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Wow, his father sounds like a piece of work. He decides that culture is the only real reason he shouldn't marry someone who was "about 9 to 12" when he's 36. T
by mherkender 12y ago
Wow, his father sounds like a piece of work.
He decides that culture is the only real reason he shouldn't marry someone who was "about 9 to 12" when he's 36. Then his long absences put her at risk of being brutally gang-raped, which happens. She ends up in the US, and eventually goes back without her kids. He tells his kids nothing about her, why she left, who she is, but still has his son beg her to come back in front of a video camera. His son thinks she abandoned him and becomes an alcoholic by 14. The guy says “We weren’t a touchy-feely, talk-about-things kind of family".
- Natsu 12y agoI thought that the US had laws against "sex tourism" so I wonder if it's possible, at least in theory, that he could get prosecuted for this?
- phpnode 12y agoThose laws were probably not on the books when this crime took place.
- ars 12y ago> sex tourism He married her. It's really not the same thing.
- Natsu 12y agoAnd then he just left, so I'm not sure what "marriage" even means in this context. Under our laws it would be something more like "statutory rape" but I do wonder what actually applies here. This isn't something I've looked into, just something I saw on 20/20 or some similar show once, so you might be right that it only applies to those setting up tours or going on them rather than to conduct that happens overseas.
- jacquesm 12y agoThis sort of thing happens every now and then, even when there are no indigenous tribes involved: http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2003/jul/15/childprotection.society http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2003/jul/15/childprotection.so...
- DanBC 12y agoOld men marrying children is common in many parts of the world. http://www.unicef.org/protection/57929_58008.html http://www.unicef.org/protection/57929_58008.html http://tooyoungtowed.org/ http://tooyoungtowed.org/
- pessimizer 12y agoSo is slavery. If you are an anthropologist from a non-slave culture working in an area where people keep slaves, and you decide not only to keep a few, but to import them when you return...
- phaus 12y ago>Old men marrying children is common in many parts of the world. There are quite a few shitty people in the world. As much as many of us hate to admit it, there are also quite a few shitty cultures. Any 36 year-old man, from any culture that has ever existed, that finds it acceptable to marry a 9-12 year old and then start raping her when she's 13 is a piece of shit. Any culture or individual that condones such behavior shouldn't exist anymore.
- jafaku 12y agoYeah our culture is the best! Everyone else is wrong!
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- phaus 12y agoI don't really subscribe to the misinformed view that one has to be perfect in order to recognize a flaw. I criticize my own culture as much as any other, perhaps more.
- askar_yu 12y agoI don't think it's fair of you to imply what he did not imply. Despite all the 'cultural-sensitivity' and what not, there are some lines that have to be drawn and stated bluntly and unapologetically. In that respect, I could not have said it better than the parent comment, and 100% agree with below statement: " Any 36 year-old man, from any culture that has ever existed, that finds it acceptable to marry a 9-12 year old and then start raping her when she's 13 is a piece of shit. Any culture or individual that condones such behavior shouldn't exist anymore."
- rayiner 12y agoI couldn't get through this article this guy made me so mad. He's like the worst sort of intellectual, the one that loses his own morality and culture to abstract ideas.
- brazzy 12y agoPersonally, I think the worst sort of intellectual is the one that gets all judgmental and mad at people based on flimsy hearsay information.
- w1ntermute 12y ago> He decides that culture is the only real reason he shouldn't marry someone who was "about 9 to 12" when he's 36. This is why I hate cultural relativists. They use it as an excuse to throw morals and common sense out the window.
- cLeEOGPw 12y agoThis is why I hate overly touchy-feelies. They use their emotional sensitivity to throw analytic thinking out of the window and then persecute people who are not like them. Where do morals and common sense come from, eh? Culture. Common sense is literally a sense that is common to a certain group of people. Morals are also mutually accepted limitations to each other behavior. So yes, morals and common sense of your culture are out of the window when dealing with another culture. Just because you have a strong opinion doesn't mean you're right.
- pessimizer 12y agoYes, if your morality is arbitrarily determined by what you can get away with, everything's moral that you can get away with. Does the father in a particular family get to set the culture of that family? If so, I think that many child molesters may have the basis for a "common sense" appeal through your argument.
- cLeEOGPw 12y agoEverything you said here is nonsensical and wrong. You completely missed the point and are rationalizing your own culture as the only right culture. Treat culture the same way you treat religion. Just as there are many religions, but none of them is the right religion, so there are many cultures, and none of them is the right culture. As for your attempt to label the father as child molester in this case, you are wrong. Child molesters are people who not only are showing behavior, that is unacceptable in the culture they are in, but also they are doing it, at least in some cases, against the will of the partner. What the father in this case did was nor against the culture in which he did it, neither against the will of the partner.
- 12y ago