Youth and sexuality
Chauhan, Chetan, Goverment to consider allowing
consensual sex among children; Hindustan Times, New Delhi, April 26, 2007
Prompted by a finding in a government study that a certain number of young children have sex or engage in sexual activity for experimenting,
the government is examining the possibility of exempting consensual sex between them from the purview of a criminal offence.
[...]
What has apparently prompted the ministry to consider the option is a finding where 26.8 per cent young adults recalled having sexual
experience during childhood and majority stating it was with friends and classmates and they were not in an abusive situation.
Dolezal, Curtis & Carballo-Dieguez, Childhood
sexual experiences and the perception of abuse among Latino men who have sex
with men; Journal
of Sex Research, August,
2002 - [External links]
These data show that not all childhood sexual experiences with older partners
are perceived as negative or are associated with damaging repercussions. This
finding is, of course, not presented to condone these practices. In fact, the
majority of the men who had such experiences were either forced or threatened or
were physically or emotionally hurt (65% reported at least one of these). There
were also indications that these experiences are associated with negative
outcomes in adulthood, in particular with alcohol use and sexual behavior. [...]
However, our findings, consistent with the modest effect sizes for correlates of
CSA reported by Rind et al. (1997, 1998), reflect that the negative consequences
of early sexual experiences are not always pervasive or severe (at least
regarding the limited measures available in this study), especially if the
experiences were perceived as consensual.
Drehle, David Von, The Myth About Boys;
The Time, July 26, 2007
Worrying about our boys -- reading and writing books about them, wringing our hands over dire trends and especially taking more time to parent
them -- is paying off. The next step is to let them really blossom, and
for that we have to trust them, give them room. The time for fearing our
sons, or fearing for their futures, is behind us. The challenge now is
to believe in them.
Gieles, Frans E. J., Go Dutch - A Practice Sample;
Youth and Sexuality in the Netherlands
Paper presented at the 19th
World Congress for Sexual Health, World Association of Sexology,
Göteborg, Sweden, June 2009
As a result of material in TV
documentaries, some Dutch politicians want to start a campaign to combat
what they see as the ‘pornification’ and ‘sexualization’ of
youth. Is this really needed, or is it better to continue the Dutch way
of dealing with youth and sexuality? I say: the latter.
Ipce
Magazine # 4, June 2011
- Theme: Sexually active children
Keeping children safe is the main aim most adults have by raising children and by
constructing policy and laws. ...
Mostly the aim is: safe for sexuality of the stranger
danger ... and for their own sexuality.... Here, we present a list of articles with facts and
thoughts about this subject.
Ipce Magazine # 5 - Theme:
Sexually active youth
Youth actually is sexually active. In our society, over-filled with
sexual images and scenes - if not at least an obsession - this not seen as
a sign of natural development, a right or a joy, but as a problem. Just
this vision raises problems. There are better visions.
Male Sexuality
Mentoring - A Positive Model for Intimate Boy - Older Male
Relationships - Sent to Ipce - author, source &
date unknown.
Other
than a mentor as noted below, neither a boy's parents or other adults,
his peers – who are most likely no better informed than himself, nor
any formal sex education program, will suffice to adequately and
satisfactorily address a boy's desire and need to learn about his
sexuality.
Reiss, Ira L.; Alice
in Wonderland: Sexual Upbringing in America; Prometheus Books - Chapter 2
We can't stop our children from finding out about types of sexuality that we don't like. But if we
openly and honestly discuss sex with our children, we can help make them responsible and caring in
their own sexual choices regardless of what today's world exposes them to.
As I will shortly discuss, we know that infants masturbate and children of all ages explore each
other's genitalia. So sex in children is far from dormant.
Let's be honest about preadolescent sexuality.
If we want to reduce exploitation of children, we have to empower children. Young people need to
know that they have real choices to make in the area of sexuality. To do that we must develop a
pluralistic rather than a dogmatic approach to sex.
Forbidding or ignoring all child sexuality does not give a child control over his or her sexuality. Only
when children are given the right to say yes to some forms of sexual exploration will children feel
that they have the responsibility to say no to other sexual practices.
Stanley, Jessica L, Bartholomew, Kim & Oram, Doug, Gay
and bisexual men's age-discrepant childhood sexual experiences;
Journal of Sex
Research, Nov,
2004 [External links]
In conclusion, the standard convention of defining age-based childhood sexual
abuse as uniformly negative, harmful, and coercive may not accurately represent
gay and bisexual men's sexual experiences. Combining perception-based CSA
experience with noncoercive, nonnegative, nonabusive experiences, as the
age-based definition does, presents a misleading picture of childhood sexual
abuse. An age-based CSA definition inflates prevalence rates of childhood sexual
abuse and inaccurately suggests that the maladjustment associated with
perception-based CSA experiences applies to all childhood age-discrepant sexual
encounters. In contrast, these results suggest that gay men with histories of
nonnegative, noncoercive childhood sexual experiences with older people are as
well adjusted as those without histories of age-discrepant childhood sexual
experiences. However, both definitions of CSA account for only a very small
proportion of the variance in adult adjustment problems. Contrary to popular
belief, negative outcomes do not inevitably follow from gay and bisexual men's
childhood age-discrepant sexual encounters.
Tatchell, Peter, I'm
14, I'm gay & I want a boyfriend -
Fourteen year old Lee tells Peter Tatchell about first sex, boyfriends, coming
out, paedophilia, and why an age of consent of 16 won't help under-age gays like
him.
Warner,
Judith, Dude, You've Got Problems;
A New York Times Blog,
April 16, 2009
Early this month, Carl Joseph
Walker-Hoover, an 11-year-old boy from Springfield, Mass., hanged
himself after months of incessantly being hounded by his classmates for
being "gay."
Wilson, Dan, Judge
takes stand against sex offender registry; Waupaca case raises
underage-consent issue; Post-Crescent, May 4, 2006
A Waupaca County judge has ordered convicted sex offender Sam Roloff's name to
be added to the state's sex offender registry, but not
until nearly 100 years have passed.
Circuit Judge Philip Kirk said the list, which now numbers more than 18,000
people, is rendered useless when it includes people like Roloff who engaged in
consensual sex with underage parties.
