Comparing homosexuals and Pedophile's?

Question

Alex wrote…
, then what moral standard do we use to determine which birth conditions are ok to manifest, and which are not?

Super freak wrote..
“some remote groups of people, living in jungles and stuff, who start having sex with girls as soon as she has her period.
and for them, it's culturally exceptable, and no one is harmed.”


That’s the point.

Our culture has put the age of 18 as the Magical age of adulthood.Some cultures today and in history, marriages were common with girls as young as 12 or 13.

If an 18 year old married a 13 year old, it was not considered abnormal.

Where does one get the idea of two “consenting adults”
over the age of 18…answer…Our Culture.

Back to the question, if someone believes that homosexuality which is obviously not the norm,but one can be born that way, why not the same to be attracted to a 14 year old?

Do we have a right to put laws on things that are instinctive?

Answer 1

I think Dan H is not referring to unconsensual sex.

Some here are jumping that all pedophile behavior are not consensual .He’s not talking about rape or forced sex,imo.

The 16 year old boy who is attracted to his 23 year old teacher. Both are consenting.

The law says a minor can’t consent.

That’s the point. Do we have a right to make laws if
instinctively this boy wants to be with this older woman?

After all he was born that way wasn’t he?

Answer 2

Homosexuals are people of the same sex who (want to) have a sexual relationship.
Paedophiles are people who (want to) have a sexual relationship with young people.
In western history, marriages have been organised with girls of less than 10 years old. They were more business pacts than real marriages. I think the same goes for Mohammed the muslim prophet.

Do not confuse things. There is a legal limit: the age of consent and there is a moral limit.
There is a very big difference between sex between an adult and a person of 18 years minus 1 day, and on the other hand sex between an adult and a very very young person. But both fall under the law. The moral law will take in account cultural aspects. I think it is safe to say that sex with a person below legal age in our society will usually be very harmful to the younger person. It has been shown clearly that teenage mothers, though there are exceptions, are not very successfull.

When the social settings vary, the legal age can be varied as well. Peru has just lowered the age of consent to 14. I think that in a country like Peru, this is a very dangerous situation. The pros argued that there are too many young pregnant girls who do not want to go to a doctor or a hospital afraid their partner will get in trouble. Needless to say that the other side of the coin is child prostitution.

If a person feels attracted to a 14 year old and does not live in Peru or a few other countries with a low age of consent, he risks a confrontation with the law. He must consider whether he wants to run that risk. But above all he must consider the interests of his younger partner. Since this is generally a woman one should also take in account that in most societies a woman is still considered to be a second class citizen.
The argument that is formally never used but always lurks behind the discussion is that many men want easier access to young girls. Again: the interest of the girl must come first.

So: a lower age of consent is only advisable in a country were sex and exploitation do not go hand in hand and where all citizens are equal in the eyes of the law and the whole society.

Answer 3

Let me explain to you what is so wrong with this logic. When a couple of adult homosexual men have a consensual relationship, no one gets hurt. What they do in the privacy of their homes is NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS. How dare you compare that to an adult man who rapes a 14 year old girl. The difference is FORCE. Girls who are raped in their teens are emotionally scarred for a long long time. Some never get over it. What I said to your last question still stands. You are absolutely sick if you think those two situations are comparable.

edit: Let me add this. The situation you are talking about, girls being married off as young as 12 or 13, those are arranged marriages that girls are forced into. Historically it was considered ok for families to force young girls to marry and have sex with much older men. This does NOT constitute a consensual relationship. Don't even try to say that it is.

edit: digitaldiva- I am going to take a stab at challenging what you just said. States have age of consent laws for a reason. In some states the age of consent is 18, in some the age is 16. In some states the situation you proposed is perfectly legal. The reason we have age of consent laws is because children are not considered mature enough to legally give consent. These relationships are not healthy and have been known to be psychologically damaging. The problem is when you try to compare an unhealthy, psychologically damaging relationship between an adult an child to a loving consensual relationship between two adults. It is not the same.

Answer 4

I can be sexually attracted to a 14-year old girl, but if I consumate the relationship I'm not only being stupid, I'm committing a crime. In an age when it was common to die by the time you were 30, sex with a 14 year old girl would have been OK, because by then she was almost middle aged! In our society, however, the mind of a 14-year old girl is hardly mature enough to understand the consequences of such a union, and her body is probably not mature enough for a safe pregnancy either so there are MEDICAL reasons to prevent this.

As to comparing homosexuality and pedophilia, they are not the same, and because the majority of the population are heterosexual, most pedophiles are also heterosexual. This is an old myth that must die.

Sometimes I have the "instinct" that I should probably shoot somebody that deserves it. However, because I have reason AND because there are laws, I don't do it.

We absolutely have a right to put laws on things that are instinctive. Instincts do not always lead us where we should go.

Answer 5

Mutually enjoyable activities by consenting adults in the privacy of their own home are no one Else's business. The concept of what constitutes an "adult" varies from culture to culture and is constantly changing. As to the comparison of pedophilia and homosexuality even a casual check of Child Protection records will show that over 90% of child molestors were heterosexual, the most common cases being young girls molested by their fathers and/or brothers. The idea of linking gays and pedophiles dates back to singer/bigot Anita Bryant and her un-successfull Dade County Initiative. As to laws addressing instincts, we all have animal impulses, that is involuntary, we also have minds and free will which allow us to decide whether to act on them. It is entirely the right, I would go so far as duty, of society to enact laws protecting those who cannot protect themselves.

Answer 6

You make one major assumption which is that the two married persons in the past were attracted to each other.

In past times people tended to marry as society and their parents saw fit. If a girl was of a certain age she was supposed to be married and often betrothed to be married, attraction was irrelevant, marriage was a commitment of love and respect to one's spouse. If a boy had achieved certain accomplishments in life, typically veteran in war or career, he was supposed to marry and quite often was betrothed as well.

It was a person's role in society that determined the age of marriage. Today many kids are still not a major player in society until they graduate from college, so the age has changed as a reflection of this.

Answer 7

I think the 18 year old probably is more mentally ready for all the different experiences and stresses that come with sex, marriage and all the other things that happen as an "adult"

Answer 8

That to which you refer as "instinctive" is based on an animalistic philosophy. We humans classify ourselves as animals, but we like to separate ourselves from animals in that we tend to think that animals react on instinct alone, and we humans have a higher calling than animalistic instinct.

Your little bit above is a lame attempt to get people to think like animals. That's all. Culture is what seperates us from the animal kingdom. Be thankful your dad or mother didn't kill you before or shortly after your birth like most large mammals are wont to do because of hunger.

Then again, there are those among us who like to justify their perspectives from the animal point-of-view in that they claim that it is "okay" for us humans to do "something" because the animals do it too. Animals have no souls, regardless of what you see on the Animal Channel.

Animals are cute! No argument there, but you need to get your head out of your *ss and great the world with your eyes open and your d*ck IN your pants.

To speak in a language that you DO understand,

"It all depends on what your definition of 'crime' is."

Answer 9

i think the answer lies in the word
consensual

I do agree with you that culturally there is differences with this
and in western society ( among other places of course )
our 14 year olds are not mature enough to consent to sex with an older person
I do not agree that homosexuality is not the norm
it is the norm for people who are homosexual

Answer 10

in other cultures girls may become mature sooner. consider a lot of girls help there mothers around the house all day. they train their daughters so they are ready to be married. in our society its a stretch to say a girl is a women when she is 18.