A 16 year old can sexually abuse a 15 year old. They can manipulate them into having sex through any manner of psychological trickery. In fact, I would argue that the average teenager likely has more recent experience manipulating other people than any adult and many teenagers first sexual experience was due to mental manipulation or peer pressure.
This is a argument based on social norms. These kinds of arguments are also led to anti-sodomy laws and anti-homosexuality laws. Because these things were ādisturbingā to some people, we made them illegal.
Again this is entirely due to social norms. We accept that teenagers have sex, so teenagers donāt consider it wrong to have sex. We have said that having sex with a minor is wrong, so we expect an adult to say no. If the social norm is that it is wrong for teenagers to have sex, then I would expect that 16 year old to think twice about if it is right or not.
I fail to see why a 24 year old (as in this case) having sex with a 15 year old is any more disturbing than a 17 year old having sex with a 15 year old. If minors are not mentally capable of giving consent and the other party might be manipulating them into sex, than both are equally wrong and both should be considered statutory rape.
Iām sure 16-year-olds have manipulated 15-year-olds into have sex, but 15-year-olds have manipulated 16-year-olds into have sex as well. The law is there because we are assuming the older person has some kind of advantage that removes our doubt that they are being manipulative. The idea that a person who is one week, or one month, or one year older can be assumed to have such an advantage - to such a degree that we will put them in prison for it - seems outrageous.
Iām not sure what you are arguing here. Are you suggesting that 15-year-olds absolutely cannot consent to sex and so anyone who has sex with a 15-year-old (even a 14-year-old) should be arrested? Are you suggesting that 15-year-olds can consent to sex and the whole law is stupid but that we have to apply it with some kind of consistency? Or do you not even care whether the law exists or not, but believe that you fully understand the purpose of it and what it should say?
But even with close age exemptions, that is still the case. After all, in Canada, a person 1 day under 16 can not give consent to have sex with a 30 year old, but one day later they can. Are we assuming that the day before, it was ok for them to have sex with everyone up to the age of 20, but then a day later it was ok to sleep with the rest of the population? There is no rational reason why this would be the case. The minor hasnāt changed. The result to the minor for the sexual act hasnāt changed. The only thing that has changed is societyās attitude towards it.
I should note that as a Californian where the legal age of consent is 18, Canadaās 16 year old line is not socially acceptable here.
Iām arguing that close age exemptions exist simply to make it easier on the state, not because they are rational. Then again, fixed age of consent laws are just as irrational, but a line had to be drawn somewhere to protect people who are unable to make decisions for themselves. If it were practical to determine a personās mental and emotional age, that at least would be a far better measure.
We canāt, so we have to draw a line for everyone and the least we can do is not confuse the matter by adding a nonsensical buffer in for the close age exemption.
Alosius, thereās no rational reason only if you assume that law is meant to provide a logical, ideal outcome in every case. Itās not. Much of our law is meant primarily to provide a clear line in what is inherently a fuzzy issue.
To choose a less volatile topic, why can 16 year-olds drive when a 15 year, 364 day cannot? Because we believe that in general, someone who is too young wonāt be able to handle driving safely. However, itās enormously fuzzy as to when someone is going to be a safe-enough driver.
Instead of having each person try to figure out when theyāre legally allowed to drive (with criminal consequences if they guess differently than the court), the law makes a relatively arbitrary line which is well demarked that functions roughly for the original purpose - preventing people too young from driving.
In this case, we acknowledge that for young people, age has some measure of authority, and a larger age difference does result in greater authority (up to a point). Since we donāt want people using authority to push consent, we add a rider based on age difference. However, at what point do we feel that authority by dint of age is significant enough that it should be forbidden? Well, giant another fuzzy area for which we need a legal bright line.
After 50 years, Iāve found that if I see something utterly irrational, itās usually because I am missing an important perspective, rather than the fact that Iām the only truly rational being in a world of stupid people :-).
Having a single, inflexible age of consent is not going to capture the nuances of reality.
In order to protect children from sexual manipulation, we are going to have one anyway.
But despite that you think that the single, inflexible age rules is miles more reasonable than a more fuzzy approach that gives some leeway to people?
Lawmaking isnāt about finding an absolute test of right and wrong (people of age X can give consent) and then making the āwrongā half illegal. There is a trade off of good and bad.
You are saying that a 15-year-old who has sex with a 16-year-old is just as likely (actually you implied more likely) to be harmed by the experience as one who has sex with a 40-year-old. You are saying it is just as likely that that experience is manipulative in a damaging way, just as likely that the 16-year-old is worthy of punishment. You are saying that it is just as reasonable a limitation on individual freedom to say to a 16-year-old that they canāt have sex with someone who they see as their own age as it is to say to a 40-year-old that they canāt have sex with someone who is from a younger generation. I donāt see how any of that is ārational.ā I think you drastically misunderstand how the law works and why we have them.
I always thought that trouper implied dependability and cooperation (as it comes from an acting ātroupeā where actors had to collaborate on performances, etc.), whereas trooper implied bravery (as it comes from military/police language). In this case, ātrooperā seems like it would fit, and it was apparently the word used in the source text.
Fixed age of consent make sense in that we have adults and we have minors. Childhood is sacred as it starts with complete dependence and graduates to complete independence legally and socially, we are compelled by society and by the nature of children to protect them even when it means protecting them from themselves. We baby proof the house for toddlers who donāt have good sense of things and teenagers are stupid because of the nature of their biology. This should be understood by folks here on BB, the teenage brain is different (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/teenbrain/ for example) and does not operate the way an adult brain does - thus they are protected as children.
We also do not expect those mentally damaged to be able to give consent either, there are some who can but there are others who simply can not - even if they act out sexually. Either we act in the best interest of children in their unique human state or they are left to the vagaries of the world which are unforgiving. Which is it? Do we have society to protect the individual and through this the whole or do we allow chaos to reign?
Moreover, we have to consider that puberty has come early to these generations in terms of the biology of the brain and our history as a species, puberty was supposed to happen about the time the brain was maturing, not before. So we have sexual yearnings and drives in children who are simply not ready for the act mentally. Not to say that little kids donāt have some yearnings, just they lack the force that puberty propels them towards experience. Again, puberty does not signal being ready in humans anymore, not for about 100 years has it been so.
Here in Germany, the age of consent is 14. Kids younger than that having sex wonāt be persecuted, however - in fact, they canāt be persecuted, because the age of criminal responsibility is also 14.
We also have comprehensive sex education in school starting at around age 10, and practically give away condoms to teenagers for free. In general, the attitudes towards sex are (relatively) relaxed - you can even see nipples on TV! However, we donāt have (full) gay marriage yet, only civil partnerships.
In a turn of events that will quite probably shock the hell out some Americans, our society has not yet descended into chaos, and the rates of teen pregnancies and rape here are in fact much lower than those in the US. Peculiar, isnāt it?
