Is Ireland correct to declare war on boys who have consensual sex with their girlfriends?

[femtastic]

Personally, I find this law to be absolutely abhorrent, and I hope it is repealed.

Court hears 'Romeo and Juliet' laws appea

THE Supreme Court has been urged to overturn as unconstitutional the so-called "Romeo and Juliet" laws which allow the prosecution of teenage boys for having sex with teenage girls but prevent prosecution of the girls.

The court is hearing an appeal arising from a 15-year-old boy being charged under the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2006 with having sex with a 14-year-old girl in the Donegal Gaeltacht.

The boy is also charged with buggery and his trial is on hold pending the outcome of the appeal, which opened yesterday and will resume on a future date.

Section 3 of the 2006 act created an offence of defilement of a child under 17 and provided for a sentence of up to five years' imprisonment. Section 5 of the act stated a girl under 17 cannot be guilty of such an offence.

In the High Court in March 2010, Ms Justice Elizabeth Dunne ruled, while the law did amount to gender discrimination, that discrimination was not invidious, capricious or disproportionate.

As the risk of pregnancy as a result of underage sex was borne by girls only, not boys, society was entitled to deter such activity and to place the burden of criminal sanction on those "who bear the least adverse consequences" of it, she said.

Outlining the boy's appeal against that decision, John O'Kelly SC said the kernel of the appeal was that both parties involved in this sexual act were children in law aged under 17, with only about a year between the two of them.

The boy's case was they engaged consensually in an act of sexual intercourse but under the act, one of them was liable to be convicted and possibly jailed for up to five years while the other was guilty of no criminal offence at all.

Mr Justice Nial Fennelly noted the 2006 act is neutral as to whether the act of sexual intercourse is consensual or not and the court was not getting involved in that issue in the appeal.

John Finlay SC, for the state, opposed the appeal and argued the High Court decision should stand. The disputed provision was a proportionate measure on grounds of pregnancy, he submitted.

Pleased to see that the Irish High Court threw the boy's (who is now a man) appeal out. He and his lawyers had tried to argue that the law was a gender discriminatory law.

www.rte.ie/news/2010/0326/court.html

It is being tried as an underage sex case to avoid having the girl testify perhaps? I cannot believe there would have been even a whisper of a prosecution if this girl had not suffered an injury, and prosecuting it as a case of underage sex means she would not be grilled on the stand as to consent, various sexual acts, etc. That is what age of consent laws are meant to do.

Consider too that the 2006 legislation was enacted to close a loophole that had allowed sexual predators to claim they had not known the age of their victims at the time of assault...

Clearly previous assumptions were stacked against victims of sexually predatory behaviour.

The boy was prosecuted under Section 5 of the legislation, which deals specifically with penetrative intercourse, the consequences of which fall unequally on girls. For all other underage sexual activity both boys and girls are equally liable to prosecution.

More info on the case and as far as I can understand the legalese, the girl maintained that the buggery etc. were not consensual.

Frankly, I think most parents would have demanded action against him whether it was alleged to be consensual or not.

www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2010/0712/1224274507627.html

Claig - That is the write up of the case referred to at the beginning of thread - your link dates it to March 2010. It would be interesting to know whether it is going through the European courts.

Actually, reading that report it sounds as though, in practice, it is being looked at quite carefully. E.g. this was the only case where there was no age difference between the parties - in the other prosecutions there were age differences of 3 - 39 years which would seem to be the purspoe of the legislation in the first place. The problem in this case is that it wasn't entirely consensual.

Not sure what the latest is. But it is unbelievable that people are even challenging the Irish High Court on this. I just checked the antimisandry.com website on this, and surprise, surprise there are some posts on there that think the system is corrupt and discriminatory.

Why would teenage girls 'come forward' anyway? The only reason to make any sort of claim would be in the case of injury/infection, rape, pregnancy.

Girls can be reasonably sure that a pregnancy will be discovered. Most pregnancies are not hidden for as long as Ann Lovett managed to hide hers. Most girls tell someone about a pregnancy. Maybe in order to avoid being found out to be engaging in underage sex, more teenage boys will decide a condom would be a good idea.. The issue of boys saying to girls that if they really loved them they would have unprotected sex is a huge one everywhere.

The reasons not to come forward in a case of rape are many fear of he said/she said situations in court, difficulty of proving consent, embarrassment about going over details of sexual activity in court if a girl has got to the point where she feels she has been raped as opposed to 'engaging' in rough sex or 'sex she can't remember' or involvement with a really passionate macho type partner, there are many reasons to give her pause besides worrying her bf will be subject to prosecution.

Reasons to avoid disclosing a pregnancy are also myriad, without adding the threat of prosecution as well. Most families are shocked and disappointed and angry.

But as mathanxiety said, it is the boy's word against the girl's, and sometimes the girl will not want to get the boy into trouble and may say that it was consensual even if she was coerced. But, fortunately, many parents will not accept that and will demand a prosecution.

'Ms Justice Dunne said it was clear from these statements that prior to the events giving rise to the criminal proceedings, the complainant and the plaintiff were not known to each other. There was some sexual activity which could be described as ?consensual?.'

• This is the usual teenage sex story in other words, no 'Romeo and Juliet' star crossed lovers blather, and there was probably a lot of cider involved, or a long walk home from a dance on a dark road together, or a lift in the back of a car..

'However, the complainant alleged that an act of buggery and an act of sexual intercourse, the offences with which the plaintiff had been charged, took place as a result of the use of force and fear. The plaintiff claimed that these acts were consensual.'

• He said/she said. And too often given the burden of proof issue, it is what he said that is accepted by a jury. If a case even gets tried.

'It was clear that there was an issue as to consent. While here consent was not a defence, it was important to bear in mind that on the complainant?s view of the circumstances, this was not a case about ?consensual? sexual activity.'

So here we are again, with an accused arguing consent -- this is the beauty of prosecution for underage sex. At least some victims of predatory sexual behaviour can be protected, and if those who really do consent get caught in the net, too bad. They are breaking the law anyway.

exactly, mathanxiety.

Claig, thank you for linking that.

I fail to understand why the initial article in the OP made no reference to a previous issue of consent. Would have changed a lot of the thread, I feel. I now feel somewhat like a rape apologist, yet that's not the case, because of misrepresentation...

Sorry if I've upset someone. Can someone delete all my previous posts on that. I don't want to defend a rapist. It's not who I aml.

And it's what I now feel I've done. FFS. I had triede loooking for more in fo on the article earlier, and couldn't find anything...

DontCallMePeanut, don't beat yourself up about it. We can all be fooled by certain arguments and posters. It's all part of seeing more clearly.

sethstarkaddersmum said right near the beginning

'is this the third controversial thread that new poster Femtastic has started and run?'

some people think femtastic may have been one of you know who.

We can all get fooled by them. I think this thread has been good as it might show people to ask the right questions.

/but I'm not usually this stupid... Sorry, this has kinda had a bad effect on me now.

I swear, I'm not a rape apologist. And now I feel like one.

You're not a rape apologist, because you didn't realise it was rape. You believed his story. So did others. It happens. But it shows that you always need to be sceptical and not accept things uncritically.

What led many people to think incorrectly here, in my opinion, is the equalism, equalist aspect, which is the argument that he used in court claiming that he was being discriminated against. It is a deceptive, in my opinion, progressive, argument, which is wrong.

If we are not careful, eventually these type of equalist arguments will be used against us in courts, and some of our rights will be stripped under the equalist banner. That is why on the other thread in AIBU, the MRA types champion equalism.

I don't think it was me who said that, HRH. Except that it was my point that without age of consent legislation and prosecution available on that basis, girls are faced with a he said/he said situation, with consent argued as a defence no matter what went on, just as adult rape victims are forced to prove lack of consent (a very difficult prospect).

In this situation, the male could be a lot older than the female too. Bear in mind that this is a country where a bishop forced victims of clergy sexual abuse to sign statements that denied any assaults. The effect of this 2006 legislation, while its defence may point to the issue of pregnancy being harder on girls than boys, will also be to make it much easier to prosecute all cases where minor girls are victims of sexual abuse.