The Official EADD Paedo Discussion Thread v3 -Nonce-tastic

[j.t]

continued from here

I do find it interesting where people draw the line at being a pedo. I for instance have a friend that slept with two 15 year girls (one the day before her 16'th birthday) they eventually found out about each other. And eventually one of the girls father found out, and phoned the police. He's in jail now for 5 years and on the pedo register for life.

Granted, he was 10 years older and should have known better. There's almost 12 years difference between my Gran and her fella..

I myself slept with a 15 year old girl when I was 17. And she had certainly been around a LOT more than I had at the time (and still now most likely!)

Where is the line drawn? Obviously, you can't be sleeping with "kids" but at what point do kids stop being kids? I know plenty of mature teenages, and I know plenty of immature adults. I'm sure it's the same with most here.

The record for youngsters having babies is a 8 year old girl in India having a baby, according to the BBC report at the time. She was repeatedly raped by her uncle. He's dead now.

According to WiKi the youngest was a 5 and a half year old girl to give birth by C section: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_youngest_birth_mothers

 

[curious_24]

I was kinda agreeing with you until you started quoting reports of five and eight year old girls giving birth. Creepy.

 

[j.t]

I was kinda agreeing with you until you started quoting reports of five and eight year old girls giving birth. Creepy.

Don't get me wrong, I don't agree with that, at all. I wouldn't have even thought it possible for a girl so young to even be able to cope with the process of pregnancy. Let alone giving birth and looking after a child at such a young age.

I do think the current age of consent is appropriate, a few months either way though shouldn't be punishable..

 

[Shambles]

There has been a fair bit of discussion on the differences between paedophilia and ebophilla. I would certainly agree there is a difference. I think it's difficult to fit that into law though. In examples like that you mention (17yo with a 15yo) I don't think it could really be classed as paedophilia at all. Obviously there still has to be consent and I guess the difficulty is in deciding at what age it is possible for a person to give informed consent. Clearly a young child can't but I can see an argument that many people are quite sexually active by their mid-teens and not always necessarily with people their own age. At the same time, I do think there needs to be protection from predatory behaviour by significantly older (usually) men who have a thing for young teenage girls. I think the law as it stands is more or less right but I could see a case being made for discretion being involved in certain cases - particularly when both are close in age and in an ongoing relationship with one being just below legal age. The law can be a blunt instrument and I suspect it would be difficult to frame it in such a way as to allow for consensual sex whilst also preventing predatory behaviour.

 

[plmar]

I do find it interesting where people draw the line at being a pedo. I for instance have a friend that slept with two 15 year girls (one the day before her 16'th birthday) they eventually found out about each other. And eventually one of the girls father found out, and phoned the police. He's in jail now for 5 years and on the pedo register for life.

Granted, he was 10 years older and should have known better. There's almost 12 years difference between my Gran and her fella..

I myself slept with a 15 year old girl when I was 17. And she had certainly been around a LOT more than I had at the time (and still now most likely!)

Where is the line drawn? Obviously, you can't be sleeping with "kids" but at what point do kids stop being kids? I know plenty of mature teenages, and I know plenty of immature adults. I'm sure it's the same with most here.

The record for youngsters having babies is a 8 year old girl in India having a baby, according to the BBC report at the time. She was repeatedly raped by her uncle. He's dead now.

According to WiKi the youngest was a 5 and a half year old girl to give birth by C section: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_youngest_birth_mothers

That's fucked up? How old was he? Did she not know his age?
5 years is a pisstake, especially for pedo-shit. He's gonna get fucked up bad while he's in there I imagine.

 

[j.t]

That's fucked up? How old was he? Did she not know his age?
5 years is a pisstake, especially for pedo-shit. He's gonna get fucked up bad while he's in there I imagine.

He was 25 at the time, they were both 15, with one a day until she was 16, the other 2 months. They were both consenting, willing and able. No coercion, just fancying each other I guess in simple terms. And I agree, he should have known better. At least in one instance to wait 24 hours!

I do write to him fairly often, and he's said their is very little violence, but in saying that's he's at a prison that only houses pedo's. And given that he's a fairly young fit lad, the majority of the population are a LOT older, so kind of narrows down the bullying, to an extent. He's told me various stories of people getting hog tied and raped etc..

But that's a story for another time..

Just to reiterate, I do not condone underage sex, nor am I an advocate for it. I do however, think their should be a little leeway if both parties were willing and it's a couple of days, weeks, months until it's "legal" anyway.

 

[StoneHappyMonday]

I strongly believe the UKs age of consent should and could be lowered without the sky falling in. And before anyone starts I have no personal interest in it happening. I don't think 15 is unreasonable in this day and age where the average boy and girl grow up much quicker, because of the imagery and expectations they are exposed to, than they did even 40 years ago, let alone more than a century ago when the current age of consent was set.

And I don't think it's even as simple as that. Perhaps it's easier to draw a line in the sand and set a date definition, but it certainly brings about injustices and labels some as sex criminals who otherwise might not be, or deserve to be, labelled so. More important than a random age plucked from nowhere, to me, is some sort of quantifying of the level of abuse in a relationship. Just how predatory the older party is being, how much they have abused their position of influence over the younger person. Because surely its abuse that is the problem, not some random line in the sand? How you quantify that level of abuse is moot I grant you but we have social worker and psychiatric reports for most other crimes, I don't see why they can't have some level of input in interviewing both parties and making some sort of judgement on how abusive a relationship might be.

 

[j.t]

I strongly believe the UKs age of consent should and could be lowered without the sky falling in. And before anyone starts I have no personal interest in it happening. I don't think 15 is unreasonable in this day and age where the average boy and girl grow up much quicker, because of the imagery and expectations they are exposed to, than they did even 40 years ago, let alone more than a century ago when the current age of consent was set.

And I don't think it's even as simple as that. Perhaps it's easier to draw a line in the sand and set a date definition, but it certainly brings about injustices and labels some as sex criminals who otherwise might not be, or deserve to be, labelled so. More important than a random age plucked from nowhere, to me, is some sort of quantifying of the level of abuse in a relationship. Just how predatory the older party is being, how much they have abused their position of influence over the younger person. Because surely its abuse that is the problem, not some random line in the sand? How you quantify that level of abuse is moot I grant you but we have social worker and psychiatric reports for most other crimes, I don't see why they can't have some level of input in interviewing both parties and making some sort of judgement on how abusive a relationship might be.

It's easier to convict than to certify.

 

[StoneHappyMonday]

It's easier to convict than to certify.

Sorry, can you explain what you mean.

 

[Shambles]

I do agree with you on the abuse of power being a big issue and that not being a part of law and instead there is an essentially arbitrary figure. I think it comes down to a case of how would you ever frame a law that tackled imbalance and abuse of power being used to get sexual favours? I would think of such situations as being more akin to rape than to child sex abuse and as such perhaps there could be ways of addressing such scenarios better within the rape laws as it's really not the same thing as abusing children. There is a big difference between, say, a middle-aged man taking advantage of his 15yo work experience girl (or 'intern' as they seem to be called these days) and a middle-aged man abusing his position on staff at a children's home or similar... I suspect that point makes more sense in my head than it does written down but hope it's possible to see what I was meaning to get at.

I do agree that the age of consent will always be an arbitrary number by its very nature. If there are ways to make the law more finely-grained where it can address more complex scenarios that would be ideal but can't really see it happening. I can see there is some sense in having a simple (albeit arbitrary) "This young and never any younger" approach to simplify understanding of the law and also in gaining prosecutions. It's hard enough as it is to get child sex abuse and/or rape charges to stick and I suspect a more complex law would simply mean more loopholes and get out clauses. The idea of a completely different approach does have some appeal though - would be nice to think laws could be made that took individual circumstances into account.

 

[j.t]

Sorry, can you explain what you mean.

Building on what you said, it would be easier (cheaper) to convict people rather than spend money on getting a psyc evaluation done on both people, then for it to go to court, second round of testing, cross testing etc.

Cheaper to "draw a line in the sand" as you put it and convict.

 

[StoneHappyMonday]

I'll try and explain my position further, via some personal experiences (and probably fail hopelessly but hey ho).

It seems to me that views on paedophilia and sentencing are too much informed by the zeitgeist rather than by rationale. In a nutshell, Savile got away with it in the 70's because his type of behaviour was largely condoned. Whereas now we are in the middle of a witch hunt against paedophilia (and Savile is handily dead) the behaviour is totally condemned without regard to nuance. See the teacher who got 4 and a half years for a basically ill-judged loving relationship with a 15 year old pupil. There seems no middle ground. I'll explain further.

In the 70's my sister, aged 13, was quite seriously sexually assaulted by the local lollipop man. The more serious charges got dropped on condition of him admitting the lesser charges and he was fined £50. And that was it. My sister was an innocent 13 year old and she was the one who got shit in the local community for making the poor man lose his job. Because the zeitgeist then leant towards condoning pervy old men and groping. Benny Hill anyone?

Fast forward to just a few years ago, I did jury service in London. Sexual assault (groping) on a 15 year old by a housing worker. The girl had obviously been around the block as it were and had a reputation that the defence made sure got heard in court. She was far from naive. Nevertheless, bollocks to that, we convicted him. Because he had groped her and had admitted it in interview (changing his plea to not guilty in court when no DNA evidence showed up). I was chairman of the jury and proudly stood up to deliver my part of justice. Guilty. Then the world went weird.

The judge immediately started banging on about how the defendant could expect a custodial sentence. WTF? My sister's attacker got fined £50. And there was more. He must immediately sign the sex offenders register and could expect to be on it for some time, if not
life. WTF?? He had barely touched her tit, even she admitted that. I went home and cried like fuck for ages. Biggest headfuck by miles that I've had to deal with in 20-30 years. I'd helped send a man to prison, and get labelled a sex criminal with a register to prove it...and I hadn't considered any of that would happen. I repeat, he barely touched her tit. Believe me, my sister got a lot worse from her attacker.

So where's the middle ground? Why is it always outrageous condemnation and six pages in the Daily Mail or condoning with a nudge and a wink? To get justice for all we need to find a different way. I'm not holding my breath on it happening either though Shammy.

 

[Eveleivibe]

Once they behave that way they'll do it again. I was naive once. They're all manipulative, cunning b******s. SHM don't feel guilty you did good. Jail isn't enough of a punishment for these people. They're not even human.

Evey

Oh don't let any of them fool you with their sob stories they're not sorry. They just want the chance to do their dirty crimes again. Pure fucking evil.

 

[curious_24]

A very well balanced argument there from Evey.

 

[Shambles]

So where's the middle ground? Why is it always outrageous condemnation and six pages in the Daily Mail or condoning with a nudge and a wink? To get justice for all we need to find a different way. I'm not holding my breath on it happening either though Shammy.

I would completely agree with all you said there. It wasn't so very long ago these kinda things were barely prosecuted at all - every place I lived as a young child there was a man who all the kids were told to stay away from but (obviously) wasn't actually being locked up for what he was doing but rather getting small fines, slaps on the wrist, a bit of tutting from the judge perhaps, largely ignored and bordering on being accepted as "one of those things". Go back a bit further and there was even less prejudice against child sex abuse and child prostitution was rife and again virtually seen as being "one of those things". I think it's great that the law has started to catch up with what are in fact horrific crimes that cause immense and lasting damage to the victims that can haunt them for a lifetime. At the same time I would also agree it's too much black and white and when it comes to the tabloids it's downright hypocrisy (don't they still do "countdowns to consent" for underage female celebrities?).

There should be a better way of dealing with such things but I can kinda understand why the pendulum has swung quite so far over to excessive punishment for comparatively minor examples such as the one you mention - it has been a very long time where that pendulum was stuck at the opposite extreme so is bound to be a backlash and some overzealous prosecutions. That doesn't make it right but it's perhaps not so surprising. Hopefully a saner middle ground approach will be found soon enough where context is taken into account more and there's less emphasis on the broad brushstokes of 15 + tit = sex offender register for life and years in prison. Such things certainly do need to be prosecuted and punished I'd say but when treated in the way you describe it almost takes away from the truly serious crimes and it all just becomes a blur of screaming tabloid paedo shocker!!! headlines with little actual thought involved any more.

I do think there are signs this is starting to happen actually. There's been recent talk of perhaps a need to address anonymity issues for people accused of sex crimes which I do think needs addressing as once the charge has been made and the name publicised that person will never be able to fully regain whatever reputation and credibility they once had even if completely exonerated. The sheer number of high profile child sex abuse and rape trials recently will hopefully get people thinking more about the whole subject - including the problems with the law.

 

[j.t]

The Sun was shunning people left right and centre calling them pedo's but as soon as Charlotte Church turned 16 awarded her "rear of the year".. Logic..

This was in quote to SHM.

 

[Eveleivibe]

A very well balanced argument there from Evey.

Balanced argument? When it comes to that group of people there's no balance.

I'm a parent. They are SCUM. BAD. EVIL. INHUMAN.

If anyone hurt my child they wouldn't be doing time because they'd no longer be living.

Evey

 

[Vurtual]

^A society should be judged by how it treats it's worst members

 

[Shambles]

If anyone hurt my child they wouldn't be doing time because they'd no longer be living.

Everybody is somebody's child - that includes sex offenders. I'm not for one moment suggesting they should... I don't even know - they are imprisoned the same as any other criminal who hurts people is imprisoned. I really don't understand the "string 'em up" mentality. Well, I suppose I kinda do cos they are obviously hideous crimes (at least the instances I suspect you are thinking of - touching a 15yo boob is not on but it's hardly Ian Watkins territory) but I do wonder if people now use tabloid hysteria about "paedos" to simply vent anger in general - scapegoat for everything that is perceived to be wrong with modern society - rather than treating them as what they are which is as people who have done truly terrible things in many cases but who are still people. I agree with the above quote. That doesn't mean such offenders should be treated lightly but it does mean they should be treated humanely. The level of vitriol and the type of language often used by people who go the "hanging's too good for 'em" way is often deeply disturbing in itself. It's all a bit eye for an eye for me. I prefer the don't sink to their level approach. Revenge is not the appropriate response for a society (albeit an understandable initial reaction from people directly affected, their friends and family and so forth).

 

[Ismene]

I am still wondering if you fancied a girl when you were 14 and still occasionally find the thought of her sexy when you are 35, does that make you a paedo? Even tho you don't find 14 year old girls of today sexy, at least not in the Cyril Smith sense.