The Meaning of Satutory Rape

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Recommended: Difficulties in establishing statutory rape

Many do not understand the true meaning behind statutory rape. So many factors go into the law that it would take a book to recognize them all. The legal definition for statutory rape is “sexual intercourse by an adult with a person below the statutorily designated age of 12” (Hill). The law was first written to have said that only a female could be a victim of statutory rape, but was later revised that it was either sex that could be a victim of this. But when you really think about it, is this a true statement? Can a male and female both be a victim of statutory rape? Can a male and female both be an offender of this crime? Some people’s opinions say that only a female can be raped. Many of those also say the classic line that everybody always says, “If he gets an erection, then he must have wanted it, so it wouldn’t be rape.” Well would this be true for a five year old little boy that has been sexually abused? Somebody that doesn’t understand why or how this is happening to his body?
Most people also do not understand that in order to be convicted of statutory rape, the victim doesn’t have to give consent or not. Only for one simple reason, when the person is that young, meaning under the age of 12, he or she cannot legally give consent. Whether “yes” or “no” was a contributing factor in the sexual act they still had sexual intercourse with a person under the age of 12, therefore it is illegal. Why does consent make a difference? For one simple reason that most would not think and it is because of the history behind it all. Statutory rape laws use to not only be divided by gender but also by racial lines. Black females were not protected under statutory rape laws because they were seen as products not as people (Ultius). Many...

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...d male, was charged with statutory rape in California and now claims that the State’s statute discriminates unconstitutionally against men only. But one detail that some people do not know about the law that is federal is that a state may provide punishment only for males to equalize deterrents to teenage pregnancy. He is claiming that, at the time of the crime, he was 17 years old and had sexual intercourse with a 16 year old female. And because of California’s statute that only criminalizes against males when acting in this behavior, and that the female was not charged with any crime, even though she was just as guilty as he was. Michael M now alleges that this disparity in the statutory rape laws is in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution (Michael M v. Superior Court of Sonoma County).
The trial

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