To: longtermmemmory
"Your brain is your friend".
Consider using it before posting.
For whatever reasons, still being debated in the medical fields, females are maturing far earlier than they once did. "Once did", as in the period when age of consent laws were written.
Whether we like it or not, and you cn verify this by visiting any 9 th graed class, society is dealing with sexually functional adults years earlier than when the age of consent laws were written.
Recent raises in the age of consent did little more than offer irristable opportunities for arbitrary and capricious enforcement of the age of consent laws.
The reality is that if the parents didn't teach their children to wait for sex in a stable marriage relationship, anything the heavy hand of John Law can do is unlikely to remedy the aforementioned parential failure.
Criminalizing sex as you suggest would only result in egregiously unfair, capricious enforcement. We simply don't have the court capacity, nor the jails, to imprision all that you propose to make criminals. Why are you so eager to grow the already bloated legal/prison system?
There is a limit to what government can do. Raising moral children isn't one of them. And jailing a large part of America's under 18 set is likewise beyond the reach of government.
As Washington observed, never issue an order that you can't enforce.
Personally, I am fed up with whining adults wanting to force government to do things which are not the appropriate role of government. Families, not governments, teach moral behavior.
31 posted on
03/06/2004 11:42:06 AM PST by
GladesGuru
(In a society predicated upon liberty, it is essential to examine principles - -)
To: GladesGuru
actually what I am looking for is clarity in criminal prosecutions. Right now it is far too ambiguous for prosecution of adults who have sex with minors who are close to majority.
Which is why you get statuory rape at below 16 and contributing to delinquency at 16-17. An adult should not be having sex with a 16 year old.
I am no looking at it from the point of controlling the children. The ADULTS are the responsible ones, the children are CHILDREN.
There is one judge in central FL who ruled that statutory rape charges had to be thrown out because if a girl could consent to an abortion, she can consent to getting pregnant.
It is not the children who go to jail, it is the adults who should not be having sex with the minors. Jail is not always required. Sex with a minor makes the adult have to register as a sex offender under FL Law.
You should be less petty when posting.
To: GladesGuru
Your comments are disgusting. A prime example of "Situational Ethics". The police chief was wrong wrong wrong. Nothing, including consensual admission from the 17 year old boy, makes it right. I am willing to bet you are a card carrying member of NAMBLA.
If laws existed and/or enforced based on societies ability to punish the criminals, then mass revolt of any law would render it impotent.
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson