Age of consent?

This is a very highly debated topic, so I would like your opinion on it.

 

18 I think is young enough, there is no need to ruin a kids life by having younger

 

I think many 18 year olds are still rather insecure and trying to find acceptance any way they can get it (I know that's what happened to me: I slept with a much older dude, fell hopelessly in love w/him, then he swiftly attempted to pass me along to one of his 50 year old friends).

Anyway, I wish I'd waited until I was 21. But he was a total charmer (on the surface), and pretended his interest in me was much more than casual sex. I was too young to figure out I was being played big time. Plus he was a psychologist, so he knew all the right things to say and do to make me want to be with him.

QP

 

well its 16 over here, which makes sense, but only because that's generally the age people start bumping their genitals together (not everyone, of course, but some.) so no doubt the law was only put in place because the police had better things to do than run around peeling sweaty teenagers off each other. if they're gonna do it anyway, they might as well be legal.

 

Lets compromise and say 17.

 

13.

With an age window that widens by one year, for each year of age until the age of 17, which then would act like a traditional age of consent.

ie. 13 year olds can do it with 13 year olds, 14 year olds can do it with 15 year olds, 15 year olds can do it with 17 year olds, 17 year olds can do it with anyone, because their "step" would include those over 18, and I consider all over 18 to be equal.

 

i don't know. i don't think the current laws are right, but i don't really know how i would change it. roorshack's system seems pretty reasonable, but still not quite perfect. like with the 13s only able to do it with other 13s, that means people in the same grade at school still can't have sex, which seems a bit too restrictive to me.

 

This is true.

But that age could be adjusted to anything, it's just an example.

And no law is perfect, they're just guidelines. This still requires prosecutorial descretion, if you have sadistic prosecutors like we do in amarica, and a population that elects prosecutors based on how many people who do all the things that that population does, that individual can send to jail for as long as possible.... wellllllllllll.......

But in a sane system, obviously if some kids fool around and their parents find out and are determined to ruin the other kid's life, as long as there really was no rape, there would be no problems. It would be different if there's actual older people manipulating kids, that's when it's logical to do something about statuatory rape. In general it should just be a guideline to allow the law to step in if things are out of control, and have some standing from which to strike at actual bad guys. It's not something that people should have to consider with their first sexual experiences, it's like telling kids that pot's bad for you because you can go to jail and lose your driver's license: fucking stupid and/or tyrannical.

 

yeah, a sane system would be pretty cool.

 

I think 16 seems reasonable. At any age under 16 you're still too immature/too confused/too easily manipulated/still developing.

 

If he had waited till 16 Sulu might have made Captain earlier

 

I think it's more the case our benefit systems, work places etc don't want to support under 16s who have a child.

 

Thing is I've known many a sixty year old the same could be said of.

 

Look at it the other way round.

Instead of asking at what age should a young person should be given the "privilege" of being manipulated into bad decisions.
Ask instead how young a "victim of manipulation" should be to render that manipulation criminal.

If a 40 year old man (with a car, money, beer, etc) says to some women "I love you, spread your legs and prove you love me." How young should the woman be before he is taking criminal advantage of her?
20? 18? 16? 14?

Don't ask if a 14, 16, or 18 year old should be smart enough to know when they are being lied to.
Ask if the 40 year old should realize that the 18, 16, or 14 year old is young and foolish.

(If I had put in all the caveats that this post deserves, it would be much much longer.)

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ahU-x-4Gxw"]New Order - Age Of Consent - YouTube

 

MikeE

You added one or two caveats rather than commenting on the likely scenario. Unless you consider the likely scenario to be an older man manipulating a younger girl.

 

None. The closest I'd chose would be puberty, but then that's still setting the law. In my opinion, the age of consent law is as flawed as they come. Just because a person is older than pope himself doesn't make that person mature enough, let alone "ready", for something. Similarly, just because a person is as young as Harriet the spy doesn't mean that person is not mature enough to act sensibly. I've seen both cases. As far as I'm concerned, it really is up to each individual cases whether or not something unlawful is taking place, rather than whether or not you meet a societal standard of some sort. If your intentions are good, and no one is getting harmed, then I wouldn't judge. I wouldn't jump on a negative bandwagon like some people might('cause I know what it's like to be misunderstood). However, if someone gets harmed, whether it's the younger party or older(trust me, it happens), I'd definitely have a problem with it.

 

with no law about age of consent, there would be no legal protection for victims of abuse...

 

Then you should have a problem with sex a puberty as there would more likely be psychological scaring if a 13 year old child was manipulated into having sex than, say, a 17 year old. If the 2 children were of a similar age (give a year or so) then that would be hugely different and I'm okay with that but say a 40 year old wanted to have sex with a girl (or boy) just turned teenager, I'dhave a big issue with that.

 

The whole thing went right over your head.

It's not because there's an age where anyone's ready. It's to limit abuse of younger people by much older people.

The law is often mis-applied and people are prosecuted for normal behavior with their piers. That is insanity.

The law is there because for society to work, we need to choose an age at which someone is considered an adult, with adult responsibilities and rights. There should be no line in the sand, but there does need to be a system to keep people who are too far beyond that age from taking advantage of people who are too far below that age.

If you don't get it, you're either stupid or a would-be-molester. It's not that anybody's inherently, by token of their age, mature enough. And it's not that anyone, by token of their age, is inherently too mature. It's to prevent extreme age gradients that tend to indicate that somebody is being taken advantage of.

If everybody's on the same page, the law doesn't matter at all, this gets back to where I was when I was talking about prosecutorial discretion. But if everybody's teetering on the edge of dropping the dime, that's why there's a law. So that if your fifteen year old kid is banging a 30 year old creeper, you can do something about it.

The age of consent law can even be viewed as legally protecting the older individual. Because what the kid does is up to the parent until the age of 18. The age of consent actually changes that.