+- Story-Portal (https://time-tales.af/storys)
+-- Forum: EBOOK (https://time-tales.af/storys/forumdisplay.php?fid=27)
+--- Forum: EBOOK (https://time-tales.af/storys/forumdisplay.php?fid=28)
+--- Thread: JZ - Greek Love (1964) (/showthread.php?tid=2705)
JZ - Greek Love (1964) - WMASG - 12-15-2025
A liaison or mateship between adult and child ("child" here means a prepuberal boy) is a much rarer thing and may or may not involve overt sexual contact. The very few instances of this of which I have any knowledge show clear evidence of being substitutions. Either the older partner takes the role of surrogate parent, big brother, uncle, grandfather, etc., to the child, or he is trying to relive with the child a much earlier experience, one dating back to his own childhood or adolescence; sometimes both. The latter type of substitution is the more unhealthy insofar as the man may not be reacting to the child as he actually is but rather to the image of the youngster in the former experience—a lessened contact with reality. (I am omitting two cases where the older partner was evidently feeble-minded and the relationship may have been nearly symmetrical, as in each of these he and the child seemed to be about on a level in vocabulary and interest.) Sometimes a genuine asymmetrical love seemed to be developing (the outcome being a Greek love situation); sometimes the adult was only a means to the child’s ends—presents, romping, physical pleasures—rather than vice versa. In each of these instances sex, where it occurred at all, was only a part of a larger relationship; and though I cannot say that the relationships were handled responsibly, yet all of them appeared to be handled tenderly, and the youngsters were not noticeably harmed. This is also confirmed by a number of individuals (mostly heterosexual) who are known to me to have been the recipients of such sexual and quasi-sexual attentions in their own preadolescent years, and who nevertheless suffered no known harm from them, as they were never caught.
Nevertheless, though one must judge each case on its own merits, I cannot defend this type of relationship to the degree or in the manner that I am defending Greek love. For one thing, the danger of getting caught is possibly even greater than in Greek love, and the penalties are likely to be severer with decreasing age of the child; the presumption by legal authorities and social workers is always that the child is innocent and was led astray by the wicked adult; the panic reaction by parents and others (source of most damage to the child) is doubtless going to be greater than it would be in the event that the youngster were already in his teens; in summary, the psychological danger of damage to the child in the event of discovery is probably greater than it would be for an adolescent (though this is disputable); and the child is more vulnerable in every way than is the adolescent (the most important single point so far). Morever, the mere fact that such liaisons are substitutions is almost automatic evidence that they originate in sickness. (Exceptions are possible, of course; such a liaison may arise from a teacher-pupil relationship, e.g. in private tutoring; or the "substitution" may occur in such a situation as an adult’s having lost a son, daughter, kid brother, etc., and seeking a replacement.)
Whatever may be said of the mental health of an individual who allows himself to be drawn into a casual sexual encounter with a child—even an importunately enthusiastic little seducer with a great deal of spontaneous affection—still Harry Stack Sullivan’s conclusion remains for the most part valid: a preadolescent child is a bundle of needs, capable mostly of what Maslow calls "deficiency love," a projection of his own need to be loved, and only seldom aware of other people as individuals with needs, feelings and vulnerabilities of their own. It follows that an adult limited to preadolescent children for love- or sex-objects is forfeiting any chance of a meaningful response, a genuine return of love; a preadolescent child, however affectionate he may be, is simply not yet ready for the kind of genuine emotional commitment which becomes usual in adolescence and therefore an important feature of Greek love.
[...]