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EASTER ISLAND (Chile)
“On Easter Island children from the age of six on
imitate the sexual behavior of adults without
censure […]” (Ford and Beach, 1951:p191). McCall (1981[1994:p80])[1]: “[…] adults refrain from
discussing [sexual matters]. Some sexual experience is apart of most Rapanui pre-adolescent behavior
and while some parents are worried about the consequences of such play,
particularly for their daughters, most realise that it is a part of becoming
an adult”. A complex custom exists in regard to the clitoris (Marshall,
1962:p249). “There it was teased out by the priest until he could fasten a
cord to it. From this dangled a weight which stretched the organ to a length
of two to three inches”. According to Danielsson
(p89-90) citing a German author, the girl is first orally instructed by an
older woman, after which she had intercourse with an older male relative. Métraux ([1957:p107-8])[2] states that puberty (10-11 for
girls, 12-14 for boys)
“[…] does not even
coincide with the beginning of sex life, which starts at a relatively tender
age. Nowadays few girls reach the critical age [puberty] without having had
some sexual experiences or even with adults, who, we were told, have recourse
to various methods of seduction or even force. The little boys are precocious
and at an early age imitate the frolics in which they have seen their elders
engaging. As far as we could judge, parents take very little notice of these
early sexual activities. Among the Easter Islanders puberty is a purely
physiological state in the mode of life”.
Janssen,
D. F., Growing Up Sexually. VolumeI. World Reference Atlas. 0.2 ed. 2004. Berlin:
Magnus Hirschfeld Archive for Sexology
Last
revised: Sept 2004
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