this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2024
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The legality of paying for intimate acts varies wildly from country to country and even in the USA, from state to state.
I make no judgement about what is considered legal or not in any given area.
I'm mostly thinking about the common law of marrying off young persons. In many places the lower limit on how old you must be to marry, is shocking. Marrying a 14 year old isn't unheard of, even in developed countries. I just don't draw a significant distinction between being married at such a young age, and being paid for intercourse at the same age. Marriage at that age may be arguably more "legal" depending on the jurisdiction, but in my mind, you're not marrying a 14 year old for their hobbies, or personality. The only reason, again, that I can think of, where someone would propose to be married to someone so young, is if the person proposing the marriage is a similar age, or if they want to have sexual relations with someone who is that young.
So for me the line is blurred and I often conflate the point in my mind.
More to the point, statutory rape generally requires that the parents are opposed to the sexual acts. Otherwise, charges are generally not pressed against the offender. Again, this varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. To that end, if you have the written consent of the parents to engage in sexual acts with someone who is below the age where they can legally make such decisions, then it might be legal, again, depending on the jurisdiction.
This is entirely, and completely commentary from a neutral standpoint. Personally, I think anyone who would seek such an arrangement needs to see a therapist, or be locked up. Morally, I don't agree with it, but often, the law does not conform to my sense of morality.
I'm just saying, I understand that some places allow for these kinds of contracts to exist. I'm not saying I agree with it at all, because I don't. I can't imagine any situation where a father, or mother, would willingly subject their child to that situation, unless they were truly and utterly desperate.... But the matter of their desperation for money to survive, is an entirely different discussion.
It is 100% illegal in ever single state in the US to pay for sex with someone that is below not only the age of majority, but also the age of consent. The minimum age of consent in the US is 14.
1000% false, in every single case. It may be more difficult to prosecute without parental involvement, but it is not required. Statutory rape is a strict liability crime; no mens rea is required. And bluntly, any prosecutor that failed to deal with an underage prostitution case would lose their job in the next election; "soft on child sex crimes" isn't a winning platform.