I have no concern with your personal motivation, nor have I tried to guess it. When I say “agenda”, I mean the line of reasoning that you are obviously advancing here. Do you really think these comments leave any doubt about what conclusion you want to imply if there are no such studies?
As for this:
If that’s the case, did someone other than you report posts for moderation and seek to stifle any broader discussion? I really don’t see why a discussion of the premise of your OP would somehow prevent people from also posting links to research and discussing its relevance and significance, if such research exists.
Thanks for the consideration. Move it where you see fit. I doubt I’ll look at it again. Raising the question was a waste of my time. I don’t intend to go back to it.
The OP is quite clear that they do not want the premise challenged. However, this does not mean that you are forced to accept the premise. But, if you disagree with it, you must provide a cite that it does not work.
Parts of your replies were on-topic, but parts of them were not. You clearly wanted to question the premise though, and that goes completely against both the spirit and the wording of the OP, who is only for proof or disproof of the premise.
You tried to focus the discussion too narrowly, and reported every post that did not fit your preconceived notion of what the answers should be as off-topic, including requests for clarification.
If cites do not exist (as apparently they do not in this case) then people are going to give the best answers that are available factually, which in topics such as this are likely to involve some opinion and speculation.
I would recommend that you consider the overall picture when people are responding in the best way that they can, and not ignore all of their replies because they do not fit your preconceived notions of what the responses should be. You will get more out of the discussions.
The OP was not framed as a neutral factual question. It was loaded with the premise that only empirical evidence about outcomes, specifically abuse outcomes, can justify this parenting strategy. I disputed the premise thus:
So disputing the premise here is a question of ethical beliefs, not something for which an objective factual cite is applicable. And you responded by saying it was a good point but off topic - thus barring any further discussion of the dubious premise.
I responded to requests for clarification in several cases. Of course, once I clarified my question, no one responded with any facts. Maybe there are no studies on point. I can accept that conclusion from someone who has looked into it and can reasonably confidently say there are no such studies. And yes, I reported some responses that I thought were off topic. When I recognized that the discussion was not going where I’d hoped, I requested that the topic be moved so the discussion could continue organically in the direction it was going. It’s not the discussion I requested nor the result I hoped for but people are free to contribute how they choose.
This doesn’t make any sense as a representation of the exchange. The “premise” I was challenging is not thing that OP is seeking evidence for. The premise is OP’s loaded assumption that empirical evidence should exist, and that empirical evidence is the only way to justify that thing.
The synopsis should be:
OP: I’m looking for scientific cites in support of X, because empirical evidence is the only valid way to justify X.
Response: I question your premise that the absence of rigorous empirical evidence should lead to skepticism about X, because
(a) such evidence may be difficult to obtain, so its absence does not justify such strong inference;
(b) X may be justified for non-empirical reasons.
So regarding this:
And I wasn’t seeking to do that. OP was implying what conclusions should be drawn from the existence or non-existence of the empirical evidence they asked for. That’s what I was disputing. It does not require a debate of the ethical issues, but it requires pointing out that non-empirical ethical arguments do exist.
If it’s not fair game to discuss the implicit assumptions of an OP that is loaded in this manner within FQ, then the entire thread should be kicked to another forum. You can’t allow an OP to advance a line of reasoning under superficial cover of a neutral “request for facts” and leave it immune to challenge.
No, it’s not. There are many reasons for adopting a parenting strategy. The OP asking about one of them says nothing of the validity of others. And if you want to discuss the others, nobody is stopping you from opening another thread about them.
For too long FQ threads have been overrun by the IMHO crowd. If you don’t know the answer to a factual question, just don’t post.
I’m starting to wonder if people are reading the same thread as me. To quote OP again:
Are you really claiming that OP is not implying any opinion here as to what conclusions we should draw about the validity of this approach to parenting if empirical data from rigorous scientific studies does not exist?
If an OP in FQ wants to avoid this kind of problem, it should ask neutrally, it should not itself not advance a questionable line of reasoning that amounts to an opinion.
And one of the things that was moderated out of bounds was even to question what kind of hypothesis might sensibly be tested in a scientific study, and the potential difficulty and likely long delay in obtaining reliable empirical data. Without that kind of context, we cannot possibly interpret any cited study sensibly, or infer anything reliable from the absence of data. Is that discussion an “opinion” that should be out of bounds in FQ?
The quoted portions are critical of poor science or non-science being trotted out as scientific rationale and do not address non-scientific rationale — most of what I rely on when interacting with children FWIW — that is recognized as such. I ask more experienced adults “what works/worked for you?” but that’s completely different from asking “has this been studied?” and, particularly important for sociology research, “how?”
Sorry, no. OP does not own a thread, and if a thread advances a line of reasoning, I don’t want to be told that the appropriate place to dispute that line of reasoning is to open another thread.
…the premise, as presented in the OP, is that it’s a “parenting strategy” designed so that “if they learn about consent and bodily autonomy early, they will be more likely to maintain those boundaries later and so will be less likely to be sexually manipulated or abused.”
But is it though?
I don’t think it is.
I think consent is consent. And if I ever have kids, I’d teach this to my kids not " so will be less likely to be sexually manipulated or abused", but so that they won’t sexually manipulate or abuse other people. Its about teaching them to respect other peoples boundaries.
Its an ethical position. Not an abuse prevention strategy.
The question “Is there any scientific or sociological evidence that this parenting strategy reduces rates of sexual abuse?” assumes the premise the OP sets up is correct. But I don’t think it is, and the OP doesn’t present any evidence to back that premise up.
The question on its own is fine.
But to answer the question effectively additional context should be allowed. Because I think the question is fundamentally based on an utterly bullshit premise, and its important to be able to point that out.
If you don’t think there is a single person out there who has adopted this “parenting strategy” designed so that “if they learn about consent and bodily autonomy early, they will be more likely to maintain those boundaries later and so will be less likely to be sexually manipulated or abused,” then you don’t have the factual answer the OP has requested.
OP: What scientific studies and empirical evidence are there to support the trendy notion that I’ve heard recently that I should not eat babies? Because all that stuff about peanuts didn’t have any solid science behind it and that turned out to be stupid and wrong.
Response: Well, there probably aren’t any studies, because what would you study that would be relevant? The belief that we shouldn’t eat babies doesn’t derive from empirical evidence that they give you indigestion, it derives from an ethical belief in their right to life.
Moderator/Ruken: This is FQ. If you don’t have the factual information that OP has asked for, please refrain from off-topic comments and opinions, if you wish you may start your own thread.
…a single person isn’t statistically significant enough for anybody to conduct scientific research. And thats kinda key to the whole discussion. How many parents do believe this? Who is advocating for this?
The first three websites I visited on Google, NONE of them mentioned it was to prevent later sexually manipulation or abuse. I’m sure if I dug a bit deeper, some would pop up.
The OP is based on, essentially, a strawman. It presented a premise that they asserted to be true, then challenged the board to provide evidence to support the premise they essentially just made up.
We should either be allowed to challenge the premise in that thread, or the thread should be moved to a more appropriate forum so the premise can be debated.