Strictly speaking, this the whole Roman Polanski fiasco shouldn't be a issue of any political importance — God knows, you'd never catch our government legislating sexual matters — but now that "Bernard Kouchner, the French Foreign Minister, revealed that he had written to Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, to call for the release of the director," which is ridiculous, I'm taking that as the go-ahead sign for me to be equally ridiculous.
So, Thaddeus Russell, writing for The Daily Beast, just wrote a thought-provoking article that puts us in mind of an age-old question concerning sexuality that's of particular interest lately: At what age is a person emotionally mature enough to get raped by Roman Polanski?
Hmmmm…
Most often my [female undergraduate] students argued that sexual relations between an adult and a child (whom some defined as anyone under 18, some under 16, and others as the "emotionally immature") necessarily involved the manipulation of the weak by the powerful, which was wrong.
But then, I asked, why was it acceptable for adults to cajole and at times physically force children to play sports, wear hipster t-shirts, attend church, wash the dishes, listen to "good" music, obey authority figures, or, as the president of the United States told them directly, to take responsibility for "nothing less than the future of this country"?
That's a kind of interesting point. Why is it that I'm allowed to force my barely pubescent daughter to do her chores and finish her homework, but Roman Polanski's not allowed to force her to take drugs and have anal sex with him? Is American culture still so perversely puritanical that it can't see the inherent hypocrisy in that?
Though, to be fair, Russell is drawing a distinction between "having sex with a child" and "raping a child," because, okay, let's draw that distinction for some reason…
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