Represenative Mark Foley isn't a pedophile. He may be a creep, but he's no chester. What makes this situation utterly despicable is a 50-something man consumed by power thought he could make sexual advances to teenage pages and get away with it because of who he was. What happened deserves some sort of outrage, but not in the manner with which it is currently occurring.
Pedophiles try to fuck kids. Foley never actually did that. While reading all of the conversations, I have yet to find an instance of where the congressman said something along the lines of, "Hey, you want to come over, have some Jesus-Juice, and suck on my shriveled, limp white penis?" He may have thought it, but he never acted on it. Now, there are fucked up passages, such as when Foley told one he liked to imagine the page's ass going up and down while he was masturbating on his stomach in bed. Not so cool. But commie-pinkos like myself would serve well to remember that speech and thought are protected by the Bill of Rights which we claim to treasure so much, even for pedophiles who should be tortured and then executed.
Additionally, society, and the media in particular, is not being truthful with itself when it labels Foley a pedophile. Why do I say that? Well, the answer lies in two places: (1) the way media has sexualized adolescents, and (2) the laughable idea that age-of-consent laws are in place first and foremost to protect children.
From books to movies to television, girls and boys are being depicted as sexual beings at a much younger age. You want proof? Click on the title of this essay to see a picture of Emma Watson. Ms. Watson, who up to this point is best known for her role in the Harry Potter movies, is all of 16 years old. Yet, she is looking longingly into the camera while wearing skin-tight clothes. Now, is there a difference between this and Foley asking his page how he jacks-off? Certainly. But perhaps the question we should all be asking is, "Why did Foley even see this boy as a sexual creature in the first place?" Maybe he has some serious mental disorder, because apparently he's checked into rehab. Or maybe part of it is because society gave him the implicit permission to view the youngest page in such a way in the first place.
There appears to be some debate now about the age and identity of the staffers, at least in the mind of Matt Drudge. But let's assume for the moment that Foley did make sexually-charged comments to a 16-year-old boy. Que the moral outrage and rightly so. But why should someone be truly upset about this? The first reaction is probably because throughout much of the country the legal age of consent is 18, and many people would say that we have such laws to protect the innocence of childhood. On this I say to both parts, bullshit. We have age of consent laws to protect us adults from ourselves. Let me give you an example. Bruce Willis fucked Lyndsey Lohan when she was 18, at least according to the celebrity gossip mills. If it's true, you know what that tells me? He would have nailed her when she was 16 had it been legal. And truth be told he wouldn't be the only one judging by the way my dad drools at the sight of a certain starlet named Scarlett. So, you can take your goody-two-shoes argument about protection and dump it out the window.
The age-of-consent law is 18 because we as a society believe that having sex with someone younger than that is a bit barbaric and shouldn't be deemed acceptable. But the actual reason it's in place is to keep people, mostly men, from actually banging a 16-year-old, because if it were legal they would. Be honest with yourself. (And please spare me the half-hearted speech of there's a meaningful maturity difference between someone who has just gotten their driver's license and someone who just got out of high school.) Like I said, it's all about protecting us from ourselves.
So, you're probably asking yourself, why, if I believe that society has been asking for this kind of behavior, am I upset about what occurred? Or put another way, why do I feel the outrage is misplaced? Let me explain.
Assuming Foley isn't a mental patient, I think any crisis of conscience he had over what he did probably went like this: "I don't know... talking to a young male about showering may not be the smartest thing. But then again, Ted Kennedy killed a woman and he still gets to be senator. So, who the fuck's going to stop me?" In other words, I think Mark Foley thought his power as an elected representative of the people would surely be enough to keep this hush-hush, particularly when the Speaker of the House seems to be at least in some ways complicit. And that my friends is truly outrageous.
Foley certainly knew what he was doing. Chances are if you're working for a Congressman at such a young age you're also thinking about a career in politics. And if I thought of that, so did he. Foley knew where he was from. Florida is not Miami. Florida is the panhandle. And most of the country is the panhandle as well. What do I mean? Well, the fact of the matter is that most of the country seems to operate under the principle of gays-need-not-apply. The representative knew that a homosexual scandal would sink his political career. But he could also rest assured that it would also derail the dreams of his young heartthrob.
To me if you want to talk about legality and this situation, you should look to sexual harassment. Because if it isn't, a lot of the dynamics are still the same. When I took Employment Discrimination, I laughed at some of the things the bosses/supervisors did, thinking, "What made them think that they would get away with this?" I quickly understood then it was all about power. One, these guys figure that if their victim wants to keep his/her job, then they won't tell. Two, these people probably have little power over there own lives, so they attempt to control somebody else's.
Bring on Mark Foley. I've already explained the first part. When it comes to the second, I'm not now arguing against myself. By his position soley, the dude had power, which I'm sure in turn fueled why he felt protected. But let's not forget, he's also a politician. One doesn't get there by not making few choices when it comes to his ethical flexibility. So, why not try to exert control over a rather powerless individual?
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. It certainly did for Foley and Hastert. If you want to be upset about something, let it be that.
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