notmyrealnick

Karma: 116

notmyrealnick 26 Jan 2012 20:52 UTC
8 points
in reply to: Luke_A_Somers’s comment on: I’ve had it with those dark rumours about our culture rigorously suppressing opinions
In the cases where that happens, you are right, it is not okay. Is that universal, though? Like I mentioned in my other reply, I looked at wikipedia’s entry about grooming before making my comment, and it did not mention isolating the child.

The entry could just be deficient, of course.

notmyrealnick 26 Jan 2012 20:47 UTC
7 points
in reply to: [deleted]’s comment on: I’ve had it with those dark rumours about our culture rigorously suppressing opinions
I did, and if you will note, it does not define such behaviors to be a part of grooming, but rather only says that many (not all) pedophiles have engaged in them. Such behaviors are obviously wrong and I am not defending them. I was specifically talking about the cases where no physical coercion is used, since those are the cases that the whole discussion was about. Cases where children were coerced are wrong and condemnable, but also irrelevant, since the discussion is about sex that the children consented to.

Also, because the abstract was somewhat unclear on whether it considered such behaviors a necessary part of grooming or not, I looked at wikipedia before writing my comment. Wikipedia’s definition says that grooming refers to “actions deliberately undertaken with the aim of befriending and establishing an emotional connection with a child, in order to lower the child’s inhibitions” and generally describes actions which would be considered positive if not for their intent. Giving gifts, for example. “Hugging and kissing or other physical contact, even when the child does not want it, can happen”, was the only thing even hinting of coercion that was mentioned.

Wikipedia can obviously be wrong and is not an authoritative source, but since neither the article nor the linked abstract implied that coercion or violence would be a necessary part of grooming, I felt justified in posting my comment.

notmyrealnick 26 Jan 2012 10:19 UTC
8 points
in reply to: dbaupp’s comment on: I’ve had it with those dark rumours about our culture rigorously suppressing opinions
If sexual consent achieved by manipulation is equivalent to rape, does that imply that pick-up artists are rapists?

Spending time building up a relationship of trust and liking with a person that you want to have sex with is called “dating” and considered normal when it is in the context of two adults. The same activity is called “grooming” and considered horrendous manipulation when it is in the context of an adult and a child. Just because trust has been built up on purpose does not make consent founded on that trust false.

notmyrealnick 26 Jan 2012 10:08 UTC
10 points
in reply to: Raemon’s comment on: I’ve had it with those dark rumours about our culture rigorously suppressing opinions
Some evidence suggests that this isn’t true.

notmyrealnick 17 Jul 2009 15:34 UTC
2 points
in reply to: PeterS’s comment on: Absolute denial for atheists
I am sceptical of some of the points in the linked text as well. The author mentions that there are cultures in which parents masturbate their children, but that isn’t obviously harmful. Yes, an example was cited where the masturbation in question was done in a harmful and painful way, but that isn’t to say that it must always be so. Young children have been documented to occasionaly masturbate even on their own, so why is it that adults helping is immeaditly abuse? And citing

“co-sleeping,” with parents physically embracing the child, often continues until the child is ten or fifteen

as an example of “abuse” is getting us into the ludicrous territory. Embracing your child is abuse! The author also makes pretty big leaps of correlation and causation:

Boys in many New Guinea groups today, for instance, are so traumatized by the early erotic experiences, neglect and assaults on their bodies that they need to prove their masculinity when they grow up and become fierce warriors and cannibals, with a third of them dying in raids and wars.

Of course, there are also plenty of valid points about real sexual abuse that does take place, or has historically taken place.

notmyrealnick 17 Jul 2009 15:26 UTC
4 points
in reply to: byrnema’s comment on: Closet survey #1

Except for the fact that many, many kids grow up and report that it’s harmful. These accounts are painful, emotional, sincere. So if the victims say that it is harmful, why don’t you believe them?

I didn’t say sexual relationships with children couldn’t be harmful; I only said that not all automatically are. For instance, rape is obviously always harmful, and AFAIK a large fraction of such relations consist mainly of rape—but not all.

notmyrealnick 14 Mar 2009 12:22 UTC
78 points
on: Closet survey #1
I don’t know if I actually believe this, but I’ve heard reports that cause me to assign a non-neglible probability on the chance that sexual relations with between children and adults aren’t necessarily as harmful as they may seem. For instance, see the Rind et al. report:

“Child Sexual Abuse does not cause intense harm on a pervasive basis regardless of gender.” Simplified, Rind et al. (1998) found that 3 out of every 100 individuals in a CSA population had clinically significant problems (compared to 2 out of every 100 in a general population).

Rind et al. contended that the degree of psychological damage was based on whether the child describes the encounter as consensual or not.

Similarly, I’ve heard second-hand accounts about people who report that they actually had loving relationships with pedophiles as kids. That didn’t traumatize them, but the follow-up “psychological care”, where the psychiatrists automatically assumed that the experience must have been horrible, did.

It would seem reasonable, on the face of it. There’s no automatic reason for why we should assume sexual relations with children must automatically be harmful and unpleasant to the kids, if not for the cached thought of all sexual relations being abuse. And in the current political climate, just about nobody will have the courage to voice such an opinion in public, so studies such as these should carry extra weight.
What links here?
- notmyrealnick's comment on I’ve had it with those dark rumours about our culture rigorously suppressing opinions by Multiheaded (26 Jan 2012 10:08 UTC; 10 points)
- [deleted]'s comment on Open Thread, May 1-15, 2012 by OpenThreadGuy (10 May 2012 14:33 UTC; 0 points)