In our quest to "save" our children (see another post here), we have lost perspective. A woman in CA is facing criminal charges for sex with two teenage boys. Historically, boys often "came of age" with older women.
Historically, it came down to puberty. When puberty arrived, it was no longer molestation, and certainly not a crime, for marriage, sex, childbirth, etc. to occur. Ever read the book Founding Mothers? Many of them were 14-16 years old, and often married to much older men to boot. And of course, one doesn't have to reach far in the Bible to find a 14 year old married to a much older man.
The age of the older one is not so much the issue, it is our fixation on "protecting" the younger one. We need all the protection in the world for those who have not entered puberty. We need less for those who have. Our laws and our system make little distinction.
This continues the pattern of how we do so many things that retard true maturity. It is almost like we are afraid for our children to grow up, or to transition to adults. Is it the desire for control? Wanting to have OUR form of love, to satisfy OUR form of the extended parental-child dependency? We are doing them no favors by being that way. Yes, it IS understandable to feel heartache that they grow up and transition out of their dependency and heavily interlinked stage, because we love them and want to spend precious time with them (which, in our time-maniacal culture, we probably do too little of, and so we are heavily laden with guilt and remorse). But it is selfish and harming to keep them in that stage too long.
People often say the words "they may be physically maturing, but they aren't mentally/emotionally ready." Nope, they probably aren't. Maturity responds to what is asked of it. In most respects, we aren't asking much. People of the 1700s matured fast because it was expected. They weren't babied, overprotected, or sheltered in some parental/societal artificial cocoon that disconnected them from reality.
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