Author Joel Williamson shared Elvis kept a group of three 14-year-old girls with him on the tour who were up "for pillow fights, tickling, kissing and cuddling when he was 22.
Plenty of famous people were scumbags. Violent, racist, misogynist, beat up women, cheated, etc. From John Wayne to Frank Sinatra, they were awful human beings but people worship them.
Jerry Lee Lewis married a 13 year old.
Yeah, but she was his cousin so…
As disgusting as we see it now, keep in mind that, back then, child marriage was not only condoned but sometimes encouraged in those parts of the Southern U.S.
We’ll never know if he did it because he had a thing for young girls, or if he did it simply because it was an accepted practice.
Regardless of why, it’s objectively terrible that he did that.
Canada only changed the age of consent from 14 to 16 last decade.
Age of consent is not the same as age an adult is allowed to be with a minor. Minors should be allowed to consent to have sex, just not with much older people. Laws that prosecute, say, a 19 year old from having sex with a 17 years old, or god forbid two 14 years olds to have sex together, are absolutely draconian.
Actually, that’s exactly what age of consent is. The age at which you’re allowed to do things with an adult of any age.
Romeo and Juliet (or close in age) exceptions are for the situation you’re describing, and are usually tacked onto age of consent laws as an exception.
In Canada, there’s a pair of these. At 14 and 15 it’s less than 5 years older, and at 12 and 13 it’s less than 2 years older.
Fun fact: there’s no such thing as objective morality. Back in the 1920s people thought it was objectively terrible for Black people to have equal rights.
I said it was objectively terrible, I didn’t mention morals. :)
Harming people is terrible, whether or not social morality supports it.
It wasn’t seen as harmful back then.
No, but it was harmful.
I’m talking about the objective harm of encouraging underage girls to avoid study and live their lives in the service of older men. There is nothing good that can be said about such a thing. It’s basically indentured servitude.
Ok, it wasn’t seen as relatively more harmful than anything else that would cause strain in a young person’s social, educational, and professional growth. Like an overinterest in sports or gambling or books.
I’m not talking about how it was seen. I’m talking about how it is. There’s a difference.
Cutting off hands was seen as socially acceptable at certain times in history, if someone was merely accused of theft. But it is horrific and terrible. How it was seen as irrelevant to it being terrible objectively terrible.
Are you just trolling, or are you actually trying to defend some of that behavior?
I’m not talking about how it was seen. I’m talking about how it is.
Ok, have fun with that, because that’s not what I was talking about at all.
are you actually trying to defend some of that behavior?
Fuck you for trying to win internet points by trying to paint someone as agreeing with pedophilia. It’s fucking disgusting and you should be ashamed of yourself.
Priscilla was 14 when they met, and he managed to convince her father to let her live with him. I blame the father just a much since he knew what was going down.
Not that I condone any of this, but consider that the cultural disgust of marrying a girl under the age of 18 is a more recent and modern taboo. Back then, in rural United States, it wasn’t an issue at all. Heck as a Gen X kid whose parents were from the Silent Generation, my mother married her first husband when she was 16 and he was 22. She never thought it was an issue other than she regretted marrying anyone at the age. But her parents, church, and teachers didn’t think it was a problem.
It’s hard to believe because most people might say Elvis lived in modern society but he’s not. The 20th century was full of changes that we don’t really think about.
I agree with you on that. And the changes still are going on. I remember in school in the 90’s it wasn’t uncommon for a college guy to date a high school girl with no real repercussion. Not saying that it was right back then, just looked at differently.
It was gross back then too. In the 90s the Coasties would trawl the junior high girls. 25 year old men “dating” 13 year olds. We all knew it was gross as fuck and not okay but small town cops didn’t give a fuck. Hell there was a deputy “dating” a 16 year old too.
It wasn’t looked at differently in the 90s.
A guy in my class knocked up a 14 year old during senior year and we basically all stopped talking to him because fucking ew, dude.
Yes, Priscilla was 14.
I don’t like saying it because people get very emotional and unreasonable about this but:
These things were normal a long time ago. It’s only been in recent years, especially starting from the 1960s, that moral panic took over and these things are looked at now as “a crime”.
it was normal to allow your child to bang adults?
First time I am hearing of this dear… Do you let adult people to fuck your kids?
“Was” means past tense.
Also, fuck your condescension.
i guess depending on what is your position on child and adult here…
but yeah, i don’t think anyone is permitting their jailbait to fuck anyone over 20 in good conscience.
Not currently. But it used to be fairly common, is the point.
ok… it was common for parents to allow catholic clergy to fuck their kids and when kid complained they did nothing. what is your point?
The distinction between past and present. And more abstractly, not confusing acknowledgement of past moral principles as agreement with them.
saying it was common back then is tacitly approving of it IMHO
but people can make up their own minds.
note that many of these people who fucked jail bait are still alive and it is still happening in celebrating circles.
did not charlie cheen rape some kid? and there many stories all the disney jailbat being raped?
What excuse will society muster for this shit happening in 1990s?
emotional and unreasonable
moral panic took over and these things are looked at now as “a crime”.
Ah yes, what a neutral and regulated way to phrase that.
I think they meant people’s reaction to the idea that the past could’ve had a different view on it that we view as disgusting rather than implying it’s “emotional and unreasonable” to view criminalized pedophilia as a “moral panic”, but I’m not a telepath. That was just my reading of it.
what is the alternative view here? this 14 year old reads on 18 year old level?
I absolutely hate (not dislike) that “huah” vocal noise that’s commonly associated with him and think any human making that noise needs to be taken out immediately.
I’ve never heard anything about any of this but I absolutely hate him and any contract he made on society simply as a product of the horror of that noise.
I exaggerate for humor, clearly, but I really do absolutely hate that noise and do not give it a single shred of artistic respect at all, it’s flatly and out-of-hand declined any consideration for credit at all and people that like him as an artist I will literally completely discount any of their artistic opinions.
I have the same artistic hate for Elvis that I have political and personal hate for Trump.
I don’t even have a way to know exactly what it is but just hearing his voice immediately sends me into a blinding rage. It’s not to my knowledge some kinda trauma type of memory associated with it, because I was only exposed to enough of it to just recognize the voice. There are just a few things I know of that make me that angry that quickly. One of them is having to backtrack. Like realizing you forgot a critical grocery and having to go back to the store immediately, or forgetting to bring that one super important thing to work and you have to go back for it before going in. That part multiplies with any kind of time pressure.
But Elvis hits me in the same kind of spot. A randomly specific and very reactive trigger. Well I say reactive but I just end up telling at myself and increasing blood pressure for a few minutes. I don’t literally go into a fugue state and start dropping people.
All that just to say that with me he is absolutely NOT loved and the little bit I heard about some kind of drama with the Graceland estate makes me laugh myself silly because screw those people, the whole lot of them. Do fans of Elvis even care a little bit about any of the family careers? It doesn’t seem so to me, but I’m not an expert.
You sound …huah, all shook up.
I guess I’ll accept the phrasing here. But I don’t like it.
Without Elvis we’d never have Johnny Bravo.
I would be very ok with that.
Elvis was a hero to most but he never meant shit to me because the fucker was whack
- Bob Vylan
This, but also rape and other abuse was tolerated for some reason back then.
There is also a bit of a gender disparity for who is getting help now. Women can get help a lot more easy than men, and aren’t as likely to be dismissed when they come forward.
Lets keep pushing in the right direction
Have you not listened to songs from that era? They’re mostly about hooking up with underage girls.
Yeah, sweet seventeen by Chuck Berry also hits … as at the very least, creepy in 2024.
Might you be thinking of “Sweet Little Sixteen” by Chuck Berry? The guy who btw installed cameras in women’s bathrooms?
Also, the most venerated boomer band of all time…
“She was just 17… if you know what I mean “
Love the Beatles, mind you, but uhhhh… all of those boomer bands were like that.
“I used to pull your pigtails And your scrunched up nose But baby you been growing And baby it’s been showing From your head down to your toes”
Another Elvis hit, “Little Sister.”
Again, love the King, but uhhh….
Might you be thinking of “Sweet Little Sixteen” by Chuck Berry? The guy who btw installed cameras in women’s bathrooms?
Ah yes, that’s the one (oops).
Love the Beatles, mind you, but uhhhh… all of those boomer bands were like that.
Yeah, I like several Chuck Berry songs but … definitely a different take. Those songs would not fly today on the radio.
For “She was just 17” Paul McCartney was only 21 when that song came out and was dating a 17 year old then. Might have written it when he was 20 and the age of consent in Britain in that time was 16. That’s only 3 or 4 years age difference. I don’t get weird vibes from that. The Beatles were young when they started.
Neil Sedaka’s “Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen” is one that gives me the strangest vibes.
Yeah, I mean it’s in the context of the time,‘I never had a problem with that per se. It’s more that some folks took it out of that context and were not quite as situationally aware I guess you could say.
Then there’s the cases of folks like Jerry Lee Lewis marring his 13 year old cousin, Elvis marrying a 14 year old, etc.
Don’t forget “Sweet Caroline” about an 11 y/o Caroline Kennedy. Fucking creep.
Snoop was a pimp. Now everybody loves him. Weird.
But did he pimp children?
seems more important that people wanted him to, even if he didn’t, as what a settlement might imply.
so you think exploiting grown-ups is ok?
So you think children have the same capacity to defend themselves as adults?
🤡
So you think every grown-up has the capacity to defend themself?
Like, you’re grown up now - if you get exploited or abused it’s your own fault because you are not a kid anymore? got it.
Rheee
sorry, i dont speak 🤡.
Why u hurt tho?
And stood trial for a murder, which he was definitely present at. Everyone’s forgotten that Snoop is an actual OG who ran with bangers. His PR with Martha Stewart completely changed his image, and now he’ll put his name and face on anything that will pay him enough money.
Because he was famous, white and in america.
Ding ding ding
Idk, but I like the song return to sender.
Downvote all you want, itll just make me like it even more
Because his fame comes from an era when that kind of age gap and inappropriate conduct was handwaved away with “fRoM a GoOd FaMiLy!”
Especially in his native southern US. Especially especially among the white folks in his native southern US.
Well he managed to sell rock music to white people so we can look past that
Oh hey, you dripped this
/s
The /s has no drip, none at all
I was literally going to edit the comment to take care of the phone typo but now… it stays.
Paedophilia seemed weirdly acceptable right up until around 2000 or so. It’s really quite surreal how commonplace it was.
I won’t say acceptable, as there were still issues and such, but it was definitely persecuted differently.
Plus it was easier to cover up back then.
Uh… no. Baby raping has always been frowned upon as far as I’m concerned. 14 year old consensual (to the extent a 14 year old can be) groupies were a thing, in the not too distant past, but social mores have changed since then. Which is good. There’s an enormous difference between the two though.
I think you may be wrong. Wikipedia tells me that:
“In 1880, the ages of consent were set at 10 or 12 in most states, with the exception of Delaware where it was 7.”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_the_United_States
I think it was that people weren’t seen as victims. They weren’t seen as helpless
Cris Collinsworth openly admitted to it
Amateur. In the 70s they admitted it in song.
