Instigator / Pro
21
1494
rating
3
debates
50.0%
won
Topic
#3494

Is Child Sexual Abuse Harmful by Itself?

Status
Finished

The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.

Winner & statistics
Better arguments
9
0
Better sources
6
0
Better legibility
3
1
Better conduct
3
1

After 3 votes and with 19 points ahead, the winner is...

Myst1
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
3
Time for argument
One week
Max argument characters
30,000
Voting period
One month
Point system
Multiple criterions
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
2
1533
rating
18
debates
36.11%
won
Description

Pro argues that the vast majority of the harm that is correlated with kids having sex with adults stems from the stigma against it and failing to control for other confounding variables.

Con argues against this view.

Disclaimer: I (pro) have uncertainty about this view but I will attempt to play devils advocate.

DEFENITIONS:
Child sexual abuse: A person that is under 18 years old having sex (that they chose to have) with someone that is five or more years older than them.

-->
@whiteflame

Thanks!

-->
@oromagi

Done.

-->
@Barney
@Vader
@whiteflame

Please delete my vote here.

-->
@oromagi

Pretty sure you voted towards the wrong side

-->
@Intelligence_06

I am pretty sure administrators or mods have a way of checking that.

-->
@Best.Korea

I am starting to suspect if you are an alt of one of the banned users on the site.

Spreading filthy lies will get you nowhere.

-->
@Best.Korea

Good troll.

War on pedophilia has only brought pain and misery to society. What we need to understand is that pedophiles are humans too. Little girls can have sexual feelings.
If a little girl has a strong desire to be in a loving relationship with an adult man, nobody should tell her that she shouldnt do what she wants.

-->
@Ehyeh

If you (or anyone else) want(s) to debate me about the "is sexual abuse harmful by itself" argument then I'm down though.

-->
@Ehyeh

"To argue a child cannot then be raped with proper education"

I never said that.

"Should women not care if they were raped if the man is appealing to them?"

If they were raped and they enjoyed it and it didn't harm them then the rape should not be done in general because whoever raped them didn't know if it would harm them (and seemingly in all liklihood it would harm them). They should care as a measure to protect other people but if it didn't harm them then it didn't harm them.

"if you think children can consent to sex if taught properly, you should also support children being able to get their drivers license at any age. If a child can consent to sex, do you also support children being able to work in steel plants and salt mines?"
I'm not convinced that minor-adult sex is as dangerous and hard to take the needed precautions for as driving and working in steel mines/salt mines.

"Are women incapable of knowing who they do and don't want to have sex with without being told?"
Obviously they are capable.

"What I'm getting at is that if children can consent to sex with the right socialisation and only feel raped because of socialisation. Can you not use this same argument and say women can only feel raped to begin with due to socialisation? I will gladly accept this debate if you wish to do it. You have a massive burden of proof criteria to fulfil."

I don't have the empiricism to back up this view but I do think that it is perhaps possible. However there is a natural selection argument that being rape-averse is an adaptive trait because basically it makes women pick who they have kids with more and therefore makes them have more intelligent/strong/healthy kids. This is because when someone rapes someone it tends to be someone less well off in terms of their DNA raping someone who is more well off in terms of their DNA I guess. Anyway, I currently don't have the empiricism to back up that view so i'll pass up that debate. It is something that I have thought about though. An interesting one it is.

-->
@Myst1

"Then you must also make a case that women who are and have been raped in history, also shouldn't care that they were raped if they found the man sexually appealing. Should women not care if they were raped if the man is appealing to them? Are women incapable of knowing who they do and don't want to have sex with without being told?"

To develop this idea, I think my wording was wrong. What I'm getting at is that if children can consent to sex with the right socialisation and only feel raped because of socialisation. Can you not use this same argument and say women can only feel raped to begin with due to socialisation? I will gladly accept this debate if you wish to do it. You have a massive burden of proof criteria to fulfil.

-->
@Myst1

I don't believe sex is ever as simple as tying one's shoes. For many, sex is an act of great emotional vulnerability and bonding with another person (especially for women). To argue a child cannot then be raped with proper education, is saying we only see sex as an act of great emotional bonding and vulnerability because we're told too or at the very least, whether that emotional bonding should ever be seen as regretful is fully down to socialisation not nature. If children only ever feel raped due to socialisation and not nature. Then you must also make a case that women who are and have been raped in history, also shouldn't care that they were raped if they found the man sexually appealing. Should women not care if they were raped if the man is appealing to them? Are women incapable of knowing who they do and don't want to have sex with without being told? Wouldn't it make more sense to not impart your views of sex on the child? and allow them to develop their own sense of sexuality so you can be sure not to be socialising them to your own view, as those you are arguing against you claim do? To argue that sex is as simple as tying shoes, is simply your view. Many see it as a deeply emotional and even spiritual union to only be had with someone you're sure you love, can you prove this view wrong? Your confounding variables are also inaccurate, as it doesn't take into account the development of the child and whether they may end up as a Christian later in life, or a Muslim. Even in polygamous societies, monogamy is still always considered righteous. Once more, if you think children can consent to sex if taught properly, you should also support children being able to get their drivers license at any age. If a child can consent to sex, do you also support children being able to work in steel plants and salt mines?

-->
@Ehyeh

I agree that it may be impossible to prove that it is not harmful in of itself. I'm not too worried about that as I am looking for revealing debate more than trying to win the debate. Also the burden of proof... Anyway, if child-adult sex is proven to be a harmless activity without confounding variables (that can be done away with) and given the right precautions (such as wearing a condom) that children would follow given the right education then children would not have to be so developed mentally to make that decision. Making such a decision would be like any other harmless task ex tying your shoes or whatever. So if I can prove that it is harmless (with such followed precautions and no confounders) then I don't have to answer the question of whether they can make an intelligent and informed decision to consent. Intelligent decision making involves weighing the pros and cons of a particular decision but if there are no cons to a decision then why must one be equipped intellectually to go through with it? Although I can think of some data that is probably coherent in showing that they can consent enough but I'm not focused on that type of research right now. However, in general children cannot consent as much as adults can consent.

-->
@Myst1

I don't necessarily think your argument is bad. I just personally don't really see how you can go about proving something such as this. We can reach high levels of probability, but I doubt that all factors can become alienated. A lot of what goes into being able to consent to sex isn't the age gap, but rather the gap in societal freedoms. For example, an adult person may be able to work, earn money, and drive a car. All of this extra freedom gives the adult a lot of power over the younger. Even if an adult does not have a car or a job, it isn't as bad because they can do so if they want to, whereas children cannot. They're at very different stages in their lives, kids are still learning basic multiplication with very little life experience. It becomes hard to say that children know when having sex is in their best interest when they're at a stage of development where we wouldn't even trust them to drive a car or pick up our groceries. Once you argue children are competent enough to consent to sex, you should also be arguing for their rights to work as truck drivers and medical professionals.

-->
@Novice_II

Sure will do

Edit: Done.

-->
@Myst1

I want the voting period to be 2 weeks, and the time for argumentation to be 2 days

-->
@King_Of_Boxes

Seems like you might want to debate me? Prove me wrong?

-->
@Ehyeh

Then you should debate me because it will be an easy win. Or you could not debate me and therefore show that you are incapable of countering my arguments.

-->
@Novice_II

I sent you a debate request.

-->
@Myst1

What in particular do you want to debate?

-->
@Novice_II

Then let's debate.

Now I wish I had accepted this debate. With such a weak affirmative case and an instigator that clearly has not been online in 5 days, it would have made for an easy win.

This has to be a troll debate xD

Obvious ridiculous that you justify the basis of Pedophilia while also seemly pretending to be "Devils advocate" it is clearly evident what you're trying to do PRO

-->
@PREZ-HILTON

This is like your 5th account here. For whatever sake of the sacrilegious god, stop forfeiting!!! (Arrrgghhh)

-->
@Wylted

I'll say that psychological defense mechanisms exist in general. I'll give you that. I didn't think that specific (and pretty tiny) part of my argument through but the rest of my argumentation still stands.

"The burden of evidence is on you to prove that psychological defense mechanism are used by victims when they go along with having sex with an adult"

You have no ideal how burden of proof works if you think I have to provide some evidence that psychological defense mechanisms exist.

-->
@Wylted

The burden of evidence is on you to prove that psychological defense mechanism are used by victims when they go along with having sex with an adult. Also, the burden of evidence is on you to prove that people even have psychological defense mechanisms that cause things to not be mentally harmful at the time but then they are mentally harmed later in the first place. You are saying that something exists in the world. The only empirical "evidence" that you have given me to back up this claim that psychological defense mechanisms are used by victims when they go along with having sex with adults is your own experience of being tortured which could is a very different experience. Torture is obviously very physically painful while CSA is not physically painful when it happens (according to the victims in Clancy's sample). The experiences are very different from each other but you assume that CSA has the same effect of defense mechanism repression (another assumption in your argument). You are committing the burden of proof logical fallacy (https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/burden-of-proof) as well as perhaps the appeal to emotion logical fallacy (https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/appeal-to-emotion). On the other hand I obviously have plenty of evidence to back up what I am saying (at least compared to you). You counter argument against my evidence is pretty much just assumptions.

I like that you're calling up psychologists who have experience in CSA though. I respect the effort.

I wasn't sexually abused. Though I did experience homos every once and a while, when my dad left me alone with them grab my dick or try to persuade me into sex in an aggressive manner. I never did it. Had I been a girl and less likely to be able to resist and with the intimidation factor, who knows maybe I would have "consensually" had sex with them, if you want to define that as consent

Yes, literal torture.

"As for you thinking that the children who have sex with adults are not harmed by it at first because of defense mechanisms the victims themselves did not say that they were not harmed by it because of defense mechanisms. They said things more like "I didn't realize that it was abuse so I didn't think of it as wrong" and "the only reason that I knew that it was wrong is because he tried to hide what we were doing when the door opened" and ""

This is an over reliance on their words as a way to explain their repressed feelings. Obviously these people are not aware of their own psychological defense mechanisms. I saw torture as normal. Sometimes I even brought it onto myself. For example I wanted my siblings to have a normal childhood, so when they would do anything wrong, I'd take the blame myself and the punishment so they never had to experience it.

I will take a while to actually argue because I am calling up psychologists who have experience in childhood sexual abuse. Many of which claim a lot of these victims don't view themselves as victims and many believe that nothing is wrong with what happened.

I am obviously not going into detail about this in the comments and I haven't fully researched the position I took in this debate yet, but you don't seem to realize what being a victim means. I thought my childhood was good, because I had no frame of reference. I can't understand how that problem would be compounded if I was experiencing abuse in a way that was physically stimulating and where I was seduced into doing it voluntarily.

I have talked to a lot of people who do recall these childhood experiences fondly, but they don't realize the harm though I can see it clearly. Their hypersexual nature causing them to get pregnant at 13 for example. The fact they can't platonic relationships with others of the sex they abused him

-->
@Wylted

I'm sorry that that happened to you. I hate to ask this but do you really mean that someone "literally tortured" you as in they physically hurt you like cutting into you or something? The way that I see it you could mean that you were sexually abused as a child? And if so then did you go along with it or were you forced because there is a big difference there. The effects of being forced are a lot worse than when kids go along with it (I assume that we can agree on that). Also if you were actually physically tortured then being physically tortured is a very different thing from having sex with an adult as a child.

As for you thinking that the children who have sex with adults are not harmed by it at first because of defense mechanisms the victims themselves did not say that they were not harmed by it because of defense mechanisms. They said things more like "I didn't realize that it was abuse so I didn't think of it as wrong" and "the only reason that I knew that it was wrong is because he tried to hide what we were doing when the door opened" and "and when the cops started asking me about what happened i guess that's when I realized that it was abuse." Those are just the anecdotes. They are real quotes but they are not completely verbatim. According to at least the vast majority of the victims the sex was not harmful to them at the time that it happened. You are trying to say that the victims, the people who experienced the abuse, are lying about their own experiences (or in effect that is what you are saying whether you mean't to say so or not). Or you are more likely saying that the defense mechanisms make victims not be harmed by it at the time. Not only is this an assumption that you appear to have no evidence for but the victims themselves contradict you. Whoever had a experience knows what the experience was like better than any theorists can guess with their assumptions (likely and in my opinion) biased culturally created projections of what they assumed that whoever lived the experience experienced. The victims say the reconceptualization of the CSA is what harmed them.

Let's say that I assume that you were sexually abused as a child. The collective self-reported experiences of CSA of Clancy's sample is a much more sure way of knowing the truth about how harmful CSA is by itself for CSA victims in general than your single self-reported experience.

-->
@Myst1

I suspect your opponent will reveal these reasons to you within his time for argumentation.

You are dense. I was literally tortured as a child. I can tell you in the moment a lot of psychological defenses made the events tolerable. It wasn't until I got away from the frequent torture that the trauma fully surfaced. It has nothing to do with social stigma though. These are psychological defense mechanisms

-->
@Novice_II

Because...?

Very weak affirmative case.

-->
@Wylted

Wylted said: "I am watching interviews with the writer of the "Trauma Myth" and she thinks that child sexual abuse is very harmful. If I limited my response to Susan Clancy quotes it would be enough to win this debate. She is concerned about the myths of how sexual abuse effects victims prevents victims from being recognized and coming forward."

My response: What Clancy thinks about how child sexual abuse is is more nuanced than that. You're not wrong that she says that she thinks that child sexual abuse is very harmful. However, she does not necessarily say and/or imply that she thinks that child sexual abuse is harmful by itself. When she says that it is very harmful she might mean that it is harmful in our current society because of confounding variables that are tied to sexual abuse in the current state of our society. She also could be lying and intentionally implying that sexual abuse is harmful by itself to avoid irreparable damage to her career because the victims from her sample tell a different story. I'll use Clancy's own verbatim words from her book called The Trauma Myth to make this argument:

"In my study—no differently from other research— the exact amount of time it took for victims to reconceptualize what had happened to them varied. It depended on the individual victims, on how old they were when abused, what educational and life experi- ences had taught them about sex, and what kinds of cues had triggered their thinking about what had hap- pened and recognizing it as abuse. Victims described the point of realization in different ways: “A light went on.” “It was like, aha!” “I said, ‘Oh my God.’” For more than a few it was “like a bomb went off. . . . Holy shit! I was abused!” For many, the realization was a “long, drawn-out process” that slowly built up to a new per- ception of the abuse. One thing did not vary: only at this point—when victims understood the abuse as such, once they had reconceptualized these formerly ambiguous and confusing events—did the experience become psychologically traumatic and begin to exert its negative effects. . . . It is the retrospective interpretation of the event that mediates subsequent impact . . . . there is almost always a period in which the victim reports a lack of awareness that they were abused and then subsequently reconceptualizes the experience . . . ."

"As I discussed at length in chapter 2, according to victims, they did not experience the abuse as awful when it happened because most simply did not understand clearly the meaning or significance of the sexual behaviors they were engaging in. That being said, at some point later on in life, they do. Over time, the “cloak of innocence lifted,” as one victim described it. Victims reconceptualized the formerly “confusing and weird experiences” and understood them for what they were—sexual in nature and clearly wrong. Only at this point—when the sexual abuse is fully apprehended— does it begin to damage victims. . . ."

In summary, the CSA victims from her sample (or at least the vast majority of the CSA victims from her sample) said that they were not mentally or physically harmed by sexual abuse at the moment when it was happening to them but after (and often long after) the sexual abuse happened and they reconceptualized the sexual abuse and that lead to the betrayal and feeling not cared for and other mental harms. Keep in mind that this is the victims themselves saying this. It is not anyone's opinion.

Clancy and I (and the CSA victims in her sample) agree that the reconceptualization of the sexual abuse is what causes the harm to children who have been sexually abused. However, in The Trauma Myth Clancy has never directly said what she thinks causes the reconceptualization. Though according to a verbatim quote of hers she has possibly indirectly implied that the reconceptualization of the CSA (which is what harms victims of CSA) is caused by culture (I'm not going to attempt to find that quote). My belief, what my intuition strongly tells me, and what makes since based on evolution is that the reconceptualization of the child-adult sex that causes the harm to victims of CSA is caused by societies strong and almost universal stigma against child-adult sex. This stigma manifests itself in the form of people saying that adult-child sex is harmful to children and so on. Why would humans evolved to be damaged by something only after the fact if that something caused the damage? Pain is a part of us that the human body evolved to make humans stop doing certain things. However these children "consented" and went along with the child-adult sex. If the child-adult sex caused children pain then wouldn't that pain be caused right when its happening? How else would pain result from adult-child sex that would make sense from a perspective of natural selection?

Not sure why you think being an idiot is a superpower.

-->
@Myst1

I am watching interviews with the writer of the "Trauma Myth" and she thinks that child sexual abuse is very harmful. If I limited my response to Susan Clancy quotes it would be enough to win this debate.

She is concerned about the myths of how sexual abuse effects victims prevents victims from being recognized and coming forward

-->
@Wylted

Thank you for complimenting me that I am superhuman. Very appreciate it.

-->
@Intelligence_06

"What I have brought up is essentially within the consideration of a question."

What made you decide to express the thoughts you have in this sentence in such a stupid way?

Seriously this sentence is retarded. Reword it to sound like a human please.

-->
@Myst1

In themselves, things are themselves.

Therefore in itself, child sex abuse is child sex abuse.

And by definition abuse is harmful.

The good old wylted days.

-->
@Myst1

"Will I get banned if I plagiarize for this debate? I prefer to quote primary sources verbatim to make my argumentation more coherent so I will probably use little of my own writing for this debate."

You won't get banned necessarily but you'll likely get trashed in the voting. Having lots of good sources is good. Cut and pastes in place of an argument counts as no argument at all in my book.

-->
@PREZ-HILTON

The obfuscation is clearly not my problem. If you think this is too much then it is you who can’t understand it. What I have brought up is essentially within the consideration of a question.

-->
@Myst1

Using sources is allowed, but you need to make sure to quote sources and provide a link.

Will I get banned if I plagiarize for this debate? I prefer to quote primary sources verbatim to make my argumentation more coherent so I will probably use little of my own writing for this debate.

Another case of obfuscation

-->
@Wylted

What if they have been anesthesized, as they are harmful to me in of itself and you just happen to remove them outright? Exactly, I can make a non-example as specific as you think. Only a Sith deals in absolutes.

-->
@Intelligence_06

I doubt punching you in the nuts would cause them to fall off, even if it did likely some physical pain would be attached to the outcome so some harm would be caused.