is hurtful. Do you really want kids to have to tell if an adult is lying to them regarding  sex? So if a kid feels hurt because  they were used and they regretted the situation...how do you think that will make them feel? You are forcing children to worry about things they don't  need to worry are about.

    Understanding sex and the risks involved does not mean one cannot make mistakes, be lied to/deceived, not get a disease or infection, be injuried, that one will go to a doctor and be tested, have a negative outcome, or just regret it. You assume that by informing kids of sex that magically nothing will go wrong. Rather we as a society will be faced with more issues. Kids will have to deal with more problems and they aren't  allowed  a parent to help them (you don't want parents involved however you have no problem with allowing people like yourself influencing a child regarding sex). By not allowing kids to give consent we can protect them from having to get tested for STDS, from emotional issues, sexual injuries, unwanted pregnancies, being treated for STDS, worrying about birth control, needing more check ups, needing to find additional doctors, and they can focus on being a kid. This of course offends you but:

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    1. I'd  rather have an offended pedophile who claims to care about children more than....a child needed to get treatment for STDS/STIs, girls with bruised cervix, parents who have to deal with emotional issues because they are no longer in he AOA of some adult, girls under 16 getting abortions.....

      Your idea of kids rights involves exposing them to more diseases, more emotional issues, injuries to their reproductive system, not having parents who can help guide them, little girls getting abortions....Yeah kids rights....the right to have more problems  to face just to make people like you happy.

      Your test has to be something one studies for correct? You being a bright student that is no problem however other children might struggle with it. A parent isn't going to spend time on this when a child has actual tasks that are more of of a priority.

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    2. Why in the world do you think that better sex ed doesn't lead to better decisions being made? Why do you think we have sex ed in the first place?

      Anyway, as for the rest, I believe in the right to bodily autonomy. If you don't, we're never really going to agree.

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  4. Hi Jacob. Are you aware of any studies that show that the majority of child sex abuse is committed by situational offenders rather than pedophiles?

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    1. You're likely looking for this post, which contains the links you're looking for:

      http://youthrightsradical.blogspot.com/2012/12/a-simple-breakdown.html

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    2. I read that once, but couldn't find it. The link to the study citing similar figures to Lanning is dead. I don't suppose you remember the name of the study so I can look it up on another source, do you?

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    3. Rather than dump an online source that'll die again, maybe you'd find a standard academic citation more useful.
      (Kinsey-Report, Lautmann, Brongersma, Groth)

      Good luck.

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  5. You lied about using child porn and collecting it.

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  6. Have you read Matthew Waites' The Age of Consent (2005) and Stephen Kershnar's Pedophilia and Adult-Child Sex: A Philosophical Analysis (2015)? I think these would be right up your street, and I highly recommend them.

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