Prescription:
An Enthusiastic Fucking
by Sterling
Chapter 2 of 11
The New York Times.
The Week In Review.
The
Lolita Syndrome has the potential to disrupt and transform the fabric
of society in profound ways. As we approach seven weeks since the
announcement of the Syndrome, it is time to take stock. This issue
includes a number of articles on the subject.
It
has now been seven weeks since the first reports of the Lolita
Syndrome. At this writing over one thousand cases have been reported,
with at least three confirmed cases in 15 different US and Canadian
metropolitan areas, plus a handful of cases in London, Singapore, and
Rome.
Of course, it has an official name: "Intercourse
Alleviated Gastrointestinal Distress Syndrome" or IAGDS, an acronym
pronounced as "Egads". But everyone calls it the Lolita Syndrome.
It
is universally assumed that the Syndrome is caused by a micro-organism.
It has not been isolated, but epidemiologists can draw many conclusions
based on the distribution of cases.
According to Dr. Arne Borg
of the Center for Disease Control, "This is almost certainly a virus,
and it is highly contagious, through direct skin contact or airborne
particles. It seems that it infects all humans, and all of us act as
carriers. The only effect we have observed so far is the Lolita
Syndrome itself, which seems to affect girls from about age five
through puberty. But even of the infected girls, our guess is that only
about half will show the Syndrome. It looks like symptoms only occur
after at least two weeks of infection. It is safe to assume that
incubating cases have spread throughout the world through airline
travel. Stopping the spread of this virus will be virtually impossible."
The
now infamous blogger Angry Scientist predicted the appearance of the
Syndrome and its basic properties. He didn't describe the symptoms, but
he clearly stated his goal: He wanted the world to confront reality as
he saw it: that pedophilic attraction in men was far more common than
people think, that it is not inherently a bad thing, and that society
should stop discriminating against men merely for the attraction. The
Syndrome matches his goals very well.
The Lolita Syndrome's
primary symptom is severe nausea and vomiting. It also involves a
maturation of the girl's vagina and vulva, though it doesn't cause the
onset of puberty itself. This maturation is rarely noticed by the girl
before the digestive symptoms begin, but it must begin at least a few
days earlier.
If untreated, mortality is over 90%. There is only
one effective treatment, and it has been a profound shock to society.
If a man has sexual intercourse with the girl, mortality is near zero.
One of the most vile, heinous crimes known to humanity is necessary to
treat a pandemic.
Simply depositing semen in the vagina is
ineffective, though the semen is necessary. A shallow penetration and
quick ejaculation is not enough. It must be a zesty, enthusiastic act
of intercourse. Tentative reports are that the girl cannot be asleep.
"What it looks like," said a researcher who requested anonymity, "is
that the girl has to really know she's being f---ed."
There
is a considerable window available between symptom onset and the last
opportunity for life-saving treatment: intercourse two days after the
first symptoms has so far always been effective, and usually the girl
will recover if she gets treatment within three days.
If an
adult woman were to require intercourse within 48 hours to save her
life, it would be a relatively straightforward matter. Arranging for a
girl to have intercourse is far more difficult.
Who can perform
an enthusiastic act of intercourse with a pre-pubescent girl? A
pedophile. Parents are now faced with the task of locating for their
daughter a member of the most loathsome class of humans on the planet
and letting him live out his most disgusting fantasy. In fact, it is
more a matter of convincing him to have sex with the girl than letting
him. The legal system still considers the treatment of this Syndrome to
be a serious crime warranting years or decades in prison. Merely coming
out of the closet will subject him to social ostracism.
In fact,
no court is going to prosecute a man who saves a girl's life. But
emotional reactions among individuals are far more complicated. Parents
may beg for a pedophile to come forward to save their daughter, but
their feelings of disgust and hatred cannot be wished away. Mistrust
runs deep on both sides and no one can honestly tell the pedophiles of
the world that all will be well. If a cure is found promptly, people
will soon forget the lifesaving service these men provided.
A
cause for alarm was the assumption that there are very few pedophiles.
Sexual attraction to pre-pubescent girls is unnatural, the usual
thinking went. Surveys showed that the typical person thought about two
percent of men were attracted to young girls.
The fear seemed justified, as the initial statistics were grim. In the
first two weeks, 85% of girls with the syndrome died.
However,
mortality has dropped each week, to 72%, 51%, 42%, and 29%. How can
society be locating hundreds of pedophiles on a moment's notice?
The
answer lies in that term "pedophile" and what it means. One meaning is
a man who commits sex crimes with children. Although one sex criminal
is too many, the actual number of men in that category is very small.
The other meaning is a man who is sexually attracted to young children.
It appears that a remarkable number of fathers, big brothers, neighbors
and friends of the family find they are able to perform a zesty,
enthusiastic act of intercourse with a small breastless, hipless girl.
The basic sexual attraction required for the act seems to be quite
common.
Although some experts in the field were not surprised to
discover this, it went totally against the narrative that society
accepted: Since the attraction of adult men to pre-pubescents was only
detected in a small handful of men who committed sex crimes, it must be
a very rare inclination. Because men who commit sex crimes have serious
problems with self-control, the inclination itself was tied to
psychological deficiencies. Scientists were strongly discouraged from
investigations that might challenge that view and even more strongly
discouraged from publishing results that undermined it.
Angry
Scientist predicted that attraction to young girls was far more
prevalent than the common view, and he was right. This is not to defend
the man, who will go down in history as one of the most despicable
criminals of all time. He already has the blood of a hundred girls on
his hands, and the casualties are sure to soar into the thousands and
beyond. Although it is harder to quantify and the effects will not be
fully apparent for decades, the majority of girls will presumably
suffer psychological damage from this premature and unwanted sexual
intercourse.
Although the government will not comment on an
ongoing investigation, everyone suspects that the most sophisticated
techniques of the NSA are being brought to bear in an effort to track
Angry Scientist's blog posts back to the man behind them. He has not
made any further posts after his famous prediction, and security
experts say it would extremely perilous for him to do so.
There
is a general consensus that he is a present or former geneticist
associated with a top secret government biological warfare program. An
agent that causes nausea and vomiting leading to death makes sense in
the context of biological warfare, as does a microbe that is impervious
to known methods of treatment. Enlargement of female genitalia is a
natural part of puberty, so it is no great surprise that a
microorganism can be crafted to trigger it prematurely. The most
difficult innovation -- many scientists would have said it was
impossible -- was one where a robust act of intercourse with the girl
would cure her. Semen alone does not suffice, and the girl must
perceive that intercourse is happening. That is a very difficult
achievement.
There is some tantalizing evidence that the virus
may inhibit the transmission of STDs, but other scientists say it is
far too soon to speculate on that.
Joe,
Ellen, and their 9-year-old Katy are a family in the suburban New York
area. (We have changed their names for this article). Katy was among
the first thirty girls to contract the Syndrome.
"Our doctor
told us that it was very likely to be fatal and that getting a man to
have sex with Katy might save her life. We couldn't think of anyone
outside the family, so I decided to do it myself," says Joe. "It was an
agonizing decision. I remember thinking I must be down the rabbit hole
with Alice, and that was the only thing that let me actually go ahead
and do it."
He naturally wanted to minimize the impact on Katy.
"I first had intercourse with my wife but didn't finish. What I did
with Katy was gentle and quick." But it didn't work to stop her
vomiting.
Then Joe made a connection. "I thought about Angry
Scientist's post and decided to work not from the medical evidence we
had at the time but from what I thought he was aiming for. I tried to
imagine how a pedophile would fantasize about having sex with a girl
and tried to live out that fantasy." That worked. He reported it to the
medical authorities and it was immediately relayed to the families of
the affected girls. Scores of girls owe their lives to his intuition
and his courageous willingness to carry out the experiment.
"I
never dreamed of sex with a girl, Katy or anyone else. But suddenly
when the need arose, I found I could perform. What I did used to be
called incestuous child rape. I played along with the script Angry
Scientist wrote for me. If it was just acting, I could shrug it off.
But it wasn't just playing a part. My body responded sexually. And
although it's hard to admit it, at some important levels, I enjoyed it."
He
pauses to reflect. ""So who am I? Could I have managed to have sex with
a boy -- or, let's say, an animal, to pick an outrageous case -- if
that was what it would take to save my daughter? I don't think it would
have worked. There was some underlying attraction there."
"What
I do know is that my Katy is alive," he says, squeezing the girl seated
to his right between him and his wife. She smiles at him; it looks like
the smile of a girl who loves her daddy.
Joe is rare in being willing to look at himself so honestly and share
what he finds.
"It's
hard, I admit it," says Ellen. "What mother wants to hear that her
husband is planning to abuse her daughter -- to rape her? What kind of
a man could do that?" She paused, looking lovingly at Joe. "A very,
very good man, of course. But feelings don't just go away because they
ought to."
We were reluctant to have Katy present at the
interview at all, but Ellen and Joe urged us to. Katy didn't pretend to
actively want to talk, but she said, "If stuff I say can help other
girls then I want to."
Her take on the whole issue: "It was
weird. Weird it had to happen and a weird experience, the part with my
daddy. But it didn't hurt. It fit," she said, giggling. "I knew my
daddy was trying to save my life. Everyone wants to talk about that
part of it. The part I remember is how awful it was to be so sick, all
that throw-up and worse when there was nothing to throw up any more.
And I was scared to death I was going to die. The sex part was weird
but it wasn't a big deal."
The young lady has a very sensible
perspective. It's better to have intercourse than die, and if there is
no tissue damage or pain, it's an even easier call. Yet children often
minimize the impact of sexual abuse at the time. It's only later that
the consequences become clear.
Everything in Katy's family is out in the open and it's a story with a
happy ending.
There are plenty of other stories, and the range of heartbreak is
sobering.
There
are fathers who didn't try, for a variety of reasons. Some felt it just
wasn't right. Some thought it couldn't possibly help; it made no sense.
Some were afraid of going to prison. Some thought they couldn't perform
with a girl that young, but now wonder if maybe they could have. Were
they just fundamentally unable to, or could they have discovered that
part of themselves if they were brave enough to look within? Some tried
but couldn't get or keep an erection. Some penetrated but could not
ejaculate. Some succeeded in completing the act but found it wasn't
enough, apparently because it wasn't enthusiastic enough.
There
are men who tried to forcibly rape their daughters but the girls were
too strong for them and died. There are mothers who wouldn't help hold
their daughter down to be raped and will forever wonder if they could
have saved her.
Of course it's not all fathers. There are plenty
of brothers, neighbors and family friends. Many men got a tearful call
from a distraught mother or father asking if they could please try to
have sex with their 6-year-old. Some just laughed and hung up. If they
had taken the time to search the web and find that the unbelievable was
real, would it have ended differently? Some just didn't want to get
involved. Many were afraid of going to prison.
All have to wonder if some little girl might still be alive today if
they had chosen differently.
Yet
of course in a great many cases -- well over half by now -- the girl
found a man for that life-giving act of enthusiastic, zestful
intercourse, and she is alive. Although far happier outcomes, in each
of these cases there is a man who is asking himself whether he's a
pedophile, and if so what that means about him and the world he lives
in.
Says
Fred Paulson of Harvard Law School, "The simplest case is clear enough.
If the girl says it's OK, if both her parents say it's OK, and if she
has the Syndrome, then it's OK. A crime committed to prevent something
worse from happening isn't a crime. If it's what a reasonable person
would consider a good faith effort, then there's no problem.
"If
the girl refuses and struggles, then it's less clear. If what a man is
providing is viewed as an accepted medical prescription for a
life-threatening disorder, then it's justified if there is no better
alternative. Sometimes children have to be subdued to receive medical
treatment. But of course it doesn't feel that way emotionally. It's
hard for anyone to watch a young girl being forcibly raped, even if it
is to save her life.
"Seven weeks ago the idea that intercourse
with a child was a medical treatment was ludicrous. Today it is firmly
established. Of course it's a medical treatment unlike any other in
history, and a treatment that until this moment was always a terrible
crime when 'administered' to a minor."
There are some
conservative religious thinkers and some secular ethicists who think
underage sex to cure the disease is flatly and absolutely immoral. The
Syndrome itself is evil, probably a human creation, and yielding to its
demands is itself evil. We should not abandon our most cherished
principles, they say. It's akin to giving in to terrorist demands. They
suggest we keep the girls comfortable as they die with dignity. They
are a minority.
Some people feel serious moral qualms but don't
want their daughters to die, and they find a way to assuage their guilt
a little. A social worker in Atlanta said, "There was the mother who
explained to her 7-year-old that she had this disease and if nothing
was done she'd probably die of it. Having sex would cure her, but
having sex was against their family's religious beliefs. And by the
way, that teenage boy two houses down wanted to know if she'd come over
to play -- even if she was throwing up."
But some parents stick
to their guns. Hundreds of trusting 6-year-olds died because their
parents refused treatment they considered contrary to God's law. But
the secular law that governs our society does not allow withholding
treatment from a child on religious grounds. No charges were pressed in
the early days. As the medical situation has become crystal clear,
there is a strong movement gathering steam to prosecute parents who
don't get their daughters what they need.
There has been local
vigilantism as well. When a girl from a morally conservative family
goes home from school with a stomach bug, anxious neighbors call and
ring the doorbell. In over a dozen cases, neighbors who didn't receive
satisfactory answers broke into the home and forcibly removed the girl,
then arranged for a man to rape her to save her life. No District
Attorney has chosen to prosecute neighbors for such behavior, and no
one believes any jury would convict them.
We're
down to 29% mortality from the Syndrome. That's much better than it
was, relieving for the moment fears of a species-ending cataclysm. But
it is still extremely high by public health standards. That number
needs to be a lot closer to zero before anyone will say we are facing
anything other than a Holocaust.
A girl gets the Syndrome. She has 48 hours to get treated. What should
her parents do?
The
closest place to look for someone to treat the girl is right at home.
Most girls have a father or father figure; many have a big brother.
They care, and they're motivated. If they're willing, are they the
right choice?
Since we are talking about sex and we all agree
incest is bad, the initial conclusion is that it's best if the man is
not the girl's father or brother or other close family member. On the
other hand, the prospect of sex is often frightening for the girl, and
it's worse since she is feeling very ill to begin with. Having a man
she knows and trusts can make it easier. What's unclear is whether from
the girl's point of view this is sex or therapy. "If you needed to
apply ointment to her labia," said one public health nurse, "her father
would be preferable to some strange man. In her head, is this ointment
or is this sex? We don't know." With a bit of bawdy humor, she adds,
"Of course, to be effective he has to apply that kind of ointment with
a zesty enthusiasm, not clinical detachment."
Perhaps there is
no suitable male relative, or perhaps the family wants to consider that
as a last resort. Where should parents turn? Calling friends and
acquaintances is an awkward, chaotic business, as distraught parents
found out in the early weeks of the Syndrome.
In New York an
agency has been launched, one that collects the names of men willing to
have intercourse with girls, at least under some circumstances. The
agency's job is to match girls with men. Other cities are quickly
following suit, though their eyes are fixed on New York, hoping to
learn from the experience of this pioneering program.
The
official name is the "Intercourse Alleviated Gastrointestinal Distress
Syndrome Resource Center". Informal names range from the obscure
"Humberts For Hire" (referring to the man who abused Lolita in
Nabokov's famous novel) to the crude "Pervs 'R Us" and
"Daughterfuckers". The name people can manage in polite conversation is
"IAGDS Center."
Dr. Ruth Rogers is the coordinator. She spoke at some length about the
issues they face.
"Parents
don't want the guys we usually think of as pedophiles. That is, they
don't want the guys from the sex offender registry, and they don't want
the sort of strange or stunted personality that might lead a man to
commit a sex crime with a child. Everyone should know we have no men
who fit that profile at the Center. There are very few of them to begin
with, and they mostly aren't volunteering anyway.
"What parents
want are 'normal' guys who think they can step forward and have 'zesty,
enthusiastic' sex with young girls, as the phrase goes. It helps if
they have some experience with girls that age to know how they think.
"The
main source of great candidates we have are close relatives of some
other girl who's the right age to be affected. Fathers and big brothers
are the most common. In fact, we'll offer any girl red carpet treatment
if she has a male relative who volunteers.
"Now, men who are in
a committed partnership have a problem because the usual understanding
is that they aren't supposed to be having sex with anyone else, even if
it is a little girl. Some wives and girlfriends are understanding on
that point and some aren't. Unattached big brothers and uncles are
often the ideal candidates.
"One group of men we're looking for
is those who have known all along they have an attraction to young
girls. They would never have gone near a girl because they're decent
guys, but they might fantasize. Maybe they've gone onto questionable
websites or downloaded some borderline photos, maybe from child
modeling sites. They're reluctant to come forward because they don't
want to attract the attention of the police. Law enforcement in New
York is now prohibited from initiating an investigation of someone
because they have contacted the Center. Some people think we shouldn't
let these people near our daughters, but I think it's hypocritical. If
a man suddenly realizes now he's attracted to young girls, they'll call
him a hero, but if he realized it before the attraction became useful,
then he's still a monster? That makes no sense.
"Then there's
the fact that there's more to this than finding a guy for every girl
who needs one. The truth about human sexuality is that it's merely nice
if the female finds the male attractive, but it's essential that the
male find the female attractive or it won't work physically. And while
people are shocked to learn how many men can have zesty intercourse
with young girls, many of those men are still primarily oriented to
grown women, so they're pickier about the girls. It's easier to find a
man for a 10-year-old than a 5-year-old, and girls also vary in
appearance and build. So as soon as a girl's family calls in, we
quickly get some video of her and send it out to our male volunteers.
They'll tell us if they're interested, and then we give the girl's
parents those men to choose among.
"It's embarrassing -- but
more to the point, alarming -- when it takes us a long time to get
anyone at all for a girl's family to look at. But thankfully we do have
some men who really are attracted to just about any girl with a pulse,"
she added with a mournful laugh.
"Because the men see the girl
before she or her parents see him, they have some confidentiality.
Whenever possible we have the parents and daughter come to us, to sit
at our terminals without any cell phone cameras, so there are no
pictures of these guys to plaster on the internet. If they can't come
in, they have a smaller pool of guys to choose from.
"Some
parents just pick a man for their daughters. Giving the daughter a veto
if she dislikes the video footage of the first guy is OK, conceivably
twice is OK, but letting her choose from a dozen isn't good. She's
going to have a negative reaction to the whole thing which will
sometimes carry over to every man she sees.
"And finally, not
all guys can perform all the time with all girls. We get feedback from
both the man and the girl's family after every meeting we arrange. We
make a note of matches that don't work. There are those few go-to guys
we know to contact if a couple other men can't get the job done."
There was one issue I wanted to raise with Dr. Rogers. "What do you
think of those men setting up ads on Craig's List?"
She answered easily, but she couldn't quite mask her expression of
distaste.
"It's
inevitable, as long as we have a shortage of men. Supply and demand. I
would caution anyone considering that option that there is no licensing
or screening. We are debating what to do about payment in our own
operations. If a family waits 48 hours to contact us, maybe they should
be paying us $10,000 -- those calls are a serious strain on us.
"What
I think lies at the heart of the payment question otherwise is that
fundamental distinction: is it sex, or is it therapy? We expect to pay
money for medical treatments -- or expect our health insurance will. We
don't expect to pay for sex -- at least females don't!
"Another
question is not whether the family pays but whether the men get paid.
What is their motivation? Sexual desire necessarily plays at least some
part. A selfless desire to save lives might be involved. Should
financial reward also play a part? Different parents may have different
preferences if it was totally up to them. To what extent should we care
what's going on in the man's head? It's complicated."
Dr. Rogers
certainly has a great many issues to consider, and enormous time
pressure. The number of girls needing treatment is growing
exponentially.