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Child Rights and AOC Laws
People voting against age-of-consent (AOC) laws often use the
argument of child rights. They consider the AOC laws as a violation of
basic human rights which every adult has and which have to be given
also to children:
Let's denote the following as the general right for
sexual self-determination:
Everybody has the right to make sex with every other
consenting human being(s) or not to make sex .
In our society, the Age-Of-Consent (AOC) laws restrict this right
to the following restricted right for sexual
self-determination:
Every adult has the right to make sex with every other
consenting adult(s) or not to make sex.
The difference between these concepts are the prohibition
- for adults to have sex with children and
- for children to have sex with adults.
It is consent, that, if we have a conflict of the interest of the
adult to have sex with a child, on one side, and some interest of the
child on the other side, the interest of the child has a higher value.
That's why in the human rights argumentation, the first point does not
play a big role.
Often, at this point will be stated that there are no children which
really want to have sex with adults. But this is not the question here
(independent of the fact that it is wrong). Even if there is no child
which want's to have sex with adults, this is not a reason to remove
this right from the children.
Remark also that to propagate a right is not equal to propagate to use
this right. For example, to propagate the right of everybody to leave
his country is in no way a propagation to leave this country. (I have
many years lived in a country without this right to leave this
country. It is something like a big prison. Now I have this right,
and I don't want to leave this country. But, if somebody will
remove this right again, I will leave this country as fast as
possible).
The main counterargument is that the child is not able to foresee
possible negative consequences of sexual relations, and it has to be
protected from these consequences.
Remark that the right of sexual self-determination is one of the
most fundamental rights of any person. I think, we have no right
to remove these rights based only on our moral considerations, to "protect"
them from somethink we don't like. There must be very good reasons
for a restriction of such a fundamental right.
Indeed, there are two obviously dangerous consequences of sexual
relations:
The child cannot foresee all consequences of pregnancy. It also cannot
estimate the probability of pregnancy and the distribution of a
veneral disease. It seems necessary to protect children from these
consequences.
But this gives reason only for forbidding unsafe sexual
techniques. It does not give reason for hard persecution of safer sex,
and there is also no reason for the persecution of sexual techniques
without any danger of pregnancy or disease for the child like
masturbation, fondling, petting, sucking a boys penis and so on.
Other possible effects does not
give enough reason for such a radical measure as the restriction of
fundamental human rights:
- The harm caused by possiblephysical
pain (which may be caused by some sexual techniques like anal
intercourse, S/M) or feelings of disgust
will be detected by the child himself independend of his age. If it
has the possibility to interrupt the sex at any moment (and knows that
it has) - a necessary condition for consensual sexual relations - it
can decide better as any other person if it wants to continue or not.
- Psychical pain like feelings of
shame and guilt is also possible. But such feelings also occur and
have to be handled by the child in other situations, for example
related with masturbation or sex-plays with age-mates.
Another argument is the power disbalance. The consent of the child is
not valid because it is always manipulated by the adult. The adult is
always misusing his greater power.
Here were have an obvious confusion between two different things:
- A power difference between the adult and the child.
- A usage of this power.
That means, power misusage by the adult to manipulate the consent of
the child is possible. In this case, we do not have a real consent of
the child. But the simple existence of such a power disbalance is not
a proof that this power was used to manipulate the child.
Another human right violated by AOC laws is the right for
privacy. I don't know usual formulations of this
right, but I think that it has to include the following:
Everybody has the right to hide information about his
private life.
Usually, in the process of persecution of pedosexual relations, this
right will be violated for the children involved:
- The child usually does not have the right to refuse to give
evidence.
- The testimony of the child, in the case of consensual sex,
contains information of very private character - the own sexual
orientation and desires of the child.
- Especially in the case of consensual relations, this testimony
will often be used against the own wishes of the child (because the
child often does not consider himself as a victim of the adult and
does not want to send him to prison).
I don't know any serious argument for such a rigorous violation of
such a fundamental right of the child. This violation may be harmful
and dangerous for the child (guilt feelings).
Moreover, the right of privacy of the child needs special
protection, because the child does not know how the information it
gives to other people may be used or misused. The following rules seem
to be necessary to protect the right of privacy of the child:
- No information given by a child about his sexual behaviour has
to be distributed to other persons or used otherwise without
explicite, free consent of the child.
- The child has to be informed about the possible consequences of
the distribution or other usage for himself and other people before
asking about this consent.
- The child has to be informed that it has the possibility not to
consent to the distribution of this information.
Mike
<Mike@alpha.c2.org>