Friday, October 01, 2004

Gender-Neutral Statutory Rape

Should Mary-Kay Letourneau be considered a (statutory) rapist and be treated the same as a male (statutory) offender?
Yes, I argue, for the following reason:
Generally, the reason for age-of-consent laws is to protect an older person from taking advantage of a minor's inexperience and lack of capacity; for example, a fourteen-year-old girl may not be mature enough to deal with the possibility of pregnancy, and therefore an older man should not be allowed totake advantage of that.
The assumption that results in non-gender-neutral statutory rape laws (or alternately enforcement) is based on the assumption that because boyus don't get pregnant, sex is not as much of a responsibility with them.
However, in any western culture it is assumed that men will help to care for their children, even if indirectly through financial support.
A teenage or pre-teen boy who has sex is risking a possible obligation to any child produced in the union. This is particularly true because courts have ordered child support payments to be made for children who were conceived when the male (but not the female) was below the age of consent, and because after conception occurs, the father has no rights toward the child at least until it is born. A boy who gets a woman pregnant can have his life ruined, even if he doesn't carry the baby.
Moreover, there are also physical risks such as venereal disease.
Given this, I think that a woman who has sex with an underage boy is subjecting him to risks that he is not yet capable of dealing with, and therefore is just as guilty as a male offender.
This might be different in cultures where males are not expected to be involved in their children's upbringing.

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