Letters to the Editor	Letters Archive

Chicagoan Loves Vegas Info

My partner and I are going to Vegas next week and my friends at Gentry in Chicago suggested that I look at your site. The information on Vegas looks great. Thank you for your help!

Ross
via the Internet

Glad we could be of help. Tell the establishments you visit you saw them in The Guide!

More on Rape Nonsense

As a sequel to your editorial "Rape Nonsense" [May 1999] consider...

Though our culture teaches us to believe that a child can not consent to sex, that he/she is not capable, i.e. mature/old enough to do so, and that even if they did consent, they were still severely harmed. We are taught to believe that even if a child gives consent, he/she really didn't want to participate in the sexual act (didn't freely give consent), and was only forced, tricked, bribed, coerced into doing so, robbing them of their innocence, what ever that means. Because the child didn't really consent, therefore the child was severely harmed.

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We are taught to believe that the child truly didn't consent, because no child would ever do so. That is, no child would ever want to be sexual with a older person, nor could they possibly enjoy sex with them. And even if it was highly pleasurable for the child, we are told to believe that he/she was still severely harmed, because either the pleasure wasn't genuine, that is, the child only thought is was pleasurable because of threats of coercion, not because of genuine pleasure. Or, the child will realize, when they get older, that it was abuse and not pleasure.

And if the child, or later when older, insists the sex with the older person was pleasurable and not at all abusive, they are labeled as "denying" or "covering up" the abuse, and possessing a serious mental problem caused by the sexual experience itself. Thus a closed case. Giving the child this "denial" label severely punishes the child, a price our culture is willing to pay to absolutely forbid and stop children from being sexual, the price cannot be too high.

Even when children are not physically threatened or harmed, our culture teaches us to believe that they were still severely sexually abused, perhaps even worse than if it was physical abuse. We are taught to believe that the emotional abuse is worse, that somehow they were emotionally violated, and that is the worse kind of violation. Of course the reality is that physical assaults are damaging, unlike such phonily-labeled emotional "abuse."

Once a sexual act occurs between an adult and child, even one that is consensual and highly pleasurable with absolutely no force or coercion, it is labeled "aggravated sexual assault," and the press will happily repeatedly call it such. Not only does such mislabeling lead one to believe that a physical sexual assault occurred, but that the child was tortured and brutalized, when nothing of the sort happened. Those up-in-arms hearing of such "assaults" are not told the truth, nor will they hear the truth that the child was never subjected to violence and in no way harmed.

Branding sex as "assault" is a grand collusion between the criminal justice system, politicians, and the press. Anyone veering from this party line will be immediately ostracized and labeled a child abuser. The child's experience is immaterial; in fact, the more the pleasure, the more the rage and violence by the public. The real violence and threats come from outraged vigilantes. Why does childhood sexuality provoke intense rage in the public?

Our culture teaches us that children are asexual and couldn't possibly enjoy sex, that they are "innocent" and have no idea of what sexual pleasure is all about. Not only does this deny children sexual pleasure, which is itself abusive, it punishes the child for what he/she knows is pleasurable. This is clearly unhealthy for children.

Why do we deny children sexual pleasures and punish anyone, including the child, who participates in such harmless wonders? Do we truly love and protect our children?

In our culture, sex is only acceptable in the context of a "relationship," and since children are too young to be into the exclusive, monogamous relationship needed to justify sex, we attempt to force them into an asexual existence, but of course it doesn't work, because sex is a powerful primal force. **

Richard Kempter
via the Internet
Michigan