A confluence of events provided the factors for the paradigm shift. 

In the 80s the media went wild for 2 EXTREMELY RARE cases of child abduction by a stranger. Adam Walsh and Etan Patz (a while later Jacob Wetterling). Kids were on milk cartons. TV news got much better ratings when they covered scary stories, involving blood and death. Heart-wrenching stories with adorable blond 6 year old victims sold like hotcakes. So Stranger Danger Panic emerged.

TV personalities got rich and famous by terrifying the population even more. Their shtick required that the victim be innocent and vulnerable. So they constantly used words like "defenseless victim", "impressionable minor", "naive child", and "inexperienced teen"

Big sexual abuse lawsuits against the Boy Scouts and the Catholic Church popularized the idea that child sex abuse is extremely harmful and extremely common. Neither of those things is true. Well-meaning people conflated the concepts of minor and child so they could inflate statistics. Teens can, of course, consent to sex, they've been doing it for all of human history, but admitting that would mean that you couldn't prosecute or sue for millions of $$$. So well-meaning but teen-phobic sex-phobic Puritans invented the mantra "minors can't consent". They have to repeat it constantly, because it is obviously not true.  Read More »

One of the most fascinating things in the last few decades of U.S. politics is the total reversal of the sex-positive vs sex-negative positions of the two main parties. 

In the 80s and 90s the Republicans were the party of Jerry Falwell and the Moral Majority. The sex-phobic Puritan idiots were all in the GOP. 

The sex-positive enjoy life and don't suppress healthy natural desires party was the Democrats. 

In the 90s the Rs tried desperately to beat Bill Clinton over the head with his sex scandals, and while some voters were disgusted by his dalliance with Lewinsky, overall he kinda made it so sex scandals don't matter. 

Now as we enter 2025 the opposite is true. Seems like every R in tarnation has half a dozen sex scandals and the Dems just won't shut up about them, and those Rs just keep winning elections. Maybe establishing a new slut-shaming left-wing Moral Majority wasn't a good idea.  Read More »

re: "but there should be at least some connections between people who engage in relationships"

You are free to have whatever kinds of relationships you want. Others are free to do the same. Who the f**k are you to tell others what kinds of relationships they should have? Mind your own f**king business.

re: "we have normalised hookup culture and sexualization"

This is absolute bulls**t. Young people are having less sex than at any time since the 1950s. Yapping nonsense about "hookup culture" is a stupid scare tactic. It has no basis in reality. All the data show that our society is more prudish, sex-phobic, and puritanical now than it's been for 4 generations.

"sexualization" is a fashionable buzz word these days, but anyone who takes some time to think it thru realizes that the whole thing is utter bulls**t. It makes no sense on any level. The word means 10 different things, but also means nothing. Read More »

It seems to me that everybody wants to blame smart phones and TikTok so they won't have to examine how helicopter parenting destroyed the minds of the younger generations.

_"Between 1979 and 1989 use of the word 'predator' goes up 900%"

Mass hysteria gripped the USA, and never let go.

https://buzzsprout.com/1112270/3884039-stranger-danger

My vids are on Instagram too.

This one, for example:

Many people fundamentally misunderstand what age of consent laws do. Few take the time to learn how they work, or even what the law in their state is. They have naive notions that "Romeo & Juliet laws" mean only bad people get branded sex criminals.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CjYL7EqoCd-/

_

Peeps in the US whipped themselves into an hysterical frenzy over mythical sex predators raping their children and lurking around every corner ready to pounce on their next sweet innocent victim. Hansen and Walsh got rich as hell terrifying American parents. Our whole society is an emotional basket case ever since.

Honestly I don't think Cuties is about sexuality at all. 

I think our sex-phobic culture has made us obsessed with sex, so we see it everywhere, and it dominates our view of everything, even when the real theme of the movie is right there shouting at us the whole time.