Why do female pedophiles get less harsh sentences then men? (purpose, society)
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Over the years there have been several cases of female teachers getting caught having sex with young boys but in almost every case they usually just get a slap on the wrist such as probation and community service with perhaps a little jail time thrown in, yet when men get caught the normally get sentenced to prison for MANY years. Why are female pedophiles treated with kid gloves while men get hammered big time?
I am a woman yet this angers me, it's basically saying "You're a woman so go have sex with as many underage boys as you want, don't worry about the consequences". It literally makes me sick this double standard.
I disagree. I think the double standard is a good thing. At 12, I would have been utterly thrilled to have made sweet love to all of my female teachers under 40...and I would have probably been grateful to them until this day.
Most women seem to think of sex differently than most men. It seems like it has more potential for harm to women than men. There is also the fact that the best purpose of criminal punishment is as negative feedback to keep the crime from occurring again, and sex crimes seem to occur more often by men than women.
I think women are treated somewhat differently due to sex and how we look at gender. It's also due to rate. Significantly more male teachers engage in sexual activity with minor students and men in general tend to engage in more socially deviant sexual behavior. So, it's more of a shock when women do it. I bet as more women engage in this behavior the more in line the sentences will become.
I am a woman yet this angers me, it's basically saying "You're a woman so go have sex with as many underage boys as you want, don't worry about the consequences". It literally makes me sick this double standard.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Clintone
I disagree. I think the double standard is a good thing.
Hmmm....
Intellectually, the double standard shouldn't exist. The law makes no distinction between the sex of the offender and the sex of the victim. But at an emotional level I agree with Clintone, having sex with an older woman and a teacher in particular didn't seem like an unattractive possibility to me. Unfortunate the reality is that these liasons don't just involve sex but distorted, and for lack of a better word, perverse emotional relationships. So the fact that we like to think that this is every young boy's fantasy the realty can be quite different.
Oh, I thought this was about little children like in day care, sorry.
I was going to say they should NOT get lighter sentences.
I don't have a lot to say about teens...my girlriends were having sex
with the football coach gym teacher.
Oh and my BEST friend with the married music teacher....oh, actually
one non married music teacher, too!!!!
All..such a great guys....otherwise.
I knew the coach as my second grade gym teacher...kindest, nicest man I ever met.
He hugged me A LOT!, secretly in his office when he sent me back to get the equipment, an honor to be picked!
Never any sexual stuff just genuinely adored me....might have picked up I didn't get much
Love at home, who knows, I was adorable.
Over the years there have been several cases of female teachers getting caught having sex with young boys but in almost every case they usually just get a slap on the wrist such as probation and community service with perhaps a little jail time thrown in, yet when men get caught the normally get sentenced to prison for MANY years. Why are female pedophiles treated with kid gloves while men get hammered big time?
I am a woman yet this angers me, it's basically saying "You're a woman so go have sex with as many underage boys as you want, don't worry about the consequences". It literally makes me sick this double standard.
I do think the double standard is based somewhat on the double standard that has long, long existed regarding boys, girls and sex. Boys are applauded for sex, and sex with a teacher is considered a coup among their friends, while women are generally punished socially for sex. I also think girls may be somewhat more vulnerable and get emotionally bonded through sex in a way that males generally don't. I'm not saying this double standard should exist, just trying to explore the many reasons it is looked at differently in society.
I do think the double standard is based somewhat on the double standard that has long, long existed regarding boys, girls and sex. Boys are applauded for sex, and sex with a teacher is considered a coup among their friends, while women are generally punished socially for sex. I also think girls may be somewhat more vulnerable and get emotionally bonded through sex in a way that males generally don't. I'm not saying this double standard should exist, just trying to explore the many reasons it is looked at differently in society.
I remember that, but it was eventually overturned and will spend years in prison:
Thus far, the comments ignore those mothers, aunts, baby-sitters, etc. who sexually molest very young children, meaning twelve or under. An female English therapist with whom I had a long talk in about 2001 had a practice consistently almost entirely of sexually abused children or the adults who had abused a youngster. She claimed that about a quarter of her clients were female abusers or the victims of females, and almost all had been centered on children below adolescence in family or caretaking situations.
When I asked her if she felt this number was representative, her reply was that the topic of female caretakers sexually molesting children was so charged - especially if it was a relative - that she was not willing to make a definite statement for sheer lack of any strong certainty. She said that the child authorities hated dealing with these cases, and the courts were totally freaked out by them. As I recall she said that the adult abusers sometimes came on their own volition, but others were forced to by family members who usually had taken the child from the mother or intervened in other ways.
I suspect that some children abused by a close female caretaker are so confused by it that it gets shoved under their emotional rug for years, as with those abused by fathers. Given our more sentimental picture of mothers vs fathers, I think the protesting children would be likely not to be believed...even when they brought it up years later. The idea of mother sexual abuse is simply too repugnant for many (most?) people to allow themselves to think about.
Because society can't seem to wrap their heads around the fact that there are predatory women as well. There are a few cases where mental illness was the accepted cause of the abusive behavior (Debra LaFave) and some female offenders have ongoing relationships with their victims (Mary Kay Letourneau). Letourneau and her former student Vili Fualauu married in 2005.
At 12, I would have been utterly thrilled to have made sweet love to all of my female teachers under 40...and I would have probably been grateful to them until this day.
You and me both. I fantasized about it at times, and now from the perspective of an adult, I tend to project my adult perspective on the child that I was. But if Miss Johnson had taken me into her bed in actual reality, would it have been that positive? Would I have felt confused, guilty, or been nursing fantasies of running off with her, not understanding the utter unworkability of that? Would I have been crushed when, likely, she abruptly broke it off or started dating a man her own age or took a job in another town or whatever?
Adolescents are not ready for intimacy (or complexity) like that. It's one thing to experiment with it, with girls your own age -- and even that is loaded dynamite. And some boys would be every bit as negatively effected as we imagine most girls more typically are.
Bottom line, it's a betrayal of trust for adults to consort with minors. I know that the older a child is, the more personal responsibility they have, and the age of majority is rather arbitrary (and, I'm increasingly convinced, too low). But a line has to be drawn somewhere. In any event, it's a conflict of interest to have a sexual relationship with someone you're supposed to have a pedagogical relationship with. It crosses boundaries such that you can no longer effectively do what you're being paid to do. Professional distance is required. Indeed, that distance is one of the advantages of conventional education over home schooling; mixing the role of parent and teacher doesn't even work very well in many ways, much less lover and teacher.
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