Max Clifford charged with 11 indecent assaults

[John_fi_Skye]

We need to be having this debate.

In my previous life, as head teacher of a secondary school, I remember the mixture of worry and outrage a mum and dad presented me with one day in my office, because their daughter - who was just short of her 15th birthday - had a 19-year-old boyfriend, and they were sure sex was involved. During our discussion, they applied the term "pedophile" to the guy. He had obviously left school, and they no doubt had much better places for their sex than school grounds, so of course my only concern was to make sure the girl was fine, and she was.

Now, ten years or so later, they're still together and they have a couple of kids. Such a lot of nonsense is talked about pedophilia by narrow-minded people and by overprotective parents in denial.

I see today a soap actor here in the UK is being investigated by the police because he may have shagged a 15-year-old 40 years ago. In law, that's rape, even if at the time she consented.

It's a bloody mess.

[Rum]

I agree. Technically a pedophile is someone who is attracted to children and classically that refers to pre pubescent kids. The 'grey' areas seem to occupy a lot of time and create a lot of anxiety. There can't be many men who haven't been stimulated by the pneumatic oozing movements of a fifteen year old. If you are 18 that is probably acceptable but if you are 50?..

[Thinking Aloud]

I agree. Technically a pedophile is someone who is attracted to children and classically that refers to pre pubescent kids. The 'grey' areas seem to occupy a lot of time and create a lot of anxiety. There can't be many men who haven't been stimulated by the pneumatic oozing movements of a fifteen year old. If you are 18 that is probably acceptable but if you are 50?..

It's not so much the "stimulation" as the acting upon it. A 50 year old ought to have enough self control to understand it's inappropriate and thus not act on the impulse.

[JimC]

I agree. Technically a pedophile is someone who is attracted to children and classically that refers to pre pubescent kids. The 'grey' areas seem to occupy a lot of time and create a lot of anxiety. There can't be many men who haven't been stimulated by the pneumatic oozing movements of a fifteen year old. If you are 18 that is probably acceptable but if you are 50?..

It's not so much the "stimulation" as the acting upon it. A 50 year old ought to have enough self control to understand it's inappropriate and thus not act on the impulse.

A critical element is when someone is abusing their authority, as a teacher, or leader of a youth group etc. Younger people can be impressed, cowed or frightened into actions in such situations. An 18 year old male with no official position having sex with a 15 year old girl is one thing, a 20 year old leader of her youth group quite another.

[En_Route]

]

I find firing off the odd parenthesis into the netosphere surprisingly cathartic.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

I agree. Technically a pedophile is someone who is attracted to children and classically that refers to pre pubescent kids. The 'grey' areas seem to occupy a lot of time and create a lot of anxiety. There can't be many men who haven't been stimulated by the pneumatic oozing movements of a fifteen year old. If you are 18 that is probably acceptable but if you are 50?..

Odd choice of words, Rum. "pneumatic oozing movements" hints too much at German predilections to me!

[JimC]

I agree. Technically a pedophile is someone who is attracted to children and classically that refers to pre pubescent kids. The 'grey' areas seem to occupy a lot of time and create a lot of anxiety. There can't be many men who haven't been stimulated by the pneumatic oozing movements of a fifteen year old. If you are 18 that is probably acceptable but if you are 50?..

Odd choice of words, Rum. "pneumatic oozing movements" hints too much at German predilections to me!

But I do like the line from T. S. Eliott about "promises of pneumatic bliss"...

[John_fi_Skye]

I agree. Technically a pedophile is someone who is attracted to children and classically that refers to pre pubescent kids. The 'grey' areas seem to occupy a lot of time and create a lot of anxiety. There can't be many men who haven't been stimulated by the pneumatic oozing movements of a fifteen year old. If you are 18 that is probably acceptable but if you are 50?..

Odd choice of words, Rum. "pneumatic oozing movements" hints too much at German predilections to me!

But I do like the line from T. S. Eliott about "promises of pneumatic bliss"...

It's very Brave New World, too. Lenina and the others were very pneumatic.

[Rum]

I agree. Technically a pedophile is someone who is attracted to children and classically that refers to pre pubescent kids. The 'grey' areas seem to occupy a lot of time and create a lot of anxiety. There can't be many men who haven't been stimulated by the pneumatic oozing movements of a fifteen year old. If you are 18 that is probably acceptable but if you are 50?..

Odd choice of words, Rum. "pneumatic oozing movements" hints too much at German predilections to me!

Don't forget I used to go into schools for work purposes. Watching some 15 year old girls on the volley ball court makes one realise the ..er..distractions that the average male teacher has to live with all day everyday!

[John_fi_Skye]

I agree. Technically a pedophile is someone who is attracted to children and classically that refers to pre pubescent kids. The 'grey' areas seem to occupy a lot of time and create a lot of anxiety. There can't be many men who haven't been stimulated by the pneumatic oozing movements of a fifteen year old. If you are 18 that is probably acceptable but if you are 50?..

Odd choice of words, Rum. "pneumatic oozing movements" hints too much at German predilections to me!

Don't forget I used to go into schools for work purposes. Watching some 15 year old girls on the volley ball court makes one realise the ..er..distractions that the average male teacher has to live with all day everyday!

Yep. That's what I was talking about, Rum. And the post earlier about youth group leaders not abusing positions of responsibility was right, and obviously the same goes for teachers. But we do need to be having this debate in our society, and at the moment that isn't happening: all that's happening is the law has its rigid lines drawn, and as a result people can be ruined or can sue for lots of money.

I knew a male teacher in his late 20's who was shagging one of his 14-year-old female pupils; but I knew another male teacher in his late 20's who started shagging a pupil when she was 17, and then they set up home and had kids and are still together.

We need the debate.

[JimC]

John fi Skye wrote:

...but I knew another male teacher in his late 20's who started shagging a pupil when she was 17, and then they set up home and had kids and are still together.

The best man at my wedding met his wife to be when he was a young teacher, and she was in the final year at school. They married the very next year, but I gather there was no sex while she was a student, and he was a teacher, which is how it should be...

[John_fi_Skye]

John fi Skye wrote:

...but I knew another male teacher in his late 20's who started shagging a pupil when she was 17, and then they set up home and had kids and are still together.

The best man at my wedding met his wife to be when he was a young teacher, and she was in the final year at school. They married the very next year, but I gather there was no sex while she was a student, and he was a teacher, which is how it should be...

Yes, I agree, Jim. But if there IS (as in the case I cited).....then what? These are the things we should debate. Certain things are clear (eg forced, non-consensual sex is wrong, and your best man was right) but once you've left them out, there are a whole lot of grey areas that we're just not discussing. And in the vacuum left by the absence of such discussion, some things are lebelled as "right" and some as "wrong", as if they were as clearly so as the two examples I gave.

[JimC]

I agree there are plenty of grey areas...

Good will, honesty and compassions have some use as guides, I suspect...

Certainly better than maundering tracts from bronze-age goat-herds...

[John_fi_Skye]

I agree there are plenty of grey areas...

Good will, honesty and compassions have some use as guides, I suspect...

Certainly better than maundering tracts from bronze-age goat-herds...

Mind you, as Dylan said, everybody must get stoned.

[En_Route]

I agree. Technically a pedophile is someone who is attracted to children and classically that refers to pre pubescent kids. The 'grey' areas seem to occupy a lot of time and create a lot of anxiety. There can't be many men who haven't been stimulated by the pneumatic oozing movements of a fifteen year old. If you are 18 that is probably acceptable but if you are 50?..

Odd choice of words, Rum. "pneumatic oozing movements" hints too much at German predilections to me!

Don't forget I used to go into schools for work purposes. Watching some 15 year old girls on the volley ball court makes one realise the ..er..distractions that the average male teacher has to live with all day everyday!

Yes indeed. In my days as a School Inspector*, I always commenced by saying: " The Department, as you are doubtless aware, takes a profoundly holistic approach to the education and development of our children, and I will be particularly concerned today to ensure that your sporting facilities are of the requisite standard and are subject to optimum utilisation. As part of our committment to evidence- based methodology, I will be documenting my findings with the aid of this camcorder, which I can see you are already quietly admiring."

* Wholly a figment of my diseased imagination.