The most important thing right now is finding a way for you and your siblings to be safe. They will be able to help you with that. Please do get in touch with them Jaya, okay? I wish you the best of luck, and know you’re not alone.

I believe the ability to consent (in a meaningful/informed way) to sex is something that everyone achieves at a different age. OK, so the *average* age at which people reach it tends to be in the mid-teens (corresponding roughly with physical maturity). But i know people who reached it at 10, and others who didn’t reach it until 20 or older (and some people – ie asexuals – may never reach it).

I don’t think there should be any statutory age of consent. I think the one and only thing that distinguishes sex from rape, no matter what the age or “developmental level” of the people involved, is whether ACTUAL consent was given – and that there should be a case-by-case assessment of whether actual consent was given, and that and that alone should determine whether someone is guilty of rape.

I accept that the idea of children, especially those before the age of puberty, consenting to sex is one that, understandably, many people have violent emotional reactions to. But i have female friends who were having fully consenting sex (with boys of around the same age) before they started menstruating.

Sure, that was “experimentation”. But isn’t it all, really?

I had a friend at school who had sex with a girl at a party when he was about 17. She initiated it, and told him she was 16. He found out later that she was actually 13 at the time. Would you consider him to be a rapist?

I am fully aware that the power imbalances between a teenager and an older adult, especially one in a position of socially granted authority, are very large, and that that can mean that “true” consent is impossible in such a situation. But there are plenty of situations between adults where the power imbalances are just as large, if not larger (eg, a person with a severe physical impairment and a “care” worker who they are dependent on for their basic bodily needs), and one situation is not worse than the other because of the ages of the people involved – it’s the power imbalance that’s the problem.

Each case should be tried individually, and if the power imbalance is determined to be great enough for meaningful, informed consent to be impossible, then the defendant should be found guilty of rape (not a “lesser” offence of “statutory rape”, but RAPE). I don’t doubt that in the vast majority of cases involving people under a certain age, that level of power imbalance will be determined to be present – but it should be that power imbalance itself, and not the factors such as age or disability which contributed to it at one remove, which should be the determining factor. And no one should EVER be found guilty of rape for an act which the other party actually, enthusiastically consented to.

I personally like the laws which are, as you say, a “three year rule” between the two parties, or as I was once told NY’s law is (I’ve never bothered looking it up and am too lazy to right now, but a cop told my sex ed class this 7 years ago), where the rule is that it is illegal for anyone over the age of 21 to have sex with anyone under the age of 17 — and then of course a base age below which consent cannot be given (so that it’s not legal for a 19 year old to “have sex” with an 11 year old).

But I absolutely do not pretend to have the answers here.

Can a 16 year old consent to have sex with an adult? Possibly. Can a 15 year old? 14? 13? 12? 11? 10? 9? etc.

Is it impossible for a 16 year old to consent? No, it is not “impossible.” But then what, exactly, separates a 16 year old from a 15 year old? A 15 from a 14? Is there some mystical, magical change that occurs when one reaches 16 that confers upon them the ability to consent? If so, then what about 15? Is there that much difference between a 16 year old and a 15 year old? If not, if it is a case by case basis, then why have statutory laws in the first place?

And there is another party to this equation. At what age are we comfortable with in turning our heads? A 16 year old with a 20 year old, one year more than the usual 3-year-rule many areas in the US have? 21? 25? 30? 35? 40? 45? 50? And so on.

We have statutory laws to protect those we consider vulnerable. Is a 16 year old, even if he/she consents, vulnerable when their intended partner is 20? 21? 35? 64? The answer is that they are, indeed, vulnerable and unlike fully grown adults, they do not have the capacity or resources available to them to weather the negative results of vulnerability (and I am speaking of all young people uniformily because while some might have the capacity/resources, many do not).

So while they may be able to grant their consent personally, they cannot do so legally (with an adult). Therefore the defense, from an adult who is well aware of this, that a 16, 15, 14, or younger girl granted her consent is no defense at all.

I will grant that statutory laws are tricky and make us uncomfortable to where we do not want to discuss them. However, without them, what legal protection do children, of all ages, have from those who want to violate and use them?

I agree with that wholeheartedly and completely. (And i am in no way whatsoever trying to deny that this particular case is a case of rape. And, on re-reading, this is probably actually more aimed at Jenna in the comments than at Cara…)

BUT, i think it is DEEPLY problematic to assume that, just because someone has a “mental disability” (the exact nature of which isn’t specified here), or indeed because they are “underage” (the age of consent for sex in the UK is 16, and in some European countries, it’s 12. There are many countries which have a higher age of consent for homosexual than for heterosexual acts…) that they “cannot” consent.

I have a mental impairment – does that mean that anyone who has sex with me is guilty of rape?

Such assumptions completely deny agency to disabled people, and are IMO among the worst examples of disablist assumptions in society. Yes, we are at higher risk of being raped. No, we are not asexual or incapable of desiring sex, and EMPHATICALLY NO, all our partners are not rapists.

Please don’t spread such patronising and taboo-reinforcing disablist assumptions.

No, the crime of rape is sex without consent. Violence is not necessary. In particular, statutory rape, where the victim is too young to legally consent, need not include violence.

Rape is ALWAYS violence. It doesn’t need to involve hitting, punching, stabbing or even holding a person down — the act of “having sex” with someone who has not consented is ALWAYS VIOLENCE. And someone who doesn’t understand that does not get to comment on my blog, so you are now banned and may fuck off.

I’m not going to bother responded to the rest of this ridiculous and contradictory comment, but I will say that if you truly do believe that sex is only heterosexual sexual intercourse, you live a sad fucking life.

No, that’s Captain Disagreed With The Point, thank you very much. I understand what you are saying, so please don’t imply I am some sort of idiot just because I dare disagree with you.

> Sex is the act of genital touching for the intent of sexual pleasure.

No, it isn’t. Sex is sexual intercourse. Pleasure doesn’t have to be the intent for it to be sex.

> Secondly, while the term “sex” itself may not innately infer consent, the term “having sex” or “had sex with” does.

No, it doesn’t. “Having sex” or “had sex with” means “having sexual intercourse with” or “had sexual intercourse with”. Neither imply consent.

By the way, it seems like you are taking back your previous assertion:

> If the victim does not have the capacity to consent, as the article later claims, it could not by definition have been “sex.”

…when you say:

> the term “sex” itself may not innately infer consent

Is this true? Have we found common ground?

> See the difference? If you can’t, you need to go find a new blog to read.

I might as well tell you to read a different article. If you think that it’s worth voicing disagreement when somebody says something distasteful instead of simply ignoring it, then surely you can understand why I do?

> No one said that rape is not forced sex, I (we) said that there is a word for forced sex, it is rape, and it is a perfectly good word.

And it’s a word the article used three times!

> The crime of rape is not sex, but the violation and violence inherent.

No, the crime of rape is sex without consent. Violence is not necessary. In particular, statutory rape, where the victim is too young to legally consent, need not include violence.

> Sex is not a crime (in most places and in most forms), so you do not charge someone with sex.

That’s like saying “swinging your arms about is not a crime, so you do not charge someone with swinging their arms about”. The fact is, swinging your arms about in order to hit somebody is a crime, and you get charged with assault. Just like having sex with somebody who doesn’t consent is a crime, and you get charged with rape. No, the generic actions are not a crime by themselves, but when they happen in particular ways it is a crime.

> Therefore, writing an article about how a man had sex with someone is pointless, unclear and invasive.

The article wasn’t unclear at all. It said “rape” three times and “sexual abuse” once.

> If the article is about how a man allegedly raped someone, that is clear, has a point and ought to be public knowledge.

This article is about how a man allegedly raped somebody, and it specifically says exactly that several times.

> Using a word like “sex” removes the violation and violation that is central to the crime, and yes IS FUCKING TRIVIALIZING.

You are seeing misogyny where there is none. The article says she was raped. It says it three times, in fact, including the headline. It also says she was sexually abused. This article in *no way* portrays her abuse as trivial.

Why have you latched onto this article and made up your own definition for “sex” to make it seem like the author is trivialising this? You seem to be making a battle out of absolutely nothing.