I thought you were taking the piss but now I'm not sure.

 

I mean, I was. I was kinda poking fun at the idea of mentally frozen teenage vampires being put together with teenage girls centuries younger than them and other variations in fantasy where magically becoming one age automatically makes you a potential love interest for

Though I do believe you could use magic to get past the difference in brain development, this obviously wouldn't do anything about the different levels of experience and any potential power imbalances.

There's not a single instance of Tonks turning into a specific other person in canon, she just alters her appearance in certain ways. I was also mainly basing it on us knowing that if you transform into an animal without being an animagus you start to think like it because of the different brain.

they only consumed drops to age up a few months, that wouldn't have really altered their looks or behaviour.

Sure I agree.

 

No one ever expects the Russian Inquisition.

Except when people object to pedophilia. A most excellent banhammer.

 

On this topic, can I say how much I hate hearing "that's just their culture" or "respect other cultures" when other cultures violate some basic human right? I especially hate seeing people use this to excuse religious lunacy and tribal bullshit. Tribal stuff is super aggravating given how awful most tribal cultures are while at the same time people romanticise them.

Western culture isn't perfect, but I've yet to see another culture that's better.

 

Well said. The basic human rights of women, children, and other oppressed peoples trump your dogshit 'culture'.

I had a buddy who went to Afghanistan in 2007-8. He told me that the Afghan troops kept a stable of boys they used as sexual playthings, and once saw an Afghan girl with Down Syndrome chained up like a dog in a front yard. A few years ago I a woman who, as a 12 year old, had been trafficked from Bountiful, British Columbia down to Utah by the FLDS to marry a 41 year old man.

Dogshit cultures, the both of them.

Also, for the record, Grenn's 'Muh Culture' excuse was such bullshit. Even in Russia the age of consent is 15.

 

I think that there's an interesting debate to be had anytime two different cultures disagree with each other on a fundamental level, even if in this case Grenn was talking out of his arse. Also, 'Western Culture' is far from a unified concept. There are tons of things that are culturally acceptable in some parts of America that don't fly in other states, never mind in other 'Western countries', with the whole gun control thing being the first example that comes to mind. At best you can argue that all liberal democracies have certain elements in common, but I don't think that that constitutes a 'Western Culture'.

 

Well, sure, and the obvious, germane example is age of consent laws that vary across all those different jurisdictions. I don't think it's reasonable to regard western European countries like Germany, France, or Spain as pedo countries where everyone is chomping at the bit to get at the youngest kids they can; I've heard from people who live there that it's really only for criminal law. My friend is from Mexico and he was shocked to find out that the age of consent in some states is 12; he said he's never seen an adult go anywhere near a 12 year old, and if they ever heard of one getting molested, they would burn the offender alive. I happen to think that if you have an informal or societally imposed age of consent that's higher than the legal one, though, then that should really be corrected, and we'd be happy to welcome you to the sensible piss yellow part of the world.

 

I hate whoever made that end. On color gradient maps, green = good, red = oh hell no. This is the exact opposite of that.

 

Maybe it was made by a libertarian?

 

Does the age of consent really affect things noricably in this case?

Like any power dynamic and different level of experience is gonna be present between Harry and Tonks even if he's 16/17 instead of 15.

He's a teenage student and she an auror in her twenties, regardless of what the law says.

 

Remember when those BitCoin Bros were trying to set up a real life Crypto Island and when someone asked what the age of consent on Crypto Island would be, their Twitter responded with, quote, "Mental maturity should be more than enough! '?

Yeah, the map was made by that guy.

 

If mental maturity is the criteria, some people will never reach the age of consent.

 

I kinda avoided this topic because I don't like the pairing in general and don't really come to a Harry Potter board to discuss ethics, but it's pretty weird how someone was banned for saying it is ethical, while teenage!Harry/Tonks is one of the most common pairings on this site. Not to mention teenage!Harry with a whole bunch of adult women. Why is it acceptable to write and read them as fantasies - let's not pretend they aren't - but not to support their legality? Are the same people who read them also objecting to those kind of relationships?

 

Grenn wasn’t banned for defending Harry/Tonks. He was banned for defending child rape in real life, then hiding behind the flimsiest of bullshit excuses, misogyny, and transphobia.

 

I wasn't aware that there's a distinction between what is ethical in fiction and what is ethical in real life, but okay.

Also: when you talk about statuary rape, please use that exact term. For many people there IS a moral distinction between rape and statuary rape.

 

You should probably look up your local laws. There are plenty of places where the ‘fantasy’ of pedophilia is considered a crime. There are stories on this site that have been sanitized to keep them and the sites from running afoul of those laws.

I don’t see the distinction, because Grenn was defending a 22 who raped a 14 year old, got pregnant, and then married their rape victim. This wasn’t a newly 18 with their 17 year old boyfriend. It was an adult and a child in a nation where the laws explicitly say the younger could not consent.

 

Because the reader often positions themself as the protagonist, especially in those kind of stories.

 

Exactly. That's why it's strange to me that people who are appalled by acceptance of statuary-rape would be so tolerant to fantasies of statuary-rape.

You view rape and statuary-rape as the exact same thing, morality wise, but for most others, it's more a sliding scale. I find rape absolutely abhorrent, but I see statuary-rape as a much more complex topic. Hell, I spent my teenage years fantasizing of being "statuary-raped". Also, most people won't exactly describe a 14-year-old as a "child".

Essentially, when you say "child rape", the picture I get in mind is an adult forcing a 10 year old into sexual acts. Which is vastly different to the situation Grenn described. Different enough to make a distinction in language when you discuss the topic - just for sake of not being misleading and escalating things.

 

14-year-old teenagers are dumbasses, even the smart ones. They'll happily fantasize (and read and write fanfic!) about things they don't understand (but think they do), would be harmed by, and would regret later.

Statutory rape gets 'complicated' if the ages are 17/18 or something, but come on.

 

What goes on in your head is your business. The fact of the matter is that Grenn was defending a 22 year old predator who seduced and raped a 14 year old boy whose age prohibited him from consenting. If you want to split hairs about ages, go nuts. All it means is that you are admitting that you think there is an age where an adult seducing a child is acceptable.

Let's be frank and honest here, shall we? If it were a 22 year old man and a 14 year old girl, not a single person would have jumped to Grenn's defense or played this game of semantics. You know it and I know it. Why? Because we see the predatory nature of the act and the violation of trust and overall despicableness of the perp, but only when that perp is male. Call it a form of sexism, whatever.

But if you'd hang that guy from the nearest tree, you'd better be ready with the noose when the sexes are reversed.