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Comment by cosmin800 | Hacker News Reader

What is the point of this article? More 'minor attracted person' propaganda? More tries to push pedophilia into normality? Key points: "Gender roles in Edo Japan recognized an in-between position for young men, called Wakashu, that was erased as Japan westernized.", "Wakashu usually ranged between seven to early twenties in age....", "Wakashu were connected to sexuality. As youth, they were considered largely free from the burdens and responsibilities of adulthood but regarded as sexually mature... " so it used to be perfectly fine having sex with 7 years old kids before the narrow minded westerners "invaded" Japan.

This article is not about gender, is about normalizing pedophilia.

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It's an article that factually reports an aspect of Japanese history, it's not "pushing" anything. The only point it makes is about LGBTQ+:

"Multifaceted gender expressions and LGBTQ+ rights are constantly negotiated and contested. While in recent decades, gender definitions and LGBTQ+ rights have expanded in many parts of the world, Wakashu illustrate how quickly more open and fluid understandings of gender and sex can be repressed and erased."

Classical antiquity also had different gender roles. I think the clash of cultures narration in the sense of nations is not helpful and could be an easy quick conclusion from the article. It must be made clear that it is part of a nationalistic narration that things are 'naturally' one way in 'our' culture. Ethics and moral need to be always be renegotiated and adjusted. Going back to the past is often not a good idea. Understanding that things can change is a good thing and should be motivating. However, examples of societies that moved towards multifaceted gender would be more encouraging.

I think (one of) the article purpose(s) is psychological desensitisation to the horror of what pedophilia is by having a different main narrative - number of genders, gender fluidity and introducing it as extra.

I see how you jumped to that conclusion, but I think you're conflating two things. First, back then it was sadly very common for children to be considered sexuality mature (age of consent in some European countries is still 13). That's been largely resolved by legal frameworks today (paedophiles still exists, but everyone agrees what they're doing is bad)

And the other idea you're conflating is that (which I think the article dispels) is that feudal Japan consider youth to be tied to age. For all we know, it might be a concept unfamiliar to us westerners that got projected onto "youth" to make the article approachable to Western audiences.

In the US, sometimes less

"In the United States, as late as the 1880s most states set the minimum age [of consent] at ten to twelve (in Delaware, it was seven in 1895)."

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_consent>

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