Ill Conceived What is Childhood?
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Nov 23, 2025 The latest discussion dives into the upcoming release of documents about Jeffrey Epstein, igniting debates around what defines childhood. Hosts explore the troubling trend of minimizing abuse through semantic arguments. They analyze how purity culture can facilitate abuse and connect it to broader natalist concerns about women and childbearing. The episode critiques a controversial defense of sexualization in teens and reflects on historical shifts in age-of-consent laws. Their exploration sparks critical dialogues on childhood protections and political implications.
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Childhood Is A Modern Social Invention
- The modern concept of childhood is historically recent and tied to schooling and labor reform.
- June Sternbach connects childhood's invention to high school expansion and child labor laws that separated kids from adult work.
Teen Pregnancy Drop Drove Fertility Shift
- Teen birth rates plunged from ~96 per 1000 in 1950 to 17.4 per 1000 by 2019, driving much of fertility decline.
- Josh Borman and June argue this fall reflects better contraception, education, and less teen sex, not a mass fertility collapse among adults.
Schools Made Adolescence Legally Valuable
- The high school movement and the Life Adjustment Curriculum institutionalized adolescence and schooling.
- Hosts credit these reforms with creating legal protections and a distinct social role for children.
