Not Getting It

[lederhosen]

Well, Hollingworth has gone.

Or at least, resigned. Howard has graciously told him he can stay in the official residence until June 30. I don't have a problem with this per se - it would be unreasonable not to give him time to make arrangements, particularly since his wife is ill, though I do hope the same charity would be extended to anybody else who suddenly loses their eligibility to government-provided accommodation.

The sad thing is, the guy still doesn't seem to understand why people are so angry. He's offered a number of apologies that aren't real apologies, boiling down to "I don't acknowledge that I've done anything wrong, but if you think I have then I'm sorry you feel that way, and I'm going to resign to protect the dignity of the position from the people who are throwing mud at me."

And just ten days ago, he once again managed to imply that a relationship between a fourteen-year-old girl and the priest who ran the boarding house where she lived was initiated by the girl.

After being roundly slammed for the same "blame the victim" behaviour last year, in the SAME CASE.

I feel sorry for the guy, in a way, because he really doesn't understand why people are so angry with him, and I don't think he ever will. He probably can't help being a dinosaur. But I'm very glad that he's no longer Governor-General.

Be interesting to see who Howard picks as his successor...

Comments

[frou-frou.livejournal.com]

I agree...Hollingworth's recent letter to Archbishiop Aspinall illustrate how out of touch he is, and how little he understands about what he's done (and continues to do) wrong. I feel sorry for the man.

Minor correction: the latest letter is a different case, about a different fourteen year old girl who (according to Dr H) 'started a relationship' with her adult rowing coach. Starts to sound like this sort of thing is happening all over the shop.

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

Ah, thanks. I saw fourteen year old girl, guy in position of authority, and just assumed it was the same case...

Re:

[frou-frou.livejournal.com]

I thought so for a while there - it's really sad how little he's learnt from this though.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

And just ten days ago, he once again managed to imply that a relationship between a fourteen-year-old girl and the priest who ran the boarding house where she lived was initiated by the girl.

I hope you're suggesting that such a claim is improbable, not impossible.

[thorfinn]

The point is so not about who "started it". The issue is abuse of power - and whether the girl "initiated" it or not is completely and utterly and totally irrelevant to the issue of the abuse of power and trust that is involved. I guarantee you, most intelligent males over the age of 25 or so could probably persuade a fourteen year old girl to "initiate" sexual contact with them, without ever "initiating" sexual contact themselves. Most don't do so because there is a serious problem with the fact that the girl almost certainly isn't capable of fully understanding what she's getting into.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

You will find I agree with on the question of power. The young woman in question was in a powerless situation, as both a resident at the college and in terms of her rights. I certainly wasn't questioning that particular point.

However, I wouldn't be so sure that such young adults "certainly isn't capable of fully understanding" what such a relationship involves. The empirical evidence to date certainly suggests otherwise.

On an issue as serious as this we must be careful not to simply take up the prejudices of our own social "conventional wisdom" - or for that matter our own experiences. There is serious research available on the biological and psychological capabilities of young adults. Some of the results may be surprising and even disconcerting. But it doesn't make them wrong.

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

The catch here is that this is society-dependent. My suspicion is that in a society that wasn't so messed up about sex, a lot of people that age quite possibly *could* have sex without serious consequences to themselves (assuming proper contraception/disease control, which IMHO comes with the "not messed up" bit).

But we are not that society. If a fourteen-year-old girl has sex with an older man, no matter how mature they both are about it, she runs the risk of being labelled as a slut. Almost a certainty, if the relationship lasts for any length of time. Maybe sex is only such a big deal because we make it a big deal, but it is a big deal.

The other issue here being that yes, kids do mature at vastly different rates, and it's not practical to have a different age of consent for every individual. So we inevitably end up with a compromise between protecting those who need protecting and giving freedom to those who are old enough to handle it. That's a pity, but I don't really see a practical alternative.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

In the first instance of factual dependence is biological and neurological. One needs to be physically mature and have the mental capacity to perform "formal operations" (to use Piaget's term). Yet in addition to these factual elements it is also matter of social implementation. The more varied a society is from the factual aspects the greater the possibility of social pathologies. Societies don't exist in a objective vacuum - otherwise we could, for example, determine the value of pi by legislation as was once attempted.

With regards to recognizing individual ages of majority (and the varied rights that would include), well that's the ideal position that I would concur with. Our current social system is a compromise between intuitive conservativism and functionality - along with being a political hot potato that few have the courage to go near.

Screening out the political distortions for a moment, is it not possible to imagine a modern social system where individual determination does occur? What resources would that take? What criteria would be used?

These are difficult questions. Yet the overwhelming majority of human history managed to achieve them because they took the issue seriously (indeed, "the coming of age" is the most important point in a person's life - with the obvious exceptions of birth and death). Why can't we?

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

With regards to recognizing individual ages of majority (and the varied rights that would include), well that's the ideal position that I would concur with.

The question is, how do you determine whether each individual is ready for the responsibilities of adulthood?

Assessing physical maturity is relatively easy, probably why a lot of societies used physical milestones to determine it (menarche being the most obvious example), but physical and emotional maturity aren't the same thing. Other coming-of-age ceremonies require a group of participants, so the timing depends on how many other candidates are around, which isn't really tailored to the individual. I've yet to see a good method for judging mental maturity that's practical for use on the entire population.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Developmental psychologists have done plenty of research on this from a variety of angles. I'm not suggesting that any of this is perfect - far from it, and mainly I don't accept the claims of many psychologists that their discipline is a science. But in terms of general structures:

Cognitive Ability: From Piaget, the capacity to perform "formal operations", beyond the "preoperational" (early childhood) and "concrete operational" (late childhood) stages, i.e., the person has the ability to reason in the abstract.

Moral Reasoning: From Kohlberg, the ability to form "post-conventional" moral justifications rather than "preconventional" (early childhood) and "conventional" (late childhood), i.e, the person has the ability to form their own moral judgements independently of authority figures or conventional wisdom.

Expressive Perfomance: From Mead (George Herbert, not Margaret), the ability to perform roles rather than than perform expressions as a game (early childhood) or as play (late childhood).

Psychoanalytic: From Freud (yes, even Freud), the capacity to recognize the superego as well as the ego (late childhood) and id (early childhood).

... And that's a very brief summary of scores of textbooks and studies on the matter. It's a tricky subject, to be sure, but at least attempting to understand it is better, in my opinion, than not attempting to understand it.

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

Now, how do you turn those definitions into a test which is:

(a) Easily and consistently applied - since you need to test *everybody*. Probably more than once, since they won't all pass first time. (I don't recall the Australian law, but I know US law does allow for the emancipation of minors in some circumstances. The problem being, it only really works as a "special case" treatment - the process is too laborious and expensive to apply to everybody.)

(b) Proof against abuse, on the tester's end. If you look at the issue of IQ testing, and culturally-biased tests, you'll understand why this one bothers me.

(c) Proof against cheating, on the subject's end - because everybody *wants* to be seen as 'mature'.


In *theory*, I'm all in favour of individually-set ages of majority, but the practical obstacles are so great I suspect it would end up worse than our current system.

[thorfinn]

Most Australian states have laws along the lines of:

For heterosexual sex, if your partner is below N years, it is statutory rape. If your partner is above N years and below M years and you are outside N plus-or-minus D years, then it's statutory rape. If your partner is above M years, you're fine.
Ditto for homosexual sex, but states have different figures for M, N and D, and some vary for homosexual sex.

I actually think that basic idea is fine. It strikes a balance between allowing sexual experimentation between relative equals (eg, a 12 year old and a 13 year old) and protection of those same individuals from "sexual predators", and it does so without just blanketly restricting sex below a specific age. That kind of "slow graduation" is good, because it allows a level of experimental behaviour that is not totally off the wall, rather than encouraging the "woohoo I'm over the age, I can suddenly overindulge and do stupid things to myself" attitude.

You'll notice that drink driving laws have recently been coming into similar structure (for N years of your license, you are not allowed any alcohol, for M years you may have L1, but then after the limit is L2) as well.

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

Yes, I think the gradated laws are a reasonable way to handle it, especially since people *don't* suddenly transit from immature to mature overnight. And the "+/- 2 years" bit seems like a fairly sensible compromise, recognising that adolescents are prone to experimenting while discouraging relationships more likely to be abusive.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

OK, this is by no means set in stone by any stretch of the imagination (heck, this is lj, not a PhD thesis), I think it is possible to develop a "adult citizen licensing" system of adequate complexity, tester-integrity and proof against cheating without straining the resources of a social system too much (I mean we do it with driving motorised vehicles, and those damn things really dangerous).

I actually like the idea that individuals could fail as well. In fact, I'd be quite happy for some people to constantly fail. In fact, you could possibly start charging a user-pays fee after the first test (that could stop people making unreasonable claims) At least our voting public would be of better quality.

As I said, these are mere hypotheses. But I really think you're on to something here - a method that could resolve the problems relating to the "crises of adolescence" and the variation between individuals.

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

At least our voting public would be of better quality.

This thought scares the willies out of me. Look at the Bush administration, and the efforts they've made to inject their own religious values into things like the school system. The voter-exclusion business in Florida made it very clear that they're not above trying to alter the balance of the voter pool in their own favour. Directly or indirectly, any system for awarding 'maturity' would be susceptible to government influence. That leads in directions I don't want to go.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Directly or indirectly, any system for awarding 'maturity' would be susceptible to government influence. That leads in directions I don't want to go.

The point being is that it does so already and it already is a political football subject the vagaries of various institutions. Your example of the exclusion of voters in Florida is actually a case in point. Governments can and will always define a method of including and excluding who are citizens, what rights they have and so forth. And many will engage in attempts of "social engineering" as you've indicated above.

In the interests of greater accuracy and adaptability that a that the social system provides a method - say determined by an independent statutory authority, rather than a government of the day - that is available for public discussion, expert critique and so forth, rather than simply chronological age and vagaries it produces. Furthermore, I would suggest that these rights are permanent to protect adult citizens from the sort of legislation that occurs in Florida et al, where "felons" lose their democratic rights for life.

Again, just random thoughts and responses to the matter. I haven't completely thought this one through. You've raised what I consider to be potentially a workable alternative.

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

The point being is that it does so already and it already is a political football subject the vagaries of various institutions. Your example of the exclusion of voters in Florida is actually a case in point. Governments can and will always define a method of including and excluding who are citizens, what rights they have and so forth. And many will engage in attempts of "social engineering" as you've indicated above.

Sure. They already do this, to the extent that I can - but that doesn't mean it can't get worse, if we give them more tools for it. Given that a "maturity test" will probably end up being at least partly subjective, this looks to me like a particularly exploitable one.

In the interests of greater accuracy and adaptability that a that the social system provides a method - say determined by an independent statutory authority, rather than a government of the day

Who determines the membership of that authority? (Hopefully not the Governor-General ;-)

BTW, I agree entirely that felons should not lose voting rights. Not unless we're willing to excuse them from paying taxes...

[thorfinn]

Err, see lederhosen's reply. In the context of the society we live in, a young adolescent is defined to be not capable... and as a result, they really actually aren't. The view of wider society actually does count. Whether a young teen really "is" ready internally, Western society doesn't accept that they are, and the consequences of that are very severe. Failing to notice and take account of those wider societal consequences is something that a young teen is entirely likely to do. Brain chemistry around that period encourages risk taking behaviour. That doesn't mean it's sensible to take those kinds of risks.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

With due respect Thorfy, I find this sort of reasoning recursive and that it doesn't correlate to the facts. If society as a whole could determine individual variation in biological and neurological processes then it would be true. But I don't think that is the case.

As for "western society" sui generis, the median age of consent is 16 in the United States, it is 14 in Europe, ranging from 12 to 17 [1]. At times it has been set as high as 21 but historically has been considerably lower, with an age of 10 in most U.S. states before the 1880s [2]. In various European governmental commissions assigned to study the legal age of sexual consent most have recommended 14 (e.g., Austria, Denmark, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland; Graupner, 1997). In Western Australia I have been informed apparently if you're under 21 you are "defined to be not capable", but only if you like guy-on-guy action.

So which figure is right? Or are none of them universally applicable? Tricky questions. But it is better that they are asked than not asked.

[1] Graupner, H. (2000). Sexual consent: The criminal law in Europe and overseas. Archives of Sexual Behavior. 29.415-461.
[2]Jenkins, P.(1998). Moral panic: Changing concepts of the child-molester in modern America. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
[3] Graupner, H. (1997). Sexualität, Jugendschutz & Menschenrechte: Ober das Recht von Kindern und Jugendlichen auf sexuelle Selbstbestimmung [Sexuality, protection of youth, & human rights: On the rights of children and youths in sexual self-determination]. Frankfurt, Germany: Peter Lang, Europiiischer Verlag der Wissenschaften.

[thorfinn]

Mmm... I'm not saying "don't look at it." I'm saying that the recursivity actually is relevant. Humans are social animals, and society does have an impact on human behaviour... and that relationship is recursive and messy. As a result, sexual capability and maturity is not the same thing as socio-sexual capability and maturity. I like the legal model similar to the "above 12 is permitted but, under 16, the age limitation on partners is plus-minus 2 years)".

There has to be a balance struck between permitting sexual behaviour and experimentation, and protecting individuals who may not be exercising good judgement about the social circumstances surrounding their actions - and the above lawset actually does so reasonably. Different societies and groups do choose to set those limits differently because they do have different values (and those values do shift over time, which is why the laws change), and that is highly relevant to the question.

In the case of Dr Hollingworth, which is where all this starts, though, the attempts to paint the events as somehow "okay" simply because the young girl "started it" are just as rotten as an attempt to paint rape as somehow "okay" simply because the woman was smoking and wearing a short skirt.

Society doesn't think so, society didn't think so at the time he was trying to cover it up and ignore it, and he should have known that. To not know that is a serious failing, and is, to steal Simon Crean's phrase, "moral turpitude", or at least serious encouragement of it.

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

FWIW, my understanding is that WA dropped the male-male age recently, and NSW is now the only state where male-male and male-female sex have different AOCs. (Hoping that gets fixed up real soon).

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

Neither, really (although if I had to pick one of the two, it would be the former).

What I'm suggesting, modulo frou_frou's factual correction, is that this is not a satisfactory excuse whether it's true or not, and should never have been offered as one.

It is no doubt possible for a fourteen-year-old to be attracted to an adult - especially an authority figure. But even if she is attracted to him, even if she actively seeks out a sexual relationship with him, it is his responsibility to say no, just as he would if a toddler wanted to eat dishwashing powder. ESPECIALLY if he is an authority figure in her life. The whole reason why we have the legal concept of a 'minor' is that children of that age generally aren't good at making this sort of decision.

Taken out of context, BTW, I wouldn't have had a huge problem with Hollingworth's recent words - without previous history I'd just write them off as unfortunate wording and leave it at that. But given the roasting he got for offering the "she started it" excuse last year, he should have been more careful. Maybe he still believes it's an excuse, maybe he's just an insensitive idiot, either way he's bad G-G material.

[turnberryknkn.livejournal.com]

What a world.

melt

[djfiggy.livejournal.com]

Don't melt just yet. It's going to get a lot worse, and people will wonder why you bailed out so quick.