It has to be this way. While it is possible that some early sexual experiences by minors may not cause trauma, the VAST majority do. It has been well established that these encounters cause harm. Maybe not immediately, it may come later in life, but it does cause problems. Nobody “gaslit” my wife, she was attacked by her father. He was responsible for physical, emotional and sexual abuse when she was a child. She closed off that part of her life, but it still leaked out. It effected her first marriage leading to divorce. She picked a schmuck like her father to marry. It wasn’t until a decade later and and marriage to someone totally unlike her father and first husband, that she was able to confront the demons in her life. We are not talking “recovered” memories, her cousin and I both had realized she had a conflicted feeling about her father, but still acted like he was St. Daddy. It was several years later that we finally found out way she acted this way. She just needed to fell safe enough to talk about it. You cannot know what will happen in the future and the chances of harm to the child are too great to risk it.
I, too, had child/adult sexual experiences (12/19), so I do understand that there can be non-traumatic results. But the psychologic records have few, if any, cases recorded of this and plenty of harmful results. But there is no way to tell if harm is caused until much later, so therefore the default choice MUST be no sex between minors and adults. Even if Lolita begs you, Humbert.
Please point me to the studies that prove the vast majority of contacts are harmful. The paper by Paul Okami which I cited previously indicates that most of this supposed evidence is an artifact of profoundly unscientific methodology.
OK, I concede that I don’t know of such records. Psychobabble is not my forte. I don’t even respect shrinks in general. In my book, psychology is at best a pseudoscience. I am an engineer. If it can’t be measured and calculated, it’s not a science. Any “science” where you can’t reproduce your results is just quackery. Even the use of statistics can easily be abused or misused and often are. Mark Twain famously said that there are “lies, damned lies and statistics”. You cannot verify what people actually think and EVERYBODY lies about sex. So whatever any pseudoscientist says on the subject of psychology is likely wrong. Freud was revered at one time, now he is pretty much discredited. I DO know the pain my wife suffered and continued to suffer. I wouldn’t have wished it on any child.
But, I what have read is that a lot of harm is caused by sexual contact with children. Plenty of people have come forward about the damage it caused in their lives. I did not hear or read about anyone saying that these experiences were good until trolls invaded this forum. And I even had a positive relationship when young. But, I do not go around advertising it. Society does not approve and I don’t want to be looked at as some kind of freak or monster. I would imagine most people with early encounters keep quiet about them like I do. Good, bad or indifferent. My wife never said anything about her experiences until several attempts to break into our home caused all these memories to come back and effect our marriage. They reminded her of how unsafe and scared she was as a child, never knowing when something would set off her father. She was diagnosed with PTSD. I suspect that those who openly advocate for them are opportunistic scum. I won’t call them pedophiles as that word has been much misused. Just my opinion.
CSA is still illegal. I simply feel that during the trial or sentencing, the level of harm should be evaluated and taken into account. If you don’t like it, change the law. Let us know how that works.
While I’m currently unable to produce any scientific literature to challenge your claims, it is there. A plethora of scientific data from qualified clinicians who specialize in pediatric healthcare and psychological development can and does attest to the harms associated with adult-child sexual activity.
Children, especially those below the age of adolescence, lack the neurological, psychological, or physiological maturity necessary to independently function as sexual beings, especially when compared to that of adult partners. It isn’t that hard to understand the harm done to their bodies, as well as countless observed cases of psychological stress caused as a result of their sexual encounters with adults, many of which have been observed to be independent from from social pressure or cultural factors.
Children cannot consent to sex with adults, plain and simple.
Here’s some advice for dealing with pro-contact posters. I’m quite pro-c leaning by many people’s standards, despite not identifying as such myself, so I know many of the arguments from both sides.
You’ll mostly come across 2 types of pro-c; those who approach it from a youth rights perspective (“children should have the rights to their own bodies”), these people are generally very willing to listen and have a reasoned discussion; those who approach it from a MAP rights perspective (“I should have the right to have sex with children”) are often less receptive. By far the most common pro-c stance is that with societal change sexual contact with children could be harmless, most don’t think that abolishing the age of consent is a good idea at the moment.
Don’t try and argue that children cannot consent. It’s a ridiculously weak argument, easy to counter, often relying on circular logic, and one that any pro-c posting online will have lots of of experience with, after all it’s the most common argument used against them.
Similarly arguing about power imbalances is a very weak and easily refuted argument.
Don’t speak in absolutes. That’s a good rule in general but it’s especially true here. In general trying to argue that the sexual contact is harmful in itself is not going to work. Any argument you make along those lines will be comfortably refuted. It’s better to talk about the risk of harm, arguments into the source of the harm are pointless as it makes no difference. Acknowledgment of an unacceptable risk of harm is the reason most people with pro-contact beliefs will never actually have sexual contact with children.
Remember that the people you’re talking to are, except in rare cases, moral and would never wish to cause a child harm. They’re not bad people. Don’t be afraid to acknowledge points that are good or that you agree with.
If you’re going to debate pro-cs stay cool and take the time to formulate your arguments well. It’s an emotionally heated topic but if you lose your cool you definitely won’t get through.
With the way our society views and treats children it’s possible that emotional manipulation would be present in sexual contact involving children more than in sexual contact between adults. In our society children’s bodies are not their own and they frequently feel like they are not allowed to say no to adults. While indirect this could perhaps be categorised as emotional manipulation and work as such in a relationship.
This would be great, in an ideal world where it can be shown conclusively that sexual contact with children is not harmful, whether inherently or as a result of societal factors as these are both unavoidable currently and effectively indistinguishable, where the rest of our laws are sufficiently effective and where there is adequate universal sex education. None of those things are true yet. At this moment in time abolishing AoC would almost certainly result in substantial harm.
This is definitely needed.
There is plenty of evidence that a substantial portion of such contact results in harm, whether a majority or not it’s substantial enough to be a concern. The source of that harm is something that can be debated and the potential for bias in scientific research is also something that can be questioned, but the denial of harmful contact is dangerous, as is the denial of positive experiences.
Just start fucking banning them if they can’t be reasoned with. There is no excuse for allowing such nonsense… They get two warnings, three strikes you are OUT.
There is no such thing as a positive relationship between a child and an adult. They ALWAYS change their view of said relationship when they are an adult. No, I’m not talking about some 17 w/ 18 year old couple of high schooler situation. The uncle should be prosecuted for child rape and sentenced accordingly.
But we should also accept that no every person subjected to CSA (or any other type of child abuse) is necessarily going to be severely traumatized, while carrying an understanding that any type of child abuse is never acceptable.
That’s untrue, there are many examples of relationships that resulted in no harm and are even viewed positively. Denying and invalidating the experiences of those who had positive experiences only harms and creates more victims through gaslighting.
You can say that it’s never acceptable and nearly always harmful, but don’t deny the experiences of those who disagree.
While I agree with the no pro-contact advocacy, I don’t agree that the subject shouldn’t be discussed. There may be reasoned arguments for it, although the trolls that wander by here seem to be just those that want to pork a child and devil take the hindmost. I suspect that, again from personal experience, that the CSA that mostly cause trauma are those that are coerced. I also suspect that much of the CSA is not the result of MAPs who can’t control their desires. Parents and parental figures who use physical, emotional and/or sexual abuse to control and punish children are not MAPs, pedophiles or even people who like children. Just cruel. So too, with the scum who produce the porn pictures and videos. They are just greedy.
I prefer to live by the words of Rhode Island’s Founding Father, Stephen Hopkins, from the historical movie, “1776”, when asked for his vote on debating the idea of American independence. “Well, in all my years, I ain’t never heard, seen nor smelled an issue that was so dangerous that it couldn’t be talked about. Hell yeah! I’m for debating anything.”
I doubt this ever happens. But you are free to link to a research paper. Very likely the victim’s words were twisted from “not being substantially traumatized” to “this was a good thing”. Even if it were the case (and I really doubt it), the risk of harm is far too great to be tolerated under any circumstances and must be prohibited and strictly enforced by law.
These people do exist regardless of how much you doubt it, I know many personally who view their experiences in a positive light.
Yes, there’s an unacceptably high risk of harm right now, but It’s not okay to invalidate people’s positive experiences any more than it is to invalidate their negative ones.
Since anyone who could say “I know that positive, consensual, loving, caring, moral and ethical romantic relationships between adults and minors do exist because I’m involved in one” would end up banned from all social media forums, hounded by an angry mob, and possibly raided by the police, I guess we’ll never know. Just saying.
For the sake of brevity, I think we can all agree that the harm adult-child sex causes far outweighs your or anybody else’s positive experiences.
I’m sure we can all think of a “Mrs. Robinson” or handsome rockstar type character and assume good things. But the bottom line here is that too many children, who are not you, face a plethora of damage both to their psyche and their bodies by engaging in this type of behavior.
Having everyone on the forum go “oh it’s not that bad” is precisely the response people like @Katy_amy want so they can weaponize it to undermine both us and Prostasia. This organization gets a lot of attention from both curious and concerned, let’s keep it as safe as possible and set the right impression, please.
It’s not up for debate. Child rape is one of the most heinous offenses a person can commit. The fact that a child protection charity allows for it’s members to post comments suggesting that child rape can be “beneficial” is outright repulsive. You guys are not doing this charity any good by posting these statements.
Prostasia and its forum community does not condone, nor do we believe that such instances are in any way allowable or acceptable. We’ve had issues in the past where users have insisted on making such comments, and they’re always dealt with and addressed accordingly, as such comments go against both Prostasia’s mission as a child protection and CSA prevention charity, as well as our forum rules.
