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Culture War Roundup for the week of February 2, 2026

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My best answer to this is college students because 7 year age gaps are the most fertile according to the data. But also, whoever they want, since I can't find justification for ever making sex with a 15 year old a crime.

My problem with this idea is that legality, while originally designed to reflect morality, inevitably influences it. Both in the "illegal, thus immoral" direction, and, what's more important in this case, "legal, thus moral".

This might be literally a first-world problem, since countries with less pervasive state influence do not conflate legality and morality equally easily, but in a place like the US I'd rather have more fine-grained AoC laws, so that fathers don't have to resort to moral, but illegal acts to keep scumbags away.

18 seems like a young age to lose paternal authority over an unmarried daughter, if that's what you value. Somehow I don't think AOC laws actually are for this though. What about an age of consent of 15, but parents can veto their daughters' relationships until they are 18, or even 21? Veto means they can press charges against the man for violating their authority over their daughter.

The way the law works now, it doesn't protect paternal authority. Daughters will just do what they will with other teenagers, who are immune from AOC prosecution. Then when they turn 18, they will do whatever they please. The law mainly functions to prevent loving, family-condoned relationships between 20-something men and teenage girls.

The law mainly functions to prevent loving, family-condoned relationships between 20-something men and teenage girls.

Mate, please stop explaining. You just sound more and more creepy the more you go on about older men and younger girls. Seven year age gaps can be a huge gulf, or not so much, depending on the age of both parties. 15 and 21 are two different phases of life. 22 and 29 are getting nearer in experiences. 30 and 37 are fine.

10 and 17 is not fine. 12 and 19 is not fine. And I've found that arguments around "why not 15?" tend to drift downwards rather than upwards in the "if 15, why not..." later development of the argument. If 15, why not 14? If 14, why not 13? If 13, why not 12 - after all in the Classical world 12 year olds were married! (as you have used as an example yourself).

As to "family condoned", that depends on the family. Were I the parent of a young daughter, I'd be highly suspicious of any 20-25 year old guy sniffing around my 13-15 year old daughter.

If 15, why not 14? If 14, why not 13? If 13, why not 12 - after all in the Classical world 12 year olds were married! (as you have used as an example yourself).

As age falls, the number of men who are disrupted decreases, while the reasons for disrupting increase. Eventually, you get children who don't desire sex, can't get pregnant, and don't understand it. It's pretty clear that the age of consent should be higher than that number, and that number is probably greater than 10 or 11. Probably it's between 13 and 15, if you look at the recent modern world. I personally think 13 is too young for sex because I think it's probably the minimum age a girl can really fall in love with a man, she's very inexperienced at that age, and any man (or boy) ought to wait and meet her family before taking her virginity, which she should definitely have. And 13 year olds still have mild intelligence deficit compared to adults that goes away by 15. If I had to pick an exact age, I'm split between 14 and 15. Maybe I would pick 14.5 because it would be funny and it would highlight the arbitrary nature of the law. "How old are you?" "14." "Which type of 14??" LOL

Why are all the guys so eager to fuck teenage girls also so insistent that these girls be virgins?

Serious question, bub: You keep talking about your "lived experience." So I assume you are not a virgin. I'm not going to ask if you've ever banged an underage girl, but I am going to ask: assuming you have had sex with a virgin, why didn't you marry her?

Serious question, bub: You keep talking about your "lived experience." So I assume you are not a virgin. I'm not going to ask if you've ever banged an underage girl

The lived experience is me at 15. I only know what went on in my head at 15 for sure, not anybody else's.

but I am going to ask: assuming you have had sex with a virgin, why didn't you marry her?

This is a loaded question, because I did marry her.

And does she know you are looking for fifteen year old candidates to replace her, now she's all old and used up?

She's not "old and used up", we married a few months ago and I will never leave her no matter how old we get.

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