Some US states have what are known as "Romeo & Juliet laws". Age of Consent exists, ostensibly, to protect children and young adults from exploitation by legal adults.
Some R&J provisions include totally decriminalising underage sex so long as both participants are under the age of consent; and introducing "brackets" whereby the age of consent can be "bent" with one participant above and below, so long as both are within a few years of age.
I think this is probably the most reasonable form of legislation on age of consent that can possible exist. I think the law needs to catch up with modern technology and consider "sexting" and the sending of illicit images between minors to "sexual activity" rather than as "pornographic material", which still has the hard-and-fast age restriction of 18 for participants and viewers.
In some recent US court cases, two minors sending illicit images to each other consensually have been charged (and often the male in a heterosexual relationship) with soliciting, possessing and distributing child pornography, despite never sharing out those illicit materials produced for each other's private enjoyment.
This included one case where an underage boy was ordered by the court to have indecent images of him taken by federal agents to recreate these illicit materials, in order to satisfy the court that they were indeed of himself and not "child pornography" acquired elsewhere.
Hello Leanne ! You are quite right, & I shouldn't have lumped in my reply to you with my reply to the other person's, as it could look as if the part of my reply to them was aimed at you, putting words into your mouth which you did not say. Apologies for my lack of clarity.
I do need to say, tho, before I hie off to another blog, that my comment about recovery was in with my paragraph about experience, not the paragraph about exploitation / abuse.
I feel the need to make this clear before I his away, as I do not wish to leave anybody with the uncomfortable impression that I condone any form of one human being taking advantage of another's naïveté, in any way.
I say no more, lest it lead to more misunderstandings.
As a mother of girls it all worries me, having been a teen myself. Girls are in such a hurry to grow up, ideally I would love to see age of consent moved up to 18.
My mother was a teenage mother, she done an excellent job but her life was put on hold. She never experienced a lot of what life offers not that she regrets it.
It's a difficult one as no matter what the consensual age is there will always be those who opt not to listen even though it is for safety. As great as sex is its better to wait in my opinion, experiences early on can really distort your views.
Rosy, there is the argument that moving the age of consent back up will only contribute to this feeling of "hurrying to grow up".
For example, the age of consent in Germany is 14 and their teen pregnancy rate is much lower than in the UK - 6 per 1000 young women compared to 26 per 1000 here.
We have an unusually high teen pregnancy rate despite a fairly typical age of consent set at the age of 16.
Where I am legal consent is 16 but 18 for same sex couples (I believe that's right ) seems silly I mean that the age is diff here.
Puberty may happen young with some people but I do not believe the age should be lowered at all as our bodies are still developing well into our late teens and early twenties with some. Our internal organs and sex organ area need protecting whilst we go through that. Although some of us didn't care about it when we were younger the age of consent is good where it is. I can't do much for other countries where the age of marriage and consent is very low other than sign petitions and share campaigns to help protect those who are unfortunate to be in these situations.
I do believe safe sex education is important as well in all areas I didnt learn anything like this at school but the youth groups etc often did things where young people learnt all sorts including cooking skills and dance there was also the Johnny ladies as we knew them who often sat outside the pharmacy on 1 night a fortnight or sommeet like that who answered peoples questions.
I personally think that 16 is about right. I really don't think it should be raised, for various reasons. I don't think I can go into too much detail without rule breaking so I'll leave it there!