'Harmful to Minors'

 The perils of protecting children from sex

 Lecture about the book of

Judith Levine, Harmful for Minors,
The perils of protecting children from sex, 2001,
University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis / London

 Rotterdam, The Netherlands, 1 November 2002
Study conference 'Aljen Klamer group', Paul' s Church,
"Abuse by definition? Image and reality"

Frans Gieles

 The reactions

Protecting children from sex is dangerous, says Levine in the subtitle.
To say this is also dangerous in contemporary USA. 

Bruce Rind, Robert Bauserman & Philip Tromovitch, who have been guests in this church in 1998,  have written about the nuances of sexuality and childhood [*], and have also experienced it. 

[*] Rind, B., Bauserman, R. & Tromovitch, An examination of assumed properties of child sexual abuse based on nonclinical samples, Paper presented at Rotterdam, The Netherlands, December 18, 1998. [External link]

In many ways they have been vilified and threatened. It is unique that the US Congress would condemn a scientific article in the same manner as the former Russians did. [*]

[*] Gieles, F.E.J., Mister President... The USA is shocked by the research of Rind, Bauserman & Tromovich, In: Ipce Newsletter nr. E6, July 1999

In the so-called 'Free West', this has not happened for quite a while. Galileo had such a problem when the Pope disagreed with his scientific conclusion that the earth circles around the sun instead of the contrary.  

A radio broadcast car positioned itself just outside of Rind's office at the university. Nobody could enter or leave the building without intruding and indoctrinating questions from the reporters. The program was sent out live and went on for six hours.

Professor Harris Mirkin, a man who looks remarkably like old Einstein, has also written his opinion, in two articles. In the first one [*], he analyses the battle against homosexuality as a political fight, a power fight. In the other [**], he says he agrees with Rind and his team. 

[*] Mirkin, Harris, The Pattern of Sexual Politics: Feminism, Homosexuality and Pedophilia, J. Homosex. Vol. 37, No. 2 (1999)

[**] Mirkin, Harris, Sex, Science and Sin: The Rind Report, Sexual Politics and American Scholarship, Manuscript submitted to Sexuality and Culture, Special Issue on Rind-Tromovitch-Bauserman

Immediately after the public recently discovered his articles, hate-mails and very hostile articles appeared. The politicians also reacted. The state of Missouri diminished the subsidies for Mirkin's university by exactly the amount of his yearly income, with a letter explaining the reason for it. Nevertheless, the university defended the freedom of science and let him retain his job.

Before we have a look at Levine's book, let's have a look at the reactions to her book, even before it was printed. 

Note: before the book was published, thus before it could be read, it was condemned. Judith is an independent writer, so she could not lose any job. Instead, the University of Minnesota, the publisher of the book, had a rough time. However, this university also defended the freedom of science, opinion and speech.

"Knight Urges University of Minnesota to Fire Officials Responsible for Book Advocating Adult-Child Sex"

This 'Knight' was Robert Knight, the male speaker of the religious-fundamentalist propaganda-organisation “Concerned Women for America’s Culture and Family Institute”. He wrote in a press release shortly after a broadcasted interview with Levine, far before the book was published:

"Child molesters are getting a big boost toward legitimacy with the University of Minnesota Press' publication of a book advocating sex with children."
"Harmful to Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children from Sex is every child molester's dream -- and every parent's nightmare."

"Joycelyn Elders, who was Bill Clinton's surgeon general, wrote the foreword for this evil tome," Knight says. "Not content to advocate for adults teaching children to masturbate, she is giving cover for adults having sex with kids -- so long as the kids give their consent. Everybody except for the molesters and their apologists knows that children cannot give meaningful consent to sex. Everybody knows that children are coerced into giving 'consent,' and that the damage can last a lifetime. The author of this book, Judith Levine, is Exhibit A. She was molested as a child and now advocates it for other children.

Levine herself

... has other ideas about this. We leave Sir Moralist Knight for a while and read what she herself has written about it -- not in her book, but in an article in Village Voice, July 3, 2002.

"This is an innocent story. In 1967, the summer before my 15th birthday, I fell in love. It was my first intense erotic love, and its object was the photography counselor at camp -- a lean, bearded, blue-eyed guy I'll call Jake. He was 26. Nothing sexual happened. Still, I think of those two months as the summer of my panouissement, a French word meaning blossoming or opening, which also means glow. Jake took hundreds of pictures of me, and his affirmation and his camera opened me to myself. They helped me begin, sexually, to glow."

"If the same events had occurred in 2002, they would not be viewed as innocent. The adults around me would write my chaste romance as a perverse tale, casting Jake as a predator and me as his hapless, clueless prey. Had I started my sex education with good-touch-bad-touch lessons in kindergarten or listened for a decade to media reporting on a world allegedly crowded with sexual malefactors sniffing the world for young flesh, I might even have believed that my friend and mentor Jake was one of them. That sweet idyll would have been, instead, the summer of my victimization. And instead of opening me, Jake's attentions might have closed me down in fear and confusion."
[…]
"He liked me, I felt, and he saw me -- saw the person I was beginning to know as myself. I could read his recognition in the photographs."
[…]  
"I tried to seduce him. [...] I fantasized the day Jake would ask me to take my shirt off, brush his lips over my nipples, then pull down the short zipper of my pants. I imagined the bristles of his beard as he kissed me there.
He never did. In fact, he mentioned sex only once that I remember, as I sat on the counter in his darkroom, watching his red-lit face concentrate on the images emerging in the trays (the smell of developing fluid is still erotic to me). He said, 'There are two things I know I can't do while I'm working here: smoke pot or make love to a woman'."
[…]
"He never touched me, except to drape an arm over my shoulder or sit close to me on a bench. He kissed me on the lips only once, mouth closed, on the last day of camp."
[…]
"In the summer of '67, a man gave a girl the innocent gift of her emerging erotic self. I wonder if I could receive it with such happiness and grace were I a girl today."

Bach to our Knight the Moralist

Knight the Moralist wrote about the same story: 

"The author of this book, Judith Levine, is Exhibit A. She was molested as a child and now advocates it for other children."

With this flagrant misrepresentation of the true story, our Knight himself is Exhibit A of his own untruthfulness, and so of his own moral untrustworthiness. Nevertheless, he unconcernedly writes further:

"Accused molesters have already misused a 1998 study published by the American Psychological Association to justify their perversion; now they will be citing this hideous book to excuse their crimes against children."

"If the Regents of the University of Minnesota do not act quickly to fire those responsible, the people of Minnesota and their elected representatives should move quickly to replace them," Knight said.

The press release, spread among millions of households and spread by many web sites, quotes King:

"the action is so grievous and so irresponsible that I felt they relinquished their right to academic freedom." 

He calls the book "very evil", although he admits ... he hasn't read it.

Levine replies 

Levine says her quote was misconstrued and that she does not approve of sex between authority figures such as parents, priests and teachers and the minors in their charge. However, she argues that teenagers should be given more credit for the choices they make when they become involved in relationships with adults.

Levine endorses the Netherlands' approach to age-of-consent laws. In 1990, the Dutch parliament made sex between adults and children ages 12 to 16 legal as long as there was mutual consent. The child or the child's parents can bring charges if they believe the minor was coerced into sex.

Levine believes the Dutch law is a "good model" for the United States because it recognizes children as sexual beings who can determine their future while not ignoring the fact that they are weaker than adults and still need legal protection. U.S. consent laws, she says, mistakenly put all minors under one category without recognizing their ability to pursue relationships.

"Legally designating a class of people categorically unable to consent to sexual relations is not the best way to protect children, particularly when 'children' include everyone from birth to eighteen," Levine writes.
[…]
"The hysteria surrounding my book is precisely what my book is about," Levine said.

Her reply did not help.  

Tim Pawlently,  

Tim Pawlenty, majority leader of the Minnesota House of Representatives and Republican candidate for governor, called for the stop of the book's release, according to the Star Tribune:  

"In recent weeks, the headlines have been filled with the stories of victims sexually abused as children," he said in a prepared statement. "This kind of disgusting victimization of children is intolerable, and the state should have no part in it." 
[...]
"We deserve to know why the name of one of our most respected institutions is being associated with this endorsement of child molestation," Pawlenty said.

Pawlenty said that he ... had not read the book.

These are only some of the hundreds of negative reactions.
We could fill the whole hour of this lecture with but a few of them, but we won't. The quoted passages above are sufficient to illustrate the atmosphere. We won't even mention the hate-mails. 
Let's quickly go to the book.

The book  

The book has two parts. The first one tells what's gone wrong, the second one gives alternatives to make things better. 
First, I want to highlight two issues mentioned throughout several chapters. 
About the first issue, one may laugh or cry, about the second issue one can only cry.

Sex education in the U.S.A. 

Sexual education does not exist in the USA, only anti-sex education. Real sex education does not exist because parents don't dare to do this. There is actually little real contact between parents and children in that country anyway and what contact there is is usually poor. Schools are not allowed to give real sex education because the school boards are usually conservative and because schools are afraid of losing their funding. 

Libraries can only get subsidies if they have a filter in their computers to filter out web site with words like "breast" or "vice" or "fornication" for children. Thus, children see no web sites about breast feeding or even biblical sites which mention "fornication". Schools that give real sex education receive less funding. Because of this kind of ruling, the government prevents the children from seeing pictures during the sex lessons. Only clinical of biological schemes are permitted. 

Very young children get lessons about good touch and bad touch. They learn to be afraid of strangers, especially men.

Usually, the educators do not mention any method of birth control. This might encourage sexual behavior. Unfortunately for the educators, young people do not need any encouraging: they do have sex frequently. One may guess the consequences: an enormous amount of unmarried teen mothers, and a lot of AIDS cases.

Instead they speak about all the illness sex may cause. Levine gives a long list of such illnesses she found in such a program (p. 105-106). No one ever speaks about any pleasure that might be obtained by sex.

In one of her chapters (# five), Levine tells about a lot of education programs and schools she has visited to see how sex education takes place. Speaking from a woman's perspective, she highlights the fact that these programs never mention that a woman may desire sex. This is completely taboo. A woman can only be the victim of the desires of men - pure and simple. 

The message is everywhere, complete and total abstinence. Don't have sex until you are married.

Levine mentions (on page 93) that 98% of the parents of a national sample of 2000 wanted a kind of education that would prevent AIDS, but that 97% of the same parents wanted this to be done by only highlighting abstinence during the sex ed lessons. 

The idea that sex is a normative -- and, heaven forbid, positive -- part of adolescent life is unutterable in America's public forum. "There is mainstream sex ed and there is right-wing sex ed," said Leslie Kantor in 1997, when she was traveling the nation in her work for SIECUS. "But there is no left-wing sex education in America." She included her own organization in that characterization. 
Just fifteen years after Joyce Purnick's newspaper denounced the idea of chastity as antediluvian, the New York Times columnist felt compelled to insert a caveat into her critique of the new abstinence-only regulations. "Obviously," she began, "nobody from the Christian right to the liberal left objects to ... encouraging sexual abstinence."
(Levine p. 93)

In the meantime, so she says, nearly all teenagers do have sexual contact. Thus, all those wise lessons referring only to abstinence, do not have any effect.

The Allan Guttmacher Institute, an institution promoting birth control and family planning, speaks about "a national epidemic of teen pregnancy" (p. 96). Other reports tell how many AIDS cases there are -- and that is worse: teenage pregnancy leads to new life, AIDS leads to death.

The young 'predators'  

This is a sad story. Levine names one of her chapters: “Children who molest – the tyranny of the normal”.

Children who go in for whatever kind of childish 'sexual' behavior are immediately called 'molesters' or 'predators', the other children in the play are 'the victims'. There are no other concepts than predator and victim. 'Predators' will get a severe kind of 'treatment', 'the victims' will receive a more kindly form of 'treatment' -- but there must always be treatment if a child has any sexual experience. It is assumed that these children are sick. 

There was a problem in a small town in the US, where a lot of children appeared to have played 'sex' or 'marriage' in the local wood. This was a case for the police, but the police had a problem: who were the molesters, who were the victims? The same child appeared in one play session as the molester, in another session as the victim. Nobody was able to imagine that the children simply had played a game with each other -- why should the only play 'cops and robbers', and not 'father and mother'? People was astonished and questioned how the children could have such dirty knowledge. Nobody had ever told them about it. Nevertheless, they knew -- and did.

Known world-wide is the case of the Swiss boy Raoul, who had helped his little sister go to the toilet, and whose neighbor woman had seen this. Immediately, the little boy was 'a molester'. He was sent to prison for punishment and 'treatment': he was 'a great danger'. The family has fled back to Switzerland -- fled because of the very real and great danger: the US way of thinking and doing about children and bodily matters.

In another case, a two-year boy who ran naked in his garden, was accused of the felony of exhibitionism. The parents were legally obligated to permit an investigation to denounce their, without any doubt, shameful way of bringing up their child. There are plenty of cases known concerning children around the age of ten, who are considered molesters, who have had to be treated and registered.. for life.

Levine tells about the case of Tony Diamond (p 45)

Tony was nine years of age and his sister Jessica was eight. Jessica had told at school that Tony had "touched her front and back". Because of a law from 1974, the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act, the school had to report any kind of "suspicion of child abuse, even by a child, to the Child Abuse Hotline. So, an investigation started with which the parents were obligate to cooperate. If not, they are viewed as promoting abuse, which would be worse. 

The record mentioned all Tony's sexual misbehaviors: at school he had spoken sexual language and had looked under girls' skirts. At four, he lay on top of Jessie in the bath. He had touched his sister's buttocks with a pencil and had poked her there. In the meantime, the testimonies of Jessica changed week after week. 

The court decided that Tony, nine years of age, was guilty of sexual abuse of a minor. The report said that Tony was "a budding sex offender".

I quote Levine (p. 46):

Tony was to become one case in a new "epidemic," the "sexualization" of children; a new class of patient, "children with sexual behavior problems"; and a new category of sexual criminal perpetrator, "children who molest." 

[...] As young as two, they are diagnosed and treated, and sometimes prosecuted, for "inappropriate" behaviors like fondling, putting things inside genitals, or even flashing, mooning, or masturbating "compulsively." 
From the anecdotes I have gathered since reporting on Tony, it appears that sex play between siblings is considered the gravest, though ironically the commonest, species of a grave and not uncommon problem.

Do speak about it, says Levine, give names to all parts of the body, teach the children to speak about bodily matters. Respect and accept masturbation by children. Accept sexual games between children. Give a quiet reaction, not hysteria or panic as often happens. Teachers are quick to panic because of the fears of anxious parents. Better to encourage this kind of play, says Levine. Emphasize the importance of friendship and care for each other. 

Do touch the children. Don't give them an armor of 'correct behavior'. Let children be children. Do not label everything about the body as 'sexual', including touching or caressing. "Our terror about sex actually 'sexualizes' behaviors that aren't sexual." (page 191). By doing so, we create fear of touching, fear of intimacy -- a bad education to later sex. Listen to the children and respect the knowledge they have about their body and sexuality. They know much more than we think. Respect their privacy, do not over-control the children.

“Outercourse”  

This concerns all forms of intimacy except intercourse. The human body has many possibilities for contact and pleasure, so teach the children these possibilities. By doing so, children also learn to communicate about intimacy, they learn about relationships. Outercourse makes it possible to speak with boys and girls in the same terms; for outercourse, there are nearly no gender differences. Outercourse may also be an accepted and encouraged game between boys or girls  without fear of referring to homosexuality. Outercourse gives adolescents the opportunity to interact intensively with each other without fear of pregnancy or deflowering. It gives many possibilities.

As we can expect, Levine pleas for an open and honest sex education from cradle to adulthood -- just like we use to do here in the Netherlands. For instance, tell about kissing. "How do you do that?" is a routine question on web sites on which youth may ask questions. The most uttered question is always "Am I normal?"

Teach the way to safe sex and speak positively about sexuality -- not only about illness, but also about pleasure and safety. Tell the children stories in which sexuality and relationships are normal  aspects. Young people have a need for romantic stories and scenes. Tell the story of Romeo and Julia, a classic one in the world's literature. Don't panic if they appear to be able to find porno on the web: they learn a lot by doing so. 

Fortunately, there are web sites nowadays to ask questions, with anonymity if wanted -- as long as the schools, libraries or parents do not filter away these web sites. The Web is an unique opportunity to give education about the sexual health of the body and the soul.

Use these possibilities at home and at school, don't be afraid of them, do not avoid them because of the fear of sexuality.

What girls can learn (Chapter 9)

What boys can learn

How to prevent AIDS?

For us, here in the Netherlands, this is not even a point of discussion: give open and honest education about and possibilities for safe sex and birth control. But the Americans need a whole chapter in a book to argue that this results in safety and health, while always hammering at abstinence contrarily results in unsafety, illness and even death. Youth simply does not follow the abstinence advice, and if one makes love, one does unprotected. Adults are afraid of open education, it might encourage sexual behavior, and adults are afraid of the sexual behavior of youths. 

There is still much aversion against and fear of homosexuality in the US culture. The same aversion and fear hinders youth from coming out - the result is sneaky and unsafe sex and avoiding the doctor and the drugstore for contraceptives.

A lot of school drop-outs are hidden gays who worry about their feelings and so give up on school. Many of the homeless youth in the US run away or are sent away from home because of their homosexuality.

There are also many people who have another culture than the 'correct' white and white-collar culture. Many people have an African or a Mediterranean culture -- great parts of the US population are Hispanics. In those cultures, youths are sexually active earlier and people tend to be more open about sexuality. Regrettably, the dominant white culture overrules this. 

Levine uses much space to argue to stop dividing people into certain categories and then appoint some of them as 'the risk groups' and to approach them as such. This is the usual way of prevention, but it does not work at all. It does not prevent HIV or AIDS. These illnesses are spread among all groups of the population. 

She also argues to respect the choices of people, including choices for sex -- for example  prostitutes earning a living in order to survive. In those circles there is knowledge of contraceptives and the practice of safe sex.

Levine makes a plea that appeals to me, a plea for thoroughly reviewing the concepts about sexuality. 

"Sex" is, in the US language and culture, simply a synonym for "danger". It is this association that leads to what is called 'sex ed", but not an association with 'pleasure'. The words 'love' or 'real love' are connected with abstinence, not with shared intimacy. However, in a really loving relationship people want to make safe love -- more than short anonymous contacts. The word 'lust' is connected with 'danger', not with 'pleasure'. 'Lust is dirty', that's the association.

Levine also pleas for more community development and the promotion of close friendships. The American community is very fragmented, there is not much community living. One can easily be exiled from these communities. A gay is 'a queer', 'a stranger', an outsider. If there were more  community feeling, there will be more motivation to keep the community safe for everybody.

These are the ways to prevent AIDS. Singling out risk groups and exiling them from the community does not work at all. It works contrarily.

In her Epilogue, Levine expresses herself more clearly 

She says that 'youth' in the US by association means the same as "undisciplined, rude, spoiled, and wild" (p. 219). No wonder, because one out of six of the population, including youth, lives in great poverty. 

There are a lot of institutions that worry heavily about child sexual abuse, but widely spread poverty is abuse. Scarcely any institution worries about that. One is busy with sex -- better to say, to prevent sex -- not with well-being, food, housing, income or good education and medical care. A plea for such things is a synonym for political suicide. A plea for stronger and stronger legislation to ban child sexual abuse is a guarantee for re-election and a nice political career.

She rants and raves against the conservatives  who defend so called 'family values', but who in fact do nothing more than prevent community welfare and promote tax exemption and freedom to have weapons. If you like high figures, count the victims of that policy. Those so called 'family values' do not give a safe community or world to our children, especially not concerning sexuality. (p. 223)

To repeat a well known story: most sexual abuse of children happens within the family -- especially the poor families, and there are a lot of them. A bit more economic certainty, some more community welfare, a feeling of shared responsibility for all our children would give somewhat more safety, also in sexual aspect. 

"Family values endanger children at home and everywhere else" (p. 223).

In the US culture, there are quite few relationships outside the family. Contacts with neighbors, shopkeepers and other citizens are quite seldom and are discouraged. Children would benefit from those kind of contacts, but these contacts are prevented because of the fear of sexual abuse and to defend family values. Children are not viewed and approached as citizens, as members of a community. Children belong to nothing, except the family. And there, within the family, is the place where child sexual abuse generally occurs.

Children would benefit from a bit of self-knowledge, knowledge of their own body and feelings, the freedom to express feelings, some appreciation and self-respect, and some acknowledgement of their intuitive knowledge and skills. There is none of that at all. 

Healthy food from a safe kitchen, natural green space to play and to make friendships -- there is none of that. Frequently, there is no pavement to walk safely on; only a highway for cars. This is the world that the rich and morally correct people have created for our offspring.

Her closing words are:

"Sex is not harmful to children. It is a vehicle to self-knowledge, love, healing, creativity, adventure, and intense feelings of aliveness. There are many ways even the smallest children can partake of it. 
Our moral obligation to the next generation is to make a world in which every child can partake safely, a world in which the needs and desires of every child -- for accomplishment, connection, meaning, and pleasure -- can be marvelously fulfilled."

Back to the Netherlands

  What might Levine’s book mean for us?

First, of course, it is a warning to not take the same direction as the US culture. We have to stay self-opinionated and defend and hold to our libertarian culture.

The same is necessary about Europe. The conservative policies of, for instance, France,  Great-Britain, Ireland and Belgium attempt to force themselves onto us. In the E.U., many plans are cooked up to 'protect the youth', but which are in fact threatening the well-being of all.

So, there are proposals to describe 'a child' as anybody younger than eighteen, followed by proposals to forbid a lot of things to 'children', among which are sex and a healthy sexual development. Following those proposals, half of the European youth will be 'criminal' because they have sex before eighteen or because they make nude photos of each other. In fact, some of this kinds of laws have already passed in the Netherlands.

What we all can do

One thing that we all can do, and to which I am strongly devoted, is to be critical concerning what people say, the words, terms and concepts they use. 

Take for example...

... the sentence "Sexual experiences are always harmful for children".

No, there is no proof. The conviction is only 'generally accepted', but never proved. The contrary has been proved.

The research of Rind et al. mentions a small minority of pervasive harm. Still too much, but not 100%. Where was that harm? It was mostly in girls who had been forced into incest within the family. 

More recent research by Rind [*] concludes that nearly all gay boys have experienced their first sexual contacts during their teenage years, have wanted this and have felt these as positive. The experiences helped to form a positive gay identity. 

[*] Rind, Bruce, Gay and Bisexual Adolescent Boys' Sexual Experiences With Men: 
An Empirical Examination of Psychological Correlates in a Nonclinical Sample; in: Archives of Sexual Behavior, 30-4, August 2001

Be critical, may I ask you

... to the words, plans and acts of people, especially if they want 'to protect the children'. Usually, this protection does not concern cars, air pollution or radioactive waste, but their own sexuality. Be especially attentive if these people show a certain fanaticism. Be attentive if they point to scapegoats. These people are afraid that a male teacher might touch their child -- not for discipline, but for comfort or caring.

Please make a distinction

Make a distinction between a little girl of five and a sturdy boy of fifteen. Make distinction between stroking or cuddling and intercourse. Make especially a distinction between feelings and acts. 

Concerning pedophilia, this distinction has already disappeared in public language. "Convicted because of pedophilia", reads the newspaper. As 'pedophilia' is a feeling or desire, this is not possible. "Convicted because of sexual acts" might be correct. 'Pedophilia' and 'sexual acts' are not the same. 

Make a distinction, first between pedophilic feelings and acts, and secondly between sexual and not-sexual feelings and acts. By thinking and speaking correctly, the whole story will be less scary. 95% of the people with pedophilic feelings will appear as humans, not as  Dutroux-like figures. Dutroux, by the way, was not a pedophile according psychiatrists, but simply an egocentric man unscrupulously aiming for lust and money. 

Don't use 'pedophilia' as a synonym for 'sex with children'

This is the common perception, but it is not correct. By doing so, the subject is not debatable. A correct definition refers to a desire or a feeling. How someone acts is a second and separate question. Feeling can never be incorrect or legally forbidden, only acts can. Therefore, make a distinction between feelings and acts. Then, the subject can be debated -- and becomes less scary.

Nowadays, people don't dare speak about these feelings. Because of this, obsession may be called up. Feelings may become bottled-up and become only more heavy and obsessive, thus more dangerous. We may see this at work, having heard of the enormous amount of people who apparently were obsessively downloading certain pictures from the Internet: several thousands, among whom were police officers, judges and priests. All of them secretly busy with their obsession. In a more open society there is no need for this.

In the modern treatment of predators, those feelings are declared as sick and forbidden, just as are fantasies and practically any contact with children. By doing so, the obsession becomes even more heavy. A vicious circle is maintained.

At least I may ask: make distinctions and nuances

Make a distinction between feelings and acts, between sexual and non-sexual feelings and acts. By doing so, one may speak more openly and honestly, and obsessions and depressions will diminish. In a more open minded society, such feelings need not grow into obsessions. That creates a more attractive and safe environment for the children. 

According to Levine: combating the sexuality of children and youths is the real peril to minors.