Thorns in This ‘Rose’

Regarding “ ‘Rose’s Rambling Journey,” by Kirk Honeycutt (Sept. 15):

A grown woman seducing a 14-year-old boy is “comic but tender.” Really? Would the same be said of a grown man seducing a 14-year-old girl?

I am a marriage, family and child counselor. As any therapist who has dealt with sexually abused boys can assure you, when a woman seduces a boy it can--and often does--leave permanent scars. There’s nothing tender about it.

Saying that “the girl needs love” is sexist whitewash. Do male rapers just need love?

As for director Martha Coolidge’s statement that “in the South at that time ovariectomies and clitoridectomies were fairly common,” the most common surgical procedure in contemporary America is circumcision, a totally unnecessary procedure that literally leaves permanent scars.

Maybe Coolidge’s question--”Is a woman’s body her own?”--should be “Is anyone’s body his or her own?”

EMANUEL PELUSO

Del Mar