One of my older cousins took up with a teacher in her high school. Can't recall if he was her actual teacher, may well have been. It was a quiet, if minor, scandal. He resigned, they married, 50+ years, great kids & grandkids. He had another career; she got a job in the school system, all their kids actually work in school systems!
Assuming she was underage, is society really better off prosecuting and jailing this teacher? Maybe I'm a closet libertarian. I am having a hard time answering Yes.
This seemed to have been something along the same lines. I didn't hear about it until I got to HS, and by then he was married. I was told that his wife was a former student, and the rumors were that he had been seeing her when she was a student. Were I an admin, I'd try to discourage any relationship between a teacher and a student at the same high school, even if she's legal and not in any of his classes. But it can probably get you sued if they're not sexually involved.
Yes, society is better off. If she's underage, it's statutory. The states have decided on an age of consent for a reason. It's to place responsibility on the adult in such a "relationship". Don't go all BenReilly on us. That guy had problems.
Other than the accent, Cleveland is largely thought of as blue collar, leans heavily left, is very union-friendly and dirty (they set their river on fire). Cincinnati is seen almost diametrically opposite, White collar, leans heavily right, hates unions and is pretty clean. Columbus changes on almost all of those points depending on if you are in the City or which suburb you are passing through. I am finding Cbus to be much more transient as time goes along, with the metro growth being fueled by our relatively recession proof economy, due to the university and government seat, and influx of corporate headquarters. http://www.siteselection.com/issues/2012/nov/columbus-ohio.cfm?s=mp Interesting read on the viability of Columbus.
, How knows what the age of consent was in the early 1960s, or if there was a teacher-student component? I'm certainly not going to ask now! Obviously not. Don't know how my aunt & uncle felt at the time, though. Nobody seemed too upset, they got married after she graduated, life went on. I was a kid & didn't pay much attention to the whole story. Just knew that they were a great couple & their kids were, too. Many people disregard perfectly sensible advice, especially where love (or lust) is concerned. As long as men & women have been in proximity to each other, there have been relationships. (Not even to mention, as long have men or women have been in close proximity to each other, etc.!)
There was probably more of it going on then, and probably more married couples with an age difference that approached or exceeded that of your relatives, whatever it was. People now (especially women) are marrying later, probably because it takes more time to have something to bring to the table. And people are eating better now, which translates into earlier puberty for girls. That brings about the premarital sex issue- how do we fix our collective mouths to tell someone to either wait from puberty to late 20s to engage in sex or marry at 18 knowing full well it probably won't last?
Nobody seriously advocates that, do they? Sucker parents who have their kids take virginity pledges that are broken during orientation week in college don't count. The only kids I can think of who really are virgins at marriage are from strongly religious families, and those people don't wait until late 20s to get married. Those cultures marry early.
I think we all do- just most of us are realistic enough to know it ain't gonna happen that way. They're suckers, but they do count. Yes, they do. I knew one girl in HS who got married as a junior and left with her husband (who I went to middle school with but not HS) for Japan where he was stationed. Luke Skywalker-lookin' fella. Her dad had to go get her because he was abusive.
Well certainly not "all" -- I didn't counsel my son on when he should have sex, nor would I have done so if I had a daughter. Surely some people do, but I doubt that many really try once their kids hit college age or so. Back in the day, when marriages weren't necessarily at a young age for the gentlemen, and when the woman was expected to be a virgin, it was tacitly understood by many that the young gentlemen would receive their sexual training from prostitutes. I tend to think that today's morality is, well, more moral.
Trouble is, whatever you can think of, you can find there are rare exceptions... Met a couple on a long train ride in the 70's once... The guy had been a semester from finishing a teaching degree on the off semester, when he met an of-age female at a dance; she was going into her senior year in HS, having missed a year due to polio. They got involved and continued to be involved on a "sure thing date" level throughout his last semester. Then he finished-- and got hired at her high school. According to them, they cooled it for five months, during which they figured out they were more interested in each other than they had quite realized. By the time I met them they were married. Not sure whether a "pre-existing condition" exception would be appropriate, or whether he should have declined the job; come to think of it, from the way they told the story, I'm not sure he knew she was in that school or even still in school. Different subject-- the sense in which we assume victimization runs one way. My sister was in HS in the early 60's. Her friends weren't the cool set, but they weren't outcasts either. They were in the know but not in the center. One of the recurring topics of discussions I overheard, was the way in which some of the popular girls would target male chaperones at dances (chaperones weren't just faculty and staff-- PTA parents did it too.) It was apparently regarded, in the active circles, as a public service to seduce the chaperone, and so nullify his interference with your friends' activities. (In fact, isn't there a scene like that in "American Graffiti?") On one scandalous occasion it was believed that a girl had briefed another on what her father was likely to be susceptible to... accurately... The innocence of children is greatly overestimated.
I remember reading about this practice in my high school history book! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundling_(tradition) I also recall reading somewhere else, that men in early America were reluctant to marry a woman who was not pregnant, as they were concerned about possibly marrying a woman who was barren. Wow.
I remember seeing a movie or something when I was in high school with a plot point that involved a father taking his son to a brothel for such an initiation. I am so, so, soooooooo grateful that that was not the accepted practice in downstate Illinois when I was growing up.
Which always surprises me, because weren't we once all children at one times, and don't we have memories? Three friends and I mooned the camera junior year. The picture got passed around school. Now we call that behavior sexting, act as if it is new, and criminalize it.
My college friend was taken to Nevada when he was 17 by his uncle, and initiated with a "hooker who had great tits." He was very grateful. OK not really a friend, he lived on the same dorm floor and tried to hit on my girlfriend.
FWIW - the Dutch I worked with said that was common practice there. Older brothers, cousins, uncles take them the first time.
I don't think you can have real freedom and liberty unless there are ways to deprive others of theirs (not to say we shouldn't have prisons and laws... but our drug laws are pretty ridiculous, and some of our approach to the sex industry could be a bit more enlightened)
So did we - until the laws were struck down as unconstitutional - though it's never been illegal to sell sex for money here - just the solicitation and living off the proceeds - which resulted in de facto illegality.
You quoted my post about statutory rape, but I think you're responding to the one about relationships between a teacher and a legal-age student. You say they "cooled it" for five months, and then were married by the time you met them. It seems to me that they voluntarily did what I would have suggested. It's clear that no crime was being committed, but if another male student decides he likes this girl but she's dating a teacher, it could get ugly (What is he doing dating our girls? Why can't he find a grown woman to date?). Or if another young lady finds out that her friend (or her enemy) is dating a teacher and makes a fuss, parents could be involved. Aiiiieeeeee... My only rebuttal is that they will become innocent children again (in both their response to the accusations and the way they're viewed by the state) if the two are caught doing something improper.
Most places that would still be statutory and criminal nowadays-- laws have been adjusted due to the presumption that he could exercise the power of authority over her. They were legally equals at their first encounter, but became unequal when he showed up for work the first time... Of course back then there wasn't so much chance of any objection, though I suppose there was some possibility that he might be fired if they were caught. My impression was that they were more concerned about the impropriety of it than the legality. He was only maybe three years older than she, BTW. As for the second case, for sure-- and the males in those cases really should have known better, etc, and deserved what they didn't actually get. My only pertinent point was that despite the clear legal fault belonging on the adult, any "predation" was on the other side. There's a bright line, but there can be plenty of shadow on either side.