At 06:05 AM 6/29/99 , Christopher Maloney wrote:
>FWIW, I disagree on your assessment of sexual harassment as
>being simply an "expression of natural sexual interest", and I
>think the American courts, as a rule, do also. For a workplace
>case, for example, to be considered harassment, there must be some
>persistence which creates a hostile environment. That's the
>theory, anyway. I'm sure that it's abused (on both sides) in
>specific cases, pretty often.
I wasn't trying to assess the issue of sexual harassment as a whole, only its hypocrisy aspect. If a woman persistently and explicitly tries to make her breasts more prominent and attractive at her work place, and a male colleague makes occasional and symbolic references to them (i.e, using words, rather than accessing breasts in the realm they exist in - physically), it's considered harassment.
Many verbal expressions of observations that everybody knows people naturally make (and that women, mostly, spend so much time trying to provoke), are considered criminal. That seems a bit sick.
I don't think women are just protective and defensive of their sexuality. Well, it is there - but also they actively try to appear sexually attractive at all times, and are a lot more adventurous, free, and deliberately expressive in exposing their body, flirting, etc. Any man trying to show as much skin at work or in the street as an average woman would be viewed as a sexually explicit pervert of some kind.
Again, this is only a quick argument towards one side of the issue.
On sex with children and it's connection here - just a few quick observations. First of all, I don't think there is much of a connection.
Second, what is a "child" and how do you draw the line.
If a 16-and-a-month year old is fooling around with a 16-short-of-a-month-yo, it's ridiculous to put them in jail, don't you think? They pass laws drawing scary pictures of a 60yo having sex with a baby, and then apply them to teens. maybe, the law can suggest the punishment smoothly dependent on age difference Citing my recent message elsewhere:
So let's set the jail term for the person 2 at (16-A1)*(A2-16)/10 years. In case of two kids a few weeks off their 16th birthday, it will mean one obligatory glance toward the State House; for a 17yo and 15yo it would mean a month of community work (quite excessive, IMO); for an 96 yo and a 12 yo it would mean 32 years in jail (a harsh punishment for a youngster abusing an elderly person).
The formula could be improved, but the point is, to make the law recognize that people's maturity changes _gradually_ with time (and also, quite individually; we may have a 15yo prostitute seducing a 17 yo shy virgin who would after that go to jail).
Same for all other laws including age-related or any other numerical limits (like, amounts of money and quantities of illegal substances involved - not that I think that all these cases should be persecuted at all)
If the lawmakers see the world in black and white and can't do arithmetic - maybe they are not qualified to govern...
You may also want to consider that the natural age limit for which the nature evolved both the beginning of the female reproductive period, as well as the aesthetical preferences of males, is well in the criminal zone in this country. By U.S. law, a huge number of marriages in the third world, and historically, are cases of child rape, which sounds a bit excessive.
Of course, in a civilized society one needs more time to ripen as a person and be ready to have kids (which is not necessarily related to sex, one could even argue that if you decide to lose your virginity at the time when you get your Ph.D and a house and are ready to have kids, it will be worse for your family life than if you were fooling around since kindergarten (is that illegal?)).
So the society may discourage, say, sex between a 15 a 20 year old, which was considered a normal thing in just about all historical times and countries, but not by long jail terms for!
As for the observing sexuality by children... Here is another quote from myself - again. aspectual and sharpened:
>There are several recent books on evolutionary
>psychology on this topic. I've read one called "Evolution
>of Desire" (review at
>http://www.chrismaloney.com/hobbies/books/evolution_desire.html).
Just read your review - thank you!
Do you want to submit some of your reviews to Extropy Online,
and also to Amazon and B&N with references to Extropian
issues?
>I think that a good bit of the struggle for and against "sexual
>freedom" that we see about us is just the age old conflict
>between evolved sexual strategies of men and women. As long
>as there are differences, there will always be conflict.
Very few people even realize why men and women are needed for reproduction, and hardly anybody is aware of any evolutionary differences. I feel it's wrong to have sex with biological beings that are not even aware of their own biological reality.
>
> > Incidentally, the types that shape social norms against human
> > natural psychology, are standing on the way of many other freedoms,
>
>And so, per my above statement, perhaps "the types" that are
>shaping social norms against *your* human natural psychology
>are merely trying to shape it to be more in line with *their*
>natural psychology.
I view myself here as a observer, not a participant - especially as far as the general culture goes, and by no means identify with any of the sides. And also, I suggest arguments aiming to stir the discussion rather than pushing my point of view...