Personal thoughts: I’m going to save most of my thoughts for after I finish reading Harmful To Minors by Judith Levine, but one comment I feel confident giving now is: I’m very disappointed in feminists. As a sex-positive feminist and youth liberationist, it’s very frustrating to learn that much of the widespread misconceptions about harmful AMSC is because feminists did what all adults always have: Spoke over children and diminished their experiences – claiming it was for the child’s benefit. While the claim was that it was to help children, I can’t help thinking it was more about some kind of revenge against the patriarchy. Like always, young people were just a tool to be used to win in some greater culture war.
I think the damage they did is very widespread today, because now the common narrative is that young people need to be strictly protected from all forms of sex, sexuality, and sexual material all together. The idea of sexual contact itself being traumatic and damaging has led to the belief all experiences and expressions of sexuality are inherently dangerous for young people. Ironically, even conservatives who would hate to be associated with feminism use this tool to further their own agendas, “Think of the children!”
At this point, I’m firmly convinced nobody is actually thinking about young people.