How to respond to pro-abuse posters in online forums?

Internet and technology
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I’ve been struggling to reconcile free speech, abuse prevention, and being sensitive to survivors of abuse?

I was a paying member of a forum and another member posted lengthy pro incest/sexual abuse of children comments, though they framed it as being harmless, natural, and beneficial. It was presented as an alternative way to raise your kids, that it was beautiful and natural to have sex with them.

The moderator of the forum said they had similar thoughts about adults having sex with kids because of an anthropology class that described aboriginal sexual customs. The moderator said that no topic was off-limits, and they encouraged the pro-incest, adults having sex with kids commenter to express themselves freely.

There was some counter-speech against adults having sex with children from me and a few other members. It was all civil, with no name-calling or knee-jerk responses.

I think if we encounter people who say that it’s beneficial to have incest/sex with kids that it’s our responsibility as adults to speak out against it because it is abuse? Children are vulnerable. I feel it’s our duty to correct these harmful ideas that contribute to the rationalization that it’s okay and even beneficial for adults to have sex with children. I also have decades of experience in the medical/mental health profession and have seen how damaging it can be when kids are sexually abused. It affects them for the rest of their lives. I too, and many close and extended family members have survived such abuse from different offenders.

I expressed my disbelief that there were few people objecting to this advocacy of incest/sex with kids. The administrator and moderator didn’t say a peep about it even when members were upset and seeking guidance/reassurance about reasons for condoning the promotion of child abuse. It would’ve been better if they’d responded with a disclaimer stating that they valued free speech above all else, even if people were advocating for committing crimes. Then we would’ve had a framework for their silence? Though some topics were shut down and deemed hate speech or misogyny. How is encouraging incest/adults to have sex with kids not troublesome?

I said that if we don’t speak out with counter-speech, it’s equivalent to silent approval and I no longer trusted the group.

The administrator and moderator did not comment in the forum thread except to say that the conversation was over. Days later, the administrator finally replied when a member asked about it in a video call.

Because of my silent approval comment, I was labelled a troll, and they should ban me but because I had a history of being sexually abused as a child that I was welcome to remain in the group if I wanted after I took some time away to heal myself.

They hadn’t replied in the thread because we weren’t giving them a good invitation, so they weren’t inclined to respond. They said they weren’t healers, and the group has to be bigger than this. They said on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being the most problematic that the thread rated a 4. They stated they love animals more than humans and if a member was posting about animal abuse in the forum, they’d just not read it, not comment on it, and mute the topic. They said they had zero knowledge about pedophilia, so felt they didn’t know enough to comment in the thread. They said that since there haven’t been good solutions to child sexual abuse that it’s even more important to be open to new ideas. They said the commenter was just seeking truth and was courageous. They said the commenter’s posts were a harmless thought experiment even though the commenter had been espousing these ideas for years, their videos on the topic were banned by YouTube but were easily found elsewhere online. That’s how the topic came up in the group. Another member discovered the videos and was upset by it and confronted the commenter. So the commenter decided to address it in the group so other people would not be surprised by it if they randomly discovered it.

I unsubscribed from the site and emails, yet I got an email from the group last month and have been re-triggered about this again. I saw a counselor about it for a session, but they said that sounds weird and to just do what’s right for me. So I unsubscribed from the emails again and in the meantime, I’ve been trying to figure out what could have made that situation better? Was I wrong in equating the silence as approval? Was that really trolling behavior from me? I feel like I’ve been gaslit and scapegoated?

I was hoping to avoid this type of situation in the future. It has been re-traumatizing for me because I really trusted the community. I was hoping to gain further insight from y’all if y’all would be so kind? Could this situation have been handled more appropriately?

Thank y’all so much.

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Hi and welcome to the forum.

This is an ethical question a lot of people have with regard to fiction and fantasy content, as well as the people who consume them and for what reasons.

The short answer to this is to just make your point and compete in the marketplace of ideas. Sadly this is an unfortunate aspect where ignorance and falsehoods can be pitched as though they’re anything but against the merits of the truth. It’s an observable, demonstrable fact that sexual conduct between adults and children is a form of exploitation or abuse. This is primarily based on the effect such behavior has on children, as they lack the physiological and psycho-social development or competence needed to understand or really ‘feel’ sex in relation to that of an adult. This is the primary driving justification for the age of consent or sexual majority, which is to protect children.
Sadly it is their right, so it lies on you to defend your ideas in the marketplace of ideas. Stuff like this looks really bad on the whole free-speech aspect of sexual fantasy material, but it still doesn’t change the fact that censorship and suppression are far worse than allowing the ideas to exist and stand against the truth and do nothing to prevent abuse.
Just know that there’s more people who stand by the truth than there are with falsehoods. As an abuse survivor myself, I can tell you with total confidence that they’re outnumbered in this respect. Child sex abuse is never tolerable, just like murder or any other crime. That’s why fantasy material is legal in most civilized nations of the world, with scientific communities urging their legality and availability with respect to a policy standpoint.
This requires commitment to the art of the debate, as well as acknowledgement of the facts.

I think this is probably the best way to approach responses to it. It’s a known fact that adult-child sex is always a form of abuse, as it causes untold amounts of damage to children. Sadly, there are a lot of people who disagree about this and will never see eye-to-eye on it, just like any other topic. They’re a lot like flat-earthers in this sense, wherein they deny empirical scientific fact in favor of satisfying and affirming their own beliefs, as opposed to adherence to the truth. You see this a lot in the face of social conservatives, religious fanatics, etc.
If you can’t agree on the facts, there’s really no other thing you could do but explain them and why the argument should be guided by them.

The difference between reality and fiction is what, I believe, defines a reasonable position. If they’re not willing to see it, the best you could do is put forward a compelling argument so that those who are willing to observe and learn from your discussions are able to recognize the reason in your words and be persuaded there.

There is nothing wrong with any sort of fantasy, so long as it remains within the fantasy context. Any reasonable person can understand and respect this observation, it isn’t hard to do.

This is very unfortunate and saddening to hear, because you’re not wrong in your analysis. The “silence is my right” position seems like you were taking on enforcing a moral stance, as opposed to making a compelling argument. I’m not going to assume things, but hopefully this “troll” designation wasn’t something to be taken seriously by the community at large.

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@terminus I think this question may be of considerable interest with respect to the “pro-contact pedophile” issue we see, and I think it could do Prostasia some good to address it in a newsletter or blog post. Pro-contact advocacy is akin to Pro-life absolutism.
I feel like the stigma associated with pedophilia forces people to band into groups that may disagree, but those who agree that pro-contact advocacy is wrong, both ethically and empirically, may feel too much pressure not to speak out. A post on this issue could act as a lighthouse of reason for people so speak out against the pro-contact pedophiles.

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I did explain the facts, but I was not willing to keep volleying back and forth because it was too upsetting for me. I left the forum and never returned.

I agree and said as much, but this wasn’t fantasy we were discussing. The pro-abuse person said that a whole new world opened up to them after they posted pedophilia videos on YouTube people reached out to them and described their alternative lifestyle and sexual way of rearing children. The pro-abuse person shared all of this with us on the forum, hoping to open up our worlds too?

As a personal development community devoted to caring and doing our part to spread positive ripples in the world, I was expecting more accountability regarding an important, sensitive matter such as the sexual abuse of kids. And if they were allowing such sensitive discussions that they would be equipped to handle them with care. Instead, they were silent, stonewalling us until a member confronted them about it again on a coaching call.

In my comments in the pro-abuse thread, I said it was irresponsible to present incest/sexual abuse of kids as a beneficial, alternative lifestyle. I did take a moral stance after having a thorough discussion when I saw that the moderator and administrator were staying neutral about something where that can contribute to further harm.

The administrator said in his coaching call reply, people were messaging him, saying they didn’t think it was a big deal, that we shouldn’t be upset about the thread.

But many of the members continued to debate about it after I left, and they told me it got even worse. People were banned and some others ended up leaving the community too. I was thankful to be out of the discussion because it was painful for me and to be called a troll for standing up for what I believe in so that our actions and words line up into a stance of caring is really bizarre to me.

I am no longer a member of that community, so it doesn’t matter if they view me as a troll or not.

Thank you for your thoughtful reply. It helps me feel less steamrolled in that there was validity in my point of view. Being labeled a troll is extremely invalidating to me. What I said is not trolling, but taking a stance. The pro-abuse person was fully supported by the leaders of the forum while I was condemned for taking a stand.

In the future, I probably will not engage in such divisive discussions because it’s too traumatizing for me. I don’t think non-traumatized people fully understand what those of us with trauma go through and continue to for the rest of our lives?

Thank you again. Now maybe I can put this to rest. :heart:

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Some of us do understand. My partner was abused as a child and I was very aware of how it can devastate and change a person for the rest of their life. My sympathies to you.

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It’s not the best decision to just silence yourself simply because of the subject matter. The marketplace of ideas is a battleground of ideas, in many ways. It’s not always easy, but this is a far better solution than censorship and restraint of the mind and word.

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Thank you and my sympathies to you and your partner too :heart:

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Your welcome. I won’t say childhood sex is ALWAYS bad. Just most of the time, I think. I, too, had early experiences, but have never felt traumatized by them. I can’t advocate this position as I may be a “unicorn” in that respect. I don’t know. But, I, sure as hell, know just how bad they can be. My wife’s whole life was colored by the abuse she suffered. I only hope our years together helped her to some measure.

Thank you for your kind words, but she is with her Maker now and finally at peace.

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I’m certain your partner was fortified and comforted by your loving compassion. I’m so sorry for your loss :heart: And thank you too for your kind words.

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I’m all for free speech, but these people genuinely don’t think there’s anything wrong with taking advantage of real children? Despite evidence that such “harmless interactions” tend to ruin a child’s life? Really? Ugh, it’s their free speech to espouse this nonsense, but you don’t have to listen to it in the slightest and owe these people nothing.

You are free to counter their accusations with reasoning, your ability to express your opinions on being with children and causing them psychological harm… If that counts as trolling, I think that place is a giant echo chamber.

I’d leave sites like that behind and never go back, especially if the staff think reasonable arguments count as trolling. Best of luck, hope you can put this all behind you.

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What counted as trolling was me holding the community leaders accountable by stating that their silence amounts to approval. If someone is on your platform encouraging abuse of children, I’d at least expect the leaders to say they’re allowing free speech and because there is no actual harm being done to children, it’s just ideas/free speech, they’re allowing it, even though it’s condoning abuse of kids.

It is upsetting to most people when someone encourages the harm of children. What’s even more insidious and manipulative is cloaking the abuse in language that says it’s a beautiful, positive, alternative lifestyle to have sex with your children. Equating sex to a hug, that children can consent, that it contributes to healthy sexuality, etc. All Ideas based on fiction. There is measurable, social, scientific proof, it is a fact that adults having sex with kids is harmful.

To people who have suffered childhood sexual abuse, and who have worked with those harmed by such abuse, it can be re-traumatizing to encounter such free speech in a group that promotes themselves as smart, conscious, caring people who are creating positive ripples in the world.

People who have no experience with trauma and abuse would be wise to educate themselves if they’re going to allow such free speech on a private site that can moderate their sites as they see fit. What about compassion for those who have been abused and may be abused in the future due to the promotion of the “alternative lifestyle” (incest/sex with kids) ideas?

Thank you so much. Thank you for your encouraging words.

I now want to be more of an advocate while also being pro what is really helpful and works.

:heart:

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It may be precisely because the admins had no personal experience with adult/child sex that they did not feel qualified to comment on it. If they had said something, it would only have been a second-hand opinion, which in turn might give them only a skewed view of reality because of the way some experiences are more taboo than others. They were right to leave the discussion to those who do have relevant personal experience – whether those be people who had negative childhood sexual experiences with adults, those who had positive experiences, or those whose initially positive experiences were marred by iatrogenic trauma after other adults learned about the relationships. There’s no reliable data on these categories’ relative size because nearly all the research is based on clinical samples which are by definition non-representative, just as was once the case with homosexuality. But there’s lots of anecdotal material in all three, if you care to look for it.

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Well, it would have been appreciated if the admins had stated they didn’t feel qualified to comment.

When your community is upset and asking for input and guidance over boundaries, what’s the harm in admins answering questions when directly asked. Instead, the admins avoided the topic, focusing on the age of consent, derailing the thread while sidestepping the issue that concerned us (child sexual abuse). It was not a question of sexuality, but of abuse. Adults have power over children. Children can be manipulated and exploited because they are not knowledgeable or fully developed/mature. They are incapable of consenting; they are at the mercy of the adults in their lives.

They depend on us to help them. Like making sure they get their teeth brushed and stopping them from playing with sharp objects, to keep them safe. We use our power for that, and they trust adults who have full authority over them. We teach kids to obey adults. Using our power to have sex with them is abusing that power and abuses them.

The person who was promoting child sexual abuse had no such relevant experiences and was unqualified to be speaking about it.

The admins later said they didn’t like how we were addressing them, so they decided not to reply. They stonewalled, gave us the silent treatment which only aggravated the situation. If they’d have addressed it at the beginning, it could have prevented much of what unfolded.

They were too thin-skinned, yet told us since we had a problem with the promotion of sex with children and even knowing some of us had trauma from this type of abuse, it didn’t matter. They said we needed to toughen up and basically get over ourselves.

A good movie to watch about child sexual abuse is The Tale, starring Laura Dern. Kids don’t have the agency that they believe they have. I didn’t fully realize the extent of the abuse that I endured in my life until I had kids. I saw what they were developmentally capable of, how vulnerable they were, and in hindsight; I saw how things that happened to me shouldn’t have. The adults failed me. By caring for my kids, and watching them develop and grow, I saw how I was not responsible as a kid. The adults were. I was just a child with limited awareness and no power.

In my experience, I’ve seen the harm caused by child sexual abuse. I’ve seen it in clinical settings manifesting as CPTSD.

I have been looking and reading. I want to have more understanding and compassion for everyone. Thanks :slightly_smiling_face:

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It does sound like the admins were thin-skinned. Perhaps they initially didn’t respond because the whole subject made them uncomfortable, but also felt guilty about not having responded and became defensive when you pressed them on it.

I agree that adults shouldn’t use their power to have sex with children, but that’s not always how it happens. It isn’t even always the adults’ initiative. As I noted before, there’s little genuinely scientific data on this because most research is based on clinical samples, and that usually means people who are psychologically damaged; if they weren’t damaged they wouldn’t be seeing a clinician and so they wouldn’t be in the sample. This used to be the case with homosexaulty before gay liberation. There was lots of “data” supporting the idea that it’s pathological, because it was only damaged gay people that clinicians saw, and that’s where the observations came from.

What research has been based on nonclinical samples has produced very different-looking results, and there’s a history of ideologically motivated attempts to suppress such research. What’s also largely suppressed in the process is the cases where the relationship was benign but the reaction of other adults who discovered it was traumatizing for the child involved. An experience of this sort is what led Joan Nelson to become a sexologist. It was with an adult male cousin and occurred when she was eight. She described it this way:

“When I was a child I experienced an ongoing incestuous relationship that seemed to me to be caring and beneficial in nature. There were love and healthy self-actualization in what I perceived to be a safe environment. I remember it as perhaps the happiest period in my life. Suddenly one day I discerned from playground talk at school that what I was doing might be ‘bad.’ Fearing that I might, indeed be a ‘bad’ person, I went to my mother for reassurance. The ensuing traumatic incidents of that day inaugurated a 30-year period of psychological and emotional dysfunction that reduced family communication to mere utilitarian process and established severe limits on my subsequent developmental journey.”

As a sexologist Nelson identified many others whose experience was at odds with the dominant narrative about intergenerational relationships. On the basis of such examples she developed a perspective which she laid out in “Intergenerational Sexual Contact: A Continuum Model of Participants and Experiences” (Journal of Sex Education & Therapy 15)

Nelson’s recounting of her personal truth evoked a strong, angry reaction from many, as did the evidence-based approach she called for. She wrote this in response to one of her critics:

"My article advocating an impartial, scientific continuum model for professionals dealing with issues of intergenerational sexuality has obviously met with severe condemnation from Wendy Maltz. Her reaction is an excellent example of the current professional bias that produces ignorance of the big picture. My paper clearly states that I agree completely with Maltz about victims and offenders in that very real, problem-centered category of intergenerational sex which is, indeed, child sexual abuse. My main thesis is that what we as society and profession currently believe to be the whole truth is only part of that truth.

"I wouldn’t bother to make an ideological issue out of it if I weren’t convinced that professional ignorance of the big picture does major harm by making ‘victims’ out of people who were never victimized except by professionals who state as diagnosis what is really value judgment. I have stated that current semantics represent only part of the entire picture of intergenerational sex. Maltz states that I want to change the terms ‘offender’ and ‘victim’ to ‘participant,’ and ‘incest’ to ‘intergenerational sex.’ This is not so. I want to include all child-adult liaisons, not just the consanguineous ones. And I want to include children who are not victimized as well as adults who offend nothing but other adults’ sensibilities.

“All sexual behavior, no matter what the relationship or age of the partners, exists on a continuum from violent rape to nurturing lovemaking. When professionals and society learn to define exploitation in terms of actual harm done, rather than age difference, we will have fewer iatrogenic victims.”

– “Joan Nelson’s Rebuttal” by Joan A. Nelson, Ed.D.; Republiced in "FreeWill Report #14 (Project Truth); April 1989; Original: Journal of Sex Education & Therapy, Vol. 15, No. 1; 1989 (Joan Nelson’s Rebuttal: Journal of Sex Education and Therapy: Vol 15, No 1)

Other relevant papers:

Paul Okami, “Sociopolitical Biases in the Contemporary Scientific Literature on Adult Human Sexual Behavior with Children and Adolescents”

Emil Kirkegaard, “Rind, Tromovitch, and Bauserman: Politically Incorrect, Scientifically Correct”

As Nelson suggests, the research shows that when you control for other factors such as physical threats and emotional manipulation, age and age difference completely disappear as predictors of whether a relationship will be harmful.

It’s likely you’re surmising that I have some kind of personal agenda in writing about this issue, so I want to lay everything on the table. As an adult I’ve had no sexual contact with minors, nor do I desire any (i.e., I’m not an MAP). I had a couple of relevant experiences as a minor:

  1. As a child, for a while I engaged in some mutual massage with my older brother, at his initiative, After a while it started to make me uncomfortable, so I begged off of doing it when he would ask and eventually he stopped asking. If I remember correctly this activity included touching each other’s behinds but not our genitals. And my memory of his bedroom where we did this indicates it was in the house we’d moved to when I was nine, an important point for reasons I’ll explain in a moment.

  2. While attending a socialist group’s convention at the age of sixteen and not yet sexually experienced, I met a 21-year-old woman who, a few days into our acquaintance, propositioned me. I was happy and excited about this, and my only regret afterwards was that, because we were both sharing rooms with several other people, we didn’t have the chance to consummate the mutual interest.

That was 1978, and it was only in the past year that it even occurred to me that some might regard Amber as a criminal “child molester.” My own feelings and memories about her have never been anything but fond.

As for the first incident, some might suppose that the activity made me uncomfortable because the buttocks are somehow naturally “private” and touching them violates an organic “boundary,” but I can think of no theoretical reason one would expect those things to be true. At the time I had no idea why I felt the way I did, but an insight I gained while talking with my therapist a couple years ago suggests an explanation.

For a few years my mother sometimes punished me with spankings and, although I hated when I got them, her announcement one day when I was eight that I no longer would left me inexplicably feeling sad. While still eight, I approached my parents and said I needed to be spanked, giving some reason I made up on the spot, but their reaction was one of consternation and all I got as a result was a sort of pretend punishment that didn’t hurt at all and obviously wasn’t what I’d been asking for. I now realize their response to my desire conveyed the message that this was something that made them uncomfortable and that I shouldn’t bring it up again, and as a result I became ashamed of this feeling and buried it, not acknowledging it again for over 20 years.

So, when the mutual massage with my brother got to the point of my behind being rubbed, I think this threatened to remind me of this desire I’d repressed, and that’s why it made me uncomfortable. So the actual root of the discomfort wasn’t what my brother did, but what my parents had done.

What first got me thinknig about the issue of intergenerational sex was a debate in the pages of the socialist group’s internal discussion bulletin. While the leadership called for lowering the age of consent to 13 or 14, a few members were arguing for abolishing it. A local organizer asked me to a one-on-one meeting, at which he asked me if I “had any differences with the leadership.” (In retrospect, I understand that the group was rapidly becoming cultic, and this meeting was part of a systematic effort to weed out any independent thinkers.) To answer this question I had to think, since I hadn’t volunteered any differences. But as an intellectual nerd I’d been avidly reading the DBs, and I thought of the things being debated there, and answered by mentioning a couple of those debates, including the one about age of consent. The arguments the organizer made in the ensuing discussion made no more sense to me than those made by the leadership in the DB, and at one point in frustration he just blurted out, “That’s just not the revolutionary Marxist position!” Of course this just made me feel contempt for him. He couldn’t make a logical argument, but he thought I was going to roll over because he just declared my position wrong?

So, that’s the origin of the emotional charge that became attached to the whole subject for me.

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Adults always have the power when it comes to children. Adults can choose what they act upon, they can control their impulses and responses. Adults have agency over themselves, initiative is within the control of the adult, not the child. An adult can enforce boundaries.

Homosexuality is not the same as child sexual abuse, so we cannot compare it. Homosexuality is between consenting adults.

Children can not consent to sex. This is the issue.

Adults having sex with children is abusive, it doesn’t matter if the child views it as abusive or not.

A child can be brainwashed and as an adult still frames the experiences in a positive light based on the abuser’s brainwashing and the way they thought of it as a child. So they can view it as non-harming, or inconsequential, or even beneficial. People differ in the ways they may respond. For some it is devastating, for others it’s not. That still doesn’t mean we should take the risk of condoning adults having sex with kids.

It is unfortunate that the parent’s response and subsequent investigation traumatizes some children after they divulge the abuse. Over time, we’re improving our responses to prevent further trauma while investigating such matters. An example of this is in Allen vs Farrow, causing further trauma by having the child interviewed repetitively by multiple people/agencies was noted and since then they have changed the processes to help prevent further traumatization.

It would be beneficial to have as much information as possible on the spectrum of sexuality, to have a more holistic view, but this in no way supports that it is beneficial and healthy for adults to have sex with children. It is irresponsible to promote adults having sex with children because children can not consent and adults have power over children. They can manipulate kids, persuade/groom without it being violent or threatening, or emotional.

It is harmful because children can not consent and are powerless over adults. An adult can recall the sexual experience they had as a child and keep the psychological framing/perspective they had during the experience, but that does not mean they weren’t abused. A child does not have the capacity to determine that they were abused because they are limited by their very nature, level of maturity, knowledge, awareness, and neurobiology.

I framed my experience as something that just happened and blamed myself, believing that I had agency in the situation. I didn’t realize the truth until I had kids, and when they became the age that I was when the abuse happened, I fully saw the truth. I saw that as a child I had no agency in that situation because I was a child and they were adults who had all the power. That’s why I recommend the movie The Tale because it illustrates this perfectly.

The truth is adults having sex with kids is abusive. It’s not about perceived pleasure, warm feelings, or viewing it as positive, it is about the abuse of power.

During adolescence when kids are growing into sexual maturity there are more grey areas where it’s tricky. This article suggests an age of assent because teens are not fully mature either and can be abused as well. Age-of-consent laws don’t reflect teenage psychology. Here’s how to fix them. - Vox

Actual harm done may be repressed/suppressed for years, even decades until something triggers the repressed trauma. Or it can be a case where we don’t realize the harm done until we have kids and see the truth. It is multilayered and complex.

If we condone adults having sex with kids, wouldn’t the children be even more vulnerable to exploitation? So does it really matter if some say they had positive experiences? To me what matters most is protecting vulnerable children from harm.

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You ask, “If we condone adults having sex with kids, wouldn’t the children be even more vulnerable to exploitation?” The answer is: no, quite the opposite. What makes children vulnerable is being gaslit and told their feelings aren’t valid, as happened to me when I was eight.

Your argument is largely circular. Starting from the assumption that intergenerational sex can only be good for the adult and harmful to the child, you call it abuse of power and therefore harmful. But you only arrive at that conclusion because you assumed it was harmful at the outset. Adults initiate all kinds of activities with children that aren’t strictly necessary, and/or fail to “set boundaries” when the children try to initiate them, yet most of these activities aren’t presumptively called abusive. There’s no rational reason to regard sexual activities differently, especially when, as is often the case, they’re centered on the child’s pleasure and/or are activities that have been normative for them in other cultures historically.

Your a priori assumption is contradicted by the many people who go on to lead a very good life, such as could not be expected if they were repressing a major trauma. As T. Rivas observes in the “Discussion” section of his book Positive Memories,

“Sometimes, critics claim all of these cases are unreliable, i.e. that at the most they represent the twisted attempt of a small sub group of abuse victims to rationalize their inherently traumatic experiences. However, this does not explain the fact that positive experiences are reported by persons who clearly seem happy with their adult lives and successful from both a societal and a creative perspective as well [such as Allen Ginsburg and Pim Fortuyn]. I got in touch personally with some of these respondents and based on my own impressions, I really cannot believe they are simply fooling themselves.”

As I explained previously, age-of-consent laws aren’t needed to protect vulnerable children from harm because the factors that are actually predictive of harm, such as physical threats and emotional manipulation, don’t depend upon age. Laws based upon these factors, and only these factors, would prohibit all actually harmful relationships.

What is needed to protect vulnerable children from harm is to stop gaslighting them about their own experiences. As long as the law tells them they’re abused regardless of how they actually feel – and, as an inevitable consequence, forcing them to betray people they love and who love them – there is no way to prevent the kind of trauma that Joan Nelson experienced. It will happen again and again until we start treating children’s feelings as valid.

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How do you see us implementing boundaries that allow adults to have sex with children without putting the kids at risk? If kids are taught to have sex with adults, will the kids be able to keep safe boundaries? Adults have problems navigating sex and consent as it is. Power is the defining factor and can not be excluded from the mix.

You are arguing that kids are on the same footing as adults. Sex is not an inconsequential activity. Sex is complex and causes intense hormonal responses and feelings. There is also the risk of disease and pregnancy. Are you saying that children have the capacity to understand all the inherent risks and benefits of sexual activity? Consent really doesn’t matter? That sexual maturity doesn’t matter? That stages of development do not matter? That consequences of sex at a young age are not of concern? A family member had recurrent bladder infections and had to have cystoscopes, she was only four. We had no idea she was being sexually abused by the father of one of her playmates. There is empirical data that tells us how damaging it can be for children to have sex with adults. What of that?

What activities would you compare to sex that adults initiate with kids, yet aren’t presumptively called abusive?

How do we explain all the people who have been traumatized, even when they initially as a child believed it was a mutual, loving activity, then realized later that they didn’t have a say so in it because of their lack of maturity and understanding? Are you saying that people like Joan Nelson, Allen Ginsberg, and Pim Fortuyn are the cases we should allow to define our view and laws of adults having sex with kids? Are you saying that if the kids say they are enjoying the activities that we determine the laws on a case-by-case basis? We let the child decide?

Are you saying it’s our culture restricting adults having sex with kids as damaging which in turn gaslights and traumatizes kids who would view sex with adults as positive otherwise?

Say we treat the children’s feelings as valid, they are enjoying themselves, it’s pleasurable and they continue having sex with their adults, then what if over time as they mature, their feelings change and they view it as the adults taking advantage of them? What recourse do they have? The damage is done.

Are you saying that kids have the ability to consent to sexual activity and it’s our laws and social conditioning that are causing the most problems for kids? That sexual activity is no different from other activities that we take part in with children, it’s just our social conditioning that treats it otherwise? So you reason that it’s our culture that is causing the most damage?

The problem is, children do not have the knowledge and awareness to know about emotional manipulation, physical threats, and harm. Children accept whatever is happening to them because they don’t know any better. This is how so many kids suffer from all manner of abuse until they are able to break free in adulthood.

You say that kids can determine if they are being abused or not, and they have the power to stop it?

Okay.

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Yet another lost user who seems to think pro-contact garbage is welcome here. Age of consent laws are designed to protect minors from being exploited by adults. If a 20-year-old has inappropriate contact with a 10-year-old, then that is assault, period.

This is supposed to be a child protection organization, and yet the forum suspiciously keeps attracting these users who are all like, “Hello, I’m here to tell you why adults touching kids’ private parts is actually not a bad thing.”

Of course, I feel they are trolls deliberately trying to tarnish Prostasia’s reputation. Like Michael45. Looks like he failed, though.

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It’s not a circular argument. It’s a sheer fact that laws focused on preventing harm be based on logic and reason. The age of consent is a valid means of preventing sexual exploitation and abuse by adults, and this type of discussion supporting or praising such an idea is not to be tolerated on the forum.

Because it IS harmful, and the risk of it causing further harm is exemplified by allowing avenues for it to continue, so therefore punitive actions need to be taken to ensure it doesn’t occur.

I apologize for not getting back to this thread, I had it muted because I had assumed the other user would be able to explain that, but apparently I have to do everything around here.

A lot of this user’s points have largely been debunked and challenged by others in the past, especially the “good life” portions.
This type of thing really, really needs more punitive measures.
@terminus Please consider appointing moderators to the forum so we can better address pro-abuse trolls such as this.

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We’re still waiting for more volunteers. If you’re reading this and agree that this forum needs more active moderation, please DM to me to volunteer.

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