If she cannot be responsible for her behavior in something as simple as not lying about her age, and seeking out sex with an adult, why would you think she is old enough and responsible enough to seek an abortion without requiring parental notification or notification and consent of a judge?

I’ve been off-line for a few days, so I’m sorry if the thread is already dead. To answer your question, I’d like to direct you to zingerella, who really did a fantastic job of sussing out the distinction.

I would just like to add something: again, it is not illegal to lie about your age, just like it is not illegal to lie on the internet. Lying is an immoral behavior (with a few exceptions, this not being one of them), but there is a huge difference sometimes between what is moral and what is legal. Her behavior, where it is irresponsible (and downright dangerous, I’d like to point out) is not for the federal government to fix, but for her parents to fix.

It does seem that there’s a discrepancy there, yes. In the instance of a hypothetical 13-year-old who has become pregnant and wants to abort the pregnancy, secretly, without having anyone tell her parents, we seek to preserve access to abortion for young women who for whatever reason do not feel that they can call on their parents for support and guidance. Leaving aside the possibility that the sexual encounter may not have been consensual, we’re admitting that it’s entirely possible that a 13-year-old may behave unwisely–she may have unprotected sex, or inadequately protected sex–but hoping that if she has access to safe, legal abortion, and feels that aborting the pregnancy is the best step for her to take, she’ll be able to do so. We recognize that a 13-year-old undergoing abortion without her parents’ knowledge is not necessarily a desirable outcome, but think that requiring parental consent has the potential to cause more and more serious problems than it has the potential to solve, in that many children who are afraid to tell their parents when they’ve seriously messed up have some grounds for that fear. It’s not so much that the 13-year-old is absolutely mature. It’s that she’s gotten herself into a pickle, and needs to be able to get herself out, and that she’s is the one who is going to have to deal with the results of the pregnancy and its termination. Her parents aren’t going to have to carry the baby to term. Her parents may believe in supporting their daughter and her child, but she’s going to be looking at a future in which the scope of the possible is pretty darned constrained.

IF you tell her you need her parents’ consent, there’s a very good chance that she’ll either go someplace that doesn’t require her to tell her parents (i.e., an illegal provider), or simply find herself stuck with a baby. Or she may tell her parents, who may indeed forbid her the procedure, and be stuck with a baby, because she made a mistake when she was 13. Or her parents may justify her fears, and hurt her further. Or they may be perfectly supportive and wonderful, but we can’t know that they will. So we say that, overall, we need to give young women access to the services they need, including, sometimes, abortion, and overall, it’s better to not require parental consent. Down the road, the woman may regret her abortion, and that’s a sad possibility. But better to regret, sincerely, a terminated pregnancy than to regret, sincerely, the outcome of a non-terminated one.

In the instance of the apparently very troubled 13-year-old with the inflated age on her MySpace page and the upsetting sexual history, I think it’s clear that she’s indeed not making good sexual decisions, or drawing the connection between her actions and the misfortunes of her male partners. But the reason we have age-of-consent and statutory-rape laws is that we as a society have decided that by virtue of their greater amounts of experience, adults are, in general and on average, more capable of giving informed, meaningful consent, and children (as in people who are not of the age of consent) are, in general and on average, less able to give meaningful consent. Therefore the burden of responsibility for ensuring that one’s partner is of age and is giving meaningful consent rests on adults (we also get lots more perqs and access to meaningful power in society, so it’s fair). Laws deal in broad generalities, and need to be enforced consistently.

In this instance, perhaps this 13-year-old should have known better. But, given that the laws governing statutory rape and sex with minors are not exactly new, and given that her partners were adults, they absolutely should have known better.

I really would like to hear your answer regarding my actual question, the one you seemed to have avoided answering…

If this girl is old enough and responsible enough to ask for an abortion without requiring parental notification (or notification and consent of a judge), how can you say she is not responsible for her behavior in lying about her age and seeking sex with an adult? This has nothing to do with lying on Myspace pages, she did this in real life with the men she met. After seeing the first man get a five year sentence in jail, she certainly knew of the ramifications. If she cannot understand that lying to this person was wrong, if she cannot empathize with his plight, what evidence do we have she has reached a maturity that would allow her to take responsibility over what should happen to her body and the fetus within?

If she cannot be responsible for her behavior in something as simple as not lying about her age, and seeking out sex with an adult, why would you think she is old enough and responsible enough to seek an abortion without requiring parental notification or notification and consent of a judge?

Thank you.

Both seeking sex with an adult over 18 and seeking an abortion requires a person to be able to recognize the effect of your decisions on others. In one case, a relatively innocent adult and in the other case, a fetus with the potential of becoming a person. Seeking sex and having an abortion can both lead to really big changes for your body. Mostly good, possibly pretty bad.

I think the same sorts of reasoning and physical and emotional maturity are called for. I know very little about child development, but in the Piaget sense, being able to determine if/then and cause and effect has occurred by age 13 for most.

I haven’t said that 13 year olds won’t have sex. And I haven’t ruled out abortions for them either.

I am asking why you think that they are capable of one decision on their own, and not capable of the other decision on their own. So far, no one has answered that question.

See, thirteen-year-olds THINK they are mature adults. They are extremely wrong. They may have the pattern-recognition abilities of adults, speech processing, debate, talents, lots of that stuff. What they lack is the EXPERIENCE behind INTELLIGENCE to make WISDOM. They do stuff like say they are 18 on the internet, pick up random strangers and then agree to meet them in public. If they ask their parents, their parents say no. And clearly (in the thirteen year olds mind) this is because the parents don’t understand them because the children don’t have the WISDOM to understand why it’s a dangerous situation. Furthermore, they may actually consent to a sexual encounter with an older person, having no experience to guide their decision. They don’t understand that their body may not actually be physically ready for something like that yet, they don’t understand that it is a crime and the person who commits it now needs to COVER IT UP somehow, many things.

Thirteen year olds are five years away from becoming legal adults in this country for many many very good reasons. They are incapable of making heavy life-altering decisions appropriately because they don’t yet know what rubric to apply to their options or even what all their options are. It’s not until sixteen or seventeen that we even see people starting to make decisions like these, about where they want to go to college or whether to own a car or not, that sort of thing.

Knee-jerk reaction to your opening statement. Now, regarding the abortion thing, I can’t say anything to the emotions going on being male, but I really don’t think that it’s the same exact flavor of decision as whether or not to have sex. An abortion solves a problem whereas sex (especially at that age) is a recreational activity. Different reasons for pursuing each one.

And also, just because the logo and name are a bit off-color doesn’t mean that the people who blog here aren’t persons. They have dignity, and much of what goes on here is political and strikes deep at who they are as humans. Respect, as such, is ABSOLUTELY called for, because if you don’t respect their deeply held beliefs, they won’t respect yours. If you need me to define respect for you, I’d be happy.

TRH

Huh? Where wasn’t I 100% respectful? (And checking the title of this blog again, uh, “punkassblog” with a nice finger logo, but somehow I need to be 100% respectful?) But again, where wasn’t I respectful?

Perhaps in error, perhaps not, I do not believe that there would be this much animosity towards a 13-year-old boy on that site.

“At 13 in many cultures (in different times) these kids were considered adults. Could get married. Could go to war.”

And in some cultures, it’s also acceptable to murder people of different races. I am not a cultural relativist.

My point with both of these points is more that I think that kids at 13, boy or girl, are basically adults in many ways. We often don’t place adult responsibility on them. But at times we do. Whether we do or do not, should probably be consistent regardless to their sex.

They didn’t get married at 13 based on culture, but based on biology. Similarly with war. Most cultures had “coming of age” rights to introduce kids to “adulthood” within the tribe or population based on biology. They were old enough to reproduce, they were adults. They were old enough to reproduce, they were expected to engage in war, they were adults. Not a cultural base, but a biological base.

At times we place adult responsibility on these kids, and at times we don’t. And I think that’s reasonable depending on what we’re asking of them, but I think we should try to be consistent.

At Pandagon there was a thread asking if we should give kids the right to vote. Some folks argued they were affected by adult laws and had basically adult minds and should vote. Others felt they didn’t pay taxes or were immature and shouldn’t vote.

And so comes the question of mine that you avoided.

If this girl is old enough and responsible enough to ask for an abortion without requiring parental notification (or notification and consent of a judge), how can you say she is not responsible for her behavior in lying about her age and seeking sex with an adult? This has nothing to do with lying on Myspace pages, she did this in real life with the men she met. After seeing the first man get a five year sentence in jail, she certainly knew of the ramifications. If she cannot understand that lying to this person was wrong, if she cannot empathize with his plight, what evidence do we have she has reached a maturity that would allow her to take responsibility over what should happen to her body and the fetus within?

If she cannot be responsible for her behavior in something as simple as not lying about her age, and seeking out sex with an adult, why would you think she is old enough and responsible enough to seek an abortion without requiring parental notification or notification and consent of a judge?

I don’t think that’s an MRA issue. I think that’s a parenting issue.

Regarding Sacks, I think you’ll find he is always polite, and frequently agrees with feminists and their issues. I’ll reissue the challenge from before:

Pick any month at random and read every post of Glenn’s and see what he has to say. Compare it with the same month selected from either Feministe, Feministing, Pandagon (the Amanda posts). Write about Glenn. Is he the misogynist that many feminists claim he is? Write about what you read at the other blog. Who more fairly represents the opposing viewpoint? Is there any truth in what he says when he critiques feminism? Are the issues he raises concerning domestic violence and child custody being raised at feminist blogs, and should they be discussed?