Is the trauma of statutory rape a result of innate characteristics, or is it socially conditioned? Richard Hanania argues that sexual abuse is only “traumatic” as a result of social interpretation. He argues that no one considers the rituals of New Guinean tribes to be abusive.
One argument in favor of the Aella/Hanania thesis is a study from 2020 which claims that victims of abuse were not negatively affected if they forgot that the abuse happened. If you don’t have the time or inclination to read a complicated scientific study, you can read a short review of it here by Lyman Stone.
If you don’t have time to be clicking on Twitter links, I will summarize it as follows:
From court records, we have evidence of child abuse (physical abuse, sexual abuse and neglect). Researchers followed up with those individuals, decades later, and collected data on their mental health.
In the graph, “O” stands for “observed behavior,” while “S” stands for “subjective reporting.” “O+S” means that there was a court record of abuse, “S” means that the individual claimed to be abused but there was no court record, and “O” means there was a court record of abuse but the individual did not recall any abuse. “None” meant there was neither a court record nor any recollection of abuse.
The “none” group and the “O” group had similar levels of depression, long-term depression, anxiety, PTSD, antisocial personality, alcohol misuse, and drug abuse. Strangely, the “O” group (people who forgot that they were abused) actually had lower levels of drug abuse than the general population (“None”).
One way to interpret this result is that leaving children out in the cold, locking them under the staircase, raping them, beating them, and other forms of abuse aren’t actually harmful. What’s harmful is our interpretation of these abuses. If we simply shrugged our shoulders and looked the other way, then these kids would be just fine. It’s only because we get hysterical and “freak out” that these kids experience any negative effects.
Hanania claims no one actually thinks that Papua New Guinean rituals are “objectively bad.” It’s perfectly fine to beat pregnant women, because that’s their culture.
But maybe there’s another interpretation of the results of the 2020 study: perhaps the suppression of memories is a successful coping strategy. In other words, the approval or disapproval of society is not the determinative factor. Rather, the ability of the mind to suppress past trauma can negate those harmful effects.
The implication of this interpretation would mean that we should be attempting to cause selective amnesia in victims of abuse. That sounds frightening, but I believe that this is one of the best possible things we could do.
I would draw a comparison in this way:
Let’s say a person has acid thrown on their face, and they become ugly. That would be harmful to them. On top of the physical harm caused, they would also experience the social stigma of being ugly. If we could devise some facial reconstruction surgery to make them beautiful again, this would be good. However, our ability to devise such a surgery doesn’t make the initial act of acid-throwing “harmless” or “socially determined.”
Some humans are capable of forgetting childhood trauma; others are not. This might be a genetically determined behavior, or it could be due to luck or some unknown factor. When the brain selectively eliminates traumatic memory, I imagine this like the surgeon conducting the reconstruction of a ruined face. It is the brain going deep inside itself and removing ugly, cancerous memories. This is an amazing capacity, and we should study it more, so that perhaps one day we can develop techniques to artificially induce amnesia to help the victims of child abuse.
None of this should lead us to believe, however, that child abuse is a neutral act, or that it does not cause pain and suffering, outside of “social conditioning.”
Can acts be innately harmful?
There are some harms which are socially determined. For example, if I called you a suka, you might interpret that as a term of endearment. However, if you spoke Russian, you’d realize I am insulting you, and you might feel embarrassed, degraded, or emotionally abused. The vocalization of the syllables in “suka” are therefore not inherently harmful, but only become harmful because of our social interpretation of those sounds.
Some harm is obviously not socially determined. Depriving a child of food or water, or beating them, causes biological harm. The question at hand is whether things which are not biologically harmful can be inherently harmful.
This is a difficult question to answer, but the evidence suggests that yes, human beings carry an innate sense of symbolic meaning beyond social conditioning.
When babies are hugged by their parents, they respond biologically. This biological response is not socially conditioned; it is innate. But there is nothing biologically necessary about a hug. Hugs do not provide babies with calories or water. Still, it seems that the baby is capable of innate interpretation.
The baby responds positively to tactile stimulus. The baby has a conception of their parents, based on sight, smell, sound, and touch. The baby understands, pre-rationally, the idea of a “persona,” and they attach value to the identity of their “parent.”
Humans are complex social creatures, and we should not be surprised that humans have innate symbolic regimes. We also are inherently attracted to certain sexual signals, like pheromones, without the need for social conditioning.
The question of how much a response is innate, and how much of it is socially conditioned, is not easy to answer. Some sexual signals are extremely socially conditioned, as in the case of fashion.
Women, in general, are attracted to male status, and male status is entirely socially subjective. Men, on the other hand, tend to be more focused on biological markers of physical health.
When a person is raped, there is probably an extent to which that harm is partially socially conditioned. The shame and guilt of being a rape victim probably contributes to the trauma. However, it seems entirely reasonable to suppose that there is also an innate or biologically determined stress-response to the experience of rape, and that this exists within children as well.
Aella calls me a pedophile.
Aella uses a neat rhetorical trick against her opponents. When she suggests that child sexual abuse is “just yet another adult doing stuff,” she defends her argument by implying that if you think children can experience abuse “sexually,” that means you are “sexualizing children.”
It’s a very cheeky move. “Are u saying kids experience this stuff as sexual?” What Aella is claiming is that for a child, having their genitals touched is a totally neutral act, with no deeper psychological impact. The only reason why child abuse victims experience trauma is because society tells them they are “supposed” to be traumatized.
What Aella is trying to do is to claim that sexual abuse can only be traumatizing for “sexual beings.” If the victim is not a “sexual being,” then it cannot be abusive, because nothing sexual is perceived. Before we address Aella’s claim, let’s examine the four different possible positions:
Children are not “sexual beings”; child sexual abuse is harmful. This is the position of most people who Aella is arguing with.
Children are not “sexual beings”; child sexual abuse is only harmful to the extent that we socially condition people to feel bad about it. This seems to be Aella’s position.
Children are “sexual beings”; child sexual abuse is not harmful, because children enjoy sex. This isn’t Aella’s position, but it was the position of pro-pedophile movements like NAMBLA and Alan Ginsberg.
Children are “sexual beings”; and also, child sexual abuse is harmful.
Aella’s opponents (option 1) claim that she is a pedophile (option 3), but she deflects this attack by claiming to be a “neutralist” (option 2).
I think the question of whether or not children are “sexual beings” can be scientifically investigated, and the answer is clear. Children are capable of sexual perceptions and experiences. It is for this reason that child sexual abuse is traumatic, because children have an inherent and innate understanding of sex, prior to any external education.
I can say, from my own experience, that I was already aware of my own sexual feelings at age 7. I was aware that nudity was sexual, human bodies were sexual, that genitalia were sexual, and I behaved in sexual ways, without any external education or instruction.
Whether or not this is good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, is up to society’s interpretation. For example, traditional Christians believe that masturbation is a sin. It’s not obvious to me, from a scientific perspective, that little boys playing in the bathtub with their own penises is especially harmful, or that it requires parental intervention.
I can say, however, that if I was raped or sexually abused at age 7, I would have felt very bad about it. Hopefully, if my mind was capable of erasing those memories, I would later on suppress them and live out the rest of my life free from the impact of such a traumatic experience. However, not all people are capable of that kind of suppression. In that case, I am sure that it would negatively impact me, outside of any social conditioning.
I can say this confidently, because there are enough studies on babies and parental touch that we know this to be true: no social conditioning is required for humans to interpret tactile experiences or facial expressions. Humans know that smiles are good, and frowns are bad. No one teaches you this; it is innate.
Every child knows that being raped is bad. We might not have the language to understand the experience, and we might not be able to rationally explain why it is bad, but the trauma-response is inborn and not socially determined.
On Papua New Guinean Rape
Hanania claims that no one thinks Papua New Guinean child rape rituals are bad. When he says that “nobody” thinks this, I am surprised.
I agree with Hanania that there are some far-left anthropologists who study Papua New Guineans and say things like “their culture is equal to ours.” I’ve read Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel, and he claims in the introduction to the book that Papua New Guineans are biologically more evolved and more intelligent than white people.
If Richard Hanania, Jared Diamond, and I were doing a survey of American far-left sociologists and anthropologists, we would probably be able to find quite a few people saying things like “Papua New Guinean child sex rituals cause no harm.” This is because these people are adhering to a performative kind of egalitarianism which signals their openness. This position has not been arrived at by rigorous, empirical study.
My hypothesis is that if we studied Papua New Guineans who were victimized by child sex rituals, and those who were not, we would find differences between them. It’s also possible that these societies are so inherently traumatic and violent that adding a few child sex rituals here and there barely makes an impact. They are already so traumatized that they are numb to further trauma. But this is not an argument in favor of the idea that “child sex rituals are not inherently traumatic.”
If you understand anything at all about the purpose of these rituals, it would be foolish to think otherwise. Sex rituals are meant to affect psychological changes. They aren’t meant to be neutral. If they had no effects, that means they aren’t working properly. They are supposed to traumatize people; that’s how trauma bonding works.
Hanania is underestimating just how traumatic life can be. Papua New Guinea provides us with especially horrifying examples of traumatic rituals, but I have detailed how human sacrifice cults were not just historically common, they were actually the norm.
It was only after pastoralist tribes like the Semites, Indo-Europeans, and Turks invaded these human-sacrificing societies that they were able to put a stop to these universal practices. In places like Mesoamerica, Africa, and Papua New Guinea, these cruel trauma-inducing practices persisted.
Understanding exactly why pastoralists opposed these practices, and why primitive agriculturists embraced them, is something I’ve covered elsewhere. But to briefly point you toward my argument: if your goal is to trauma-bond your population to a gerontocratic cult of elder shamans, then abusing all the young boys is a good way to accomplish that. On the other hand, if your goal is to develop a warrior class based on confidence, excellence, fearlessness, and masculinity, then violently diddling all the teenage boys is a bad idea.
Conclusion
Human sexuality is not the black-and-white binary that people would like to make it out to be. Sexuality is not primarily motivated by reproductive urges, but by aesthetic and sociological desires (although breeding is a kink too, that’s not what motivates most sexual urges). Aesthetic and sociological desires develop long before puberty, and begin to take shape in childhood. Freud was correct about this.
The early development of childhood sexuality is similar to the early development of other physical capacities: the muscles begin to strengthen, the skull fuses together, and the body prepares itself for maturity. But just because children are capable of running and jumping does not mean it would be appropriate to place them in a boxing ring and have adults punch them in the face. Similarly, just because children have some sexual instincts does not mean that it is appropriate for adults to have sexual contact with children.
Christianity demands that we think of children as non-sexual beings. This is a protective lie. It is easier to tell medieval peasants that children are “not sexual” and therefore ineligible for marriage than to tell them a more complicated and nuanced story. But in the face of Aella’s supposedly “rationalist” arguments, it is necessary to make that more nuanced case.
Some children fight each other at a young age, but this does not mean that they are equipped to fight adults. Some children sexually experiment at a young age, but this does not mean that sexual contact with adults is “non-traumatic.”
Sex and violence are deeply intertwined, at a psychological level. Beginning in the 1890s with First Wave Feminists like Haverlock Ellis, a new form of sexology was introduced which claimed that sexuality could be “cooperative” and “non-violent.” Ellis embraced bisexuality, polyamory, and all sorts of other deviant behaviors as “emotionally neutral.”
Opposed to Ellis were the Leninists, who adhered to monogamy, and the Freudians, who saw homosexuality as an expression of eroticized rejection. Right-wing reactionaries tend to see Ellis, Lenin, and Freud as all part of one big Cultural Marxist (read: Jewish) conspiracy against western Christendom, but it is necessary to make distinctions between them.
I appreciate the fact that Aella has conducted studies of her readers to collect empirical data on human sexual behavior. However, as concerns the question of child sexual abuse, I do not find her to be a “rationalist” at all. She has not unemotionally considered the question of whether or not child sexual abuse is inherently harmful or not. She is clearly biased, and has a predetermined conclusion in mind, which she pursues to ameliorate her own feelings of trauma around the subject. This is not science: it is therapy in disguise.
Child sexual abuse is harmful. Thankfully, many children can suppress their own memories, by some miracle of the subconscious, and this protects them from being destroyed by these experiences. But this aptitude is not universal, and it does not negate the fact that the original experience was harmful.
To give a metaphor: some lizards can detach their tails and later regrow them. But this does not mean that the lizard is not at least temporarily harmed. It loses time and calories in the process. Similarly, the abuse of children, although it can be overcome through selective amnesia, is harmful, even if in some cases, it does not have life-long negative effects.
I am not accusing Aella of being a pedophile or advocating for pedophilia. I am not hysterically attacking her as an evil person. I think I understand her motivated reasoning. Victims cope in various ways, and no one is perfect.
But just as I don’t “believe all women” when they claim that Jeffrey Epstein was a shape-shifting pedophile (he was, in fact, an ephebophile), I also don’t believe women who claim that the sexual abuse of 8 year olds is a “neutral act.” Even if Aella was some exception to the rule, her anecdotal experience doesn’t tell us anything about Papua New Guineans or humanity as a whole.
It is possible that some of the guilt and shame that child abuse victims feel is sociologically influenced. Some victims feel “dirty” or “gross” because they feel judged by their peers or adults. This is reinforced when adults blame children for “bringing it on themselves” or being complicit in their abuse.
As much as possible, we should avoid participating in victim-shaming, because it does harm. But at the same time, even if we were to eliminate victim-shaming, there is still good evidence that child sexual abuse causes long-term harm to victims.
The fact that many victims have selective amnesia about their court-documented abuse is evidence for my hypothesis. Selective amnesia is a successful coping mechanism employed to protect children against their own traumatic memories.
The benefits of traumatic amnesia are understood by alcoholics and drug abusers. Drug use allows for temporary amnesia, which relieves the effects of traumatic memories. Unfortunately, these solutions are temporary and have harmful side effects. I am hopeful that perhaps we can discover more effective therapeutic techniques for inducing traumatic amnesia to allow child abuse victims to live fuller, healthier lives.1
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For a philosophical account, I am reminded of the Nietzschean power of forgetfulness.
Perhaps the least controversial thing you've ever written, but also true
Adult women in the age gap discourse: I’m 25 and he’s 30 and this is obviously stark example of sexually traumatizing predation.
Children getting diddled and violated: well… you see, that all cultural relativism you silly Westerners.
Oh to be alive in 2025!