Formaldehyde
Both Fair And Balanced
Or is it an incredibly serious felony?
Carol Hunt: Kate debate: is she gay teen lover or paedophile?
Slate: Is Kaitlyn Hunt Being Punished Because She Is Gay?
Carol Hunt: Kate debate: is she gay teen lover or paedophile?
Homophobia and teenage sex lie at the heart of a case in Florida which is causing a social media storm.
Teen lover or sexual predator? Devoted partner or calculating molester? Child or criminal? Kaitlyn Hunt (no relation) has been called all of the above in the few months since she was arrested in western Florida, and charged with two counts of "lewd and lascivious battery on a child 12-16" (her 15-year-old partner). On Wednesday, at her first and only press conference, a traumatised Kaitlyn, who looks a lot younger than her 18 years, said: "I'm scared of losing my life, the rest of my life, not being able to go to college and be around kids, my sisters and my family."
It's a case that serves to remind us in Ireland of how insensitive laws covering teen sex are. Under our own Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2006 (sometimes known as the Romeo and Juliet law), if two teenagers under 17 years of age are having sex, then the boy is guilty of an offence but not the girl. It's discriminatory and also completely crazy to deal with teen sex through the hammer of the law, but there you are; the Supreme Court upheld this lunacy just last year, and young boys, in consensual relationships, can be charged under it. An obscene piece of gender discrimination if you ask me and rather tempting, one would suspect, for the parents of young girls with undesirable boyfriends (as many decent young men can initially appear to a doting parent) to threaten to report the bowsie to the guards.
The case of Kaitlyn Hunt in Florida, however, is different in that there are no boys involved whatsoever. The story starts a year ago when Kaitlyn met, and fell in love with, a young girl on her basketball team. Kaitlyn was then 17 and the younger girl just 14.
When their coach found out about their relationship she kicked Kaitlyn off the team and informed the younger girl's parents that she was in a same-sex relationship.
When Kaitlyn turned 18 the younger girl's parents obtained the evidence (taped phone calls) they needed to charge Kaitlyn with a felony and went to the police.
There are two loud and conflicting camps commenting on this case. The first is that of Kaitlyn, her family and supporters, all of whom are asserting that Kaitlyn was charged because she was in a same-sex relationship with a girl whose parents do not believe or want to believe their daughter is gay. Homophobia, they say, is the issue. Kids in high school have sexual relationships every day. If it had been a young boy instead of Kaitlyn the authorities would never have become involved, they insist.
On the other side, the young girl's parents, the police and the school board (who expelled Kaitlyn) are insisting that this is a cut and dried charge concerning an adult suspect and a child victim. As the age of consent in Florida is 16, they assert that consent does not matter if the victim is under that age nor, they assert, does the sexuality of the adult suspect. They are just upholding the law and protecting the vulnerable. The attorney for the younger girl's family said: "The issue here has nothing do with whether a relationship existed. What happened was a crime was committed, and that's a crime under Florida law, and that crime is being prosecuted."
The story would probably have stayed within the confines of Florida and neighbouring states if not for social media. Kaitlyn's supporters have used Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Change.org, Reddit pretty much every site I've ever heard of and many that I haven't to garner support for their cause. Both the American Civil Liberties Union and the internet activist group Anonymous have condemned the prosecution, the latter saying the case is motivated by "intolerance". All over America supporters of Hunt are wearing T-shirts, bangles and carrying posters and placards that read: "Stop the Hate, Free Kate."
There would seem to be two issues here. The first, as in Ireland, concerns the handling of sex between teens. Chances are there are more than a few teenage boys under the age of 17 having consensual sex in Ireland at the moment (goodness me, maybe even right at this exact moment!) with 16- year-old girls.
Do you know any? If you do, why aren't you marching them into your local police station and insisting that they be charged with statutory rape?
One presumes the reason most adults don't do this is because they figure it may not be the best way to deal with hormonal teenagers in the throes of consensual sexual relationships. Not if they want to continue having a trusting relationship with their child, that is. Or perhaps like a lot of Irish parents they'd prefer to keep their fingers crossed that the kids are using contraception and not have to comment one way or another. Don't ask, don't tell and hopefully they won't be grandparents just yet ...
The second issue is the scourge of homophobia. Research shows that homophobic bullying has increased dramatically over the past seven years not just in the US but worldwide. The increase in religious fundamentalism of all hues hasn't helped. Life for gay teens and adults can be horribly tough.
Yet while some people know instinctively that they are heterosexual or homosexual from a young age, many teens will experiment with their sexuality they're not so sure, and adolescence can be a confusing time. Boys may try out sex with other boys and girls with other girls. For many it will just be that, an experiment or exploration with a friend they trust; for others it will be their given sexual orientation. And for some, like Kaitlyn, it will become a crime for which she will be severely punished.
On Friday Kaitlyn refused to accept a plea deal which would have allowed her to avoid registering as a sex offender for life if she pleaded guilty to lesser charges of child abuse. She will appear in court on June 15th and if convicted, could face up to 15 years in prison.
Tough love, eh?
Slate: Is Kaitlyn Hunt Being Punished Because She Is Gay?
What do you think?It looks that way. But her case is about more than gay rights.
Kaitlyn Hunt, an 18-year-old Florida student, is getting lots of sympathy after being criminally charged over her sexual relationship with her 14-year-old girlfriend. Hunt and the younger girl were basketball teammates. Hunts parents say the girls parents went to the police, because they blamed Kaitlyn for their child's homosexuality, as CBS put it. Hunts family put up a Facebook page called Free Kate, with links to T-shirts, bracelets, and a petition. More than 45,000 people have signed it. The Florida ACLU has spoken out on her behalf, saying this is a harmless, consensual relationship.
The mother of the younger girl, meanwhile, reportedly says that she's just a mom protecting her daughter and that this is not about gay rights. The prosecutors also see no shadow of homophobia. "The law doesn't make any differentiation. It doesn't matter if it's two girls or two boys, or an older boy and a younger girl or an older girl and a younger boy. Whatever the combination, it doesn't matter," State Attorney Bruce Colton said. His office charged Hunt in February with two counts of lewd and lascivious battery of a child. She has been expelled from school. Now she has to decide whether to plead guilty to lesser charges of child abuse, in exchange for which, Colton says, hell recommend a sentence of two years of house arrest. If Hunt goes to trial, on the other hand, she could wind up having to register as a sex offender (though she could also fight that outcome, under Florida law, because she and her alleged victim are only four years apart in age). Update, May 24: Hunt opted not to take the plea deal Friday. If convicted, she faces a maximum 15-year sentence.
Its hard for me to see how you can take the homophobia out of this case. And if Hunt truly was having a consensual relationship, then these proposed sentences seem out of whackand that applies to two years of house arrest as well as the sex offender registry. Im struck, though, by the stark contrast between the support for Kaitlyn Hunt and the denunciation of various 17- and 18-year-old boys who have been charged with sex crimes because of their relationships, or encounters, with 15- or 14-year-old girls. Is this case really so different because its about two girls? Or does it reveal a larger problem with charging older teenagers for having sex with younger ones?
Compare Hunt to Genarlow Wilson, convicted at 17 of child molestation for having oral sex with a 15-year-old girl at a New Years party. Or consider the case of Marcus Dwayne Dixon, prosecuted when he was an 18-year-old high school football star for raping a 15-year-old girl who said hed forced her to lose her virginity. The jury found Dixon not guilty of rape, but convicted him of statutory rape: The girl was underage, and she and Dixon had sex. Both Wilson and Dixon got mandatory 10-year sentences, and each served two years before the Georgia Supreme Court struck down the punishment as grossly disproportionate to the crime.
Does it matter that Wilson and Dixon are black? That the girl in Dixons case was white? That after their convictions, the Georgia legislature made consensual sex between teenagers a misdemeanor? My point is that its so hard to know which older teenagers are predatory and which are in love, or at least fond of each other, with younger teenagers who love or like them back. Kaitlyn Hunts parents are understandably complaining about selective prosecution. They are absolutely right that most of the time no one calls the cops when a high school senior has sex with a freshman. But if the uneven enforcement of statutory rape laws is a problem, then its also a problem for the rare boy who gets caught in a prosecutors web. Surely most of the time, its a call from an unhappy parent that prompts police involvement. Is that OK as long as the parent is protecting a daughter from an older guy, from not if the perceived threat is an older girl?
Weighing all of this a few years ago, along with research on the adolescent brain, my colleague Will Saletan proposed a sliding scale of consent to sex for teenagers. The states, meanwhile, are all over the map in determining at what ages, and with what age spans between partners, consensual sex should be treated as a crime. Some have passed Romeo and Juliet laws, which protect two teenagers who are only a few years apart in age from prosecution, or at least knock down the potential charges to a misdemeanor offense.
I dont have an easy answer to all the confusion. I can see why a 14-year-olds parents would be wary of her 18-year-old boyfriend. But if the law treats that boy as a criminal, then why not the 18-year-old girlfriend? Maybe the better answer is that parental wariness just shouldnt translate into criminal charges in a case involving two high school students and a three or four-year age gap. Kaitlyn Hunts plight is about gay rights. But its not only about that.
