In high school I used to show friends images of girls and asked if they find them attractive. The fun was in seeing how their response change with different ages. I would show them objectively attractive 15 year old girl and they would give reasons why she looks too young or how finding them attractive is disgusting. You might think the same, however the catch was that the girl is actually 21 year old model older than any of us. Other times I did the opposite showing them minors, saying they are older to see how they would 180 when I told them the actual age.

I think I got the idea from a scene in Lie to me tv show where the main character is a sherlock type investigator that can deduce if someone is lying. In one episode a man is accused of statutory rape of a 15 year old. He said she claimed to be 18 and that he did not know, so the investigator showed him an image of another 15 year old girl in a bikini and asked him if he found this girl attractive. He said no but the investigator could tell he was lying and ashamed about finding her attractive. He then explained all the features of the girls body that are attractive in explicit detail which made the other characters cringe. Then he revealed that she is actually an adult model. The fact that he lied about finding her attractive, but lied and felt the shame of finding her attraction was apparently proof of his innocence. For me the interesting part was in how the reaction of everyone changed, that they believe that sexualizing an image of an woman is bad or okay based on her biological age not her perceived age.

I tried to see how far I could go with this game. I showed friends a 25 year old model which they find too young while an 14 year old actress was seen as attractive when the ages are switched. 25+ are though to pass off as minors. Kpop groups worked well as gauging the age of korean woman is though for westerners. I remember showing one friend an image of a newly debut group where one was 14 and the other three are 18+, asking him to point out the one he find most attractive and the one they believed was the 15 year old. Then calling them a pedo when he pointed to the 14 year old as most attractive. I remember him looking up the image date to be sure she didn't turn 15 lol. Good times.

Back then I thought they where lying about their attraction, but later I realized that they actually form their opinion on attraction based on what they perceive their age to be. This is something I just can't relate to. If I see a baby, I do not need to know if the baby is 2month old or a genetic freak 18 year old. I just do not find that figure attractive. Same way I can find a cartoon attractive or certain 14 years old attractive as their body figure aligns with attractive adult females. I do not think that my friends find babies sexually attractive, but it is weird that there is no way I can actually test that. As they continuously apply the function: IF perceived_female_age < socially_acceptable_age THEN return 'not attractive' else return true_attraction_metric. If I could truly convince them that a 5 year old is actually a 26 year old midget with rare genetic disease, would they find them attractive? I don't know..

When we were around 17. There was a 15 year old asian girl in our school that joined our small minecraft survival server. 3 or 4 guys in our group had a crush on her. While she was ~15 she looked like she looked 12 max. Baby face, flat, no hips, totally a body figure of a young child. Again I have no problem saying that there are even some 12 year olds that men would find physically attractive. But that is because they developed certain body proportions, but this girl.. finding her attractive makes you an pedophile, there is no way around it. If you find that attractive you must find similar built prepubescent children attractive. I even checked with one of them. Maybe they found her attractive based on personality in spite of her appearance? but no he liked her 'petite figure'. Insane.

I believe the reason they have this filter is due to their inability to mentality separate attraction from permissible sexual fantasy. For me that is built in to my religious upbringing. I have an innate feeling that sexual fantasy of any woman as immoral. But for my friends, they see attraction to girls and subsequent actions with them as okay. This breaks down when faced with minors. They think that they are bad people if they have sexual fantasies about minors. They never train the muscle in their mind to see attractive girls and permissible sexual partner as two distinct groups, causing errors to pop up when confronted with them. I guess its similar with finding girlfriends of your friend attractive, or meeting a cousin for the first time and not allowing yourself to find her attractive. It is normal to mentally fight attraction of group that in you culture are seen as untouchable. It's a mindset. A friend once told me he though I was a bad person because I expressed having some bad urges. I did not get it, for me being a bad person is doing bad thing not wanting to do bad things. I never touched or even kissed a female in my life yet this guy who has hurt multiple girls, pressured and arguably date raped some of them them, sees me as a bad guy for having bad urges?

Unfortunately none of my friends would be able to have a conversation about any of this without dismissing it as "weird pedophile shit". The only physical being whom I could discuss this with is so far out of the norm on gender and sexual attraction patterns that they will dedicate a special chapter on him/they/her in the next DSM.

Funnily enough you where one if the subjects of these experiments Somi. I showed your image when you where 15 and I was 16 I believe? It was when you where in I.O.I and I showed you to the unofficial leader of our class who was the most prone to say edgy things for his thoughts on your looks. I do not remember his response though. Either way, Somi your continuous steady flow is carving new rivers in my mind, with every though, your existence is becoming more physical as neurons adapt to hold you. One day the region of white matter neurons and short range association fibers that you occupy will be indistinguishable from any other conscious mind. Till then, goodnight Somi.