My father is a retired cop. I have been “exposed” to, and “educated” about the seamier side of society, which is the part of society my father got to deal with every day in his career as a law enforcement officer. I didn’t grow up in a bubble. And, you completely missed my point, which was NOT to compare, associate, or make distinctions between homosexuals, and pedophiles.
My point is, the general consensus regarding homosexuals in this country did a complete and total 180* flip in about 2 generations. I am not saying right, wrong, or indifferent about the extremes to which anti-homosexual feelings ran in this country, just a mere 1 or 2 generations ago. The point is, those widely-held, hardcore sentiments about homosexuality changed, and changed rapidly.
Right now, there are widely-held, hardcore sentiments against pedophiles. In your lifetime, you will see those widely-held, hardcore sentiments slowly become “liberalized”, just as they did with homosexuality. This is not comparing the two groups as to their lifestyles, but, rather, it is illustrating a point; that point being, given enough time, notions about things you never believed would be tolerated, let alone mainstreamed, can, and do change.
There are places in the world RIGHT NOW where the age of sexual consent is 14.