I often think that times were better back in the 50s. Everything seemed so much simpler. Sexuality wasn’t thrown in peoples’ faces the way it is now. Well, did I just get a reality check! My grandma was downstairs watching Lolita. If you’re unfamiliar with the movie, it’s the story of a middle-aged man who marries a woman in order to woo her 14 year old daughter. The young girl is, indeed flirtatious and sensuous. But this does not change the fact that she is a child and he is an adult.
My grandma has continuously made comments about how selfish and manipulative the young girl is. Now, I understand that the girl doesn’t have the greatest attitude, but is she not absolutely entitled to a numbness toward this man?! He has seduced her, controlled her, and molested her, yet SHE is selfish and has a bad attitude toward him?
Now I am beginning to see that every decade has had it’s major downfalls in the way society thinks. I see that present-day teens and pre-teens are being empowered in ways they never should have been, which also allows older men to fantasize and even act on those fantasies about young girls, with no consequence. At least, though, our young women are not being silenced. It makes me so sad for my daughter and all the young girls I know to think there was a time that they wouldn’t have been worth protecting. I think about the fact that there are many women out there who were taught to be accommodating to these sick men’s abuse. I feel for the once-young-and-innocent girls who were treated as if it was more important to obey your elders and to have a positive attitude to those who were above you than it was to distance yourself from someone who was harming you.
Fortunately, I have seen something tonight. Although there are many ways we are moving toward more worldly ways and we continue to hurt others in our society, we are making some steps in a positive direction to protect our children. Even though girls are becoming sexually active at younger ages, they are finding a right in that to choose for themselves, instead of being abused and manipulated by “adults”. I have seen that we are starting to recognize children as little people, who need to be loved and protected.
What do you think? Is this a step in the right direction? Where are we failing to protect our children? Should children be seen and not heard or do we need to give them a voice so that the ‘bad guys’ can be caught?
The L.O.W. 