Child Rape as Legitimate Entertainment

He makes a number of excellent points, but still misses what has bothered me worst about "Hound Dog:"  the way that the adults in charge of making this movie (producer, director, writers) have maneuvered 12-year-old Fanning into being its most vocal defender. A pubescent girl's judgment is not the equivalent of adult judgment. Mr. Redford is too busy expanding the mission of his little film festival to political commentary to be bothered addressing the issue, as well.

 

Frankly, I worry about all the child actors whose parents allow them to be roped into this kind of role. Take Angus T. Jones, of "Two and A Half Men." The entire show revolves around his being roped into sexually charged situations by the adults in his life. Unlike the Christian Rightists, I think the show is funny as hell, but I wonder what sort of adult Angus will grow up to be, having been deprived of his childhood innocence at such a tender age. The same is true of Fanning, and all the other child actors who have been sexualized for profit at an age when they should be left alone to be children.

 

Of course, the entire notion of childhood as a separate, protected status is less than a century old, and peculiar to developed Western cultures. Perhaps child labor and child prostitution is the natural state of affairs. It certainly appears that we are headed back in that direction.