News Forum - Thai teacher in US accused of sexual relations with 16 year old student

[Thaiger]

A Thai teacher at a high school in Seattle in the state of Washington was accused of having sex with his 16 year old student. He was arrested at the school on February 17 and released on bail the next day for US$100,000 or 3.5 million baht. The Seattle Times reported yesterday that a Thai …

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[Vigo]

Had he been in Thailand, he might have been able to hush up his alleged crime with the school blaming the student.

[Karolyn]

16 is legal in the UK, and is surely a young adult

[Khunmark]

9 minutes ago, Karolyn said:

16 is legal in the UK, and is surely a young adult

There are a range of variables involved with the age of consent, such as age difference. In this case power relations and professional integrity would also come into play.

[Soidog]

Not in Nakhon Nowhere now matey. Now you have big Pompam! 

[Karolyn]

20 hours ago, Khunmark said:

There are a range of variables involved with the age of consent, such as age difference. In this case power relations and professional integrity would also come into play.

Half psrudoscientific all. And before feminism came with its war on men, no one gave a shit about power imbalances. Also at least in the UK again, college tutors do (or once did) have sex with inexperienced undergrads, without it being a crime, even though it might be improper to many people. Too many double standards to take seriously, let alone justify post hoc. 13 to about age 25 is a young adult, things like set ages for sexual consent, drinking, smoking, or driving, are never, ever justified with any science. The age of 18 has no objective basis, might as well be 20 like in Japan, or 21 like it used to be in Britain. It means nothing

 

Edited March 1, 2023 by Karolyn

[HolyCowCm]

This guy just ruined his life.

[BigHewer]

A post has been removed.

Moderator

[Khunmark]

2 hours ago, Karolyn said:

Half psrudoscientific all. And before feminism came with its war on men, no one gave a shit about power imbalances. Also at least in the UK again, college tutors do (or once did) have sex with inexperienced undergrads, without it being a crime, even though it might be improper to many people. Too many double standards to take seriously, let alone justify post hoc. 13 to about age 25 is a young adult, things like set ages for sexual consent, drinking, smoking, or driving, are never, ever justified with any science. The age of 18 has no objective basis, might as well be 20 like in Japan, or 21 like it used to be in Britain. It means nothing

So then. If there’s grass on the pitch let’s play cricket.

[Karolyn]

2 hours ago, Khunmark said:

So then. If there’s grass on the pitch let’s play cricket.

Sort of, but its a bit more complicated, and it's about more than just sex. The same reasoning affects laws and attitudes about driving, alcohol, etc. 

If adolescence is defined by an 'imbalance' in the growing prefrontal cortex, as neuroscientists would have it, then the neuronal connectivity wont haven't achieved full adult grade, until someone's early 20s, or maybe later than that.

Teenage decision making, when it is emotionally 'cold', is experimentally as solid as that of older adults, aged over 25. The difference from older adults, and younger children, comes in situations that are emotionally 'hot', in which teens make rash mistakes - unprotected sex, but also things like substance abuse.

Well there is no basis for saying it's wrong for someone over 30 to have sex with a 16 year old, but ine with an 18 year old. Not a single scientific paper, has backed 18 as a significant age, for the end of adolescence, or the start of post-adolescence.

So, either raise adulthood to about 24 or 25. Or drop it to 13 or 14, because either approach makes sense. Young people are vulnerable past age 18, but they are also capable of mature descicions, including sexual consent, already in their eatly teens, as long as the situation is not emotionally 'hot', through peer pressure, etc. 

Its ignoring when people ignore the science, and the common sense. 

[Marc26]

On 2/28/2023 at 5:07 PM, Karolyn said:

16 is legal in the UK, and is surely a young adult

Man you post some creepy shit....

[Pinetree]

On 2/28/2023 at 5:07 PM, Karolyn said:

16 is legal in the UK, and is surely a young adult

Not if you are in a position of power and authority over the 16 year old.  In the UK he would be prosecuted 

[Khunmark]

16 hours ago, Karolyn said:

Sort of, but its a bit more complicated, and it's about more than just sex. The same reasoning affects laws and attitudes about driving, alcohol, etc. 

If adolescence is defined by an 'imbalance' in the growing prefrontal cortex, as neuroscientists would have it, then the neuronal connectivity wont haven't achieved full adult grade, until someone's early 20s, or maybe later than that.

Teenage decision making, when it is emotionally 'cold', is experimentally as solid as that of older adults, aged over 25. The difference from older adults, and younger children, comes in situations that are emotionally 'hot', in which teens make rash mistakes - unprotected sex, but also things like substance abuse.

Well there is no basis for saying it's wrong for someone over 30 to have sex with a 16 year old, but ine with an 18 year old. Not a single scientific paper, has backed 18 as a significant age, for the end of adolescence, or the start of post-adolescence.

So, either raise adulthood to about 24 or 25. Or drop it to 13 or 14, because either approach makes sense. Young people are vulnerable past age 18, but they are also capable of mature descicions, including sexual consent, already in their eatly teens, as long as the situation is not emotionally 'hot', through peer pressure, etc. 

Its ignoring when people ignore the science, and the common sense. 

I don’t mind  that you challenge the prevailing laws on consent. As you point out the laws regarding the matter around age, are arbitrary. But you’ll need to provide an alternative model that is workable before I am convinced.

[Grumpish]

2 hours ago, Pinetree said:

Not if you are in a position of power and authority over the 16 year old.  In the UK he would be prosecuted 

Agreed - age of consent is very variable worldwide, from 11 in Nigeria to 21 in Bahrain, and even in the US varies by state. In borderline cases such as this one though, it is the breach of trust that is more important.

[JohninDublin]

On 2/28/2023 at 5:07 PM, Karolyn said:

16 is legal in the UK, and is surely a young adult

If you apply UK law, there is a secondary issue, that regardless of the AOC, there is legislation that forbids such conduct between students and teachers where there is a professional relationship.

[HolyCowCm]

3 minutes ago, JohninDublin said:

If you apply UK lawch, there is a secondary issue, that regardless of the AOC, there is legislation that forbids such conduct between students and teachers where there is a professional relationship.

Exactly. Now if she dropped out of school then the consent age is set at 16 for the State of Washington, but the next by-clause is he or she cannot be more than 5yrs older than the minors age. He definitely blew it on that one as is 32yrs old and as we say he must pay the piper.

[Karolyn]

On 3/2/2023 at 3:56 AM, Marc26 said:

Man you post some creepy shit....

Biologists define adulthood, by reproductive age.

At face value, that might seem to mean menarche for women, which is normally at 12 to 13. But there's usually two or three years until the periods become regular, so it's age 14 to 16.

This is when women are 'really' fertile, though conception does happen before, it's rare and suboptimal. I'm not a doctor, so I won't speak about the real or imagined health risks, surrounding such early pregnancy. But evolution made women good to go, when their menstrual cycle is in order. 

In boys, adulthood would be semenarche/spermarche, at 13 or 14 years old. These sorts of ages are averages, but as with other biological life events, like menopause, there really isn't one size will fit all, which just reflects a human desire for neatness.

So yea... someone who is an average 16 years old, is unambiguously a young adult.

In this case, there are other moral issues, he's a teacher. But 16 is a young adult, sexually and morally.

On 3/2/2023 at 12:06 PM, HolyCowCm said:

Exactly. Now if she dropped out of school then the consent age is set at 16 for the State of Washington, but the next by-clause is he or she cannot be more than 5yrs older than the minors age. He definitely blew it on that one as is 32yrs old and as we say he must pay the piper.

The AoC is 13 in Japan and in Argentina. Don't know about Argentina, but Japan has low incidence of sex crimes against children, older minors, and adult women.

Realism is better than unrealism.

[LuckyStrike]

I live in Washington State. 16 is on the old side for Seattle.

bunch-o-weirdos

[JohninDublin]

12 hours ago, Karolyn said:

Biologists define adulthood, by reproductive age.

At face value, that might seem to mean menarche for women, which is normally at 12 to 13. But there's usually two or three years until the periods become regular, so it's age 14 to 16.

This is when women are 'really' fertile, though conception does happen before, it's rare and suboptimal. I'm not a doctor, so I won't speak about the real or imagined health risks, surrounding such early pregnancy. But evolution made women good to go, when their menstrual cycle is in order. 

In boys, adulthood would be semenarche/spermarche, at 13 or 14 years old. These sorts of ages are averages, but as with other biological life events, like menopause, there really isn't one size will fit all, which just reflects a human desire for neatness.

So yea... someone who is an average 16 years old, is unambiguously a young adult.

In this case, there are other moral issues, he's a teacher. But 16 is a young adult, sexually and morally.

The AoC is 13 in Japan and in Argentina. Don't know about Argentina, but Japan has low incidence of sex crimes against children, older minors, and adult women.

Realism is better than unrealism.

Just some comments on the AoC.

In Japan, 13 is the default miimum age, but the governor of each prefecture is allowed to set higher ages, so in Tokyo, as an example, it is 18. 13 was the AoC until the 90's, when there were a series of exposures in the media, about girls wanting to have the latest fashion accessories or phones, selling themselves. I am not sure that there is a low incidence of sex crimes against children there. I think there is still a number of schoolgirls selling themselves, though it has declined. More importantly, I think most sex crimes are about power rather than sex, and that remains the driving force,

The AoC in England was originally set in medieval times at age 12. It was not uncommon for children in infancy to be married to each other in order to forge dynastic alliances. However these children did not shae a bed until later years. King John consummated a marriage with a 13 yr old girl when he was aged 34.

The AoC was raised to 13 and soon after to 16 in the 1880's following a series in the now defunct, Pall Mall Gazette, where a journalist, WT Stead showed how poorly the law protected young girls, by buying a girl for £5. He became an embarrassment to the establishment, who had their revenge on him by convicting him of child abduction in relation to the purchased girl on the grounds that he had not obtained the Father's permission for the purchase. He was sentenced to 3 months in prison. 

[Karolyn]

2 hours ago, JohninDublin said:

Just some comments on the AoC.

In Japan, 13 is the default miimum age, but the governor of each prefecture is allowed to set higher ages, so in Tokyo, as an example, it is 18. 13 was the AoC until the 90's, when there were a series of exposures in the media, about girls wanting to have the latest fashion accessories or phones, selling themselves. I am not sure that there is a low incidence of sex crimes against children there. I think there is still a number of schoolgirls selling themselves, though it has declined. More importantly, I think most sex crimes are about power rather than sex, and that remains the driving force,

The AoC in England was originally set in medieval times at age 12. It was not uncommon for children in infancy to be married to each other in order to forge dynastic alliances. However these children did not shae a bed until later years. King John consummated a marriage with a 13 yr old girl when he was aged 34.

The AoC was raised to 13 and soon after to 16 in the 1880's following a series in the now defunct, Pall Mall Gazette, where a journalist, WT Stead showed how poorly the law protected young girls, by buying a girl for £5. He became an embarrassment to the establishment, who had their revenge on him by convicting him of child abduction in relation to the purchased girl on the grounds that he had not obtained the Father's permission for the purchase. He was sentenced to 3 months in prison. 

Right. The age of consent is mis-named, because it isn't about wether teens can consent. They can. From day one, raising the age of consent was about protecting young women from real and imagined social dangers. It was so in England and in the US, during the industrial era, and even in 1990s Japan. A country with no taboo against sex or relationships at middle or high school age, though Jap teens have sex less than do westerners. Age of consent laws should be renamed to something else, and differentiated in the social mind, from the consented sex act itself. Until recently in the Phillipines, the age of consent was 13, but other laws protected young women from older men, as per the patriarchal Spanish influence, I suppose, and the nature of these laws was more traditional in tone, but it shows the impulse is universal - it just got mishandled through confusion with the consent issue, in WIERD countries and under their influence. But the point is, protecting young people from situations involving sex, isn't the same as protecting people from sex.

Be realist about social as well as biological facts. When you were in your  early and mid teens, it was acceptable to have sex with people over 18, though probably up to a certain age, such as 20, 25, or even 30. The problem isn't so much that a teacher over 30, is jailed for having sex, though if age itself isn't the problem, no one should be convicted on that basis alone. The main problem is socially acceptable and entirely normal behavior, is criminalised, which on principle, should never happen. Step back from moral crap, and the subject is a legal mess.

On a related note, just yesterday I found a news item that, in the US, a 16 year old girl has been convicted for child pornography, involving her own selfies. Try as you might, you can't justify that situation, using reason. It's the fruits of outdated legislation, or that which made no sense from the beginning. This things need tweaking to fix them, to maintain protections of children but stop nonsense in the courtroom, but moral bullcrap prevents that. Reminds me of what Nietzsche said, about moralic acid... liberal crocodile tears for self-professed victims, and family values crap about the innocence of youth, converge in a horseshoe shape, when this subject is raised. Preventing critical thinking, about over-moralised legislation, so the law can't reflect modernity, reality, or the moral maze. Human biology, anthropology, psychology, and sociology need to become catalysts. 

Edited March 4, 2023 by Karolyn

[JohninDublin]

2 hours ago, Karolyn said:

Right. The age of consent is mis-named, because it isn't about wether teens can consent. They can. From day one, raising the age of consent was about protecting young women from real and imagined social dangers. It was so in England and in the US, during the industrial era, and even in 1990s Japan. A country with no taboo against sex or relationships at middle or high school age, though Jap teens have sex less than do westerners. Age of consent laws should be renamed to something else, and differentiated in the social mind, from the consented sex act itself. Until recently in the Phillipines, the age of consent was 13, but other laws protected young women from older men, as per the patriarchal Spanish influence, I suppose, and the nature of these laws was more traditional in tone, but it shows the impulse is universal - it just got mishandled through confusion with the consent issue, in WIERD countries and under their influence. But the point is, protecting young people from situations involving sex, isn't the same as protecting people from sex.

Be realist about social as well as biological facts. When you were in your  early and mid teens, it was acceptable to have sex with people over 18, though probably up to a certain age, such as 20, 25, or even 30. The problem isn't so much that a teacher over 30, is jailed for having sex, though if age itself isn't the problem, no one should be convicted on that basis alone. The main problem is socially acceptable and entirely normal behavior, is criminalised, which on principle, should never happen. Step back from moral crap, and the subject is a legal mess.

On a related note, just yesterday I found a news item that, in the US, a 16 year old girl has been convicted for child pornography, involving her own selfies. Try as you might, you can't justify that situation, using reason. It's the fruits of outdated legislation, or that which made no sense from the beginning. This things need tweaking to fix them, to maintain protections of children but stop nonsense in the courtroom, but moral bullcrap prevents that. Reminds me of what Nietzsche said, about moralic acid... liberal crocodile tears for self-professed victims, and family values crap about the innocence of youth, converge in a horseshoe shape, when this subject is raised. Preventing critical thinking, about over-moralised legislation, so the law can't reflect modernity, reality, or the moral maze. Human biology, anthropology, psychology, and sociology need to become catalysts. 

You make some very good points. The biggest problem really is that with AoC, one size fits all. It simply does not make sense that having sex with a girl yesterday was illegal, but with the same girl today, it is legal because she has reached a certain defined age.

The laws in the US are particularly bizarre. For example, between 2020-2010, three 10 year-olds have married adult men in Tennessee, but there is an AoC of 18 in that state. Then there are emancipated minors, who are legally classified as adults, but might be as young as 14. Can they consent? Surely if not, then how can they be classed as adults? 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_marriage_in_the_United_States

Extract: 

 

Underage marriage and sexual consent[edit]

Main articles: Ages of consent in the United States and Marry-your-rapist law § United States

In the United States, the age of sexual consent varies by state, territory/district, or federal law, and typically ranges from 16 to 18 years.

State-legislated age of consent laws and marriage age laws are inconsistent in relation to one another. In some states, it is possible for a minor to legally marry even if they are below the age of consent in that state. Between 2000 and 2015, at least 200,000 minors were legally married in the United States. 86% of those marriages were between that minor and an adult. About 5% of the minors were aged 15 or younger, meaning they would be under the age of consent in all United States territories.^[32]

In some cases, judges who approve an underage marriage, for example because the minor is pregnant, may be approving a marriage between a rapist and their statutory victim.^[64]

 

[Karolyn]

6 hours ago, JohninDublin said:

You make some very good points. The biggest problem really is that with AoC, one size fits all. It simply does not make sense that having sex with a girl yesterday was illegal, but with the same girl today, it is legal because she has reached a certain defined age.

The laws in the US are particularly bizarre. For example, between 2020-2010, three 10 year-olds have married adult men in Tennessee, but there is an AoC of 18 in that state. Then there are emancipated minors, who are legally classified as adults, but might be as young as 14. Can they consent? Surely if not, then how can they be classed as adults? 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_marriage_in_the_United_States

Extract: 

Underage marriage and sexual consent[edit]

Main articles: Ages of consent in the United States and Marry-your-rapist law § United States

In the United States, the age of sexual consent varies by state, territory/district, or federal law, and typically ranges from 16 to 18 years.

State-legislated age of consent laws and marriage age laws are inconsistent in relation to one another. In some states, it is possible for a minor to legally marry even if they are below the age of consent in that state. Between 2000 and 2015, at least 200,000 minors were legally married in the United States. 86% of those marriages were between that minor and an adult. About 5% of the minors were aged 15 or younger, meaning they would be under the age of consent in all United States territories.^[32]

In some cases, judges who approve an underage marriage, for example because the minor is pregnant, may be approving a marriage between a rapist and their statutory victim.^[64]

The thing about one day later, used to be the butt of jokes, for its very irrationality. People used to joke about young people in cars, waiting till midnight for the girl to turn legal. Nowadays people dare not joke about this. But if you think about it, the AoC is just one of a series of legislation, like minimum drinking age. But you work in a shop and you knowingly sell cider to a teenager, you don't end up on something like a paedo sex register.

Statutory rape was historically how we slid into the present war, upon male sexuality. Listen and believe and all that. No suffering means no victim, and in a sane world, therefore no crime, or at least no conviction. And you'll notice that the US states allowing marriages of adults to pregnant minors, are conservative states, while the trials and convictions of older people (even youths <25) for having sex with fertile minors (aged 13+) are biased against male sexuality, as per the 'war on men'.

Somehow the left's realism about sex, be it genuine or merely their self-image, goes out the window, if we are talking about the AoC. Because it's not the sort of people they advocate for.

[HiuMak]

US$100K . Now that is an expensive lesson.