A reader writes:
You should know that Matt and Trey already answered this question a long time ago: "It makes your johnson look bigger."
Another shifts gears:
Okay, Romeo and Juliet is a poor example to prove that young teenaged girls have been objects of sexual desire. 1) It's a play about punishing misbehaving teenagers. It only works as a narrative if Juliet is the object of desire. Even so, that desire is regulated through a secret marriage. 2) Previous to the 1885 Criminal Law Act, the age of consent in England was 13 (and had been lower before an 1860 Act).
During Shakespeare's day, a 13 year old could have been reasonably seen as a woman, not a child. When Marie Antionette was married to Louis XVII at the age of 14, all of their advisors couldn't understand why they didn't immediately begin having children. To us it seems clear that it's because of their young ages, but not to observers in the late 18th century. Our extended adolescence comes from our better understanding of how people develop. It's one of the many reasons why the age of consent in the US is now between 16 and 18 – we recognize that 13 year olds don't know what they're consenting to. Indeed, W.T. Stead's series, "The Maiden Tribute to Modern Babylon," which pushed Parliament to discuss the 1885 Criminal Law Act, explicitly made this point. (Incidentally, this bill is remembered more for the Labouchere Amendment, which criminalized homosexuality, than it's intended purpose – to raise the age of consent and stop the traffic of women into brothels.)
I know this has nothing to do with pubic hair, but we can't just use our sexual mores to judge the past or vice versa. I take the writer's point – teenaged females were objects of desire before the 1970s – but attitudes towards sex involve historical context. (Plus, I really detest Romeo and Juliet, which is often read as a romance, when it really is about punishing children who don't follow their parents' rules for marriage. Yeah, the families are told that their children's deaths are their fault, but the real narrative punishment is directed at Juliet, who has to wake up to her dead husband after faking her own death so that they could be together.)
The Dish 