Consenting adult sex is criminal now?

Hugh Freaking Dillon wrote:

Pjzepp67 wrote:

Would we be discussing this so lightly if the teacher had been male and the pupils were young girls :shock:

a 27 year old male and a bunch of 18 year old girls. that's nothing in today's society. of course this would still be no big deal.

as a father of two young girls, I'd personally kill the fucker, but criminal? NO

Why kill if its "no big deal"... :fp:

It never ceases to amaze me how rock stars used to get passes from mainstream society in the 'young girls' department. For example, Jimmy Page was notorious for dating young 'women' (some, according to reports, were under 15).

morality as it pertains to sexuality is a very complex mind fuck to me....
I see all this judgement of this woman, all of it based on this loose moral framework of acceptability in the current societal model.
At what point can we call a lack of conventional sexual morality a mental illness? The topics of love and sex addiction are ridiculed and dismissed even more than most other mental illnesses. I mean...good luck talking to your loved ones about your sexual deviance - chronic masturbation, compulsive sex with strangers, and your growing obsession with panty sniffing or whateverthefuck. It's difficult to even define or distinguish between fetish and deviant mental illness. or between sexual conditioning and our natural predispositions. From my understanding, we can really only say ' when the behaviour becomes self destructive, it crosses the line to mental illness/addiction'. So then....does the fact this woman did this mean she's a sex addict? That would be a mental illness, no? Or is this just a case of a sexually liberated person making a big mistake by fulfilling her fantasies with students? Is the age difference really morally reprehensible when (as noted) we excuse this daily in our society? (rockstars, porn, youth sexuality in media etc). Crossing the imaginary line into adulthood at 18 is not exactly a good gauge of a persons' ability to maturely deal with sexual relationships and advances....but I guess we need that line to create the laws,right?

Interesting topics....but to the story in the OP....if not having sex with students was conditional to the job, then she should lose her job. If her students were under any kind of duress, then it should be criminal. If it's determined they were not (sounds like they weren't), then she shouldn't be found guilty of any criminal charge. As with sexual harassment cases, participating in what is consensual sex with a coworker/student type relationship opens the door to your partner lying and claiming duress, so it's def ill-advised. It's important to protect people, but to have blanket laws saying it's criminal is taking it too far imo.

Drowned Out wrote:

Or is this just a case of a sexually liberated person making a big mistake by fulfilling her fantasies with students?

I don't give a shit about her liberation, but yes, made a big mistake. Key word - students.

It was tough to tell from your overall post, but please tell me you weren't cutting her slack for this.

Of course we're sexual - we wouldn't be here but for it (not to mention it's fun) - but at some point, common sense needs to greet the primal.

hedonist wrote:

Drowned Out wrote:

Or is this just a case of a sexually liberated person making a big mistake by fulfilling her fantasies with students?

I don't give a shit about her liberation, but yes, made a big mistake. Key word - students.

It was tough to tell from your overall post, but please tell me you weren't cutting her slack for this.

Of course we're sexual - we wouldn't be here but for it (not to mention it's fun) - but at some point, common sense needs to greet the primal.

Agreed. Whether she would meet criteria for mental illness or an addiction, that doesn't excuse the need for personal responsibility and accountability. If that were the case, anyone with an alcohol addiction wouldn't be held responsible for a a DWI. Hypersexuality is not going to be included in the DSM 5 (due out in May). After a lot of debate, the APA decided to include it in the appendix, as an area for further research. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/sex ... -the-dsm-v
It was going to be classified as an addictive disorder and the proposed criteria were:

DSM 5 PROPOSED DIAGNOSTIC CRITERIA FOR HYPERSEXUAL DISORDER

A. Over a period of at least 6 months, recurrent and intense sexual fantasies, sexual urges, or sexual behaviors in association with 3 or more of the following 5 criteria:

1.Time consumed by sexual fantasies, urges or behaviors repetitively interferes with other important (non-sexual) goals, activities and obligations.
2. Repetitively engaging in sexual fantasies, urges or behaviors in response to dysphoric mood states (e.g., anxiety, depression, boredom, irritability).
3. Repetitively engaging in sexual fantasies, urges or behaviors in response to stressful life events.
4. Repetitive but unsuccessful efforts to control or significantly reduce these sexual fantasies, urges or behaviors.
5. Repetitively engaging in sexual behaviors while disregarding the risk for physical or emotional harm to self or others.

* Provided A: That there is clinically significant personal distress or impairment in social, occupational or other important areas of functioning associated with the frequency and intensity of these sexual fantasies, urges or behaviors.
* Provided B: That these sexual fantasies, urges or behaviors are not due to the direct physiological effect of an exogenous substance (e.g., a drug of abuse or a medication)
Specify if: Masturbation, Pornography, Sexual Behavior with Consenting Adults, Cybersex, Telephone Sex, Strip Clubs, Other




I don't know if this teacher would have met criteria for this disorder...it's possible that she does meet criteria for another disorder, such as a bipolar disorder or a personality disorder. If so, I hope she gets treatment. That wouldn't excuse the behavior though.

Drowned Out wrote:

I'm not saying her mental state is an excuse for responsibility or accountability, but maybe it coudl give insight - I don't think thats been touched on yet. Since Newton, I've seen a lot of calls for improvements and increased access to mental healthcare, and for empathy toward mental illness in order to break the shame felt by people seeking help for it. I was only speculating that this case might have parallels that are being overlooked. My overall post is looking for understanding of sexual morality. Common sense meeting primal doesn't always boil down to enforceable, just law.
Im not sure i'm cutting her slack - what she did is by definition set out in her contract, wrong - I'm sure she was aware of that. So I don't have sympathy. Still, I don't think it's 7-year-sentence-wrong...that's more than most rape sentences ffs!.....if no one was harmed, then any punishment beyond her losing her job/license, the public shame of being forever viewed as the gangbang slut teacher, and maybe a fine for the waste of court time, is a moral judgement of a victimless crime; one that appears on the surface to be more concerned with precedent than reality. That's not justice to me.
I guess I'm disputing the law, not that she broke it. As Jasun said - unless we're convicting consensual sex between a boss and an adult employee, it's a double standard. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think a 27 year old McDonalds manager could do 7 years for consensual sex with the 18 year old drive thru attendant....they can sue for sexual harassment, but i don't think you could do 7 years for that either? From a criminal viewpoint - maybe the key word here should be 'adult', not 'students'?

I hear you on that. I'm shocked to hear she got such a long sentence. I posted stats on another thread about rape convictions in the US and the arrest rates are minuscule:

54% of rapes/sexual assaults are not reported to the police
12% of those reported lead to an arrest
9% get prosecuted
5% lead to a felony conviction
3% of rapists will ever spend a day in jail

There was a law on the books that she violated, so there's the conviction, but one of my concerns about such a long sentence is that it could negatively impact general attitudes and views about other sexual assault cases, leading to people minimizing their impact.

I think we do have to be careful when looking at how a mental health diagnosis impacts our expectation for personal responsibility and accountability. Pedophilia is a diagnosable disorder (one that is extremely treatment-resistant), but I don't think we want to see that diagnosis being used as the basis for lighter sentences. Jerry Sandusky certainly tried with his Histrionic Personality Disorder defense :roll: There's also a big difference between thought disorders (such as schizophrenia) and other disorders (ie. personality disorders like Antisocial Personality Disorder) and the impact they have on people's ability to control their behavior and choices. One is really considered an illness and the other is really about how people relate to their environment. Both are deserving of treatment (although the insurance companies don't think so), but they don't impact thinking in the same way.

comebackgirl wrote:

I hear you on that. I'm shocked to hear she got such a long sentence. I posted stats on another thread about rape convictions in the US and the arrest rates are minuscule:

54% of rapes/sexual assaults are not reported to the police
12% of those reported lead to an arrest
9% get prosecuted
5% lead to a felony conviction
3% of rapists will ever spend a day in jail

There was a law on the books that she violated, so there's the conviction, but one of my concerns about such a long sentence is that it could negatively impact general attitudes and views about other sexual assault cases, leading to people minimizing their impact.

I think we do have to be careful when looking at how a mental health diagnosis impacts our expectation for personal responsibility and accountability. Pedophilia is a diagnosable disorder (one that is extremely treatment-resistant), but I don't think we want to see that diagnosis being used as the basis for lighter sentences. Jerry Sandusky certainly tried with his Histrionic Personality Disorder defense :roll: There's also a big difference between thought disorders (such as schizophrenia) and other disorders (ie. personality disorders like Antisocial Personality Disorder) and the impact they have on people's ability to control their behavior and choices. One is really considered an illness and the other is really about how people relate to their environment. Both are deserving of treatment (although the insurance companies don't think so), but they don't impact thinking in the same way.

Thanks for those stats, but this case will have zero impact on rape cases. It's apples and fried chicken wings. You know better than anyone the issues with prosecuting a rape case (which is the unfortunate reality). In this situation, there was video, and 5 boys that were probably all too willing to expound on what happened and how it happened.

EdsonNascimento wrote:

comebackgirl wrote:

I hear you on that. I'm shocked to hear she got such a long sentence. I posted stats on another thread about rape convictions in the US and the arrest rates are minuscule:

54% of rapes/sexual assaults are not reported to the police
12% of those reported lead to an arrest
9% get prosecuted
5% lead to a felony conviction
3% of rapists will ever spend a day in jail

There was a law on the books that she violated, so there's the conviction, but one of my concerns about such a long sentence is that it could negatively impact general attitudes and views about other sexual assault cases, leading to people minimizing their impact.

I think we do have to be careful when looking at how a mental health diagnosis impacts our expectation for personal responsibility and accountability. Pedophilia is a diagnosable disorder (one that is extremely treatment-resistant), but I don't think we want to see that diagnosis being used as the basis for lighter sentences. Jerry Sandusky certainly tried with his Histrionic Personality Disorder defense :roll: There's also a big difference between thought disorders (such as schizophrenia) and other disorders (ie. personality disorders like Antisocial Personality Disorder) and the impact they have on people's ability to control their behavior and choices. One is really considered an illness and the other is really about how people relate to their environment. Both are deserving of treatment (although the insurance companies don't think so), but they don't impact thinking in the same way.

Thanks for those stats, but this case will have zero impact on rape cases. It's apples and fried chicken wings. You know better than anyone the issues with prosecuting a rape case (which is the unfortunate reality). In this situation, there was video, and 5 boys that were probably all too willing to expound on what happened and how it happened.

I hope it won't. My concern is that people hear about high profile cases like this and then they use it as an example to minimize other cases. Unfortunately I've seen that done time and again.