Someone needs to check that guys computer for CP.
No because 14 is not old enough to make an informed decision about that and involving the parents will increase the likelihood that they will pressure their kid into doing it for the money.
The thing that gets me is even when you up the age to 16, a common age of consent, you still have consent issues. 10 million dollars creates a consent issue for any poor person of any age. Are they truly making a choice? And I get that this is what sex workers already face.
But for fuck’s sake our society seems far more willing to entertain this than just having a society where nobody needs sex work to not starve.
Once one is of a consenting age, sex work is just work
The better question to ask is if it’s morally acceptable to force someone to work to not starve? And then there’s the whole exploitation of the global south thing.
And at least personally, I’d much rather do sex work than be a coal miner
Dude I’m poor and I’ll appreciate that $10M choice any day.
With $10M on the table, my poverty is now a choice.
Sure, just like a promotion becomes a choice for a woman under a misogynist boss when he propositions her. Consent cannot exist in such a power imbalance. And it’s not your fault or her fault. It’s us, it’s the system making that shitty situation real. We can and should change the system so that nobody faces such a choice.
You’re essentially saying that I’m incapable of economic consent, and I disagree because that dehumanizes me.
I’d say the system already did that.
It can’t exist? As an exaggeration, is there no way for a woman to meaningfully consent to an offer from her male boss to swap packed lunches? After all, he might take offense and pass her over for the promotion if she declines.
And if consent is possible in that scenario, what makes it immediately impossible in the scenario where sex or romance is involved?
It seems obvious that consent has to exist on some kind of spectrum like almost everything else. But it’s spoken about and thought about in a very binary way. That seems problematic given how big a topic consent is lately.
Funny you should bring up food. In the military leaders are trained to eat after their troops, to never gamble with them, and in general never ask anything from them that isn’t related to doing the job.
Because consent cannot exist in a power imbalance. So yes the lunch swap has the exact same problem. Just with less trauma counseling.
Don’t you think taking that hard-line stance kind of corners you into taking some nonsensical positions?
For example a physical power imbalance will always exist between two men of different sizes. Because the imbalance is there, you have to answer with a hard no when someone asks: “is it possible for two men of different sizes to consent to sex with one another?” But if someone asks “is it okay for two guys of different sizes to have sex?” you would presumably say yes.
Now you have been forced to say it is okay for sex to happen despite the impossibility of any consent having being given.
Obviously the line gets drawn somewhere yes. Why 18 and not 19? Etc… I just had a good laugh because you stepped right in one.
“Hey should the rich and wealthy be able to rape children as long as they pay them afterwards?”
What a weird fucking question to ask.
I think it must be fairly normal to wonder things like this. Once I saw a video of a man standing on a busy sidewalk offering passersby the opportunity to shoot a staple gun into his bare chest for a dollar or so. It was immediately fascinating. The proposition was so direct: pay money to inflict pain. And people were taking him up on it!
Interesting, sort of in the same way that this Twitter guy’s question is interesting. The same way other moral thought experiments like “the trolley problem” are interesting.
No. What? “Is it moral if I rape a girl for money” is not peak philosophy. It’s not even a new idea. Holy fuck. You give philosophy a bad name.
What do you think about the parallel I was trying to draw between the video I mentioned and this guy’s question about paying for rape? I thought the reason that someone’s interest could be caught by the video is similar in nature to the reasons someone might wonder “is it okay to pay to hurt someone”? And that train of thought leads naturally enough to “Well how much harm is permissible for what amount of money?” which leads naturally enough to imagining specific circumstances.
And those trains of thought are similar to the thought behind people’s ancient musings about other tricky question of morality like the trolley problem. It’s not peak philosophy it’s just ordinary human thought. You shouldn’t be so afraid or repulsed by it or whatever.
The train of thought that youtube story leads me to is not ‘how much harm is permissible’ but ‘why are humans such vile creatures?’. Does everbody just love the thought of hurting others? Is this normal? Why the fuck would anyone want to staple some guys chest?
The question reads like a sexual fantasy, to be clear. It doesn’t read like a normal innocent question. It reads like he thinks a LOT about how he can rape kids and get away with it socially, hence the poll. It does not read innocently. It is entirely too specific.
You’re probably right about this specific dude’s motivations for posing the question, but I think I am right that this type of thought is entirely normal and even common to have. You are right about the dismissiveness too, sorry.
Just chiming in to say I think you’re right in that these types of thought experiments pop into people’s heads pretty regularly, albeit with way less “trying to justify a creepy sex fantasy” intent like the public poll post seems to have.
Though I have to question why it was public in the first place. I don’t know who the poster is or if it’s their real name, but what if it’s less “projection” and more “morbid curiosity” in seeing just how many people would answer yes to this heinous question? There is some merit in gauging reactions to this from a social psychology point of view (even if this is an non-scientific example).
Follow-up thought. Without morbid thought experiments, how do people create horror stories and gritty crime dramas like L&O:SVU when a story has no particular real life basis? I’m not sure it’s wholly possible in a fictional novel or show. There’s a reason people eat crime dramas up; it’s fascinating and horrifying to see how far a real and fictionalized human will go in various circumstances.
In a way, it’s a manifestation of the “call of the void” situation, where an intrusive thought (what if I jump off this bridge right now? what happens if I yank the steering wheel driving 50mph? spook a herd of grazing horses? slap grandpa upside the head? while out hunting??) so I think its purpose is more to keep you aware of harzards in whatever the situation may be. Avoidance through sudden acknowledgement of the risk.
Again, I don’t recognize this person or know any background, but maybe they posed the question as a wacky means of self-preservation on a broader level? As if the poller thought, “How many of my viewers would prostitute out their child if given the most forgiving, financially advantageous, and seemingly consensual circumstances?” to figure out how worried they should be about a certain percentage of their friends, neighbors, and/or followers. Avoidance through asking weird questions publicly.
Edit: Holy ship I managed to write a whole novel on my thought experiment about thought experiments ahhahh.
Lol no. If this was something I thought was said in “good faith,” then it would be fine to discuss. However, I don’t think it was said in good faith and I think the person was being intentionally disgusting. It’s not ordinary human thought. But thanks for being so dismissive.
But thanks for being so dismissive.
Like you weren’t?
i think there is something to be said about the value of money, there is ALWAYS an amount of money people are willing to be paid to do something.
What a weird fucking question to ask.
wait until you figured out how we discovered science
or better yet, if you’re more of a normie, who figured out you can drink cow milk first.
Haha Lemmy hates to hear this, good luck.
yeah, i do a bit of lolcowing on lemmy from time to time, same as i did on reddit.
It’s fun. Would recommend people stop caring about the shit they read/write on the internet, its mostly bullshit anyway.
I don’t look to create unnecessary consternation but for an outcast community this place sure can be super hostile to ‘against the grain’ opinions. I don’t want adulation but an explanation to go with the downvote parade would be nice sometimes.
Not even talking about political or ethical subjects, take OP above you as an example.
“How we discovered science” this is such a stupid statement. Nonsensical.
It was a woman. Who figured out we could drink other animal milks first, by watching a calf drink it. She probably needed it for a human baby. A lot of stuff that doesn’t make sense to men makes sense to women.
And it is a weird and boring question in the OP. He wants to rape a girl for money. Gee, that’s never been asked before. What a deep philospher.
You got way too hung on their example. The point was science is tinkering and following weird curiosities but with extra steps. Virtually every major innovation in the last century (for most of civilisation I would argue) has been a result of indirect tinkering, or benefitted from a completely unrelated field.
You were in such a rush to defend their point, you missed mine. Which is that pseudoscience and pseudointellectualism look exactly like this - made up bullshit based in nothing. I’m not “top hung up” on their examples - that’s exactly how I’m showing their nonsense. Get some intellectual hygiene. Question things. Demand proof and exactitudes. THAT is the basis of real critical thought and scientific reasoning.
Sure, curiosity can lead to scientific advancements. Or it can lead to conspiracies. It depends on what it’s being based on.
Advancements are made in the cognitive mortar between the bricks of knowledge we have. If those bricks aren’t made of anything substantial, the mortar won’t save it either. Gotta have a basis in something solid. That’s why we take measurements and data.
It was a woman. Who figured out we could drink other animal milks first, by watching a calf drink it. She probably needed it for a human baby. A lot of stuff that doesn’t make sense to men makes sense to women.
that seems plausible. I would imagine this happened on pretty early in human history, but it would have to be late enough that we had somewhat domesticated animals.
And it is a weird and boring question in the OP. He wants to rape a girl for money.
it’s certainly weird, but so are a lot of questions, and it’s boring, but then again, when are questions ever exciting lol.
As for philosophy, the single most intriguing question that has ever been asked is quite literally “what is the meaning of life”
But what if he gets her killed at age 20? Massive savings.
I dunno what the reason for this poll is. Honestly, what do opinions matter for this?
Legally, yeah, that’s something that can happen. Basically child marriage, which, with the consent of the parents, can happen.
The law is pretty clear on these things.
You might not like that, or disagree with it, and that’s fine. Everyone is entitled to have an opinion on it. The fact is, the proposed agreement in this hypothetical is a private contract which, for the most part, is fine and acceptable under common law pretty much everywhere.
I think it’s insane to allow parents to effectively force a child into this position, and that parents would ever agree to such a thing, or that anyone would want to in the first place. None of the motivations for this make sense to me. So personally, I wouldn’t agree to nor propose anything like this (I’m a guy).
But I also recognise that any such private contract between a family and a would be husband or whatever, are outside of my control. I might not understand it, I may not agree with it, but as long as it’s not breaking a law, I can’t do shit about it. If anyone is bothered by this, and you fell strongly about making sure things like this don’t happen, you will have to talk to your government and make the changes in law to forbid it.
IMO, legally, I don’t care. If someone wants to put themselves into this situation, then fine. It doesn’t really affect me. I don’t feel strongly enough about it (given that everyone is consenting), that I feel that anything should change. I also feel like the vast majority of people would not agree to something like this, neither the children, nor their parents. So in my mind, anyone who would morally be okay with this, has made their decision and must live with the consequences of their choices. I certainly won’t, so why would I care.
I’m just apathetic to people who willfully put themselves in these unusual and morally questionable scenarios.
I’ll emphasize that my apathy is heavily dependent on consent on all sides, including and especially the consent of the child in the scenario. In my mind that consent must be informed consent, which would require that the child has an understanding of the acts they are agreeing to. IMO, the number of 14 year old persons who are sufficiently informed about intercourse to be able to be informed of what they are consenting to, is going to be an incredibly small number to begin with. Only in that context am I apathetic.
In pretty much every other scenario, I’m strongly against such an agreement until all parties are sufficiently informed to provide consent.
IMO, legally, I don’t care. If someone wants to put themselves into this situation, then fine. It doesn’t really affect me.
Why… would it affect you. What on earth are you talking about?
You know, one guy murdering another guy over a pack of raisins doesn’t affect you, but I have no earthly idea why this should stop you from caring it happened.
For me it’s about freedom.
Freedom has limits that most don’t really talk about. To me, the limits of freedom exist where your freedom and the freedom of others intersect. If your freedom is impacting the ability for someone else to enjoy their freedoms, then it needs to be a matter settled by law.
Murdering someone kinda removes that person’s ability to exercise their freedoms.
Someone getting freaky behind closed doors, doesn’t affect anyone else’s freedoms.
Both individuals engaged in that act should be free to consent to the act, and revoke that consent at any time.
I’ll reiterate, this assumes informed consent, not implied or assumed consent. Again, reiterating: children that have no understanding of sexual acts, or what they entail, cannot provide informed consent because they do not understand what they are consenting to, or what the ramifications are of that consent.
Does that clear things up a bit?
Both individuals engaged in that act should be free to consent to the act, and revoke that consent at any time.
A 14 year old.
Again, reiterating: children that have no understanding of sexual acts, or what they entail, […]
I like how you keep putting up these disclaimers like they’re supposed to absolve you of being a weirdo, but you keep building in these little exceptions for “very mature” children.
Mystik, how much the child knows about sex does not matter. That’s not why it’s illegal.
The law makes it legal or illegal.
You miss the point.
The fact is, the law specifically allows for this shit. Holy crap people.
The judicial system is so fucked that you can get parental consent and do whatever you want with the underage person. That’s fucked.
The laws are fucked.
Now that I’ve pointed it out, and you bozos don’t know enough about the law you live under, you think I agree it should be allowed. I don’t.
It’s allowed.
I don’t agree with it.
It’s it clear yet? Fix your laws. Period.
Tl;Dr: This pedo thinks kids can consent to have sex with him.
Oh, you misunderstand.
By expressing an understanding of the legalities of it, and speaking from a neutral viewpoint, plus some deficiency in reading comprehension (you clearly didn’t read the whole post), you seem to have assumed that my statements meant I agreed with any of the laws I was discussing.
I don’t.
Let me put it simply (and I said this in my previous post, more or less): no adult person should be seeking this kind of “deal” or “relationship” with someone who is under the age of consent.
I recognise that with parental permission you can attain concent to (at the very least) marry an underage person. I don’t agree that people this young should be allowed to be married or perform sexual acts even with the consent of the parents. The law disagrees.
I don’t like it, and I don’t have to.
My post was largely a commentary on how fucked up the legal system is for allowing this.
You want change? Pass new laws.
The fact is, the proposed agreement in this hypothetical is a private contract which, for the most part, is fine and acceptable under common law pretty much everywhere.
Uh. No. That’s not correct. That’s not even remotely correct.
You can’t have a private contract for an act that is illegal. This isn’t a contract for marriage. This is a contract for sex. Moreover, it’s a contract for sex with a person that can not legally consent to sex.
WTF is wrong with you?
The legality of paying for intimate acts varies wildly from country to country and even in the USA, from state to state.
I make no judgement about what is considered legal or not in any given area.
I’m mostly thinking about the common law of marrying off young persons. In many places the lower limit on how old you must be to marry, is shocking. Marrying a 14 year old isn’t unheard of, even in developed countries. I just don’t draw a significant distinction between being married at such a young age, and being paid for intercourse at the same age. Marriage at that age may be arguably more “legal” depending on the jurisdiction, but in my mind, you’re not marrying a 14 year old for their hobbies, or personality. The only reason, again, that I can think of, where someone would propose to be married to someone so young, is if the person proposing the marriage is a similar age, or if they want to have sexual relations with someone who is that young.
So for me the line is blurred and I often conflate the point in my mind.
More to the point, statutory rape generally requires that the parents are opposed to the sexual acts. Otherwise, charges are generally not pressed against the offender. Again, this varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. To that end, if you have the written consent of the parents to engage in sexual acts with someone who is below the age where they can legally make such decisions, then it might be legal, again, depending on the jurisdiction.
This is entirely, and completely commentary from a neutral standpoint. Personally, I think anyone who would seek such an arrangement needs to see a therapist, or be locked up. Morally, I don’t agree with it, but often, the law does not conform to my sense of morality.
I’m just saying, I understand that some places allow for these kinds of contracts to exist. I’m not saying I agree with it at all, because I don’t. I can’t imagine any situation where a father, or mother, would willingly subject their child to that situation, unless they were truly and utterly desperate… But the matter of their desperation for money to survive, is an entirely different discussion.
The legality of paying for intimate acts varies wildly from country to country and even in the USA, from state to state.
It is 100% illegal in ever single state in the US to pay for sex with someone that is below not only the age of majority, but also the age of consent. The minimum age of consent in the US is 14.
More to the point, statutory rape generally requires that the parents are opposed to the sexual acts.
1000% false, in every single case. It may be more difficult to prosecute without parental involvement, but it is not required. Statutory rape is a strict liability crime; no mens rea is required. And bluntly, any prosecutor that failed to deal with an underage prostitution case would lose their job in the next election; “soft on child sex crimes” isn’t a winning platform.
You also can’t legally enter a contract of any kind at that age.
This isn’t completely true, children actually can be married at that age including to adults in some states. There’s also no such thing as statutory rape between spouses in this circumstance. The kid’s spouse also usually become their guardian, so they cannot get divorced without the adult spouse’s permission in many places.
Ok, I forgot marriage was a contract.
That’s alright, I kinda used your comment to spread awareness about child marriage in the US. I want people to know so they can vote to ban it. Overwhelmingly most voters in the US do want to ban child marriage but they don’t even realize it exists.
Hey, it’s a good cause. I’m not mad about it. Child marriage is a disgrace and people should be made aware that it still exists and who it is that is fighting for it to continue.
The fact is, the proposed agreement in this hypothetical is a private contract which, for the most part, is fine and acceptable under common law pretty much everywhere.
“Pretty much everywhere”?
Dude do you even know what “common law” means? There’s basically one in Europe, the UK.
Secondly, you can’t make contracts to void laws/avoid regulations set by laws. You can’t make a private contract that someone agrees to work for you for less than the federal mandated minimum wage.
You can’t make a contract saying you’re selling someone to be a slave, as slavery is illegal in the US (unless you’re put in prison, US industry strongly relies on prison slave labour).
You can’t make a contract saying you allow someone to murder you. That person would still be trialed as a murderer.
IMO, legally, I don’t care. If someone wants to put themselves into this situation, then fine. It doesn’t really affect me.
I think it does, however indirectly. When the rich start getting more relaxed about buying people and treating them more as product than people… it will affect us all.
You could get people to do absolutely inhumane shit if you took 10 million to a very poor country and just started egging people on. People would literally kill for just hundreds of dollars. With 10 million you could make some sort of mad max murderdome type of setup. Just have “private contracts” with everyone, and it’s okay, right? No need to consider the morality in the slightest.
do you even know what “common law” means?
Yes. But apparently you don’t.
Yes, the UK uses common law. Also, so do many current or former “Commonwealth”, including, but not limited to, the USA.
Common law is why overturning Roe v. Wade made abortion bans possible. Roe v. Wade was the common law precedent that allowed for women to have the right to an abortion.
And no, contacts cannot overrule the law, whether from a law passed by the governing body, or by common law. This is why i essentially said, if you don’t like it/agree with it, change the laws.
Make it illegal. Change the law to make it illegal.
Then, regardless of the contract, it is a crime.
As for the rich and any affect this might have on me… The rich do this shit, not to dehumanize us “Poor’s”, but because they’ve already dehumanized us. I don’t think this is a cause, this is an effect.
But I’ll give you an upvote for sharing your opinion. I’ll fight anyone who tries to take your opinion away from you.
Oh you went from “pretty much everywhere” to “well, uh, many commonwealth countries”.
You sure you didn’t have to go check what it meant, and then you were shocked at how many of what we’d consider “developed countries” actually do not use common law?
In the EU, only Ireland still has common law.
All others use civil law. And I’m sure you didn’t know that. :)
You should consider offing your self
Dude I think the proper nomenclature is “unalive”
Richard forgot to include nonbinary and intersex options in his poll. What a blunder! Egg on his face, he sure looks incompetent
How online do I need to be to understand this?
“Libertarians”
That blue checkmark carries more information then any single word ever could.
<thisPersonPays14AMonthToTwitter yes=‘yes’/>
This guy also has a whole post on Substack complaining that the left is too wary of age gaps in relationships and that this is an “attack on heterosexuality” or whatever. It’s kind of funny how conservatives will decry that queer people are all groomers and yet proclaim that age gaps and adults dating teenagers is part of heterosexual culture under the same breath.
Because the only thing that’s keeping them from the most depraved things humans can do is the laws. They grew up wrong. The rest of us are asking to live our authentic lives and they can’t think of anything that would stop us, upon living our authentic lives, from committing depraved acts because that’s what they would do if the laws allowed it. We ask to be allowed to have healthy relationships between consenting adults and they see a dangerous precedent that once we’re allowed to do that, then what else are we allowed to do. Its from a basic difference in where they think ethics and morality come from. I think ethics and morality come from within ourselves and that laws should be written to establish communal protections that allow people to achieve true freedom from oppression. They believe ethics and morality exist separate from humanity and laws exist to ensure intrinsically bad people (everyone) remains moral. Within that group, the repressives we’re talking about in this post are truly the most dangerous.
Look. All this is super complicated and I’m realizing I’m over simplifying entire systems of ethics it took me 35 pages single spaced to describe in college. Its valuable to have discussions about where ethics come from when discussing politics because ultimately that’s what you actually vote on and about
Very well put, thank you
Edit: replied to the wrong comment. I absolutely agree with you
There is a loooooooooooooong fucked up history of this being sanctioned by organized religions of all types. It stems from the patriarchal ideal woman being a baby factory and is absolutely a barbaric practice. The men in these religions are conditioned to be interested in young virginal girls that they call women but treat like property.
https://phys.org/news/2020-08-reveal-patterns-sexual-abuse-religious.html
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2352250X20301421
https://www.gotquestions.org/child-marriage.html
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/child-marriage-and-religion-in-the-united-states
That was some wild and deranged shit holy fuck. And the comments too.
Hey there’s a word for that! It’s called “Child prostitution”!
Doesn’t sound quite as reasonable, does it? Not that it ever did.The gap between yes/no men and yes/no women is kinda crazy. Also, probably has a lot to do with the audience this post reached.
I’m pretty sure it’s from a bunch of conservative dudes answering that they’re women to try to make conservative beliefs look popular with women. Like an “as a black man…” moment, except it’s “as a woman…”
No… Women can be pedophiles too and you are operating on a biased belief system hoping that the data is incorrect cause you want it to be.
We don’t have that, we have the results of the poll and people are fucked up in the head even when you want them not to be.
Considering that 95% of adults who marry children are men (according to the UN)… yeah nah man. Guys pretend to be women on the internet all the time. And conservatives on Twitter pretend to be groups which they aren’t all the time. There is absolutely 0 chance a higher portion of women answered “yes” to this than men considering the facts of child marriage. It’s not just about “pedophilia” but of patriarchal societies where women are treated more or less as sex objects, things which exist for men and who’s sole purpose is to have babies.
And the fact that historically marriage is initiated by men in basically all countries is unimportant now cause…? And the 5% in your own statistics just… Doesn’t exist?
You want there to be zero chance and refuse to accept any other reality. And yet women do enter into sex work willingly across the world. Women do plenty of things to set their life up like marrying men they don’t love all the time. Your need for a better world than we live in is irrelevant.
Man what are you even talking about right now…? What exactly are you arguing against here? I don’t think we’re on the same page.
I’m saying that women would absolutely take that offer. More than you think. And that you are making up a falsehood in your own head that it must be men to make you feel better about the world even though you have no basis for it other than conspiracy and hopeful wishful thinking.
The best science we have on the matter suggests that a larger portion of men are pedophiles (expressing interest in sexual relations with children), and statistically most offending pedophiles are men. This random poll on Twitter, a site infested with pedophiles and men with disgusting views on women and women’s rights, where any random account can participate, is completely contradictory to the science on the matter. In my opinion, that’s a pretty reasonable indication of the results being skewed by bad actors. There is no actual way to ensure the integrity of the results, as literally anyone can vote and anyone can make a new account to vote (and there are a lot of Twitter bots).
Now, I could see the argument that “women on Twitter are significantly less representative of women than men on Twitter are representative of men”, but it’s hard to see that effect causing this stark of a difference.
You are being downvoted because you think your interpretation is more likely than the other person’s. The point is that anonymous polling data isn’t reliable because people lie or even totally doctor the data. So we need to use common sense and look at other, actually reliable, data to get a better sense of what is true.
You don’t want to do that. So your analysis doesn’t stand up to any scrutiny. That’s all.
It’s an anonymous social media platform with a user base that’s over 1/3rd women more than even the percentage combined up there.
If you think no women at all participated in that poll then you are picking a side that for some reason excuses an entire gender for what can only be considered bias reasons.
Yes I understand it’s untrustworthy but we aren’t saying this is some numbers in a spreadsheet poll, it was a poll on a site that even though we may disagree with it is swarming with a huge amount of real people sitting on their phone users.
So, the only way you could assume that literally no women voted in that poll because “theirs no way they would vote that way” is a cognitive bias from wanting that to be a truth when the more likely answer and the one that is shown to be reality in a world where people (men and women included) prostitute their children for a lot less than the hypothetical.
You are using an absence of a perfect source be excuse to throw away all of the results because you want to. That’s on you, not me.
why are people obsessed with coming up with scenarios in which it could be okay to have sex with children
Be… because they want to have sex with children?
i feel gross just from reading that.
Found the pedophile.
95.7% of men who responded said no
60.9% of women who responded said no
Also keep in mind that the normative number of people voting as women is drastically lower thereby significantly manipulating the actual ratio. This is, even when everyone would actually answer truthfully, by no means a factual representation
Isn’t gender always self reported in these kind of questionnaires?
That is assuming of course that all the women who said yes are in fact people being truthful and not creeps 'as-a-black-man’ing.
Since they’re following the guy, I’m pretty suspicious of that polling regardless.
