Age of Consent in Fiction

[gehayi]

erastes is blogging today over about age of consent in fiction. I wanted to reply, but I couldn't; Blogspot limits comments to 4096 characters. (Cripes, even LJ does better than that.) So I thought I'd post here and leave a link there.

Sometimes I wonder how George R. R. Martin got away with it in his A Song of Ice and Fire series. For those who haven't

Comments

[eternalism]

I can understand that people would want to read things that they can relate to, as a general rule. Especially romance. It makes it easier for the reader to perhaps put themself in the place of the main character, or whatever character they choose, so that the experience is much more real to them and they enjoy it more. Vicarious sexin's.

But there's some irony in throwing in false 'facts' and viewpoints in order to make a story seem more real to the reader, I have to admit. Especially when the story is supposedly based on actual history.

History isn't a pretty thing, most of the time. If I'm to read a novel that's based on actual history, I want it to be gritty, dark, and full of syphilis, dammit! It may not be nice, but at least it might be accurate. And hell, if you're going to write a historical romance, arranged marriages can provide a perfect way to find struggle and opposition in your plot. It's not like everyone was faithful to their spouses, after all.

[anderyn]

I can't remember when I didn't know that medieval marriages were all about the land/social advantage/more kids, so it didn't matter about the ages -- of course, I was a voracious reader from the time I first picked up a book, and I still recall the historical novel that had the novice monk and nun colliding in the barn where they stored the apples and having sex (I think they were both about fourteen -- young teenagers anyhow) and the poor baron who was married to a much richer/more noble six-year-old and got in BIG trouble after succumbing to his marital lusts (he'd been having it off with her nurse, in the same bed, but one night, he just, ah, started playing around, and well... I *think* the girl died, but I don't recall -- she was certainly injured) and the home-made abortion of the young monk's mother (he came home to find the bed all over blood and his mother dying, thought she'd been raped, but she'd done it herself so she wouldn't have an eighteenth kid). And that was published some time in the fifties or early sixties (I

[gehayi]

Damn, I wish I'd read that book. Nowadays they probably wouldn't even publish it.

[anderyn]

The Golden Hand, Edith Simon. Bless Google books for letting me search the terms I could recall. I now have a copy requested on interlibrary loan.

[kippurbird]

You know, I never thought about that before. Of course I never really thought about marriage either. It's sort of something that has been driven into our subconscious now that this is how old you're supposed to be when you marry and everything else doesn't exist. The idea that you even need to have a consensual age never even occurred to me.

Except in that case with McCulaly Cullcan? The kid from Home Alone?

[lee_rowan]

There is a sort of age issue in Age of Sail. Aboard ship, if a boy under 14 was forced into sex with another man, he would more likely be treated as a rape victim (though depending on the situation and the captain, possibly not.) If he was over 14, even if he was raped he could be tried for sodomy. Logic has little to do with it--this was an age where a goat would be executed if some idiot fucked it. (Pardon my Anglo-Saxon, but that's the mot juste.)

[gehayi]

Yeah, I found that out when I was doing the research for this review. They had to be able to prove penetration and emission to make the charge stick, though.

[lee_rowan]

Depends on the court. If they had a board of bible-thumpers and a kid with no notion of how to defend himself, he'd probably hang.

[gehayi]

Yeah, somehow that doesn't surprise me.

[thundercrap]

I believe a significant part of this is because of marketability comfort rather than historical accuracy. Most people are more comfortable with a character falling in love when reading it from the perspective of a mature adult. An adult woman can better place herself in the position of an eighteen year old than a twelve year old when she's fantasizing herself into the role

[gehayi]

An adult woman can better place herself in the position of an eighteen year old than a twelve year old when she's fantasizing herself into the role.

That might be why I'm not getting this. I don't imagine myself in the role of the lead. I picture the character in the lead. The story isn't about me, and I don't want it to be. I'd make a horrible heroine in most cases.

[thundercrap]

It's a marketable identifier. I once gave a panel on how to appeal to different audiences as an artist. Women appreciate softer imagery with pastels and sparkle. Men prefer metallic shrine and bold lines. I imagine it's the same thing for writers. It's not a matter of accuracy. It's just what sells.

[furikku]

Whether things are "alright" in other countries or not, I have problems with 12-17 having sex outside of their age group as they're frequently taken advantage of.

Yeah, it can be pretty hard to enjoy what is supposed to be a fluffy escapist read when there's all this "aaaaaa child abuse aaaaa" klaxon business going on in the brain.