DeepNeuralNetwork
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User ID: 799
DeepNeuralNetwork
1d ago
18 seems like a young age to lose paternal authority over an unmarried daughter, if that's what you value. Somehow I don't think AOC laws actually are for this though. What about an age of consent of 15, but parents can veto their daughters' relationships until they are 18, or even 21? Veto means they can press charges against the man for violating their authority over their daughter.
The way the law works now, it doesn't protect paternal authority. Daughters will just do what they will with other teenagers, who are immune from AOC prosecution. Then when they turn 18, they will do whatever they please. The law mainly functions to prevent loving, family-condoned relationships between 20-something men and teenage girls.
DeepNeuralNetwork
1d ago
The law makes a very clear distinction between the two such that self-defense is not assault.
It would be even better if the law made a distinction where a loving relationship involving a 15 year old between could never be statutory rape. Only people who actually victimize should be prosecutable.
In many jurisdictions, it absolutely is.
I guess in mine it's not, because human nature is violent and we don't want to make every man who gets in a fight a felon.
A "15-year-old girl who loves her 20-year-old boyfriend" is not the same as "a 15-year-old victim of statutory rape".
It is if they have sex, even if she wanted it and is not victimized by it.
DeepNeuralNetwork
1d ago
This applies to marriage but not age of consent. You could just criminalize making a 15 year old pregnant, instead of sex itself. But I don't think that's even necessary because pregnancy at that age is not significantly more dangerous than at 20. Not enough to justify making it a felony. The historical demographic record is a testament to this.
DeepNeuralNetwork
1d ago
Assault is legal in some cases, such as self defense, plus it's not a felony to get in a fight, and on top of that if I punch someone, they're more of a victim than a 15 year old girl who loves her 20 year old boyfriend. Yet, the crime is less severe. That's illogical.
DeepNeuralNetwork
1d ago
My best answer to this is college students because 7 year age gaps are the most fertile according to the data. But also, whoever they want, since I can't find justification for ever making sex with a 15 year old a crime.
DeepNeuralNetwork
2d ago
The fact that the death threat people never seem very educated, and that smart people on this forum independently arive at the same opinions as myself, makes me think this topic is for some reason stratified mainly by intelligence.
DeepNeuralNetwork
2d ago
I don't have time to use this forum a lot, but I wanted insight from a more intelligent crowd than X on this topic. You don't have to engage.
DeepNeuralNetwork
2d ago
Is there any reason the age of consent should be higher than 15 in the United States? I've concluded from Twitter that it's extremely difficult to find and good arguments against this. Meanwhile there's a lot of evidence for the position. Academics seem to agree with an age of consent around 15 while 18 seems to be more of a grassroots idea.
The arguments for an age of consent of 15 are multitude. First there's evospych; studies show most men in their twenties are attracted to 15 year old girls. Then there's ancient demography; the median age of marriage ranged from 16 to 18 for girls until 1600 AD and the minimum legal age of marriage ranged from 12-14 in most societies. Next there's the psychometric evidence: 15 year old girls demonstrate adult intelligence, while little children would be considered handicapped by adult intelligence standards, meaning the former should be able to understand sex and its consequences while the latter likely cannot. There's contemporary cross cultural evidence, specifically from Europe, which shows that wealthy modern countries can do just fine with age of consent set at 14 or 15. Example countries right now include France, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Austria, Hungary, Estonia, and more.
All of this evidence points to 9 being too young, but 18 being too high. It seems like 14 or 15 is the optimal sweet spot. This is important right now as we can't properly judge Epstein without thinking scientifically about the age of consent. All of his victims were over 14, and that's not underaged everywhere. It's probable he would he charged with prostitution in Europe, but seeing this as a pedophile situation is not necessarily the right way to look at it.
The counter evidence I have been shown is essentially nil. It usually is just a death threat, actually. The best evidence is that the brain develops until 25, but then why not have an age of consent of 25? Why not let 24 year olds date 15 year olds? It doesn't really matter logically when the brain is mature, just when it is mature enough, given that 18 year olds brains are still maturing but they are seen as mature enough by these people.
The other main piece of objective evidence is that fecundity peaks around 20. The issue with this is that sex and dating do not mean pregnancy. Furthermore ancient demography shows that teen pregnancy is good enough anyway. Finally, the data don't seem to indicate that teenage girls are too young for pregnancy; the negative causal effects on their pregnancy are extremely mild and don't justify banning a 20 year old from dating a 15 year old.
Finally there's subjective evidence, lived experience. Interlocuters swear up and down that they weren't mature enough to date at 15. Well, that's not my experience and the experience of a ton of other people, including entire countries with nuclear weapons. I'm not sure who is wrong here, or if it's just something that genuinely differs between people. Still, lived experience is really not how I hand out felonies to loving couples. I find that idea odious. Especially when the girl and her family testify that their lived experience is different from the American norm.
Even with no STDs, I support a common law age of consent. For example, if I were on a jury and a prosecutor was trying to convict a child molester of rape or sexual assault, I would vote guilty if the child is under an age of reasonable intelligence. All I would need as evidence is a psychological examination that shows the child does not understand sex or its consequences. I would never buy this for an intelligent adolescent.
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