# Age of Consent



## Polednice (Sep 13, 2009)

Thoughts? Sexual consent, obviously.

This is one of those things that is mighty strange, because as far as the law is concerned, there is something magical that happens on your 5478th/5479th night (depending on leap years  ) that makes you ready for intercourse the next day when you turn 16 (this is speaking from a UK perspective - I know other countries have different ages). Even if something magical does happen in a short period of time, it sure as hell doesn't happen at the same age for all people.

It seems that the law is intended - or at least currently invoked - to do two major things, one of which is reasonable but ineffective, the other just stupid. The stupid one is teenage pregnancy. When people talk about lowering the age of consent (either by law, or supposedly _de facto_ by giving younger kids contraception), they talk as though it's an "endorsement" of sex and will therefore lead kids to earlier pregnancies. There is so much illogical bull in that notion that I won't take it apart in the OP. It's enough to say that the law doesn't work like that, shouldn't work like that, and provides no help for 17-year-olds who also get pregnant by mistake.

The more reasonable thing, of course, is the protection of young people from those who are likely to take advantage of them. I don't think that the answer to this is having a definitive cut-off like 16 and then charging 17-year-olds with under-age partners with statutory rape. Instead, I think the single age of consent should be abolished and replaced with a sliding scale of permissible age differences - for example (and these aren't thoroughly thought out), a 12-year-old couldn't sleep with anyone younger than 11 or older than 13, and a 15-year-old couldn't sleep with anyone younger than 13 or older than 17. Eventually, we'd need an infinite upwards age allowance so that, say, a 20-year-old could have sex with someone who's 90, but perhaps that should just coincide with the age of adulthood.

No doubt some of you will be shocked or disgusted that I even mention a 12-year-old having sex, but I'm afraid such prudishness is part of the problem. I don't think all 12-year-olds are emotionally ready for it, nor do I think they should be "encouraged" (not that anyone does any encouraging except for other 12-year-olds), but taking this yucky, hands-off, WON'T SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?! approach just leads to repressed sexuality, higher teenage pregnancies, and other problems. Whether you or I like it or not, they _will_ have sex, and they need suitable laws to govern it.

I also think we have to completely abandon language like "endorsement" - a law about age of consent has _nothing_ to do with endorsement, first and most importantly because its purpose should regard safety and protection, not sexual moralising, and second because - surprise, surprise! - sex is _not_ a bad thing that either does or does not need endorsement.


----------



## Cnote11 (Jul 17, 2010)

Yes, I always thought the notion of this magical age was ridiculous. The legal age here is 16, however, which seems fairer than 18. Although there is a clause that says the parents have to consent to the relationship for it to not be statutory rape. I have a friend who is a hardcore Republican Christian. The day he turned 18 he felt sick and disgusted by any girl even a day under 18, because he felt that made him some kind of sick perverted pedophile (despite the age being 16 here). I found this behavior to be quite strange.


----------



## eorrific (May 14, 2011)

Cnote11 said:


> Yes, I always thought the notion of this magical age was ridiculous.


My thoughts exactly. Age cut-offs are stupid. We all just get a second older every second that goes by.


----------



## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Sick disgusting paedophilia. I think the age of consent should 14.


----------



## Praeludium (Oct 9, 2011)

In France the sexual majority is at 15 years and 8 months - don't know why. It's even stranger than 16 !
I also think it's a bit dumb but I guess it's about compromises.

I think the age of consent isn't only a legal problem. There's an official age, but the problem is, I'm sure, with the whole "socially/morally acceptable" thing. I remember hearing parents (some friends of my aunt or something like that), saying that for sure they wouldn't allow their girl and her boyfrien to sleep together (they had to sleep in a different room, and were more than/roughly 16 I think) but that they didn't care of what happened when they weren't at home. Well, to them it certainly seemed a great choice, but I find this stupid (and a bit irresponsible since the better place for them to lose their virginity certainly would be in the toilets of the high school).
I think that from the age of 15 years and 8 months, the teenagers should be allowed by the parent to be adults responsible of their choices. Parents or family shouldn't have authority on this. They could express their views but certainly shouldn't say "you must" or "you can't".
I think the moral authority of the family is a big problem. Parents should be educated  to understand that from the age of 16 their child is responsible of his sexual choices (in France at least, but I guess it's the same elsewhere, ie. that it's not just about age of consent ?). I'm sure abusively authoritative or dogmatic parents cause much more problem than the legal age limit to have sex.

That said I think your idea of sliding scale of permissible age differences is the most logic, even if it would make some "honest peoples" being scandalized and yelling their indignation. 
The question is where should it stop ? 11 still seem too young to me, even physiologically. Which doesn't mean there isn't any sexuality at this age.
I think the problem is also somehow linked to the sexual education. If it's mostly done by _some medias_ nowadays, mainly because it's taboo (paradoxes, I love you), how can we know than the children aren't psychologically deformed by it ? Wouldn't this sliding scale of permissible age differences encourage this deformity ?
Age of consent seem to be a bit inappropriate at this age, which doesn't mean that infantile sexuality should be ignored.


----------



## Moira (Apr 1, 2012)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Sick disgusting paedophilia. I think the age of consent should 14.


I have always considered that a 'random' age is ridiculous. Every child is different. One should establish whether it is actually consensual or whether it is not.

Of course, this presupposes that there is no paedophilia present where some sicko suggests that the three year old is consenting because he/she is not objecting. To this end, the whole physical readiness used in history where the thought was "If she is old enough to bleed, she's old enough to breed" makes a degree of sense in determining a possible general age of consent. Nearly all girls are menstruating women by the time they are fourteen.

To my thinking there is an additional advantage is lowering the age of consent from sixteen, which is the law in South Africa, to fourteen. We have a large number of sexually active children as young as twelve. If the age of consent was set at 14 it would be easier for magistrates to make sensible rulings with younger children. Part of the problem is that a magistrate (usually male) looks at a fifteen year old girl in the case of statutory rape he sees a mature woman and he cannot in good conscience find a man guilty for thinking what he is thinking. At thirteen/fourteen the distinction between children and women is blurred but in a fifteen year old she is usually pretty obviously a woman.


----------



## Moira (Apr 1, 2012)

Moira said:


> Part of the problem is that a magistrate (usually male) looks at a fifteen year old girl in the case of statutory rape he sees a mature woman and he cannot in good conscience find a man guilty for thinking what he is thinking. .


When I say 'mature woman" I suppose I mean 'nubile', rather than mature.


----------

