Worth starting a separate thread after Godiver's post below.

My feeling is that the entire Age Of Consent law is based on a flaw - but I must admit I cannot see an obvious alternative.

It strikes me that the thing society wants to prevent is people being taken advantage of. As a result it assumes that age has something to do with it. The reality is - people of both genders mature at very different ages.
It is also very hard to assess when someone is being taken advantage of.

The basic flaw is - why is sex regarded as so important? It is not like murder or stealing or wounding somebody.

EDUCATION must be the answer - precautions, ramifications, risks - but as to the law, that is harder to decide.

Another point is that people seem to be maturing earlier, both physically and mentally, with the extra information provided by the Internet.

And I think females can be abused more easily than males - their essence tends to fall for romance, love and those areas of reason to procreate whereas males tend to become aroused for more physical reasons.

All in all - not an easy solution to a complex problem. But I do think that, if someone can be considered to know it is wrong to kill or hurt someone else, a similar attitude should exist as to them deciding when to have sex and of what kind.

Lack of education results in girls under the age of 16 falling pregnant. I was fortunate to have sex-education at our school.

I do think there has to be an age of consent, they maybe have got it right at 16. However, when I was 17, I had sex with a female in the fourth year at school who was either 14 or 15. Was that wrong, in the eyes of the law yes, however, neither of us felt it was. My justification at the time was that their was only a two year age gap.

I think that females generally mature much quicker than males in the teenage years and in the case of my experience, she certainly knew what she wanted and we had enough common-sense to have the appropriate precautions.

I don't see any changes to the age of consent anytime soon.

I think they have it right at 16 personally but i would not feel comfortable having sex with someone who is 16. Your morals set your personal boundaries and the law is there to protect where people seek to abuse. I think if you are attracted to 16 year olds you are also going to be attracted to 15 and 14 year olds which is where the law comes into play. If you are attracted to very young people then the very young people need to be protected by a defining law that seeks to assess when they are mature enough.

Speaking as a female I can say that there is generally a big difference between girls of 14 and girls of 16. That growth period produces quite a noticeble change.

I don't agree that if a person is attracted to one person of a certain age they necesarily will be attracted to others of that age. People become attracted to individuals. By definition "paedophiles" are attracted to children, generally meaning pre-puberty. Girls of 14 and above are mostly too old for a "paedophile" because most are very mature. As someone said, that word has been greatly misused.

I actually believe that all abuse is wrong, sexual or otherwise, and it should not matter what age the victim.

It is a huge topic.

Uk law does deal with 14+ differently to under 14s and Paedophiles by definition are people who like children who are pre pubescent. Most of us cant understand that at all......

16 is a good age for consent though in many countries they have made it 14 or 15 for obvious reasons that girls that age seem to have sex - some 60% supposedly.....

There are more cases of "abuse" going to court for kids with kids ( eg 16 - 18 year olds haveing sex with 12 - 15 year olds )

I think that the UK probably has it right for our society.

I still think that the law should not prosecute if the acts took place over 5 years ago - because the evidence would not exist and it is impossible to test the truth of such a claim after that time - it is hard enough near the time......Juries hate these cases because they dont have enough to base their verdicts on except the "public performances" in court of the key players and lawyers.....which is no way to conduct real and fair justice.

You made a good point Jonathan - sex is not rocket science...why is it such a difficult decision to make whether or not to go to bed with somebody, one that only adults could possibly make?

Some brief points of my own :

1/ the age of consent in the UK was raised from 12 to 16 in the late 19th century when girls generally began puberty at 15 or 16 and there was no sex education in schools. Furthermore, it was raised to combat the widespread problem of child prostitution in London at the time.

2/ Males and females will always see sex differently (as JK stated). Girls can get pregnant. Girls and women demand and need emotional committment. On the other hand, teenage girls are generally more emotionally and physically devoloped than their same age male peers.

3/ Perhaps we should have have an age of consent to be impregnated at 16 rather than an age of consent to sex itself. If an older guy has sex with a 15 year old and makes sure contraception is used, fine, if he recklessly impregnates the girl, or fails to use contraception, then throw the book at him.

4/ The German law, I think, is most sensible. The age of consent is generally 14, but if it is clear that the older partner took advantage of a lack of emotional or sexual maturity on the part of a 14 or 15 year old he can be prosecuted (although such prosecutions are rare, at least until recently. Under pressure from the EU the German government has been trying to raise the age of consent to 18, even to the extent that 17 year old boys could be presecuted for child abuse for kissing their 17 year old girlfriends!).

5/ It is a misconception that the age of consent is still 16 in the UK. Nu Labor have been bringing in laws nearly every week, it's hard to keep up with them, suffice to say that any older guy having sex with a 16/17 year old is on dodgy legal ground these days. For example, it is illegal to send a sexy e-mail to a person under 18 (even if it is your 17 year old girlfriend). You could also get into trouble if you have sex with a 16 year old after buying her a meal.

6/ Finally, I don't think it will ever be possible for society to discuss the morality of sex completely rationally, especially if 'children' are added to the brew. But I do think we are going backwards in our ability to try.

There is a Statute of Limitations on prosecutions (usually 6 years) in almost every western country for all crimes except murder.

And that's when there may be excellent proof but the time has passed. When it's the word of one against another-how can it be proved ?.

If I had the name of, say a News of the World reporter( or anyone) and researched his life I could accuse him of anything sexual and possibly get away with it. Just imagine..he could be married with kids and be entirely respectible but that would just fuel the publicity.

I do know one person that jumped on the bandwagon and applied for compensation from the Catholic Church after a priest was convicted..he never appeared at the trial just waited until it was all over.

He basically told me it wasn't true but as the man had gone to jail because of other victims he didn't see why he shouldn't get some money.

I note-the Catholic Church has now paid out millions of pounds around the world and has an unlimited fund for those seeking counselling yet something like 5% of the victims bother with the counseling.

I think we are getting a perfect example of the irrational thinking-and politicised thinking that swirls around the subject of sex-with the US elections.

Ronald Reagen-generally regarded as a god of Conservatism gave a speech to the all powerful Evangelicals in 1984 and said a better word to describe unwed pregnant teenage girls would be "promiscuous"

Since then there have been endless calls that pregant unwed black teens are a sign of "a crisis in black America" or they are derided as "welfare queens"

Up pops Sarah Palin who it seems is a choice to get the Evangelicals and hard right onside for McCain-with a 17 year old unwed pregnant teenage daughter and it's called a "celebration of life !"

I don't thihk that 16 year old girls get pregnant because of lack of education. I think they know where babies come from by that age. They get pregnant through carelessness and probably irresponsibility probably fueled by alcohol.

robbiex wrote:
I don't thihk that 16 year old girls get pregnant because of lack of education. I think they know where babies come from by that age. They get pregnant through carelessness and probably irresponsibility probably fueled by alcohol.

It also knocks them up several ratchets on the Council Flat waiting list !

I thought the Age of Consent was 16 in the UK except for Teachers where it is now 18 ( Another dig at the teaching profession by New Labour who will not allow teachers equal rights to other citizens )

I really would say to anyone considering teaching as a career - dont...it will all end in tears if you are any good at it.

I would love the Police to prosecute criminals again rather than be the "thought police" that they are becoming.

Latest story on the LAWYER who was shot proves that the POLICE have fabricated their story of events - their own Police helicopter shows that they were not at risk and the lawyer was not pointing a gun at them.