Your honor, Can we really say I’m the person that robbed that gas station? In a Baudrillardian sense, both myself and the gas station were mere hyper-real symbols, and thus morally indistinguishable from the pure form of action, that is being-in-ourselves and not for-ourselves, undifferentiated from any particular point in space or time. I cannot be said to have Truly embodied the sign of “taking what belongs to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it”, which is said to be Stealing; because what it is, is, is unclear. Am I myself, and not them? How can we say in any objective sense that one is differentiated from the other? How can we demonstrate such a thing when the prosecution itself is ontologically incapable of acquiring true knowledge, being bound to the narrow perspective of their conditions?
Okay, let’s dial it back a bit then. If a 28 year old model puts a nametag on that says “I’m 8 years old”, does it suddenly become pedophilia? It might be a bit “what are you doing that for” but she doesn’t become a child.
If an adult couple, with full consent, engage in Teacher-Student roleplay, does that implicate them in a crime because a real student and real teacher situation is fucked up and unethical?
If I wrote a book where a character’s age was not revealed, and then at the end of the book it suddenly became clear that this character had been a child the whole time, perhaps I’m a shitty author, but it doesn’t suddenly mean every reader goes straight to jail.
All I’m saying is that if you’re going into the works because you know there’s child content, and that’s what you’re into, then that’s bad. But it’s bad that you’re into that anyway.
And if a work is trying to attract attention from those people, then they’re probably not good works for other people.
But if you’re not interested in children, and a character says they’re a teenager, but they don’t remind you of any teenagers you’ve ever met in your real life, it’s easy to go “okay sure whatever” and continue to not connect the idea of this character with real “teenageness”. In the same way that shows can have dragons or laser eyes or flying cars, I can go “okay this person is a Fantasy Teenager, who is for all intents and purposes an adult. Got it”
Now, that’s not to say I’ve never seen something and gone “hmm, this isn’t for me”. That’s totally a thing! There can still be taste, and there can still be plotlines that are cringe, or just plotlines I don’t enjoy in general. And I think it’s fair to think “huh… the author could have picked any age… why did they pick this age”, and maybe that’s enough to take someone out of enjoying a work entirely. Nothing wrong with that.
Thanks! I imagine for some people it’s too informal, or too rambly, but I try to reproduce a casual speaking style, essentially. Glad it made at least one person happy! 😅
😛
Okay, let’s dial it back a bit then. If a 28 year old model puts a nametag on that says “I’m 8 years old”, does it suddenly become pedophilia? It might be a bit “what are you doing that for” but she doesn’t become a child.
If an adult couple, with full consent, engage in Teacher-Student roleplay, does that implicate them in a crime because a real student and real teacher situation is fucked up and unethical?
If I wrote a book where a character’s age was not revealed, and then at the end of the book it suddenly became clear that this character had been a child the whole time, perhaps I’m a shitty author, but it doesn’t suddenly mean every reader goes straight to jail.
All I’m saying is that if you’re going into the works because you know there’s child content, and that’s what you’re into, then that’s bad. But it’s bad that you’re into that anyway.
And if a work is trying to attract attention from those people, then they’re probably not good works for other people.
But if you’re not interested in children, and a character says they’re a teenager, but they don’t remind you of any teenagers you’ve ever met in your real life, it’s easy to go “okay sure whatever” and continue to not connect the idea of this character with real “teenageness”. In the same way that shows can have dragons or laser eyes or flying cars, I can go “okay this person is a Fantasy Teenager, who is for all intents and purposes an adult. Got it”
Now, that’s not to say I’ve never seen something and gone “hmm, this isn’t for me”. That’s totally a thing! There can still be taste, and there can still be plotlines that are cringe, or just plotlines I don’t enjoy in general. And I think it’s fair to think “huh… the author could have picked any age… why did they pick this age”, and maybe that’s enough to take someone out of enjoying a work entirely. Nothing wrong with that.
Hey, I just wanted to say I really like your writing style!
Thanks! I imagine for some people it’s too informal, or too rambly, but I try to reproduce a casual speaking style, essentially. Glad it made at least one person happy! 😅
That’s what I love about it! Plus, some of your hypotheticals made me laugh. 😃