Nic:
Truthfully Ross, I do think that "the room in the house that [my] bed occupies" is different from any other. It's where my wife and I go, we close the door and . . . . .
It's surely different because you make it so.
If the exact same room had only a computer desk and chair in it, it would be nothing special. Only when we attach emotional significance to a "personal space" as being distinctly for intimate purposes, does it's change status.
I guess I would have to ask the question (to bring this back on topic): does MJ see his bed in this light? I honestly can't answer that - the guy appears to be a total screwball. However, on the count of molestation in this instance, his name was cleared.
Am I "creating culturally imposed lines"? 'Spose so - why is that a bad thing again?
Please don't get me wrong. I completely agree with the idea of such artificial boundaries, especially in our paranoid age. I also know that there's a safeguard in it, given that there are predators in the world.
I think it all boils down to common sense.
Alas, common sense isn't all that common
I always sleep naked ... should I put shorts on?
Likewise, though I wear shorts when visiting family with children, as I know they can exhuberantly charge into a room when they're wide awake in the morning!
If I'm an honest guy and not going to abuse anyway why would it make any difference?
It actually shouldn't, as can be seen in some cultures, but we do have such inhibitions. I sometimes wonder how much of that is encultured, though. This comes back to the crux of my argument about conscience. It also has a bearing on MJ's perspective in all of this.
See the minefield that ensues when there are no clear lines.
No, I'm afraid I don't. I think that's a slippery slope fallacy.
It's similar to the one that states that homosexuals are paedophiles. The bottom line is that paedophiles are paedophiles, and it has no direct bearing on whether or not someone is heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, transsexual or asexual.
Taking an absolute extreme example: I believe that most people would not abuse a child, even if they were to spend even night sharing a bed in a naked state. MJ expressed that the idea was abhorent to him, also. I wouldn't want to take the chance, if I had kids, though. Personally I just don't understand the parents involved in the MJ case, at all!
