Heres a good video of how creepy muslim marriage to kids are

[Islam Imamate]

By this slippery slope logic, we should ban all age requirements for everything.

I don't know what the age of consent should be, we can argue about that, but there should definitely be one. As an adult, you should recognize that a child probably doesn't understand what the implications of marriage are. 8 year olds, dude...

My point was that to use your argument would mean raising the age of consent to 25. Or at least raising the age a person is legally allowed to get married at. With the divorce rate where it is it might be that 18 year olds also don't understand what the implications of marriage are.

 

[ehtheist]

I think people need to realize the way humanity progresses is by looking at the past and realizing some of the stuff we did was really stupid.

Muslims don't exactly do that. Lol. For instance. Slavery in America was evil and those people were evil. We shouldn't have slavery. Or cancer isn't caused by an angry God and therefore we should sacrifice people to heal people with cancer...

When people start this whole way of "well everyone did it in the past so person A wasn't wrong" it leads down a very moronic road.

The problem is, which one, or group of us, decides what is evil and wrong and all of this? Everyone thinks they're the ones - their ways, cultural norms, their moral compasses, the values of their civilization, are the right ones. Well, not everyone, but most will - and based on how you're talking about this, you think you are the one in a position to make this type of judgement.

Many elements of "modernizing" and "progress" of past centuries are now looked at as horrible mistakes - barbarism and unparalleled arrogance of dictatorial mindsets, imposed on people just living their lives in what they see as a morally sound way. The people who did things like start up the Residential Schools would have talked a lot like you are right now. Same with the people who went a colonizing, going into say, India and soon to be Pakistan for economic gain, but fully expecting to civilize the savages. The people who did the evil of Westernized slavery, as you're talking about, probably talked just like you are right now Handsome. They felt justified because some things were just savage and uncivilized - just like you're thinking right now.

You're right, some things which are quite problematic get justified because of tradition or history or religion or whatever. But inversely, a lot of horrible things happen in the name of progress, of advanced civilization and more evolved moralities... In short, horrible black marks on the moral history are justified by people like you talking like you are right now Handsome. Now, we even see a lot of movements trying to capture some of the wisdom of many historical practices and teachings - the thing arrogant civilizations dubbed as savagery - because sometimes the old ways were better than what our modern sensibilities could come up with.

So, I ask the question - how have you arrived at the position where you can compare this historically precedented, globally practiced thing to Western slavery? Who handed you the gavel of absolute moral judgement which you're so comfortable swinging - and why do you deserve it? And what makes you different than the arrogant, evil men who marched into other cultures and said "ok, this is barbarism. We're going to teach you our right way of doing it - the right way of doing it"?

 

[dontsnitch]

My point was that to use your argument would mean raising the age of consent to 25. Or at least raising the age a person is legally allowed to get married at. With the divorce rate where it is it might be that 18 year olds also don't understand what the implications of marriage are.

You have to grant that there is a difference when one person does understand the implications, because he's a grown man, and the other party cannot (or may not) because she is a child.

I'd say that's a distinction worth noting from two young people who are committing the mutual error or getting married without understanding what it means.

 

[Islam Imamate]

You have to grant that there is a difference when one person does understand the implications, because he's a grown man, and the other party cannot (or may not) because she is a child.

I'd say that's a distinction worth noting from two young people who are committing the mutual error or getting married without understanding what it means.

That's true.

 

[Handsomebwonderfull]

The problem is, which one, or group of us, decides what is evil and wrong and all of this? Everyone thinks they're the ones - their ways, cultural norms, their moral compasses, the values of their civilization, are the right ones. Well, not everyone, but most will - and based on how you're talking about this, you think you are the one in a position to make this type of judgement.

Many elements of "modernizing" and "progress" of past centuries are now looked at as horrible mistakes - barbarism and unparalleled arrogance of dictatorial mindsets, imposed on people just living their lives in what they see as a morally sound way. The people who did things like start up the Residential Schools would have talked a lot like you are right now. Same with the people who went a colonizing, going into say, India and soon to be Pakistan for economic gain, but fully expecting to civilize the savages. The people who did the evil of Westernized slavery, as you're talking about, probably talked just like you are right now Handsome. They felt justified because some things were just savage and uncivilized - just like you're thinking right now.

You're right, some things which are quite problematic get justified because of tradition or history or religion or whatever. But inversely, a lot of horrible things happen in the name of progress, of advanced civilization and more evolved moralities... In short, horrible black marks on the moral history are justified by people like you talking like you are right now Handsome. Now, we even see a lot of movements trying to capture some of the wisdom of many historical practices and teachings - the thing arrogant civilizations dubbed as savagery - because sometimes the old ways were better than what our modern sensibilities could come up with.

So, I ask the question - how have you arrived at the position where you can compare this historically precedented, globally practiced thing to Western slavery? Who handed you the gavel of absolute moral judgement which you're so comfortable swinging - and why do you deserve it? And what makes you different than the arrogant, evil men who marched into other cultures and said "ok, this is barbarism. We're going to teach you our right way of doing it - the right way of doing it"?

The reason I can say it's barbaric is because I'm better than them.

Duh.

 

[dontsnitch]

That's true.

There is a slippery slope here, but practically speaking, we should be able to put an arbitrary number down on paper to prevent abuse of this kind. Very much like the abortion debate.

 

[Handsomebwonderfull]

I mean roughly for 195,000 years our ancestors couldn't read, write, do basic math, had insane beliefs died when they were 35 etc

We in general are more knowledgable and wiser. In 1000 years they'll look back At Us And hopefully they'll be better than us.

You can argue all you want with historical relativism bullshit but the fact is we are wiser than our ancestors. Get over it.

 

[Islam Imamate]

There is a slippery slope here, but practically speaking, we should be able to put an arbitrary number down on paper to prevent abuse of this kind. Very much like the abortion debate.

I'm a fan of the tiered age of consent system that allows younger people to be sexually active with one another but not adults(i.e. 15 year age of consent with anyone up to 18 years and 18 for general age of consent).

As it applies to marriage its probably best to keep it higher. When you look at human history you see the extension of childhood. a few centuries ago children as young as 7 could work in places like England and in fact were expected to. Now we have child labor laws that reserve work for older minors and requires that it doesn't interfere with compulsory education.

However, at the same time perhaps it might be true that the conditions which made some of our past ideas concerning children, marriage, and work are still present in countries today. It should shock no one that Yemen, the poorest Arab country with a relatively low life expectancy, is where child marriage is the most common.

 

[ehtheist]

I think there is a way to make the argument that one way is better than the other and that's to look at the outcomes. What are the long term mental and physical health outcomes for child marriages vs marriages where both individual are at least 18? I don't know at the moment but I would bet that girls who marry under the age of 15 probably have worse outcomes overall.

That's one approach and one with merit. Though, it does rely on it actually being the case and something tells me that our current societal standards and laws concerning marriage and consent don't just happen to be those which produce the optimal utilitarian outcome. If we actually took an honest, measured look at how we handled marriage and consent, we'd likely find what we do now - what people like the OP are actively defending - are really dysfunctional.

Also, there is lots of societal precedent for adopting certain laws and practices not because they produce the best outcomes in a utilitarian sense, but for other reasons entirely. If we could show that a Platonic dictatorial aristocracy (don't recall the exact term he used - the totalitarian style state led by the benevolent philosopher king) would produce optimal results, in the way you're suggesting, would we immediately jump to enter that and ditch our Western democratic models? No. "But it's WRONG to steal peoples' freedom! Dictatorship is evil!" and such sentiments would be an almost impassible barrier, I suspect, as we tried to move to a system which has better outcomes.

Now, before you say "straw man," I'm just pointing towards a type of case, not saying that's a definitive one. What if we found out that utilitarian principles were best met by women, across the board, staying at home and raising the kids? What if it was discovered that kids sexually active from very young ages actually improved their mental health compared to our current societal practices of sheltering them? So many "what if" cases that fly in the face of our customs and sensibilities show that we oftentimes keep things in place in spite of utilitarian grounds against them. I think you'd find more than a few active laws on the books, not hypothetical ones, which society would fight to keep while ditching them would actually be superior, from a standpoint of utility.

Again, I'm not making these arguments, but if we proceed along the course you're suggesting - not a bad course by any stretch - these are some of the hurdles we'll come across. Just saying "X produces optimal results compared to Y, so let's make X the custom" isn't in and of itself a conclusive argument for societal change, in practical terms. And all of this puts the cart before the horse - we need to show that X is better than Y first... With our current dysfunctional notions of marriage, our mess of a notion of consent, I'm not sure we're in a position o do that.

 

[ehtheist]

The reason I can say it's barbaric is because I'm better than them.

Duh.

I mean roughly for 195,000 years our ancestors couldn't read, write, do basic math, had insane beliefs died when they were 35 etc

We in general are more knowledgable and wiser. In 1000 years they'll look back At Us And hopefully they'll be better than us.

You can argue all you want with historical relativism bullshit but the fact is we are wiser than our ancestors. Get over it.

I honestly can't tell whether or not these messages are a serious response...

 

[dontsnitch]

I mean roughly for 195,000 years our ancestors couldn't read, write, do basic math, had insane beliefs died when they were 35 etc

We in general are more knowledgable and wiser. In 1000 years they'll look back At Us And hopefully they'll be better than us.

You can argue all you want with historical relativism bullshit but the fact is we are wiser than our ancestors. Get over it.

I'd say we are more knowledgeable, but not necessarily wiser. It's an important distinction.

There is this idea that society advances linearly, and that's not necessarily true. Everything that society introduces is not better by virtue of being newer.

 

[dontsnitch]

I'm a fan of the tiered age of consent system that allows younger people to be sexually active with one another but not adults(i.e. 15 year age of consent with anyone up to 18 years and 18 for general age of consent).

As it applies to marriage its probably best to keep it higher. When you look at human history you see the extension of childhood. a few centuries ago children as young as 7 could work in places like England and in fact were expected to. Now we have child labor laws that reserve work for older minors and requires that it doesn't interfere with compulsory education.

However, at the same time perhaps it might be true that the conditions which made some of our past ideas concerning children, marriage, and work are still present in countries today. It should shock no one that Yemen, the poorest Arab country with a relatively low life expectancy, is where child marriage is the most common.

Well, if your life expectancy is 50, if you get married at 10, you've lived 20% of your life already.

A tiered age of consent may be more reasonable, but it's more complicated, and the law likes plain numbers.

 

[Handsomebwonderfull]

I honestly can't tell whether or not these messages are a serious response...

You can't even respond lol. Please tell me oh paragraph writing one why cavemen culture should be accepted today.

It's not like I can say "you shouldn't sacrifice humans to cure my leader of cancer"

Where do I get off?

Lol

Bro just move on, I'll chop you and your 3 page long posts up then tie you in knots.

 

[ehtheist]

You can't even respond lol. Please tell me oh paragraph writing one why cavemen culture should be accepted today.

It's not like I can say "you shouldn't sacrifice humans to cure my leader of cancer"

Where do I get off?

Lol

Bro just move on, I'll chop you and your 3 page long posts up then tie you in knots.

You know, I'm not going to respond to this in any serious way. If you would like to believe it's for the reasons you listed, feel free. Have a good one.

 

[Handsomebwonderfull]

You know, I'm not going to respond to this in any serious way. If you would like to believe it's for the reasons you listed, feel free. Have a good one.

See you can't even answer a simple question

Was human sacrifice wrong?

 

[Islam Imamate]

I mean roughly for 195,000 years our ancestors couldn't read, write, do basic math, had insane beliefs died when they were 35 etc

We in general are more knowledgable and wiser. In 1000 years they'll look back At Us And hopefully they'll be better than us.

You can argue all you want with historical relativism bullshit but the fact is we are wiser than our ancestors. Get over it.

I don't think that's the only explanation for the change in our behavior. That is, perhaps some of the things we look back on with disgust when it comes to the behaviors of our ancestors were rational behaviors given the context. So in some cases it might not be knowledge that separates us from our ancestors but rather the constellation of incentives and disincentives.

That's not to say it applies in this case. It might, just maybe, be more acceptable if these child marriages were between children like Gandhi;s marriage was and not between a young girl and a grown ass man.

A tiered age of consent may be more reasonable, but it's more complicated, and the law likes plain numbers.

I can't accept that if it means allowing the possibility of throwing the book at some poor 18 year old boy who's fucking his 15-16 year old gf.

Personally I would have the tiers be 15-21 and then 18 onward.

 

[2DUM2TAP]

If I'm not mistaken a person's brain doesn't finish developing until their mid 20s so why is the 18 year old so much more capable of such a decision than 14 year old? There's also the fact that girls enter puberty earlier and tend to mature faster sexually.Who's to say you average 13-15 year old girl isn't as capable of consenting to sex and marriage as your average 16-18 year old boy?

You're brain may continue developing until the mid 20's but by the age of 18 it is suggested that you fully comprehend the long term ramifications of your actions.
I tend to agree with that.

 

[dontsnitch]

I can't accept that if it means allowing the possibility of throwing the book at some poor 18 year old boy who's fucking his 15-16 year old gf.

Personally I would have the tiers be 15-21 and then 18 onward.

There's an argument to be made that the amount of 18 year old boys who don't deserve punishment but are actually harmed in any meaningful way by this, are outnumbered by the 18 year olds that deserve it.

In any case, I'm fine with your logic, I'm just lazy and don't feel like implementing your new law into my hypothetical society.

 

[Islam Imamate]

That's one approach and one with merit. Though, it does rely on it actually being the case and something tells me that our current societal standards and laws concerning marriage and consent don't just happen to be those which produce the optimal utilitarian outcome. If we actually took an honest, measured look at how we handled marriage and consent, we'd likely find what we do now - what people like the OP are actively defending - are really dysfunctional.

Also, there is lots of societal precedent for adopting certain laws and practices not because they produce the best outcomes in a utilitarian sense, but for other reasons entirely. If we could show that a Platonic dictatorial aristocracy (don't recall the exact term he used - the totalitarian style state led by the benevolent philosopher king) would produce optimal results, in the way you're suggesting, would we immediately jump to enter that and ditch our Western democratic models? No. "But it's WRONG to steal peoples' freedom! Dictatorship is evil!" and such sentiments would be an almost impassible barrier, I suspect, as we tried to move to a system which has better outcomes.

Now, before you say "straw man," I'm just pointing towards a type of case, not saying that's a definitive one. What if we found out that utilitarian principles were best met by women, across the board, staying at home and raising the kids? What if it was discovered that kids sexually active from very young ages actually improved their mental health compared to our current societal practices of sheltering them? So many "what if" cases that fly in the face of our customs and sensibilities show that we oftentimes keep things in place in spite of utilitarian grounds against them. I think you'd find more than a few active laws on the books, not hypothetical ones, which society would fight to keep while ditching them would actually be superior, from a standpoint of utility.

Again, I'm not making these arguments, but if we proceed along the course you're suggesting - not a bad course by any stretch - these are some of the hurdles we'll come across. Just saying "X produces optimal results compared to Y, so let's make X the custom" isn't in and of itself a conclusive argument for societal change, in practical terms. And all of this puts the cart before the horse - we need to show that X is better than Y first... With our current dysfunctional notions of marriage, our mess of a notion of consent, I'm not sure we're in a position o do that.

I see what you're saying and I agree to an extent. Personally I'm not so wedded to the current way of doing things that I would provide resistance to alternative ideas concerning marriage if it could be demonstrated that they're superior.

For instance, I know a relatively well off South Asian community. Within that community a form of arranged marriage is common. The parents arrange the marriages by finding a partner through the community but the children have to give their seal of approval for it to go ahead. Generally it seems to work as the marriages say intact. The parents probably aren't looking around for potential partners for their children on the basis of their ability in bed or taste in movies, they're looking for educated and well off potential partners from stable and respectable families. And underneath all this there seems to be a watered down honor culture that keeps everyone in line. No one is getting stoned to death if they get divorced, the threat of your and your family's reputation being dragged through the mud seems to be enough.

Might not result in the most passionate, Disney-esque marriages but they sure seem stable.

 

[godking]

Like I already said the kids have no choice the parents are the ones deciding the mariage which means there is no love. It also means you are stupid now gtfo here with your ignorant love conquers all crap. It doesnt matter if its culturally correct its still some fucked up pedo shit. Muhhamud was a pedo too and it doesnt matter if the kids want to they are still kids and its some sick ass shit.

You do know that its only been the last 100 years or so that girls where not expected to be married off at 14-16 in the western world right ?