Is it just me or does the wording of the article suggest that [...] it would have been acceptable for these two men to have attacked a young female in a park and subjected her to sexual assault(s) if only she was 16 rather than just (allegedly) appearing to be so?
While there is definitely some confusion to be had from the wording of the article, it does mention that Lawyers for the defendants stressed that the sex had been consensual, and was only termed 'rape' because of the framework of law.
So, had the girl been 16, this would not be a case for a rape charge (this reading admittedly taken from the lawyers of two men who had sex with a 10 year old, thus highly open to critisism). The 'rape' charge is there due to the definition in law of sex with a minor as rape, whether or not the minor agreed to it.
Obviously, their claim makes little sense in the eyes of the law. 'Had the girl been 16' = 'Had the girl been legally capable to decide whether or not she wanted to have sex'. If we agree with the legal definition of age of consent, the above statement makes about as much sense as saying an unconscious woman gave consent and was only 'raped' because of the framework of the law.
I can see that they might want to remove some of the stigma from the term 'rape', when the girl agreed to have sex with the men (or so we are told). This might make sense if the girl were 14 or 15, but a ten year old?
The article does make it rather unclear as to the situation. It relies on the reading of 'consensual' sex with a 10-year-old as an attack. It uses terms such as rape and sexual assault, which lead us to the impression of forced sex ('traditional rape', if you'll excuse an ugly term)*.
If the sex was unforced, then the use of these terms would in fact be due to the girl's age. If we magically take these acts out of context and apply them to a situation with a 16-year-old, they would not be considered rape (a 16-year-old's consent counts as such). So strictly speaking, it would have been acceptable for these two men to have attacked a young female in a park and subjected her to sexual assault(s) if only she was 16, because it would not have been an attack, nor would it have been a sexual assualt.
So, basically, these men got off lightly because 'she looked like she was giving consent'. If the judge is going to follow the law, then he should see that this holds as much water as 'the unconscious victim looked like she was giving consent', that is, not a drop.
Of course, this only shows the risk of imposing hypotheticals onto reality. One is given the impression that situation in consideration is actually pretty-much okay because it is similar (only a few years!) to a situation where it would be okay.
Because 'girl at 10' and 'girl at 16' (hell, why not add 'girl at 21' and 'girl at 35'?) only differ in terms of a number, the judge gets to consider the case 'as if it were okay'. He understands that all girls are pretty much the same, that they are only equal to how they look. Who could chastise these men for making such an easy mistake?
As XK points, out, it's unlikely this logic would be used in a parallel situation where the girl was not the toy.
*Does anybody else feel icky about how society only tends to see violent rape as real rape? |
