Ward Fulton - The Forbidden Family Game

"Stan raised himself on one elbow and looked down at me, scowling. 'You're not going to tell Dad how I screwed you, are you?'

"I know I giggled. 'Why? Doesn't he know how?'

"That set us off. We just lay there, laughing like idiots-which I guess we were along about then. Mindless and just feeling. But feeling very good, stretching a little just to feel muscles pull and know you're alive. It's great, that afterwards feeling. Almost as good as screwing itself. Only, of course, if there wasn't any screwing there wouldn't be that glorious after feeling.

"That was the first time Stan ever screwed me-or we screwed each other, however you want to put it. His technique was crude, not subtle at all, but then, at that time, I didn't know there were subtler ways of fucking… "

The preceding is a condensed version of Jill W-'s story, with much more to come, in Chapter Three. Jill, from her own words about herself, her family and their travels, establishes herself as one of the jet-set crowd, wealthy families who entertain themselves with globe-trotting, to whom Marrakech and Marseilles and Singapore are as commonplace as the corner drugstore, as familiar as the supermarket.

Jill's family were swingers, which is not to say that all globe-trotters are swingers or sexually promiscuous. She is simply a child of the very rich who were.

Maxwell Douglas, in The Documented Story of Sub-Teen Sex, a study funded by the American Institute of Motivation Research and conducted in co-operation with the California Youth Authority and other institutions dealing with youthful delinquents, quotes a prominent volunteer social worker, who operates at two levels, working with the very poor in her social service capacity and living, in her normal life, among the very rich. She is quoted as saying that "the morals of the very poor and the very rich are very much alike."

He also quotes a C. Y. A. official, as commenting on the squalid conditions under which the very poor often have to live: "With all too many of these girls, sex is simply a way of life. Many of them live in crowded conditions where they see sex all around them. It becomes a facet of life, so, when it happens to them, they are neither surprised nor offended. They simply lack the moral background of middle-class mores."

Douglas interprets the above use of the term "middle-class mores": "They represent… the finest values by which we live-honesty, integrity, virtue, courtesy, kindness-all the basic plus-values of life in America."

Jill W- and the other four young girls considered in this volume are from among the very rich, where, frequently, the morals are "very like" those of the extremely poor, though for generally quite different reasons.

The moral standards of the very poor are often impaired by the type of life forced on them by poverty, the crowded conditions that bring youngsters into constant contact with sex, so that they are neither surprised nor offended when it happens to them. Among the very rich there are instances of youngsters who are given too much too soon and who are therefore bored, seeking stimulation by some means other than the plentitude around them. Many of them turn to sex for that stimulation.

Douglas, in his searching study, says that "among the so-called 'privileged' there are 'pockets of moral poverty' as real and perhaps more detrimental to society than the financial pockets of poverty."

Jill W- and the others, as shall be seen, all came from very wealthy families, families that were, in the terms of Maxwell Douglas, "pockets of moral poverty." Each instance cited in this volume has a different triggering motivation that turns the young girl toward sex, notably, incestuous sex. However, each girl was caught up in some form of sexual activity because the family or associates lived in a "pocket of moral poverty"-where those homely, middle-class mores had little or no meaning.

Even though the immediate triggering motivation in each instance was different, the basic fact remains, that the families, and hence the children, lacked those very standards.

Jill W- lived in a jet-set society among a.particular set, the swingers, where sex was a way of life.

Fay Y- (Chapter One) represents defiant rebellion, one of four categories noted by a program administrator for another juvenile center. His list, developed over years of study of the juvenile delinquent problem, notes the causes as: identification; peer group status; search for affection; and "punishment" of parents. Fay was deliberately seeking to "punish" her parents for their neglect of her when she turned to sex. She was also probably seeking to garner affection long denied her by her parents.

Motivations are rarely as clear-cut as the categories developed for them. There is often an overlap, a blend of drives, and, in the cases cited here, often an underlying feeling of boredom from too much indulgence, too many worldly and material "things" far too readily available too early in life.

Vance Packard, in The Sexual Wilderness, particularly notes this restlessness among the youth that all too often breaks out in sexual delinquency. He lists eight basic causes, ranging from the shift from breast feeding to bottle feeding of infants (common in-the past generation) to fear of the potential destruction inherent in nuclear warfare. Among these eight causes he notes that overindulgence is among the most potent, since an excess of material possessions stultifies any sense of achievement.

Certainly overindulgence in material things strongly influenced both Jill and Fay.

In the case of James and Jane I-, the musical twins (Chapter Two), material possessions was not so much a contributing factor as lack of parental affection along with isolation from their peer group.

The feeling of frustration due to too many material possessions that fail to stimulate to achievement is not a real factor with James and Jane. They had the satisfaction of achievement in their music. Yet, however great that personal satisfaction may have been, they were driven to it by an overambitious mother who apparently gave little thought to their need for affection as well as authority.

Alexis S- (Chapter Four) is the product of a broken home, and a sensuous father who gives her the affection she has been lacking from her gay, young-looking mother and introduces her to sex. Although the act is incestuous and forced on the girl, "the association in the act of a grown-up, who, to the child, must represent the omnipotent parent, probably condones the transgression." At least this is the opinion of a group of child psychologists.

To Alexis her father was not just a representative of "the omnipotent parent," he was her actual father. Aside from an initial revulsion, Alexis accepted sex and even relished it, continuing her practices with her brother, once the sex act was "condoned" by her father.

Eddie M- (Chapter Five) is a study in tragedy, as will be seen.

The stories of these five youngsters, each caught up in an incestuous relationship, were selected because each represents some particular motivation that can drive even those of the rich to sex as an outlet for frustrations. It is perhaps impertinent even to hope that this volume will find wide circulation among the rich and that, if it does, will have any material effect on mitigating the conditions outlined here. However, there is much to be learned from these instances that can be applied to alleviate similar conditions at any economic level.

These case histories demonstrate one thing clearly-that without the warmth and affection of parents in an environment of those much maligned and scorned "middle-class mores" a youngster may allow his frustrations to turn him toward sex in all its distorted facets.

"You know who I am, of course. Or at least who my father is. Unless, of course, you're one of those people who are too intelligent to look at television. At that, you look intelligent, which is something few-really intelligent people do. One of the most brilliant men I ever knew looked like a half-wit. And my father, of course, looks like a jolly, jolly big daddy to the world-and he's a louse. But a very rich louse.