I’d never think of it, and I’d never allow it. Plus I think you’re capable of dealing with any flaming which might sneak through. I’ve seen you in action.

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“…but I think there is a point being missed. I don’t think it’s an issue of having an “age” of consent. Some kids I think are capable of making an informed decision on whether they should be having sex at 14. On the other hand others probably aren’t emotionally mature enough even at 21.”

Kids are kids, not small adults. They don’t get to vote, they don’t get to drive and they don’t get to be sex objects for adults. You can have all the sex education you want from kindergarten on up, but a twelve-year old child is still a child whether they’re in Tonga or in Toronto or Glasgow and twelve-year old kids are not ready to have sex with anyone of any age, be it physically or mentally. In fact most people are never ready for sex at any age, that’s why there’s alcohol which either prepares you or comforts you afterwards. But those children under a certain age must be protected from predators who are out there and desperate to fuck someone’s naked child.

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“Surely it would be better to increase sex education, make sure young men and women are given proper emotional preparation for what is lets face it one if the most driving human appetites.”

You can’t force a child to see and understand sex from the perspective of an adult. Sex education does not protect girls and boys from predators, all it does is tell the kids certain tabs fit into certain slots. Making it illegal for a thirty-year old man to have sex with a 14-year old child protects the children. The point of the “close in age exemption” is to prevent teenagers from becoming sex criminals for acting out their high school fantasies with each other. No one is saying, necessarily, that kids shouldn’t fuck around. It’s that they should be protected from people wanting to take advantage of their naivete.

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“Women who are able to approach agencies for contraceptive and sexual health advice (unworried about legal implications) are much more likely to be in a position to make an informed choice about sex.”

No one in Canada, pharmacist or doctor, would ever consider denying a teenager birth control. I think there might be some concerns depending on the extreme youth of the child, like if the child is in the 12-year old range. But Canadian teens have access here to birth control, condoms, and even abortions pretty much on demand (there are no legal restrictions on abortion in Canada).

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“The problem with raising the age is that it then puts limits on teachers, parents, youth workers etc as to how much information they can give young people.”

No. The age of consent does not preclude information sessions in Health Class, over the Internet, in the doctor’s office or at the YM/WCA. At least not here. Sex Ed starts very early in the Education System here, much earlier than the current age of consent. Raising the age of consent, again, is not a ban on a teenagers sexuality. It’s a ban on predators.

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“Like I said before its about informed consent and the difficulty lies in measuring that. Young women reach physical maturity much earlier than they used to but live in a society where sex is full of ambiguity. We (the adults) use it to sell cars and to control relationships and a whole multitude of things aside from the primary function of procreation.”

The problem with “informed consent” is an “informed” young teenager is an oxymoron. But what I’m writing aboot is not aboot how women are sexualized at a younger age, although this has cooled recently with the deaths of Britney and Hillary. It’s aboot young girls being used as sex slaves inside a Cult and there’s very little the government can do to stop it from happening. Except, maybe, increase the age of consent a few years and use existing anti-prostitution laws to offer these girls some protection.

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“The women in your original article are being abused but not just through sex. They (presumably) are being kept from influences outside of the ‘cult’ and it is this that is imprisoning them not the age of consent.”

I’m proposing using the age of consent laws as a means to freeing these girls, not on banning them from having sex.

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“Also..I read the article FAQ and still don’t get why you don’t want to be born in Tonga. Sex isn’t in itself bad. In countries with a low life expectancy it can be a matter of survival.”

No, again, sex in itself is not wrong. But any culture in which a child is fair game for an adult is wrong. That’s where more sex education should be focussed, in protecting children from the warped cultural shit that third world nations are allowed to get away with in the name of “Cultural Relativism” (and second and first world as well… like Canada’s Bountiful, British Columbia). And like in South Africa where, for a long time, there was a belief in many regions that having sex with a virgin would cure AIDS. So groups of men would line up and fuck the neighbour’s 9-year old child or even year-old babies. That was a pretty culturally specific thing as well… which got stopped through education and public shaming.

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“Women are much less likely to suffer birth complications if they have their children early. Its a culturally specific thing.”

Cultural tendancies are a pretty weak excuse for children having children sired by adults. Women are much less likely to have birthing complications if they have access to clean water and hospitals. Neither Tonga (12-years old) nor Spain (13-years old) are third world nations and have both clean water and modern hospitals so I’m not sure of the rationale behind their age of consent laws. Sex with someone so young in this country is considered, and rightfully so, pedophilia…

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The problem that the authorities are trying to address is not the situation where two teenagers who think they are in love should be considered criminal because the state has decided the are below the arbitrary age limit. The issue is that sex has the potential to be used to exert power and that there are adult men (usually, almost always men) who would abuse their position of trust to get easy sexual relief.

Surely it would be better to increase sex education, make sure young men and women are given proper emotional preparation for what is lets face it one if the most driving human appetites.

By saying it’s pro child sex its a risk of becoming really melodramatic. You could say it’s pro not criminalising teenagers for natural urges.

Whether there should be some sort of framework introduced to prevent dirty old men from abusing that is a good question but criminalising teenagers isn’t the answer.

Women who are able to approach agencies for contraceptive and sexual health advice (unworried about legal implications) are much more likely to be in a position to make an informed choice about sex.

Like I said before its about informed consent and the difficulty lies in measuring that. Young women reach physical maturity much earlier than they used to but live in a society where sex is full of ambiguity. We (the adults) use it to sell cars and to control relationships and a whole multitude of things aside from the primary function of procreation.

In Scotland the age of consent is 16 (for all sexualities) but across the water from me in Northern Ireland the age is 17. In France it is 15. In Spain 13.

The problem with raising the age is that it then puts limits on teachers, parents, youth workers etc as to how much information they can give young people.

The women in your original article are being abused but not just through sex. They (presumably) are being kept from influences outside of the ‘cult’ and it is this that is imprisoning them not the age of consent.

Also..I read the article FAQ and still don’t get why you don’t want to be born in Tonga. Sex isn’t in itself bad. In countries with a low life expectancy it can be a matter of survival. Women are much less likely to suffer birth complications if they have their children early. Its a culturally specific thing.

“The Tories have accused Dion’s Liberals of slowing nine government anti-crime bills in the House of Commons and the Liberal leader acknowledged part of the reason behind his new platform is the prospect that justice and crime may be a major issue in the next federal election.”
Thursday, March 15, 2007; CanWest News Service

Age Of Consent FAQ’s: [here]
1. What are the “sex” laws in Canada…
2. How Canada compares to the world…
3. Why you don’t want to be born in Tonga…