Pop and Rock Stars... and underage girls

[existentialist]

I had a similar experience. Still friends with her now (if only on fb) and I will also always be grateful to her... for the friendship and guidance as much as the sex.

I think it's different when it's a teenage boy and an older woman. I know some people find that offensive, but IMO you can't really argue the same power relationships exist between boy/woman and girl/man

I think there are often differences, but not always. The problem is working out when the differences are a problem.

One major issue is that, while the idea that every teenage boy would happily screw anyone prevails, those teenage boys who were manipulated into sex with a much older woman and suffered the emotional consequences will be marginalised and given to feel that the residual feelings they have are not valid, because they "ought" to be feeling cocky and proud, not used.

It sounds as if your experience was about a great deal more than simply being used for sex - even if it was technically as illegal as anything Bowie is being accused of - but it's worth pointing out, if it needs to be, that you may have been fortunate. And, given the attitudes of most teenage boys to matters sexual, it was probably more luck than judgement... I don't mean that as any comment on you, specifically, though.

 

[Favelado]

13. Prior to 1999 it was 12.

It was 13 until last year.

 

[Mation]

I can understand the desire for that. I can also understand why others might desire to have a more rounded discussion, without being threatened with a banning.

Yep. Poor you. Nowhere to have your voice heard.

Anyway, this (our part of this thread) is bollocks, so I won't post any more about it.

 

[Favelado]

No but I think there were some sweeping generalisations earlier in the thread. I find it quite disturbing that some posters are chucking Saville, Bowie, Peel and Glitter into the same 'bad' box. I don't think that othering or lack of distinction is very helpful.
.

Of course. Bowie and Peel were cool and that makes them totally different.

 

[Spymaster]

It was 13 until last year.

I know.

 

[1%er]

13. Prior to 1999 it was 12.

I wonder why people think the countries with higher or lower ages are wrong just because their politicians say 16 They are called children on this thread about sex but are labeled young adults on threads about the voting age

 

[Favelado]

I know.

Yeah. Sorry.

 

[8den]

So to be clear LiamO had exactly the same experience as Maddox on that they were both underage and both had sex with an older sexual partner While underage, and both remember that relationship fondly and both agree that the sex was consensual.


But LiamO thinks it was different because he was a boy a Maddox a girl.


And yet LiamO started a thread vilifying Bowie?

 

[trashpony]

Of course. Bowie and Peel were cool and that makes them totally different.

They had sex with young women under the age of consent in that country at that time. They didn't rape and sexually assault children without consent.

ETA: do you really not see a difference?

 

[DotCommunist]

I'm more of a space cadet, tbh.

sky pilot

 

[Ranbay]

few more post till this one takes over the RIP thread.

 

[Buddy Bradley]

They had sex with young women under the age of consent in that country at that time.

Isn't sex under the age of consent referred to as statutory rape?

They didn't rape and sexually assault children without consent.

Children under the age of consent can't give consent - that's kind of the whole point.

 

[Idris2002]

sky pilot

Angels one five

 

[killer b]

And yet LiamO started a thread vilifying Bowie?

I think the discussion Liam is seeking is more nuanced than that tbf.

 

[Patteran]

In fairness, my point is not so much that 'Bowie's (and lots of others) behaviour was completely disgusting and shouldn't just be whitewashed out.' but...

a) The blatant hypocrisy in how we view what they did. If we like or admire a person's work there is a tendency to focus on their achievements/canon of work rather than their sexual shortcomings. If we don't like them then we focus on their sexual proclivities and ignore their work.

If Bowie had been a politician, especially a tory one, or Jim Davidson or how many people would be queueing up to demand he get a poitive-comments-only RIP thread? None. In fact clowns like 8den would probably be leading the charge to pillory them.

b) I would recognise that how Bowie et al carried was wrong and exploitative but, as has been noted above, it was something that was both widespread and mostly sniggered at at the time. Anybody at the same shite these days would have no such excuses.

It seems a bit daft to me to project modern-day conventional wisdom onto the actions of people 40/50 years ago.

I agree, Liam, there is a double standard. Fact is, over on Facebook, i've been mitigating his flirtation with fascism in a discussion with some of our old comrades - something I wouldn't have done for Jim Davidson, or a Tory MP, or a singer I hadn't loved since my early teens. And when it's someone less dear to me, Queen for example, I'm the first to sneer 'Sun City cunts'. Maybe it's because we saw the end of the story - when i got into Ziggy in the early 80s, Bowie was a cool older dude in a suit with a band of mixed ethnicity, wearing a haircut that every lad at the football copied. Then he was an even older dude in a polo neck with a beautiful grown-up Somalian wife. He wasn't a noncey old nazi - the story didn't end that way. Course of least resistance - a little hypocrisy/cognitive dissonance is simpler than cutting something joyful out of our cultural lives. I saw him live, once - Maine Road, 87ish, Glass Spider Tour. He was shit. That didn't matter, either, didn't affect the relationship I'd developed with him. He was Bowie, & he was ace.

 

[trashpony]

Isn't sex under the age of consent referred to as statutory rape?

Children under the age of consent can't give consent - that's kind of the whole point.

No it isn't. There's no such offence as statutory rape.

It's arbitrary (the age of consent).

 

[existentialist]

Isn't sex under the age of consent referred to as statutory rape?

Children under the age of consent can't give consent - that's kind of the whole point.

"Statutory rape" is not a term that is used in UK law: I have a feeling it originates from the US.

But - as you say - given that in the UK someone under 13 is not deemed capable of legally giving consent, sexual activity with them is by definition non-consensual, so penetrative sex is rape.

 

[Buddy Bradley]

It's arbitrary (the age of consent).

Not from the point of view of the law.

 

[Buddy Bradley]

"Statutory rape" is not a term that is used in UK law: I have a feeling it originates from the US.

Relevant bit of Wikipedia (since the CPS one was less readable):

Statutory rape - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[trashpony]

Not from the point of view of the law.

But it's arbitrary insomuch as it's a made up age which is determined by social mores.

 

[ska invita]

That said; you rarely hear MJs "PYT"

there were loads of songs from say the 50s onwards that actively expressed sexual fantasies around young women, pondering 'are you sixteen?' and so on. There was a definite fetishisation over teenage girls that seems to be have been a cultural meme even...and it was reinforced by men across the media, on tv, in the papers, and the less said about djs the better.

Whats upsetting to me about older men sleeping with young teenagers is the more than likely power imbalance - which suggests a degree of coercision and taking advantage, but also that the older man is getting a power trip from the whole experience. The power tripping also feeds into the way men were talking about it in the media - men ran the media in those days in a way they don't exclusively do so as much now. I'd like to think that sexual power tripping culture amongst men has changed somewhat since then, not just acting differently because it would be disapproved to sleep with young teens.

 

[existentialist]

Relevant bit of Wikipedia (since the CPS one was less readable):

Statutory rape - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

All of the examples on that page that are cited as "statutory rape" refer to the United States. The section on UK law does not mention it once.

 

[8den]

I think the discussion Liam is seeking is more nuanced than that tbf.

I think If that's what LiamO wants he's gone about it completely the wrong way.

Post that Video on an RIP thread was fucking moronic

 

[Buddy Bradley]

All of the examples on that page that are cited as "statutory rape" refer to the United States. The section on UK law does not mention it once.

Yes, I was agreeing with you.

 

[trashpony]

Relevant bit of Wikipedia (since the CPS one was less readable):

Statutory rape - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

That's called 'sexual activity with a child' if you read that wiki properly. There is no such offence as statutory rape in the UK.

ETA: cross-posted

 

[killer b]

I think If that's what LiamO wants he's gone about it completely the wrong way.

Post that Video on an RIP thread was fucking moronic

He's been totally transparent on this thread - including in the OP - what his position is. Haven't you read it?

 

[Buddy Bradley]

That's called 'sexual activity with a child' if you read that wiki properly. There is no such offence as statutory rape in the UK.

ETA: cross-posted

I can read fine, thanks for the condescending comment though.

 

[SpackleFrog]

But it's arbitrary insomuch as it's a made up age which is determined by social mores.

Attempts to agree on a legal definition of the age of consent may be arbitrary but the concept of an age of consent is anything but arbitrary.

 

[belboid]

I think the discussion Liam is seeking is more nuanced than that tbf.

come on, it's Liam. The cunt just wants a fight

 

[8den]

He's been totally transparent on this thread - including in the OP - what his position is. Haven't you read it?

Yes.

The comparison with Chaplin is particularly egregious. Chaplin pursued and groomed under aged women his entire life.