The Age of Consent
This topic is in response to a question from a theist on these pages who supports and excuses pre teen marriage and sexual activity with older men. Specifically the full sexual penetration of a nine year old by a 50 year old man.
Sorry if it distresses some readers, it certainly distresses me.
You can read some of the justifications offered here https://www.atheistrepublic.com/forums/debate-room/god-paradox?page=3#co...
Just so everyone can read what prompted this OP here are the theist's answers to my questions:
1. Do you think that the marriage of a six year old to a 50 year old man is moral?
Answer: "YES" with equivocation
2. Do you think the sexual penetration of a nine year old by a 50plus year old man is moral? 'Married' or not?
Your answer: YES
3. Do you think a six year old can give informed consent to sexual acts such as "thighing?"?
Your answer; "YES"
4. Do you think a nine year old can give informed, free consent to full penetrative sex with a 50 year old man?
Your answer "YES"
5. Are there any circumstances that you can explain where such acts are ethical and moral?
Your answer? YES
There are more attempted excuses for such behavior, equally as sickening to my moral sense, in that thread; the questions asked to me as a form of moral justification of his views were as follows:
- What according to you is the appropriate age of consent?
- Let’s say for example, that a 13 year old school girl has sex with her 17 year old boyfriend? Is it morally right or wrong?
- Is there any limit on the age difference between the bride and the groom in a marriage? Say for example, would you say an age difference greater than 30 years would not be okay, or something like that?
I do not propose to answer these questions in the OP...for a start the first answer will require a wall of text and quotes that will discourage interested parties from reading all of this topic.
Therefore I shall answer each 'question' below in the 'replies section', You can pick what you wish to read!
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What according to you is the appropriate age of consent?
I think, that in my jurisdiction of Western Australia, after many amendments and soul searching we have just about got it right: The decisions were reached after much discussion, decades of medical and psychological reports and, of course the experience of many decisions , good and bad in the Courts of Law.
The age of consent to sexual activity is fixed at 16. This is based on the ability to process information, resilience of the teens own decision making process and the general population of 16 year olds' mental and physical development.
There are some important caveats to this decision; One of the most recent and most important is designed to prevent the exploitation of teens by influence of authority:
The age of consent is 18 years old if there is a special relationship between them, where one person is in a position of power or authority over the other person.(WA Police)
Furthermore 'consent' is also defined: “Consensual sex is when both parties are of legal age, agree to engage in intercourse by choice, and have the freedom and capacity to make that choice. This means agreeing to sexual relations without fear, coercion, force or intimidation. Giving consent is active, not passive. It means freely choosing to say ‘yes’ and also being free to change your mind at any time.” (WA Police)
This is not a stance built on the stories from an ancient book, this is a law and it has my personal support based on medical evidence of when a child is physically and mentally ready to understand the responsibilities of a healthy sex life.
This is not a diktat from the parents, priests or teachers, it is a MORAL decision based on the well being of children.
This paragraph from WA Health puts it very succinctly and much better than I:
Age of consent laws attempt to strike a balance between protecting children and young people from exploitation and other harms, and preserving their right to privacy and healthy sexual development. Young people at the age of consent are viewed by law to have general sexual competence to enforce personal boundaries and negotiate the risks involved in sexual activities. When an adult engages in sexual behaviour with someone below the age of consent, they are committing a criminal offence (child sexual abuse).
(Edit tags)
@Old man Shouts
You said: “The age of consent to sexual activity is fixed at 16.”
Here are my counter questions to that statement.
Do you think this should be considered a universally applicable optimal age across time, cultures and geographies?
And would you consider all those cultures and peoples who differ with your standard as immoral?
From Wikipedia, I gathered that “in 1880, the age of consent was set at 10 or 12 in most states, with the exception of Delaware where it was 7.” Would you then say that the people of that generation were ‘immoral barbarians’ for doing so?
Is this standard of 16 an objective, set-in-stone benchmark? Or is it more of a legal convenience? For example, if a girl who is 15 years and 10 months old is entered into a consensual sexual relationship, it would obviously be considered illegal/rape. However, it’s obvious that there is not going be much of a difference physically/emotionally/intellectually between a girl of 15 years and 10 months and another girl of 16 years. Yet, one becomes rape and the other becomes legit. Isn’t this more of a legal convenience than any rational reason?
You said: “This is based on the ability to process information, resilience of the teens own decision making process and the general population of 16 year olds' mental and physical development.”
Okay here you have cited mental/physical development. Here are my questions.
Are you claiming that all 16 year olds across the world are endowed with these faculties to satisfactory levels to engage in consent? Or can it differ from culture/country to culture/country?
Are you saying that it’s never possible for a 14 or a 15 year old to be more mature (mentally/physically) than a 16 year old, ever?
You said: “The age of consent is 18 years old if there is a special relationship between them, where one person is in a position of power or authority over the other person.(WA Police)
2 questions:
Are you claiming that by 18 every girl will have the mental maturity to detect the exploitative tactics of those in power? What if her mental maturity was that of a 14 year old? How do you protect such children?
On the contrary, what about 16 year old who have the maturity or 20 year olds? What happens if such a girl (16 years with maturity of 20) wants to marry the President of America and her parents/family are fully aware of her intentions and support her? Will the law have to interfere and prevent the girl from fulfilling her genuine desire?
And then to my second question you said: “The decision is based on the norm found among the general population of teenagers: It is based on the physical and mental capabilities and risks of sexual contact in the early teen years.”
General population of teenagers? How general is general? Does it include the whole world for all times?
You said: “Personally, and having been in the situation myself with my step children, no I do not think it is either moral or immoral for a 13 year old to have FULLY CONSENSUAL sex with a 17 year old OF ANY SEX.
What do you mean fully ‘consensual sex’ by 13 year old? Isn’t that way below the age of consent? And why shouldn’t a 17 year old boy have all the wily maturity to woo an innocent girl into an inappropriate relationship? Why shouldn’t his act be deemed as rape? Just because he is 1 year below that imaginary redline of adulthood???
In India, a popular gang rape case that become national news, the one who most brutally raped the victim was a 17 year old – he was of course punished most leniently on account of his age, which caused an outrage.
You said: “I think it is dangerous for them both and is a failure in education.”
You are talking about ‘failure in education’. How would you judge a situation where there was no such thing as ‘modern education’? Do you consider all those ‘age of consent’ standards that were fixed prior to modern education as immoral?
You said: “The moment the 17 year old turns 18 then, and rightly so they are deemed to be a responsible adult and run the risk of prosecution if they continue the activity.”
So what changes between a boy who is 17 years and 11 months and a boy who is 18 years physically or mentally?
You said: “Four areas of knowledge are required in order to give consent: understanding of what the physical act(s) involve, their meaning, society's laws and cultural norms….”
How can you say that all girls who are 16 or 18, will gain a satisfactory level of understanding of all these issues at hand? And how can you say that a girl below 16 will never ever be able to fairly appreciate these ideas? SO, don’t you think this is just an arbitrary standard hammered out more for legal convenience than any objective/rational method?
Yes, I agree most of what you said is an optimal solution for our current times and situations that can (with some amends) applied in the modern world. But to insist that this has to be deemed a universal moral dictum is, to put it most politely, childish.
@ Royism
I will answer your rather infantile remarks soon. In short are you defending the rape of a nine year old, and the sale of female children to the highest bidder by the dominant household male by attacking the opinion that you asked me for?
I said quite clearly I think we have, in WA, got it just about right in defending the rights and childhood of most children in regrads to sexual matters.
Are you trying to say every or most 9 year old girls brought up in Islam will have the mental and physical maturity as well as the freedom of choice of a girl brought up in secular WA ?
Read the quotes from Health WA again. It is evident you have only skimmed.
You are on a hiding to nothing and merely demonstrating your complete inhumanity and inability to distinguish between archaic custom and moral behaviour.
@Old Man Shouts
You said: “In short are you defending the rape of a nine year old, and the sale of female children to the highest bidder by the dominant household male by attacking the opinion that you asked me for?”
Repeated assertions don’t improve your argument. As long as you can’t provide us a universally acceptable standard for age of consent, your back-projections of your subjective standards evolved in our current situation has no value at all… no matter how much wordplay you indulge in.
You said: I said quite clearly I think we have, in WA, got it just about right in defending the rights and childhood of most children in regrads to sexual matters.
What you think is irrelevant here. Tell us on what objective basis you arrived at that… and if you can apply your standard universally for all times across all cultures and regions?
You said: “Are you trying to say every or most 9 year old girls brought up in Islam will have the mental and physical maturity as well as the freedom of choice of a girl brought up in secular WA ?
Red herring alert! That’s exactly what I DID NOT say. In fact, I categorically stated that I wouldn’t give my daughter in marriage at 6 or 9 or for that matter at 18 too. And that’s because I understand that the age of 9 is not some universally recommended age limit in Islam. It was for a certain time and Islam gives us the freedom to choose an appropriate age given our situation.
You said: You are on a hiding to nothing and merely demonstrating your complete inhumanity and inability to distinguish between archaic custom and moral behaviour.”
That’s exactly my question to you! Do you think all ‘Archaic’ customs must abide by your standard? If not are they all immoral? Secondly, your repeated assertion to make it sound as if I support the marriage of a 9 year old in our times speaks to a malicious intent. I do not support it for reasons already explained 100 times before this.
Wow, " It was for a certain time and Islam gives us the freedom to choose an appropriate age given our situation."
I need hard-core evidence of this from the Quran and Hadith.
ROYISM has claimed that at some point in history, NOT THE HISTORY OF ISLAM, but in general, at some certain point, age 6 and 9 were considered ENOUGH for marriage.
I'm waiting.
@Seek3r
You said: I need hard-core evidence of this from the Quran and Hadith. ROYISM has claimed that at some point in history, NOT THE HISTORY OF ISLAM, but in general, at some certain point, age 6 and 9 were considered ENOUGH for marriage.
It’s probably because you jumped into this discussion midway you are asking me to repeat things that have been elaborated in previous threads.
What I mean by ‘it was for a certain time’… is not that it was valid for a certain time and it automatically got nullified at a certain point in time.
Depending on the social mores, and the society’s understanding of what’s in the best interest of the parties involved, the marriageable age can be flexible. Moreover, even within a society, you can’t impose what is appropriate for a particular girl onto other girls. Mohammed (PBUH) his own daughter, Fathima, was married off at 18, which is even better than Old Man Shouts’ standard of 16!
And what is the evidence for it? The fact that Islam has not prescribed a must-marry age for girls, it’s understood that depending on a society’s understanding of what’s an appropriate age, we can fix the age.
It’s more like this. Mohammad (PBUH) had used camels as transport. But that does not mean that every Muslim until the end of times must use only camels to commute. Depending on the times, we can use whichever transport is most appropriate for us to fulfill our needs. So long as there is no statement in Quran or Hadith that a Muslim must not use any other means of transport, it’s not a law. Similarly, as long as there is no diktat specifying the age of marriage, then it’s not a law.
I had to jump in because what you claim is ridiculous.
No matter what the fuck the society says, how educated your child is or how brilliant she is or whatever the "exceptions" you wish to make.
Giving away a 6 year old daughter for engagement when she doesn't even have the agency to understand what the commitment means and what's in store for her future, I call this "selling your daughter".
Having intercourse with a 9 year old is downright disgusting and inappropriate. It is psychologically IMPROBABLE that such a child would ever be able to understand what's going on with them. It is also biologically improbable as no evidence suggests that Ayesha reached the 5th stage of her puberty before the consummation of the marriage.
There is no way to justify a 53 year old's intercourse with a 9 year old. You can talk about how early marriages were popular in 7th century and how it can't be applied today because education and blabla is required. If 9 year olds were given off to marriage (which I am not aware of a single instance in Islamic history except for Ayesha's case) then anyone who married these girls committed rape.
@Seek3r
You said: Giving away a 6 year old daughter for engagement when she doesn't even have the agency to understand what the commitment means and what's in store for her future, I call this "selling your daughter".
Seek3, please understand that hyperventilating your personal emotions is not of much use. The reason this thread was started is because when old Man Shouts was indulging in similar subjective regurgitations, I challenged him with a few questions to see if there is any objectivity to those emotions. From the first round, it’s already becoming evident that his West Australian standards are merely the result of a variety of subjective factors relevant only to our times, and perhaps not even applicable everywhere in the world. And you want to project those moralities onto a culture separated from you by 1400 years???
Dear ROYISM,
Please understand that attempting to form a strong argument on the basis of ZERO EVIDENCE and countless fallacies is not going to help you.You have utterly failed to justify why you're making an exception in the immorality of giving away a 9 year old daughter for marriage 1400 years ago and why your perspective is completely different now.
You say education and career is important today. Your assertions are such that it feels like 100% of the Arabs were full illiterates and retards who had no idea about the world around them and there was no career. Therefore, marriage back then was ok. But now, no it's not okay because the girl must be literate and must have the ability to support herself financially.
What ON EARTH does education and career has ANYTHING to do with the question of a 9 year old's marriage. And why do you assume that Abu Bakr was not educated or that Ayesha had 0 knowledge of everything? Of course she was educated. She is one of those muhadisahs who have narrated hundreds of ahadith on intimacy and sexual matters. And you are telling me education matters today, hence you can't give away your daughter. But back then it was different. What the fuck was so different? Elaborate.
Besides, she didn't GIVE HERSELF in marriage, her parents did. Therefore, the parents who had decades worth of life experience didn't give a fuck about anything because their daughter was marrying to the so-called LAST PROPHET. Therefore, I bet they'd even give away their baby to get their child married to a prophet. It was a selfish decision and they thought it will be good for their daughter to be married to the man whom Muslims consider to be the "greatest to have ever stepped on the face of this earth".
You are completely blinded. You are thinking from Islam's perspective. Your job is to DEFEND Islam while those who are trying to make you understand and get you out of your illiteracy are not defending atheism or Islam, they are trying to make you understand how immoral it was for a 53 year old to have intercourse with a 9 year old.
"And you want to project those moralities onto a culture separated from you by 1400 years?"
If this is what you say is true, then Arabs were definitely and collectively entirely immoral, illiterate and indecent. They were before the advent of Islam and they remained after it. The type of immorality just shifted. They started giving away their 9-year-olds for marriage. An age in which it is extremely important for a child to learn from their parents. An age when one is gullible, mentally fragile and emotionally undeveloped.
Ayesha was sold to Muhammad because he was a prophet. It seemed like a great deed. It may not have happened if Muhammad hadn't forged the dream in which Gabriel shows him his future wife which happens to be the young and tiny Ayesha. This is how brainwashed the Arabians were by Muhammad. Abu Bakr believed every single word of this prophet and thus gave away his daughter, in fact sold her.
Try as much as you might, you cannot justify this atrocity which happened 1400 years ago.
@Seek3r
You said: You have utterly failed to justify why you're making an exception in the immorality of giving away a 9 year old daughter for marriage 1400 years ago and why your perspective is completely different now.
Instead of making an assertion, I would appreciate it if you can cut-paste my arguments and dissect them rationally.
You said: Your assertions are such that it feels like 100% of the Arabs were full illiterates and retards who had no idea about the world around them and there was no career.
The age of 18 as a standard is mainly based on our current educational system where a girl has to complete 12 years of school and a few years of college to become a graduate. This educational system was definitely not there back in those days. I mean, just think logically. What does a girl have to learn back in the day other than milking goats and baking bread? And talking of career, you can become a warrior, business merchant, shepherd etc. All these are extremely taxing for women, and life was such that women took care of the household chores while men indulged in these activities that were not particularly enviable. Moreover, in a society that faced an existential threat from every corner – a plague, a war, a famine etc – raising as many children as possible was a need of the society. SO what better thing can a girl do other than get married early and start a family? Even if you don’t agree with all my points, I don’t think there is any gainsaying that life back then was vastly different from our reality. There is just no comparison.
You said: “What ON EARTH does education and career has ANYTHING to do with the question of a 9 year old's marriage.”
Today, getting a 9 year old married would seriously jeopardize her education and career. Whereas back then that was not the case. That was my point.
You said: “And why do you assume that Abu Bakr was not educated or that Ayesha had 0 knowledge of everything? Of course she was educated.”
Yes, because back then education was merely learning to read and write. And some of her greatest lessons (that made her a scholar) came from her marital relationship with the prophet. So, education back then was very different from our modern ideas of education, which would not be possible if a girl is married off early.
You said: “She is one of those muhadisahs who have narrated hundreds of ahadith on intimacy and sexual matters.”
Of course yes. And to become that all she had to do was live with the prophet. So in a way, her marriage was her university. But not so today.
You said: “And you are telling me education matters today, hence you can't give away your daughter. But back then it was different. What the fuck was so different? Elaborate.”
I hope now you understand why it was different back then.
You said: “Therefore, the parents who had decades worth of life experience didn't give a fuck about anything because their daughter was marrying to the so-called LAST PROPHET.”
Just in the previous point you mentioned how Ayesha was Muhadissa and how she was well educated and so on. How was that achieved? Only through her marriage to the prophet. So, it only proves that that Abu Bakr’s decision was correct.
You said: “they are trying to make you understand how immoral it was for a 53 year old to have intercourse with a 9 year old.”
It would be very easy to make me understand that. All you have to do is bring your universal moral standard for the age of consent that can be applied across time anywhere in the world. Do you have one such standard?
When I said, "And you want to project those moralities onto a culture separated from you by 1400 years?"
You rebutted: “If this is what you say is true, then Arabs were definitely and collectively entirely immoral, illiterate and indecent.’
When I talk of you projecting your moralities back onto a distant people, I am not judging their morality. I am only saying that your standards would be inadequate because their situations were different.
You said: “They started giving away their 9-year-olds for marriage. An age in which it is extremely important for a child to learn from their parents. An age when one is gullible, mentally fragile and emotionally undeveloped.”
Today you are saying this because you have a certain lens through which you view the world. I don’t know what according to you is the age of consent. But according to Old Man, it’s 16. Fast forward 500 years, a time when the world would have advanced so much that humans would be living to be 200 or so. And sciences would have advanced so much that people would have to spend a good 50 years of their initial years, just studying. Under such a circumstance, our notions of childhood would be greatly altered. It may be 30 years or so, and consent would be illegitimate before that. And imagine those people back projecting their morality on to our society and judging us as stone-age barbarians!!! How fair would that be?
You said: “Ayesha was sold to Muhammad because he was a prophet. It seemed like a great deed. It may not have happened if Muhammad hadn't forged the dream in which Gabriel shows him his future wife which happens to be the young and tiny Ayesha.”
Ayesha was already engaged to someone when the prophet’s proposal came. So it was not something that was done in contravention to the norms of the society just for the sake of the prophet. It was anyways going to take place… just that when the prophet’s proposal came, the earlier engagement was annulled in favor of the prophet.
Have you noticed one more thing? The prophet has been reviled both by enemies of his own times and all the way down to the present time (by Christian missionaries etc) on a variety of issues, including his marriage to Zainab. But never in history was his marriage to Ayesha ever a bone to pick with. Not by the Quraish or the crusaders who came later. It was sometime in the mid 19th century or so, that for the first time ever, some Christian missionary raises this issue.
It shows that this marriage was not really flying in the face of any convention or traditions in the past. The world over, the age of marriage for girls was pretty low.
Royism, would it have been, or is it now, okay for a woman in her fifties to have sexual intercourse with a boy of, say 12?
@CyberLN
You said: Royism, would it have been, or is it now, okay for a woman in her fifties to have sexual intercourse with a boy of, say 12?
Not in our times. For the same reasons that are applicable to girls.
@Royism
How funny that you, and other theists in general frown at us, atheists, for using moral relativism, but then , here you are.
@Royism
Are you seriously trying to tell me that the links I gave to academic studies and the WHO studies are inapplicable to your religion? That 9 year old humans differ so markedly in some parts of the world that they have the mental and physical maturity for a full sexual and mental relationship of equality with a 53 year old male?
Seriously?
The reasons for my decisions regarding rthe age of consent are based on research and the wellbeing of the child. Yours on misogynistic fairytales.
You really are a piece of work.
"no evidence suggests that Ayesha reached the 5th stage of her puberty before the consummation of the marriage."
What evidence is against that? According to calculations she was about 19 years old at the time the marriage was consummated. The "evidence" against that is the age she describes to herself, but we all know, as historians know, that they didn't know their own ages at the time in Arabia. Not only that but we also know there are numerous mistakes in the hadiths regarding the ages of different people - because no one ever really knew how old they were. But comparing to the age of Aisha's sister Aisha was about 19 years old.
The Qur'an states the age of marriage as combination of puberty and sufficient mental maturity. A girl may reach the age of the beginning of puberty at the age of 9, but usually not mental maturity. Often not even puberty. However, if a child is married this early with the child genuine consent - very unlikely - and if she moves in to live with the husband right away (notice that often in child marries two people are married and both still spend years living with their own parents) sexual intercourse is prohibited until a) the child is physically capable, b) it doesn't cause her harm or suffering and c) she gives her consent. Without these three things fulfilled it is a crime against sharia and a judge should nullify the marriage (if the parents are too dumb).
You don't know how common child marriage used to be? It wasn't an Islamic thing. It was an all over the world thing. Oh yes, even the Christians.
When it comes to selling your daughter, it is done. The child is given to a man and the man pays the dower to the family, but this breaks the genuine Sharia law. The dower belongs to the wife. Not to her old family, not to her new family, but only to her. If she hasn't received the dower they're not technically even married. It is a requirement for the marriage to be valid.
@ Leper
So, Aisha, who was literate, commanded armies, could count her opponents, didn't know how fucking old she was? You do know that the Arabs came up with numbers that included zero thus making counting a doddle compared to the clumsy Roman method?
Christ on a bike, you are making Royisms apologetics look intelligent...
Of course I know that. But, unlike Royism I neither applaud or use it as a moral basis for society.
It was a time thankfully long gone in the Western sphere and is rightly roundly condemned in modern times.
Only in backward cultures where women are considered property of the dominant male and,in many cases, of less value than livestock or a fucking car does this barbaric practice continue. I am looking at a large part of the Islamic world when I say that.
That you excuse it is symptomatic of your iron age beliefs.
Wow, " It was for a certain time and Islam gives us the freedom to choose an appropriate age given our situation."
I need hard-core evidence of this from the Quran and Hadith.
ROYISM has claimed that at some point in history, NOT THE HISTORY OF ISLAM, but in general, at some certain point, age 6 and 9 were considered ENOUGH for marriage.
I'm waiting.
@ Royism
I clearly stated the basis for my MORAL agreement with laws in my jurisdiction. They are based on decades of research into the mental and physical growth and maturty of children.
There are numerous studies from many countries and, indeed, the WHO, never mind the specific academic studies that I gave you in my reply. They bear out the sensible approach of my jurisdiction.
My support is not 'arbitrary ' it is based on the best information regarding the well being of the child, that is the moral path. That is your question answered.
Your defence of pedophilia and the marriage of children to older males seems to hinge primarily on iron age tradition which you are unable to shed, and financial reasons , either benefit to the dominant family male or the female in question " her job prospects". Hardly objectively moral.
That I understand you cannot condemn the morality of your prophet without undermining your own sense if identity does not give you the right to impose your primitive customs on any minor child, whether you consider you have the right by the coincidence of your sex or by weight of misogynistic tradition.
Read the Health WA section on informed consent and the ability of a minor child to grant such consent. That is agreed by the U.N. rights of the child studies and the WHO.
You on the other hand rely on a primitive book of errors and goatherders tales of conquest told round a camel dung fire. Which is moral?
My money is on the decisions that protect minor children from people like you.
@Old Man Shouts
I thought you would be answering my questions. Shall i expect they are coming?
@Royism
I answered your questions in my first replies to your original questions, repeated in the OP.
My stance on the age of consent is based on academic research in medical, social and psychology. Like all legislation it is based on a compromise, but does base itself on the rights, and benefits to the child. That is the MORAL approach.
Look at your answers to the questions in the OP.
Your purely iron age perspective is evidenced by your inability to separate the rights of the child (see WHO) and your archaic assumption of ownership of female children..
IF you have sensible comments or questions then please read the literature I referenced and the WHO papers regarding both the rights of the child and the maturity mileposts of children. Ther are numerous papers available on the effects of sexual abuse of minors, read some of them and then resume, if you can, your obvious point scoring (not) puerile line of questioning.
You will find all your questions answered...except of course the big one...why are you defending a perverted and unjust tradition that only harms children?
@Old Man Shouts
You said: “I answered your questions in my first replies to your original questions, repeated in the OP.”
I had raised counter questions to your replies, and you said you would be answering ‘my infantile’ questions. I still have not found those answers.
You haven’t answered a single question. Okay, let me make it easy for you. You don’t have to answer all those questions. Here is one. Just ONE. Let’s see if you have any cogent answer for that.
DO YOU THINK THAT THE AGE OF CONSENT THAT YOU HAVE ARRIVED AT THROUGH THE WA LEGISLATION MUST BE A UNIVERSAL STANDARD FOR ALL TIMES, ALL PEOPLES AND ALL REGIONS?
Something cannot be both objectively moral and moral only subject to context, the two positions are mutually exclusive.
Your comments on consent are absurdly stupid yet again, of course the legal age of consent is arbitrary and therefore morally subjective. You seem to delight in pointing the blindingly obvious fact that human laws are flawed, when no one has suggested otherwise, then bizarrely fail to see the irony that the context is that you have consistently tried to justify paedophilia with children as young as nine as morally objective.
It is YOU and only YOU who is claiming morals are universal or objective, yet have failed to offer any, parenthetically and bizarrely claiming paedophilia and revenge murder as moral. Then bizarrely telling atheists that an age of consent of 16 is immoral because it isn't a perfect law?
@Sheldon
You said: “Something cannot be both objectively moral and moral only subject to context, the two positions are mutually exclusive.”
That’s wrong. In fact every objective truth has exceptions subject to context. Water is liquid, is a generalized objective statement. However, I can qualify it with, “Except when it’s below zero degrees.” The temperature contextualizes it.
You said: …of course the legal age of consent is arbitrary and therefore morally subjective.
Thank you for accepting that. I have been trying to prove this to you all along. Now my question is, how can you judge an event that took place 1500 years ago in another era and a different socio-cultural reality with your subjective/arbitrary standards?
You said: “You seem to delight in pointing the blindingly obvious fact that human laws are flawed, when no one has suggested otherwise,”
This humility is welcome. But coming from such a humble position I don’t think you should have the temerity to call a marriage that happened in a setting totally alien and unfamiliar to you as ‘rape’.
You said: “then bizarrely fail to see the irony that the context is that you have consistently tried to justify paedophilia with children as young as nine as morally objective.”
There you go again! You pitifully agree to having a ‘subjective/arbitrary/flawed’ system on one hand, and on the other you make bold assertions of pedophilia. I don’t understand this paradox.
@Royism
Even if it is a fact, why should we shut our mouth off?
So in what context is there an exception to the objective truth that the world is not flat? Dear oh dear...
I don't know why you keep rehashing this lie that you are telling me morality is subjective, I have always known this and said so in multiple threads, you are the one lying that objective morality is possible, yet can't offer one single example.
Rape is sex without consent, marriage is irrelevant to this concept. The idea a child of 6 or 9 can give informed consent to either marriage or sex is not just objectively untrue, it is the vile excuse paedophiles have always used to justify their immoral victimisation of helpless children to satisfy they predatory sexual desires.
Paedophilia is sexual feelings directed towards children, the epoch they occur in is entirely moot to this description, the problem is you are so blinkered and desperate to defend your superstitious beliefs you have to keep denying any and all facts that threaten them. A child of 6 cannot give informed consent to marriage or sex, that is axiomatic, and the sexual abuse of children causes lifelong emotional and psychological trauma, if your morality doesn't care about that then I want no part of it. The problem is that at some level you know it is wrong, as you are lying about the reasons you wouldn't want your children married off at 6 to men in their 50's.
My subjective morality finds paedophile repulsively immoral behaviour, your unevidenced claim for objective morality has consistently tried to condone it as moral, this says it all really.
@ Sheldon
"Paedophilia is sexual feelings directed towards children, the epoch they occur in is entirely moot to this description, "
Exactly what I have been saying since this creature has been trying to toss out of his prophet truck, red herrings, strawmen, false leads and for all I know barbie dolls and sex toys.
As I said he knows he is wrong, plain wrong but is in fear of his life should he criticise his prophet. What a fucking sad sack of shit.
-Let’s say for example, that a 13 year old school girl has sex with her 17 year old boyfriend? Is it morally right or wrong?
Again, the law in Western Australia is progressive and, in my opinion, has got it very close to right.
The decision is based on the norm found among the general population of teenagers: It is based on the physical and mental capabilities and risks of sexual contact in the early teen years. I will once again use WA Health to make my point:
Developmentally appropriate sexual exploration
It is a common and normal part of sexual development for young people to explore and experiment in sexual interactions with their peers (Araji, 2004; Barbaree & Marshall, 2006; Eade, 2003). Developmentally appropriate sexual exploration is when there is mutual agreement between same- or similar-aged peers, it is non-coercive and all participants have the control to participate, continue or stop the behaviour (Barbaree & Marshall, 2006). The state jurisdictions that provide a legal defence when the sexual interaction is between two young people close in age (Western Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory) are attempting to find a balance that protects children and young people from adult sexual exploitation in a way that does not criminalise them for having sexual relationships with their peers.”
Personally, and having been in the situation myself with my step children, no I do not think it is either moral or immoral for a 13 year old to have FULLY CONSENSUAL sex with a 17 year old OF ANY SEX. I think it is dangerous for them both and is a failure in education. However it is NOT a criminal offence and their respective situations must be considered. The moment the 17 year old turns 18 then, and rightly so they are deemed to be a responsible adult and run the risk of prosecution if they continue the activity. Does 'coming of age' day make a moral difference? Probably not, but for the general good of the Populus, and particularly those below the age of consent it is a necessary (and moral) protection.
I quote again from WA Health: Age of consent laws are designed to protect children and young people from sexual exploitation and abuse. Such laws effectively determine that children and young people below the age of consent are yet to reach a level of general maturity enabling their safe participation in sexual activities. . An important distinction should be made between "willingness" and "consent". A child may be willing to engage in sexual behaviour; however, as they do not have the decision-making capacity to give consent according to law, all sexual interactions between an adult and a person under the age of consent are considered abusive (Barbaree & Marshall, 2006).
Again the MORAL decision is based on what is right and protects the YOUNGER member of the relationship.
And if the children are BOTH below the age of consent?
WA law states: Developmentally appropriate sexual exploration
It is a common and normal part of sexual development for young people to explore and experiment in sexual interactions with their peers (Araji, 2004; Barbaree & Marshall, 2006; Eade, 2003). Developmentally appropriate sexual exploration is when there is mutual agreement between same- or similar-aged peers, it is non-coercive and all participants have the control to participate, continue or stop the behaviour (Barbaree & Marshall, 2006). The state jurisdictions that provide a legal defence when the sexual interaction is between two young people close in age (Western Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory) are attempting to find a balance that protects children and young people from adult sexual exploitation in a way that does not criminalise them for having sexual relationships with their peers.
Note that the benefit of the child is paramount in the decisions regarding this law.
The benefit and safety of children is the MORAL path..
-Is there any limit on the age difference between the bride and the groom in a marriage? Say for example, would you say an age difference greater than 30 years would not be okay, or something like that?
At age 18, both sexes are deemed to adult and capable of making fully informed decisions about their bodies and their futures. This is arbitrary and NOT based on medical and psychological studies and can not be conflated with the 'age of consent'
So providing the following definition of consent has been observed by someone of a legal adult age (and fully capable of giving informed consent):
Consent
Four areas of knowledge are required in order to give consent: understanding of what the physical act(s) involve, their meaning, society's laws and cultural norms, and possible consequences (McCarthy & Thompson, 2004). According to theoretical and practical understandings of consent, those key elements include:
- transparency about what is being proposed (not being tricked or fooled);
- that all parties possess similar cultural knowledge about standards of behaviour;
- that all parties are similarly aware of possible consequences, such as pregnancy or disease;
- having respect for agreement or disagreement without repercussion; and
- that consent is freely given, and that all parties have the legal competence to freely give consent (being in possession of decision-making capacity and unaffected by intoxication)
(WA Health)
I have no problems with ADULTS having relationships with any age group of adult age and full capable of informed consent. I was cougared myself...we are very happy!
In a few weeks our school season begins, and although I am not employed by any school board, I will be active in a public school. I will soon be facing children from ages 5 to 15, and what I see is the face of innocence. And although it brings me great joy to see such beautiful and innocent children, my soul and thoughts will be tainted by my memories of what is happening in this forum. I feel dirty, I need to wash my hands.
These are children, and although some may have, or soon have the biological ability to have sex and reproduce, emotionally and intellectually they are innocent and gullible children. One does not gauge their age of consent based on the ability of their uterus to function, it should always be based on their emotional and intellectual maturity and ability to handle such major events.
@ David
Thanks David, I agree 100% with you. That anyone can defend an iron age mentality where immature females are the property of the dominant male and can be bought and sold for sexual exploitation or in exchange for power, wealth or influence...or even in some cases fear of retribution....I find it vomitous....
I found it very hard to write my responses......
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