Re:Turns Out Schrödinger, the Father of Quantum Physics, Was...
by happytoexplain on Friday January 14, 2022 @10:37AM
(#29935743)
Sometimes it's for suspicious reasons, but sometimes the focus on legal age of consent is just a misguided reaction to the opposite irrationality.
Generally this topic perhaps more than any other suffers from semantic ambiguity, due to an unwillingness to put a lot of thought into it and bad faith arguments, which both stem from how incredibly uncomfortable and emotional the real consequences surrounding the topic are.
Examples of distinctions that are usually not made clear in contexts where they should be:
- Abuse vs pedophilia.
- Colloquial vs objective definitions of pedophilia.
- Legal vs moral.
- Feeling vs acting.
- "Prepubescent child" vs "person who has secondary sexual characteristics and/or is fully sexually developed, but whose mind may not yet be - or certainly is not - physiologically and/or sociologically developed enough to express independence in the face of even mild sexual advances from an adult, or to make sound decisions about sex (for sometimes undefinably subjective meanings of 'sound decision')".
People opining on age of consent sometimes have a good point, often not, but I think in either case they are usually honestly trying to bring more clarity to an important topic.
Generally this topic perhaps more than any other suffers from semantic ambiguity, due to an unwillingness to put a lot of thought into it and bad faith arguments, which both stem from how incredibly uncomfortable and emotional the real consequences surrounding the topic are.
Examples of distinctions that are usually not made clear in contexts where they should be:
- Abuse vs pedophilia.
- Colloquial vs objective definitions of pedophilia.
- Legal vs moral.
- Feeling vs acting.
- "Prepubescent child" vs "person who has secondary sexual characteristics and/or is fully sexually developed, but whose mind may not yet be - or certainly is not - physiologically and/or sociologically developed enough to express independence in the face of even mild sexual advances from an adult, or to make sound decisions about sex (for sometimes undefinably subjective meanings of 'sound decision')".
People opining on age of consent sometimes have a good point, often not, but I think in either case they are usually honestly trying to bring more clarity to an important topic.