History of, likewise, age of consent, history of, children's rights, skimming the surface of a complex subject:
Pedophilia was first formally recognized and named in the late 19th century. A significant amount of research in the area has taken place since the 1980s. Although mostly documented in men, there are also women who exhibit the disorder, and researchers assume available estimates underrepresent the true number of female pedophiles. No cure for pedophilia has been developed, but there are therapies that can reduce the incidence of a person committing child sexual abuse. In the United States, following Kansas v. Hendricks, sex offenders who are diagnosed with certain mental disorders, particularly pedophilia, can be subject to indefinite civil commitment. The exact causes of pedophilia have not been conclusively established. Some studies of pedophilia in child sex offenders have correlated it with various neurological abnormalities and psychological pathologies.
Humans have practiced pedophilia throughout history. It was not, as noted above, widely considered as unacceptable behavior until the 19th century, primarily in the United Kingdom and Europe. It may still be widely accepted as permissible behavior in other cultures, other parts of the world.
As for what may be considered the age of consent:
In traditional societies, the age of consent for a sexual union was a matter for the family to decide, or a tribal custom. In most cases, this coincided with signs of puberty, menstruation for a woman and pubic hair for a man. The ancient Greek poet Hesiod in Works and Days (c. 700 BC) suggests that a man should marry around the age of thirty, and that he should take a wife who is five years past puberty.
Other historical and cultural considerations below:
The British Isles have rather a sordid history:
The English common law had traditionally set the age of consent within the range of 10 to 12, but in 1875 the age was raised to 13. After intense sensational media revelations about the scourge of under-age prostitution in London in the 1880s caused respectable middle-class outrage, the age of consent was raised to 16 in 1885. Early feminists of the Social Purity movement such as Josephine Butler and others, instrumental in securing the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts, began to turn towards the problem of child prostitution by the end of the 1870s.
The investigative journalist William Thomas Stead of the Pall Mall Gazette was pivotal in exposing the problem of child prostitution in the London underworld through a publicity stunt. In 1885 he "purchased" one victim, Eliza Armstrong the 13-year-old daughter of a chimney sweep, for £5 and took her to a brothel where she was drugged. He then published a series of four exposés entitled The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon, which shocked its readers with tales of child prostitution and the abduction, procurement and sale of young English virgins to Continental "pleasure palaces". The "Maiden Tribute" was an instant hit with the public. Victorian society was thrown into an uproar about prostitution. Fearing riots on a national scale, the Home Secretary, Sir William Harcourt pleaded in vain with Stead to cease publication of the articles. A wide variety of reform groups held protest meetings and marched together to Hyde Park demanding that the age of consent be raised. The government was forced to pass the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885 that raised the age of consent to 16 and clamped down on prostitution.
British feminists played a major role in bringing about these major cultural and social reforms:
In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries a number of women were dismayed by the sexual double standard whereby women had to remain virginal before marriage and faithful inside it. On the other hand, a blind eye was turned if men had sex with more than one partner. One of women’s greatest victories was the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts (CDAs). These Acts, the first of which had been passed in 1864, allowed police in a number of garrison towns and naval ports the right to arrest women suspected of being common prostitutes and require them to be medically examined for sexually transmitted diseases. If found infected, women could be detained for treatment. This, according to feminists, was unfair, because it blamed prostitutes for the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, not the men who used their services. Under the leadership of Josephine Butler, the Ladies’ National Association led a campaign to repeal these acts and eventually succeeded 22 years after they had been passed.
In the late 20th century, an international effort was made to secure the rights of children internationally:
The UN General Assembly adopted the Convention and opened it for signature on 20 November 1989 (the 30th anniversary of its Declaration of the Rights of the Child). It came into force on 2 September 1990, after it was ratified by the required number of nations. Currently, 194 countries are party to it, including every member of the United Nations except Somalia and the United States. In Somalia, parliamentary approval and presidential assent of the ratification act was obtained "without the articles of 14, 20 and 21 due to Somali culture, religion and the provisional constitution." On 20 January 2015, Somalia ratified the convention and the process will be finalized once the Government of Somalia deposits the instrument of ratification at UN Headquarters in New York.
One might also add as sarcastic footnote that within the Roman Catholic Church, a woman who has an abortion, someone who performs an abortion, can be excommunicated. Someone who rapes a child IS NOT excommunicated. Twisted.