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I don’t expect you, being a man, to be completely aware of the implications your assertion contains. You aren’t a woman and may be unaware of history.
But we all should try to walk a block or two, if not a mile, in the shoes of others before we judge a situation.
But we all should try to walk a block or two, if not a mile, in the shoes of others before we judge a situation.
Every criminally accused defendant deserves representation. I’m not sure when representation came to mean reasonable doubt or excuses to permit crime, but the arguments used to “defend” men for sexual misbehavior, I’m positive, led the way.
A defense is evidence that reduces the strength and trust in the veracity of a prosecutors argument. Not for eliminating the behaviour in question as a crime.
An adult in a “consensual” relationship doesn’t get to explain away sexual contact. The child was 14 and a girl.
An adult in a “consensual” relationship doesn’t get to explain away sexual contact. The child was 14 and a girl.
Many many years ago, sexual crimes against women and children were considered property crimes. The argument proffered as a “defense” is a carryover from that time and those beliefs. And as a woman, I take great offense.
A woman’s existence as a sentient independent human person was confirmed about 100 years ago. So the ability to offer a defense that no harm was done because the male in question wasn’t in a position of authority, should have been eradicated with it.
But we don’t recognize 14 year olds as women in the modern age. They are children. Another left over from the age women and children were property. A 14 year old child can’t vote, sign a legal contract or decide whether they attend school or not. But they can consent to sex?
A convenient leftover from the era that child brides were an exchange of property between gentlemen. Shotgun weddings were the solution to defiling a man’s property and reputation. So “consent” to being defiled excused any evidence of crime as long as compensation followed.
It’s an insult as well as a false and implication loaded argument to assert that an adult male, regardless of his temporary employment status, isn’t guilty of a crime for sexual behaviour with a child.
I don’t care if she was naked, writhing in ecstasy, or begging to be approached sexually. NOTHING excuses an adult male from criminal guilt for engaging in sexual activity with a child. NOTHING!
Female children are not property.
Female children are not property.
The argument is along the lines of examining a victims sexual history (was she already defiled, thus no property crime). Or questioning why the victim put herself in danger (lax property owners can’t sue for defiled property).
So forgive me if I don’t agree that offering the argument that a crime wasn’t committed, because the man in question was a substitute teacher, as an acceptable defense. It isn’t. It’s demonstrative of a lack of ethics or a belief that women remain property.
Which is one of the reasons I fight vehemently to expose the malignancy of the far right’s ideology. It isn’t difficult to recognize those that promote this ideology would prefer our society return to its traditional roots; when women & children were property, not persons.
In the interest of transparency, I’m copying @Citizen004. Though I’m confident he’s aware of the origin of his legal arguments. These are the people he represents. It’s the ideology of the party he supports and the unspoken preferred outcome of UCP for Alberta, & CPC for Canada.
