When Mc Dowell wants "Yes to mean No"

national | rights, freedoms and repression | news report Wednesday May 24, 2006 21:59 by Oliver Cromwell, the Lord High Protector

the 23rd of May, the RTE news broadcast caught my eye for a variety of reasons. Perhaps it was name of the barrister at law, Paul Anthony Mc Dermott explaining to RTE legal affairs editor Mary Wilson, what had occured at yesterday's Supreme Court ruling.....
http://www.rte.ie/news/2006/0523/sex.html
Or maybe it was how Bertie Ahern said sorry for calling someone a thief and how Deputy Rabitte looked at him....
Maybe it was the idea of how someone could go empty their gun at a school in Cork and not be "Yankee style" a kid, but a grown up instead...

talk to them about it, & tell them to wait till they're older.

the cornerstones of Western culture's literature and art tell the stories of sex between "the underage".
This is for very good reasons, the concept of "being of age" is a very new one.

Pyramus & Thisbe by Ovid & the retelling in Shakespeare's "Romeo & Juliet".
both kids are underage. Indeed Juliet has been estimated at between 9 and 12.

Despina's aria, scene 19 of Act 1 of "Cosi Fan Tutti" (They're all at it )
by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart :-

"Una donna a quindici anni
Dèe saper ogni gran moda,
Dove il diavolo ha la coda,
Cosa è bene e mal cos'è.
Dèe saper le maliziette "

paraphrases to -
a woman at 15 years of age had better now well where the devil keeps his tail.... something that is good and bad- sure that's it, she had better know the "naughtiness"

Little over a hundred years ago, children in most of Europe worked. The word "teenager" & variants of it are etymologically dated to 1921, 1941 with possible precedents in the USA 1894 or even at a psuh 1818.
At which time Half the queens of Europe (meaning female royal people not the other concept which didn't exist) were underage brides.

Childhood is a bourgoise concept which prosperity and wealth have brought us. That is why most of the poor of the world don't really enjoy it. & With that we have invented concepts of "innocence" which before were only thought to apply to pre-pubescence. No-one can deny that sexual activity between mature persons and the young is immoral and has negative effects on their wellbeing and learning of proper social and sexual interaction. Not a one of us, I hope would even dare to defend paedophilia. Which is why I advise against entering "age of consent" into your search engine. But I suggest that many of us in our younger days nursed sexual fantasies and desires for others of or near or age without regard to Mc Dowell's authority as "lord high protector of fun".

No-one that is except perhaps members of the Roman Catholic clergy.....

But the idea that we may legislate or even move as a society to regulate sexual behaviour between the young after puberty and in adolescence, is very dangerous territory indeed. The European union of 25 states sees much variation in the extent to which decisions on "sexual morality" may be decided by the local government ministry. Ages of consent for sexual intercourse or activity vary widely, from the youngest at 12 to the highest (for homosexual acts) at 21. Anglo-saxon cultures for a variety of reasons seem to enjoy more the "idealism of innocence", that somehow children or teenagers know nothing of sex or are not eager to experience it. Thus we have the parental advisory

At end it was not what caught my eye, but really what caught my ear - the way Mary Wilson of RTE pronounced "S-E-X"

thank God such strong language came after the watershed
& the wee ones were asleep....
wet dreams or not.
next they'll be selling them condoms & piercings.