Here’s a little video that takes a look at some PUAs and MRAs who share a great love for underage girls … and a hatred of the word “pedophile.” If some of the quotes in the video look familiar, that’s because they’re from a creepy mini-manifesto called “Age of Consent is Misandry,” which we examined here not too long ago. The rest are from a thread on Roissy’s Citizen Renegade blog that really has to be read to be believed. You’ll notice one, er, interesting comment from a guy calling himself “Welmer.” That’s our good friend W.F. Price from The Spearhead.
Enjoy?
Sharculese
Thanks
I’m guessing that you mean Marcus Dixon……Not quite Ion’s “scenario”, but it really is a struggle to find anything that comes even vaguely close to it.
Okay, just going to put this out there.
I was sexually active as a teen. So were at least one of my high school best friends; several of my best friends in college; my best friend in grad school; and my partner.
Many of us were sexually active with people three or more years older.
I think underage sex in America is a bit like underage drinking. Yes, it would be ideal if no one did it, but people are going to do it. And it might well be safer and healthier if they could do it openly, with the knowledge and support of the trusted adults in their lives.
I’m not saying teenage sex should be completely unregulated. Certainly, sex with a 13 year old should be illegal. I’m also in favor of stringent laws against sex with a significant age gap, if the younger partner is a minor.
But telling 16-year-olds that they shouldn’t have sex is clearly not working.
’m guessing that you mean Marcus Dixon
Yes! That was it. Thanks.
As a 16 year-old girl, nothing creeps me out more than these men referring to girls of my age as “women”. Actually, scratch that, nothing creeps me out more than the comment about checking out 12 year-olds on the beach and saying they deserved it because of the bathing suits that they chose to wear. Are there really middle-aged men checking me out and thinking that I’m asking for it because I’m wearing a practical outfit for swimming? *shudder*
The comment at 2:47 is full on admitting that it’s ok for men to go around flaunting their sexuality, and being sexual, and being “normal men”, but that women need to be hidden away to keep their sexuality in.
But then these guys complain they can’t get laid. headdesk.
Also, i second the thought that telling 16 year olds not to have sex isn’t working. But the idea with statutory rape is that they can have sex. Just not with non-minors. Or rather, people in the age of majority can’t have sex with minors. Because the onus fully, and fairly, is on the person who is a legal adult. When i was 16, I was sleeping with a 20 year old dude. That should not have been. At all. I mean, I thought I loved him. But he was just manipulative, socially awkward, and uncomfortable dating anyone with an opinion of their own, and the courage to stand up for themselves. At 16, i was pretty much a doormat, and he took complete advantage of that.
@FoSF:
“But then these guys complain they can’t get laid. headdesk.”
They complain because their model of how that’s all supposed to work is completely and utterly fucked. They basically want to be able to proposition any woman they want whenever they want and have the answer always be “yes”. When that doesn’t work in the real world, they see it as the fault of women because it’s easier than looking in the mirror for the problem.
My daughter had periods at 8 and breasts at 10. She was getting hit on every now and then by grown ups as early as 11 and pretty regularly by 14. She didn’t have a fake ID or dress like an adult, just like any other teenager.
By the time she was 15, she’d gotten to where she’d give those guys a piece of her mind in no uncertain terms, and anyone close by would know just how much of a creep he was.
Now that she actually is an adult at 27 and looks it (though just as lovely as ever), creeper guys don’t hit on her, which I find telling.
I agree with Simone Lovelace on this one, ideally it should be an individual judgement based on individual people’s level of maturity and readiness, not something regulated by laws. If the act is consensual, the law shouldn’t be involved. It sounds like the government doesn’t trust young people to make decisions and is trying to ‘protect them from themselves’.
dan and Sharculese – why the hostile tone? it was a hypothetical scenario, which might happen with the laws set up the way they are and I don’t think it would be right, is all.
Dan, Sharculese, and others: The case this brought to mind for me was that of Genarlow Wilson. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_v._State_of_Georgia) He was 17 & was arrested, tried, & sentenced to 10 years for getting a blowjob from a 15-year-old. His state has/had Romeo and Juliet laws that, ludicrously, didn’t apply to oral sex.
This suggests to me that there *are* problems with the age of consent laws. Sex between people who are similar in age shouldn’t be a criminal offense, and loopholes like the one in Georgia should be closed up. I also kinda feel like 18 is too old an age of consent. It could be argued that 16 and 17 year olds should have the right to have sex with a partner of their choice (even an older one), without fear of that person going to jail.. At that age, they might still be prone to poor judgment, but they have preferences and a sex drive of their own, and it’s their body to do what they want with. (Of course, a pairing between a 16-year-old and a guy in his 20’s or older is usually creepy as hell. Just not sure it should be a crime.)
But the commenters in that video have missed the point completely. You don’t get to decide that a girl is ready for sex, based on the fact that she has breasts and hips. It is really up to her. “That girl has probably had a period, so she’s implicitly consented to sex” is about the most objectifying thing you could say.
Good god.
The thread and that video…it’s like a fucked up episode of The Twilight Zone.
@betoma:
“But the commenters in that video have missed the point completely. You don’t get to decide that a girl is ready for sex, based on the fact that she has breasts and hips. It is really up to her. “That girl has probably had a period, so she’s implicitly consented to sex” is about the most objectifying thing you could say.”
All ties in with their entitlement mentality. It doesn’t matter what a woman wants. They want not just the final decision but the ONLY decision.
My daughter had periods at 8 and breasts at 10. She was getting hit on every now and then by grown ups as early as 11 and pretty regularly by 14. She didn’t have a fake ID or dress like an adult, just like any other teenager.
Reminds me of this really awesome girl I work with. She was completely developed by 14 and as a result got a ton of unwanted attention from older men. Her response was to start reading up on feminism. She’s 21 now and she looks and dresses like a Barbie doll, but she’s the most committed and articulate feminist I know and will give you hell for suggesting that the way she looks detracts from her ideas.
Dan, Sharculese, and others: The case this brought to mind for me was that of Genarlow Wilson. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_v._State_of_Georgia) He was 17 & was arrested, tried, & sentenced to 10 years for getting a blowjob from a 15-year-old. His state has/had Romeo and Juliet laws that, ludicrously, didn’t apply to oral sex.
I know I said yes earlier, but I’m terrible with names and now that I read that summary it was definitely the wilson trial I was thinking of.To be clear though, the problem wasn’t that the romeo and juliet law didn’t apply to oral sex (GA’s R&J provision is- “If the victim is at least 14 but less than 16 years of age and the person convicted of statutory rape is 18 years of age or younger and is no more than four years older than the victim, such person shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.”) The prosecution convinced the jury to convict on a child molestation charge that sounded less severe but carried a ten year prison sentence.
I was in high school when this happened, but my English teacher was a white woman dating a black man, so she took the case very seriously and kept us informed on how it was going.
“I know I said yes earlier, but I’m terrible with names and now that I read that summary it was definitely the wilson trial I was thinking of.” Fun fact: I couldn’t remember the name either, & found the case by doing a search on some combination of “oral sex trial underage romeo and juliet.” That I found the info I wanted, & not something horrifyingly unsavory, is little short of miraculous.
That Wikipedia page says that “at the time of his conviction, provisions for similarity in age that allowed underage consent to be taken into account were only applicable to vaginal sex. Because the case involved oral sex the consent of the girl was not at that time legally relevant.” It also mentions the deceptively harsh sentence.
I had periods at 9 and breasts at 10. I had the good fortune not to be hit on much as a young’un. I’m not conventionally attractive, and I grew up in a pretty “safe” neighborhood, but mostly was just lucky. Still, the idea that someone could have viewed little ten-year-old me as a sex object is horrifying.
To be totally clear, I do think there should be age-of-consent laws; I just think they should be a lot more flexible. I would be okay with a system where–for example–a 14-15 year-old could have sex with anyone aged 14-16; a 16-year-old could have sex with anyone between the ages of 14 and 24; and an 18-year-old and up can have sex with anyone over the age of 16.
It’s not that I think a 16-year-old *should* bang a 24-year-old. In most cases, that would be a terrible, terrible idea. But I do think it’s very possible that such a relationship could be safe and consensual; and that in most cases, criminalizing this activity–and thus forcing it underground–might do more harm than good.
But that’s all based on personal experience. I would love, love, love to see some research about this.
In most European countries the age of consent is low (Spain 13, Germany 14, France 15). Still teenage pregnancies, new cases of STIs are rare compared to the US. I’m not sure about abuse, but I doubt it’s worse. I honestly don’t know any teenage girls, who hooked up with middle aged men. But yes, I’m sure it happens just not in my upper middle class circle.
You can’t regulate everything by law. The better way is healthy sex education and lax laws than abstinent only sex education and rigid laws. Most people I talked about it lost their virginity around 16, boys often a bit later, though legally everybody was allowed to fuck with 14.
Not to say that I agree with the weird posts in the video. I mean, legally I could date a 14 year old, but I rather spare myself the drama
there’s enough drama with women my age.Beside, what should I talk about with a 14 year old? Twilight, Justin Bieber, her mean BFF, her upcoming geometry test, immature (male) classmates?When I was in high school I remember reading that while our age of consent was 16, you could legally get married (as a girl) at 14 with parental permission. When I was a senior I was taking a fluff class with a lot of underclassmen and there was one 15-year-old in my class who was married.
MARRIED. AT FIFTEEN.
So … this bugs me a bit. As a 15-year-old you can’t have sex with someone older than you but you can get married to them. Having sex is such a big, scary decision (well, at 15 it sorta is … the abundance of babies born to girls in my school is a testament to that), but getting married? No big thang. Go right ahead.
Seems to me that age of consent laws would work better if they just set a cap. I know that some states do this (four or five years older than the girl being an upper limit). It’s perfectly feasible that a girl would meet a guy as a freshman who was a senior and get into a relationship. Is it a great idea? No, probably not, but it’s definitely not an unrealistic situation.
That said … I know that when I was 19/20 I had a lot of older guys trying to make that Pantal Power Play with me. I was too secure and mature for it to work, but they tried anyway. I had several friends on whom it worked, and most cases wound up being a “Woo, Screw, Dump” situation (thankfully not woo, screw, dump, baby). Being 16 or 18 isn’t like magic and doesn’t make one prone to good decisions automatically, after all. Most 20-ish adults are still basically kids. I think the biggest problem with telling teens and young adults not to have sex is that we just assume they will Just Say No (right, we see how well that works) when the time comes, and that’s pretty naive. Teaching people how to deal with the ploys like, “I’ll dump you if you don’t,” or, “But I love you, and if you want to show me how much you love me too blah blah blah,” or, “Just the tip/But condoms feel stupid!” would be better. To make a driving analogy, instead of just telling them not to drive or to just wear their seatbelt, perhaps it’s better to teach them how to drive the fucking car, which includes sometimes not driving (drunk, tired, whatever), always wearing a seatbelt, and how to dodge angry badgers that run into the road.
I figured out the problem. The brains of these particular MRAs stopped developing at age thirteen.
That Wikipedia page says that “at the time of his conviction, provisions for similarity in age that allowed underage consent to be taken into account were only applicable to vaginal sex. Because the case involved oral sex the consent of the girl was not at that time legally relevant.”
Yeah, I didn’t read the wikipedia article, but now that you mention it, I can see the law was amended in 2006, but I don’t have westlaw access right now so I don’t know what the change was. I would totally believe it was as a result of the winslow trial.
You can’t regulate everything by law. The better way is healthy sex education and lax laws than abstinent only sex education and rigid laws.
I agree, but sadly, for most of America, decent sex ed is years and years, if not decades and decades, away…
Just catching up here. There were some good comments caught in moderation, including one with some interesting links and info from Puella Sapiens, an interesting one from Taryn, an actual 16 year old, and a few others.
Holly, I agree that this video was a bit problematic, but hey I needed to do a quick post, and it so many appalling comments in it.
I also agree that age of consent laws should be more flexible with regard to “romeo and juliet” situations, but are absolutely necessary to keep the creepers from going after the juliets (and the romeos, too).
Where the hell is NWOSub? All this talk about underage girls should’ve brought him running by now.
I think he’s boycotting. Aren’t all the trolls boycotting? It’s so peaceful!
I dunno, going on strike is such a Marxist thing to do; it seems out of character. Maybe the dudes in the white coats finally caught up with him.