homosexual activity shortens a man’s life expectancy by about 20 years.

Assuming for the sake of argument that that’s true, why is that? If it’s not independent of social factors (and surely it’s not), then it can’t be used as an argument to justify the very social factors in question.

most children pass through an age when they are attracted to friendships with the same gender, but they grow out of it. Letting the sexual development of a child be truncated (usually by older men) by early homosexual activity is simply unjust.

This assumes that heteronormativity without argument.

Then there is the MSM (man having sex with men) who has a hetero sex partner but never tells her about his MSM activity. That’s fraud.

Now you seem to be going off into a general rant about homosexuality that has nothing to do with the topic.

1. homosexual activity shortens a man’s life expectancy by about 20 years.

2. most children pass through an age when they are attracted to friendships with the same gender, but they grow out of it. Letting the sexual development of a child be truncated (usually by older men) by early homosexual activity is simply unjust.

We have some nasty diseases in the general population, due to homosexual activity. Even babies are being infected with HIV. Obviously, the consequences of the activity is not confined to consenting persons. Then there is the MSM (man having sex with men) who has a hetero sex partner but never tells her about his MSM activity. That’s fraud.

Which is an excellent reason to expect more of the children in your life, rather than less, and, in return, accord more respect to those who do their best to rise to the occasion.

do we run the risk, by accepting this position, of it being determined that person X still has not gained the ability to use his innate, natural, inalienable, individual, human rights, even after, say, fifty years outside of the womb?

Well, we can at least say that the mere fact that someone acts irrationally is not by itself evidence that their rational faculties are impaired — since the capacity to behave rationally includes the capacity to behave irrationally. And anyone who tries to raise the bar too high on other people will (absent a government monopoly) run the risk of having raised equally high on themselves.

do we run the risk of people murdering X, justifying said murder by claiming that X, although possessing the innate, negative right to life, has not yet gained the “ability” to use that right?

My view (elaborated in my abortion and punishment articles) is that if one proposes to make decisions for a rationally impaired person (e.g., having sex with them or killing them), one has to act as that person’s agent, that is, one has to make the decision for them that (as best one can determine) they would make for themselves if not impaired.

For example, they would, it seems, be incapable of granting authority to their parents to govern them

See above.

If we conclude that one’s ability to use one’s innate rights can be gained over time, do we open ourselves up to the claim that these abilities can be lost over time as well.

Sure.

The one problem I see here is that no parent, according to Rothbardian theory, is innately obligated to raise children.

I deal with the nature and basis of parental/guardianship rights/duties in my abortion paper, which I promise to post soon! But briefly, guardianship rights and responsibilities come as a package, and in accepting one, one thereby accepts the other.

do you think it’s possible that one can gain the ability to use one’s innate rights even without actually seceding from one’s parents and taking on all the same responsibility of adults?

Sure. For me it’s just a matter of whether one’s capacities are impaired or not.

how would the Longian legal system go about proving beyond a reasonable doubt that a given child does not possess the capacity to consent, or would it simply be assumed the child does not. And if so, how would we determine the Knappian switch from having to prove the one to having to prove the other

Well, the Longian legal system isn’t a dictatorship run by me. The precise rules of evidence and specifications of age, etc., will be determined by evolving custom, I reckon.

David Heinrich:

I’d argue they’re the victim’s property, and she has a right to demand copies sold or distributed back.

The originals, maybe, but a claim of ownership to the copies seems to assume the legitimacy of IP, which I reject.

We can, however, say that *nobody* reaches maturity by a certain age, e.g., 5, or even 10 maybe.

Sure. Though I can’t see that that rule has any clear advantage over the one I recommended (or vice versa). I think their results would be essentially the same. General principles are a matter of natural law, but their precise specification belongs to custom.

Same sex relations may have a higher burden of proof, even if the teenager or near-teenager claims to be gay.

I share other posters’ puzzlement over this one.

David Gordon:

No, because Locke thinks that in the state of nature, anyone can enforce the law of nature, not just the victim of a crime or his or her agent.

Well, I think something like this (qualifications no doubt needed): if X is in a position to prevent or redress a rights-violation against Y, and Y’s consent or lack of same cannot practicably be ascertained first, X is entitled to presume Y’s consent to X’s acting as Y’s agent in the manner until evidence to the contrary emerges.

Same sex relations may have a higher burden of proof, even if the teenager or near-teenager claims to be gay.

Um. Why?

Rob:

While Western cultures have made it the norm to prohibit sex between adults and anyone under 16 or 18, from my understanding of history, the majority of cultures throughout time (and even a lot of cultures today) have left the responsibility to decide with the parents of the child ….

It seems to me that somebody’s consent is getting lost in this discussion of “responsibility.” Can you guess whose?

Rob:

Concerning girls – if parents today were actually paying attention and protecting their daughters there would not be a need for government involvement in the issue of age of consent.

It’s interesting that, in a discussion of age-of-consent clauses in existing rape statutes — which usually do not say anything in particular about gender — you’d spend your entire reply talking about “parents … protecting their daughters” and about the supposed sexual behavior of adolescent girls. I hear that adolescent boys sometimes have sex, too.