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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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Original poster

NSPCC again

62 replies

Imnobody4 · 22/07/2020 13:17

I'm not sure whether to be heartened by this or not.
NSPCC put out a tweet implying children can consent to sex.
Lots of complaints and outcry concerning safeguarding.

NSPCC withdraw for rewrite. No accusations of bigotry etc
I am wrong to think this is progress of sorts?

NSPCC again
NSPCC again
OP posts:
RaccoonTwenty7 · 22/07/2020 13:20

16 year olds are children.
Children do have sex and while legally they cannot consent, the police aren't going to do anything about two underage kids who both say they wanted it - "It is an offence for anyone to have any sexual activity with a person under the age of 16. However, Home Office guidance is clear that there is no intention to prosecute teenagers under the age of 16 where both mutually agree and where they are of a similar age."

Ereshkigalangcleg · 22/07/2020 13:20

Depends what they put up next, I guess!

RaccoonTwenty7 · 22/07/2020 13:20

*Children under age of 16

Ereshkigalangcleg · 22/07/2020 13:21

That's not the point, 16 year olds are not what most people understand by "child".

HoneysuckIejasmine · 22/07/2020 13:23

If they were talking about 16+ year olds then they need to make that abundantly clear, which they did not. The vast, vast, vast majority of who is understood to be "children" cannot consent to sex.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 22/07/2020 13:23

And generally don't have their parents explaining consent to them for the first time. Consent needs to be taught in a way that doesn't sexualise children.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 22/07/2020 13:23

YY, Honeysuckle

Ereshkigalangcleg · 22/07/2020 13:24

Hopefully they'll make it clear in any future iterations of this message.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 22/07/2020 13:27

Can someone talk me through what was wrong with the original proof in simple terms? I read it as talking to a child about their future sex life when they were old enough to have one. Is the problem that it wasn't stated clearly that children can't consent to anything sexual?

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 22/07/2020 13:27

Proof? Don't know where that came from. Tweet.

Gatr · 22/07/2020 13:29

I wouldnt of thought that was about children specifically having the ability to consent to sex.

Theres much wider discussion early on about consent before children are of age, i would talk about safe sex etc before i would be expecting them to have sex
Equally having discussions about consent and that they can say no is important, and equally they must respect someones no especially for teens. Much sexual exploring is done under age and is sometimes under pressure so i would be talking to kids around 12 ish and up about consent

RaccoonTwenty7 · 22/07/2020 13:36

That's not the point, 16 year olds are not what most people understand by "child".

Doesn't change that they are. Besides, if your 14 year old was gonna have sex with his 14 year old girlfriend, wouldn't you want to make sure he at least got consent (not legal consent but willingness and enthusiasm regardless) rather than rape her (not stay rape, but rape without willingness/enthusiasm from his partner). Because... Even the Home Office say they are not looking to prosecute situations like that, and they are underage children, so advice around consent is useful for these children.

Kids kiss and touch before moving onto sex usually. I remember having my first "snog" in the school library when I was about 10. What if the boy who kissed me hadn't known about consent and kissed me when I want into it? That's assault...

RaccoonTwenty7 · 22/07/2020 13:37

Wasn't into it*

Original poster
Imnobody4 · 22/07/2020 13:43

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g

Proof? Don't know where that came from. Tweet.
Not sure what you mean. Tweets are both from NSPCC Twitter feed.

It is more about clumsy wording than anything and the fact that Twitter is not the right medium for this kind of thing.

As an aside they also have a PR problem with this from Daily Mail.
The wife of an aristocrat who flew more than 30 times onJeffrey Epstein’s ‘Lolita Express’ private jet has stepped down from her role at the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.

Clare Hazell raised thousands of pounds for the charity by hosting a classic car show each year at her family’s sprawling Elveden Estate in Norfolk.

The Mail on Sunday last month revealed that the interior designer – who became the Countess of Iveagh in 2001 when she married Edward Guinness, 4th Earl of Iveagh and a member of the brewing dynasty – had repeatedly travelled with serial paedophile Epstein on his private jet.

Flight logs revealed she took 32 flights between 1998 and 2000, including trips to his homes in New York,Florida, the Caribbean and NewMexico.

OP posts:
ThinEndoftheWedge · 22/07/2020 18:44

If they were talking about 16+ year olds then they need to make that abundantly clear, which they did not. The vast, vast, vast majority of who is understood to be "children" cannot consent to sex.

Agreed. As the tweet reads - it states that my role as parent is to ensure my 10 yr old knows what to do to consent to sex. Otherwise known in law as RAPE.

One off horrendous tweet might be forgivable (just) but this is in a long line of utter F### ups.

HandsOffMyRights · 22/07/2020 19:16

So many safeguarding red flags around this charity, including:

Rubber wankman
Epstein Link
This Tweet
Other Tweet saying children can use whatever toilet they like (they replied to a TRA when asked)
Munro Bergdorf

They've been captured. When will they be investigated?

Concerns were raised ages ago now when Lisa (sorry can't recall surname) a safeguarding expert and former social worker, who was banned from Twitter (and possibly MN?) wrote to the NSPCC about safeguarding concerns.

beargrass · 22/07/2020 20:55

Aren't they under investigation from a year ago? Re: rubber-wank-piss-fetish-at-work-when-you-work-with-kids-man?

https://www.rollonfriday.com/news-content/exclusive-barrister-forces-charity-commission-probe-nspcc-over-workplace-porn-shoot

Or am I kink-shaming? Hmm

DidoLamenting · 22/07/2020 20:59

@RaccoonTwenty7

16 year olds are children. Children do have sex and while legally they cannot consent, the police aren't going to do anything about two underage kids who both say they wanted it - "It is an offence for anyone to have any sexual activity with a person under the age of 16. However, Home Office guidance is clear that there is no intention to prosecute teenagers under the age of 16 where both mutually agree and where they are of a similar age."
16 year olds are not children. There is a range of ages where a person becomes entitled to carry out certain activities.

A 16 year old can leave home and get married without parental permission.

Beamur · 22/07/2020 21:40

This charity also has statutory powers...

ChattyLion · 22/07/2020 23:32

Christ.. that coming from NSPCC looks very bad indeed.

As PP said Twitter is definitely not the medium for nuanced conversations directed at parents like this.

but in any case, for those wanting to give NSPCC the benefit of the doubt, the only possible acceptable phrase here would be ‘your teenager’. Even then that would be inappropriate, because that would cover 13 year olds who should not be having sex even with ‘consent’ and with a partner of same age, because they are too young. So actually there isn’t any wording that works with what NSPCC have written there.

‘Child’ is totally wrong. Children under age of 13 can’t legally consent to sex, sexual activity with 12 year olds or under-12s is statutory rape. The wording of ‘your child’ that the NSPCC have used is massively inappropriate within a very sketchy premise.

ShinyFootball · 23/07/2020 01:20

I don't see bad intent with this? Isn't there a big push on this board for consent to be taught from an early age?

Like a pp I would take this to mean talking about it with a child about their future sex life.

And FWIW the global standard by various orgs for age of consent is 18. UK is out of step on this (not saying I think we should change it, just for info).

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 23/07/2020 06:37

I mistyped my first post here yesterday. My second one was a correction, not a suggestion that proof was lacking.

It's harsh to blame the NSPCC for accepting money raised by a friend of Epstein. I am no apologist for them but the woman organised an annual event. The funds would mostly have come from attendees.

Deliriumoftheendless · 23/07/2020 06:54

@ShinyFootball

I don't see bad intent with this? Isn't there a big push on this board for consent to be taught from an early age?

Like a pp I would take this to mean talking about it with a child about their future sex life.

And FWIW the global standard by various orgs for age of consent is 18. UK is out of step on this (not saying I think we should change it, just for info).

Consent should be taught from an early age but maybe “physical contact” would have been a better phrase- ie even small children should be aware not everyone else wants a hug or a kiss (as younger kids may do) then expanding that out to a sexual context as they get older.

It’s a good idea to teach children about boundaries, but there’s better ways of phrasing the tweet, maybe?

Deliriumoftheendless · 23/07/2020 06:55

But also I have no idea of the context of this tweet- maybe earlier tweets had mentioned this and this particular one refers to older kids?

Lamahaha · 23/07/2020 07:22

When I first read that I was at once confused and horrified. With "child" I understood a real child, and it confused me that the CHILD should ensure that the other person (an adult? another child?) should be happy the other one must consent.
Never mind that a child cannot consent to sex anyway -- it sounded like the person driving the action was the child; that it was the child who wants sex.

I am anyway not happy with the rumour I keep hearing that "children masturbate too", which is not my experience at all, and that we should educate ourselves on this and not be so prudish.