Age of Consent to be lowered .. ?

[Stephanie]

"MINISTERS ARE EXPECTED to discuss plans to lower the age of consent in Ireland from 17 to 16 at the

final Cabinet meeting of 2013 this morning, the Irish Times reports."



What do you think about this ?

Good , bad , makes no difference ?

What about sex-ed ? Unwanted teenage pregnancies ? Abortion illegal ?

Are kids mature enough at 16 to forge forth ? Is this a tacit consent from society ?

What about people that target kids ? Will it encourage them to do so more freely ?



xx

[SteveB]

Are they mature enough is not a valid question unfortunately. Making something illegal doesn't stop people doing it.

Just out of interest Romero's age could be guessed at 16 to 19, Juliet was two weeks short of her 14th birthday.
That's why they are called Romero and Juliet crimes.

Best if people are not sexually active until they are mature enough to deal with it, but will legislation stop it. Don't think so, all it does is criminalize young people.

[Zoidberg]

There shouldn't be an age of consent per se, instead there should be a maximum age difference for someone to have consensual sex / sexual relations with someone else. It would stop 17 year olds being prosecuted for having sex with a 16 year old while at the same time protecting that 16 year old from a 19-20 year old.

Kids will always be kids and will experiment with each other and they shouldn't be punished by the law for doing that. What the government should do is protect those kids from older people who pray on them. I don't think it's right that the age of consent should be lowered (say 16 as an example) across the board, then you just have older sickos then trying to have sex with people who are still kids.

Kids need protection from adults not from other kids.

[johnb59]

Lowering the age to 16?have to be 18 to drink? Would you rather see your daughter knocked up at sixteen. Legal or see her come in drunk occasionally illegal? No fucking contest?

[jpenney]

There shouldn't be an age of consent per se, instead there should be a maximum age difference for someone to have consensual sex / sexual relations with someone else. It would stop 17 year olds being prosecuted for having sex with a 16 year old while at the same time protecting that 16 year old from a 19-20 year old.

Kids will always be kids and will experiment with each other and they shouldn't be punished by the law for doing that. What the government should do is protect those kids from older people who pray on them. I don't think it's right that the age of consent should be lowered (say 16 as an example) across the board, then you just have older sickos then trying to have sex with people who are still kids.

Kids need protection from adults not from other kids.

Unfortunately the vast majority of teenage girls with unwanted pregnancies are from other kids. We are in a very difficult area. The pressures being put on young girls to be very sexually active is coming from other kids and they feel they have to conform.
Whatever about stable relationships(is there such a thing at sixteen?) the type of behavior we read about-blowjobs in discos, going commando in night clubs etc. is in my opinion not healthy.
The view that it ok for a seventeen year old girl to have sex with a teenage boy but not with a forty year old man is contradictory and purely based on perception. Back in the time of the tudor kings this was quite normal.
Current society makes these situations very difficult. What's the answer ? I don't know. It would be nice to think we could educate all our young people to be sensible in their actions but I don't think we ever will. The only thing lowering the age of consent will do is ensure a seventeen year old boy engaging in consensual sex with fifteen year old girl cannot be charged with rape but a fifteen year old boy can.It will change nothing.

[warmcome]

i'm surprised this is in focus at cabinet level and no moral frenzy from the public.
i think it will change fuck all but avoid some needless prosecutions of youths.

[SteveB]

Out of interest, quick search reveals the following,


The age of consent in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland is 16.

Ages from 10 to 13 were typically regarded as acceptable ages for sexual consent in Western countries during the mid-19th century.

Most jurisdictions set the age of consent in the range 14 to 18, ages of consent as low as 12 and as high as 21 exist. The laws may also vary by the type of sexual act, the gender of the actors, or other restrictions such as abuse of a position of trust.

[dob]

Are they mature enough is not a valid question unfortunately. Making something illegal doesn't stop people doing it.

Just out of interest Romero's age could be guessed at 16 to 19, Juliet was two weeks short of her 14th birthday.
That's why they are called Romero and Juliet crimes.

Best if people are not sexually active until they are mature enough to deal with it, but will legislation stop it. Don't think so, all it does is criminalize young people.

However in them times, the life expectancy was in the mid thirties, so teenagers were half way through life at that stage. The human race could have died out.........

[dob]

Unfortunately the vast majority of teenage girls with unwanted pregnancies are from other kids. We are in a very difficult area. The pressures being put on young girls to be very sexually active is coming from other kids and they feel they have to conform.
Whatever about stable relationships(is there such a thing at sixteen?) the type of behavior we read about-blowjobs in discos, going commando in night clubs etc. is in my opinion not healthy.
The view that it ok for a seventeen year old girl to have sex with a teenage boy but not with a forty year old man is contradictory and purely based on perception. Back in the time of the tudor kings this was quite normal.
Current society makes these situations very difficult. What's the answer ? I don't know. It would be nice to think we could educate all our young people to be sensible in their actions but I don't think we ever will. The only thing lowering the age of consent will do is ensure a seventeen year old boy engaging in consensual sex with fifteen year old girl cannot be charged with rape but a fifteen year old boy can.It will change nothing.

Statistics tell us the rate of teenage pregnancy has been falling for years.

[SteveB]

However in them times, the life expectancy was in the mid thirties, so teenagers were half way through life at that stage. The human race could have died out.........

Indeed. Also in those times you probably would have left home and be working at an early age.

I was surprised age is 16 in the North. This is because it is 16 throughout UK. There were controversial suggestions, unlikely to go anywhere, that the age should be lowered in the UK perhaps to 14 because most teenagers were sexually active anyway. This would probably applied in the North too. But it is still sixteen in the North. And this creates an anomaly. Are teenagers more mature there. I think the answer is to make sure young people are not taken advantage of, but the age of consent between teenagers of nearly the same age is is arbitrary and matters little if it is 17 or 16.