Anarchy Magazine, NAMBLA, and Bookfair workshops on roadkill and herbal medicine

I think the age of consent laws should be abolished and replaced by the formula (x/2 + 7) < y.

Surely this DIY shit is just endemic of a retreat from politics into a pathetic DIY ethos, why not focus on mass campaigns to defend the right to abortion, so that it's accessible to for all women in safe environments rather than having to fuck about with homebrew kits like it's the fucking 1940's. I don't want any women I know having to use some fucking hippies recipe and instructions for a homebrew abortion sandwhiched inbetween an article about 'Loving your vagina' and shit poems about 'Mother nature'.

yes but it's the mistaking of this individualised solution (and one women have been doing for many many decade's regardless of DIY zines and the like) for an actual political position, to the point where i've heard anarchists argue that DIY and herbal abortions are more 'anarchist' cos they empower women independently of the medical industrial complex. I mean yes herbal and DIY as a last resort but lets be clear it's not what we should be aiming for, just as yes, plenty of working class people scam free food, shoplift and pull various scams to get by and just survive these things shouldn't be seen as aims in themselves, we shouldn't have to do this shit. I'd certainly shit two house worth of bricks if I found out a female friend of mine was going to try a herbal or diy abortion.

i know it's obvious to everyone here, but the fact that the age of consent is somewhat arbitrary doesn't logically mean there shouldn't be one. i mean it's not like the terrible oppressive capitalist state is going round locking up 16 year-olds with 15 year-old girlfriends en masse, although if they have sex it's technically rape. Of course, non sequiters are very handy if you want to fuck pre-pubescent kids in the name of anarchism.

yeah Saii's blog is pretty spot on iirc.

yeah i'm sure it happens, but the vast majority of the time even the state manages to be far less letter-of-the-law than the NAMBLA lot claim - i mean i'd guess the instances of such 'rape' and subsequent legal action are at least 3 or 4 orders of magnitude apart, and yet there isn't the difficulty of establishing (lack of) consent there is with adult rape cases as the law just requires proof of sex (much easier). and even then, we're not talking about pre-pubescent kids getting fucked by 50 year-old beardy mystics, so there is an entirely different set of power relations at work and NAMBLA are drawing a false analogy.

I believe the baseline for the formula is 14.

A hippie herbalist saved my daughter all manner of physical discomfort, possibly some long term damage from reflux, and likely our family from bankruptcy. We'd probably still be traipsing from one specialist to another, without her help. (I was initially skeptical, but desperate enough to try it.) Medical doctors don't treat patients, they sell medicines. Market economics 101. So it really pisses me off to see herbalism grouped with pedophilia.

Moving on: If I am not mistaken, indecent exposure is a "sex offense". Get caught skinny dipping, go on the sex offender list for life (in the usa). So I wouldn't let a distaste for MBLA (ask any gun totin' good ole boy with a son or daughter, what he would do to a child abuser) blind us to the reality of the draconian measures being enacted by the state, to appease the Bush administration's fundamentalist constituency.

Of course, this may not be the forum for a serious discussion of the matters...

crass reductionism 101 - you think there aren't 'natural remedy' entrepreneurs? i've no problem with herbal remedies if they look good in double-blind RCTs, anecdote doesn't cut it with lives at stake.

When I was 16 I had sex with 31 years old woman. Will that be legal in libcom?

No shit? Point being, the Bush administration's fronting for it's racist, fundamentalist constituency (same as Nixon, Reagen ad naseum) is a major event in usa poltiical life. MBLA is a freak sideshow. Most folks have never heard of it.

Sooo, when the medical industry gives their approval to age old, time tested remedies, folks should give them a try, but not before? Don't hold your breath, the pharmaceutical companies will never allow it.

And bankruptcy via medial care is hardly anecdotal, either. Try reading about this thing called "a health care crisis". Like climate change, it's gotten so bad even the bourgeois media admits its existence!

so when i write 'evidence' you read 'CORPORATIONS' - wtf? in what way does a randomised double-blind RCT equal 'the medical industry' - capital is more than happy to sell actual medicines and snake oil placebos, in matters of life and death i don't think asking for evidence is akin to blind faith in drug companies

But in the haste to distant themselves from NAMBLA (or whatever the acroynym is) some are making statements such as

Yes, that ishappening, though not (as you say) en masse. Worse, it is happening selectively. Depends on who your family is--money, social stauts, and yes, race-- whether or not you get prosecuted.

yeah sure, but like i say since it isn't happening en masse it isn't one of the major points of struggle - i mean the justice system is fucked - class-skewed, racist, you name it - in all sorts of ways. but i think if we are discussing it it's vital we differentiate ourselves from paedos, just like when discussing immigration it's important to distinguish ourselves from the far right or pro-cheap labour liberals.

edit: "it's vital we differentiate ourselves from paedos" - never thought i'd write that!