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naraburns  nihil supernum  7d ago (text post)   Edited 7d ago   4987 thread views

Quality Contributions Report for August 2026

This is the Quality Contributions Roundup. It showcases interesting and well-written comments and posts from the period covered. If you want to get an idea of what this community is about or how we want you to participate, look no further (except the rules maybe--those might be important too).

As a reminder, you can nominate Quality Contributions by hitting the report button and selecting the "Actually A Quality Contribution!" option. Additionally, links to all of the roundups can be found in the wiki of /r/theThread which can be found here. For a list of other great community content, see here.

These are mostly chronologically ordered, but I have in some cases tried to cluster comments by topic so if there is something you are looking for (or trying to avoid), this might be helpful.

Quality Contributions to the Main Motte

@birb_cromble:

@Tanista:

@Muninn:

@self_made_human:

@DiscourseMagnus:

@gattsuru:

Contributions for the week of August 3, 2026

@Shakes:

@FtttG:

@quiet_NaN:

@iprayiam3:

@georgioz:

@birb_cromble:

@Tretiak:

@100ProofTollBooth:

@YoungAchamian:

@Aapje58:

Contributions for the week of August 10, 2026

@gattsuru:

@GBRK:

@Thoroughlygruntled:

@FtttG:

@zoink:

@georgioz:

@JeSuisCharlie:

Contributions for the week of August 17, 2026

@faceh:

@Shakes:

@ratherblather:

@Shirayuki3:

Contributions for the week of August 24, 2026

@hanikrummihundursvin:

@faceh:

@Shakes:

@RandomRanger:

@netstack:

@FtttG:

Contributions for the week of August 31, 2026

@thejdizzler:

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Can you please elaborate on these?

For the UK: until 2003, the United Kingdom's of majority for the purpose of producing or featuring in pornography was 16, sometimes including topless sixteen-year-old girls being included in regular tabloid newspapers. It was only changed to 18 as a side component to a much larger bill. It's just weird to think that, well after Eternal September, this line wasn't some universal standard even just from the US to the UK.

Blue Is The Warmest Color is a French coming-of-age story, originally a comic and eventually turned into a well-recognized live-action film. It also features lesbian sex between an 'college student' and a 15-year-old. I haven't watched it, so I can't tell you what the protagonist's age is during the full-frontal six minute sex scene in the film version, but the story's pretty clear that they start hooking up while the protagonist is an early high school equivalent. It's mostly noteworthy because it received a pretty mainstream coverage and applause.

The general paradox applies more broadly: any coming of age story recognizing the initiation of sexual desire has to straddle the simultaneous recognition that most people start having it happen at teenage age ranges, and actually presenting it as happening at those age ranges can be a felony. Like, in reality, no, the law's never enforced that way, and probably can't be prosecuted in the United States. But also in practice, yes, because if you try to do it payment processors will treat it as illegal activity, most vendors won't accept it because it's illegal, and in most social environments it's worse than untreated leprosy. Unless they don't react that way, in which case it can be lauded by mainstream publications.

Shield's own The Blue Lagoon, 1980, is a heterosexual version. Even in written form, see the infamous underage orgy scene in Stephen King's It or various literary fiction, it's something we just accept. While not anywhere near as explicit, see Holden Caufield can hire a prostitute at the age of 16, the prostitute herself can be 16 and not new to the work, and it's assigned reading that most teachers just gloss over. Or for an extreme version, the various outstanding support of Harry Potter fanfic as a route for self-discovery that was extremely popular back before the author made her stance of transgender stuff public, and had (and has) an staggering amount of stuff that I hope you have good blocklists for.

You can avoid the paradox -- a lot of early furry fandom works handled it by having their characters wait until college to have their sexual awakening, leading to the establishment of the Off I Go To Gay Furry College genre; others by carefully not mentioning the age of their characters at all -- but this typically results or requires characters that have an unhealthy relationship with their sexuality at the start of the story, and kinda dodges the matter rather than resolving it.

... the obvious problem with this issue is that the sexualization of both male and female children and adolescents that did take place after 1968 or so was only ever supported ideologically by liberal leftists...

I think that explains stuff like the Breendoggle being so heavily buried - even today, Marion Zimmer Bradley's stocked in stores that wouldn't consider keeping a monster like Orson Scott Card and be very cautious about Piers Anthony - but there's a pretty large faction of Red Tribers that do recognize 16-17 age sexuality as something that happens and is acceptable within their local cultural expectations. You just don't see many Borderer norms discussed as meaningful outside of their own environment.

It's just weird to think that, well after Eternal September, this line wasn't some universal standard even just from the US to the UK.

It's definitely not something I expected to learn.

[Waiting until college to have their sexual awakening...] but this typically results in or requires [characters] that have an unhealthy relationship with their sexuality... and kinda dodges the matter rather than resolving it.

Oh, so exactly like real life then.

but there's a pretty large faction of Red Tribers that do recognize 16-17 age sexuality as something that happens

So basically, the culture that takes a more complimentary posture towards men- in contrast to the one that's built upon maximal exploitation "minimizing men's evil desires"- has a healthier and more constructive picture of how sexuality works.

Perhaps moving in that direction is superior to moving in the opposite direction- but of course, any hint of that would mean more stuff for your blocklists. The amount of un-consensual and un-good in the world would increase.

Oh, so exactly like real life then.

Do you think average people have their sexual awakening after the age of 18?

No.

I think the average person is more likely to attempt to suppress it far beyond that age than is normal (though the average age of virginity loss is to my knowledge still under 18, which is good).

And I think that is undignified, harmful, and requires you to have an ultimately unhealthy relationship with your sexuality. Young adults are supposed to want sex, and they're supposed to want it enough to actually get it; if they're doing neither of those things they're malfunctioning.

Fair enough. What do you consider suppression in this context?

Your basic Untitled fare (for both genders).

So - basically foregoing dating and socializing with the opposite sex out of resentment and anxiety?

Well, that and having the relevant authority figures intentionally fuel that resentment and anxiety (including through media and laws specifically crafted to enforce the same), exaggerating risks, downplaying benefits, degrading either sex's ability to practice [or want to practice] being attractive to the other.

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