Great love stories of all time? Seems to me, after reading the article, that it was the same old, same old. Young troubled, abused, foster child happens to arouse older guy who instead of guiding a young person becomes part of the abuse cycle. Troubled, abused teen, experiences kindness and safer harbour and in return gives what she has to him - sex. Look up "sexual grooming" please. I don"t doubt she loved him. She feels he saved her. But in fact she saved herself by moving on. I don't place any responsibility on her. The writer can get watery eyed on the "romance", I'll just wish Augusta Britt all the best.
I was already raising my eyebrow at the title, but when I got to the part where you invent a little fantasy about a conniving woman to get mad about, I knew I was reading something written by a deeply disturbed person who hates women. I had to know more!
How convenient that Wikipedia informed me you were fired for fucking your students, once tried to kill your girlfriend, and admitted “I am a danger to myself and others.” Man no shit. You really aren’t doing yourself any favors posting this little rant.
Why would you EVER go into gender studies? Was it an attempt to rationalize your demons or something?
Your writing is nothing more than a thinly veiled excuse for pedophilia and grooming, masked as intellectualism or a supposed refusal to conform to societal norms. You are every bit as sleazy as McCarthy and Barney, evidently. What a joke.
Two things can be true at the same time. Full consent requires roughly equal power. And you cannot know anyone else's power level with any certainty.
All else equal, a famous middle-aged male writer has much more power than a teenage girl in foster care. And, sometimes teenage girls in foster care run right the fuck over famous middle-aged male writers.
A power imbalance makes abuse much more likely. But it's no guarantee. "Avoid power imbalances in sexual relationships" is a good rule of thumb. Especially if one is prone to being abused. But it's too blunt and overarching as an actual universal rule. Because, at the end of the day, relationships with power imbalances are required for mobility. No teenage girl in foster care can make a better life for herself on her own. Nor can anyone else. We all need help from people who have more than us. The idea that if that helps also involves sex, it's automatically exploitative is some "sex is magic" bullshit.
“ Full consent requires roughly equal power.” No two people in this world are fully equal. And that standard only became the cultural norm five minutes ago, and in my book was never a good standard. Hopefully a less prudish culture will learn to be less afraid of the witch-hunters pretending to speak for the marginalized.
BTW, I’m familiar with your other writing on sex work. Congrats on basically validating the entire reasoning behind the “Nordic model” on sex work. I’m sure this analysis will serve you well.
Thanks for this blog, and I'll read the Vanity Fair article (if there's no paywall). I'll also follow you on Bluesky. I'm a fan of Cormac McCarthy's writing, and bought his last two books (The Passenger and Stella Maris) as soon as they were each published.
Great love stories of all time? Seems to me, after reading the article, that it was the same old, same old. Young troubled, abused, foster child happens to arouse older guy who instead of guiding a young person becomes part of the abuse cycle. Troubled, abused teen, experiences kindness and safer harbour and in return gives what she has to him - sex. Look up "sexual grooming" please. I don"t doubt she loved him. She feels he saved her. But in fact she saved herself by moving on. I don't place any responsibility on her. The writer can get watery eyed on the "romance", I'll just wish Augusta Britt all the best.
I was already raising my eyebrow at the title, but when I got to the part where you invent a little fantasy about a conniving woman to get mad about, I knew I was reading something written by a deeply disturbed person who hates women. I had to know more!
How convenient that Wikipedia informed me you were fired for fucking your students, once tried to kill your girlfriend, and admitted “I am a danger to myself and others.” Man no shit. You really aren’t doing yourself any favors posting this little rant.
Why would you EVER go into gender studies? Was it an attempt to rationalize your demons or something?
Your writing is nothing more than a thinly veiled excuse for pedophilia and grooming, masked as intellectualism or a supposed refusal to conform to societal norms. You are every bit as sleazy as McCarthy and Barney, evidently. What a joke.
Two things can be true at the same time. Full consent requires roughly equal power. And you cannot know anyone else's power level with any certainty.
All else equal, a famous middle-aged male writer has much more power than a teenage girl in foster care. And, sometimes teenage girls in foster care run right the fuck over famous middle-aged male writers.
A power imbalance makes abuse much more likely. But it's no guarantee. "Avoid power imbalances in sexual relationships" is a good rule of thumb. Especially if one is prone to being abused. But it's too blunt and overarching as an actual universal rule. Because, at the end of the day, relationships with power imbalances are required for mobility. No teenage girl in foster care can make a better life for herself on her own. Nor can anyone else. We all need help from people who have more than us. The idea that if that helps also involves sex, it's automatically exploitative is some "sex is magic" bullshit.
“ Full consent requires roughly equal power.” No two people in this world are fully equal. And that standard only became the cultural norm five minutes ago, and in my book was never a good standard. Hopefully a less prudish culture will learn to be less afraid of the witch-hunters pretending to speak for the marginalized.
BTW, I’m familiar with your other writing on sex work. Congrats on basically validating the entire reasoning behind the “Nordic model” on sex work. I’m sure this analysis will serve you well.
Thanks for this blog, and I'll read the Vanity Fair article (if there's no paywall). I'll also follow you on Bluesky. I'm a fan of Cormac McCarthy's writing, and bought his last two books (The Passenger and Stella Maris) as soon as they were each published.