this post was submitted on 03 Dec 2023
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A Florida woman is facing felony charges for allegedly posing online as a homeschooler to sexually assault an underage boy.

22-year-old Alyssa Ann Zinger was arrested in Tampa on Nov. 24 and taken to jail; she faces two counts of lewd or lascivious battery and five counts of lewd or lascivious molestation. The police do not believe this was an isolated incident.

“It is disturbing and unsettling to see an adult take advantage of a child and prey on them,” Chief Lee Bercaw said in a statement. “Anyone who may have been a victim of Zinger’s, we encourage you to come forward. The Tampa Police Department will support you and ensure a predator like Zinger doesn’t cause you or others additional harm.”

Police say they were tipped off that Zinger allegedly had a relationship with a child between the ages of 12 and 15, and that following an investigation, they learned that she “communicated with the victim primarily through an online social media platform.”

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[–] TheBananaKing@lemmy.world 94 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

That's the second time in about a month I've seen it described as sexual assault / molestation / predation when it's a woman doing it.

Usually news outlets bend over backwards to call it a 'relationship' or a 'romp' or otherwise put a positive spin on it.

Colour me impressed.

[–] jettrscga@lemmy.world 25 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Police say they were tipped off that Zinger allegedly had a relationship with a child between the ages of 12 and 15...

[–] TheBananaKing@lemmy.world 10 points 9 months ago

Ah, bleh. I only looked at the excerpt

[–] ParsnipWitch@feddit.de 4 points 9 months ago (3 children)

They call it a "sexual relationship" regularly when it is between a man and a teenage girl as well.

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[–] jpreston2005@lemmy.world 46 points 9 months ago (9 children)
[–] BenPranklin@lemmy.world 26 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

While that's definitely what happened often the legal definition of "rape" in a state explicitly requires penetration with a penis. So a lot of things that a normal person would consider rape are classed as sexual assault and have to be reported as such in the media. You can see this in the recent E. Jean Carroll suit against trump. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/aug/07/donald-trump-rape-language-e-jean-carroll

[–] AnneBonny@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 9 months ago

While that’s definitely what happened often the legal definition of “rape” in a state explicitly requires penetration with a penis. So a lot of things that a normal person would consider rape are classed as sexual assault and have to be reported as such in the media.

The Department of Justice redefined rape a decade ago. The revised definition includes penetration with any object. I think it would be fine to call an act rape if it meets the federal definition of rape, but does not meet the state definition.

A man who receives oral sex without his consent or is made to penetrate without his consent would still not qualify as rape under the revised definition however.

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[–] anarchy79@lemmy.world 15 points 9 months ago (13 children)

If you call everything rape, the word loses all meaning. Obviously there is a difference between violent physical sexual assault and sending nudes to someone, and ages and context matters.

You are not being "brave" by pretending that the world is 100% black or white, and it's getting ridiculous with this echo chamber where everybody is competing over who hates rape the most, it's fucking childish, talk about the least controversial opinion one could possibly have.

Like wow, are you against pedophilia too? That is SO very bold of you!

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[–] leaky_shower_thought@feddit.nl 44 points 9 months ago

Thank you, florida woman.

Florida man has been dominating the eccentric-wild news segment but I see you have stepped up for the cause.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 29 points 9 months ago (4 children)

I already don't understand pedophilia, but I especially have a hard time wrapping my head around a person in their early 20s that's into grooming and sexually assaulting people who are not that much younger than them to begin with.

[–] zeppo@lemmy.world 32 points 9 months ago (1 children)

For the same reason it’s illegal… while there might not be a huge difference in age between someone 22 and 14, there’s a vast difference in maturity, experience and vulnerability to manipulation. While I’m not a psychologist, it seems like for some people, it’s based on opportunity (easier to manipulate a younger person) and others it’s based on a psychological impairment regarding their own sexual development. For this lady perhaps it’s a combo.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 15 points 9 months ago (3 children)

I'm not trying to quarrel with the legality at all. There is no question in my mind that it deserves to be illegal. I just can't wrap my head around the psychology of this. This wasn't opportunity, this took effort.

[–] zeppo@lemmy.world 11 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I didn't think you were questioning the illegality. I agree; you'd think it would be easier for her to find someone her age. Except for what I was saying earlier... some people go for minors because they can manipulate them more easily. And then, if she's warped in the way that she's particularly attracted to younger people, that explains why she'd seek one out.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 5 points 9 months ago (2 children)

The manipulation part does make sense to me. I just find the whole thing hard to keep in my head I guess.

[–] QHC@lemmy.world 9 points 9 months ago (2 children)

It's not a bad thing that you have a hard time empathizing with pedophiles, in case that helps.

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[–] TheBananaKing@lemmy.world 6 points 9 months ago

It's about power. It's always about power.

Power over the victim, and the power to transgress.

If they can manipulate people and get away with heinous shit, in their mind they must have rich-person energy.

[–] tonyn@lemmy.ml 4 points 9 months ago

Just spitballing here, but a young attractive woman like her probably gets a lot of unwanted attention from men who have sought to control her. Maybe she wanted someone who didn't pose a threat. Still illegal, and she still needs to go to jail. It doesn't matter what turns one into a predator.

[–] treefrog@lemm.ee 29 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I did time in prison for growing mushrooms and had the unfortunate privilege of living with pedophiles for two years.

I'm sure some don't give a fuck. But I know a few who are basically children mentally due to trauma or mental disability. They believe children are sexual beings and basically project their attraction to kids, onto kids.

In other words, they justify their actions by believing children want to have sex and take innocent things like an affectionate kiss on the cheek, as flirting.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 10 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

It all just sounds so alien to me. It's just such a way of thinking so wholly different from anything I ever think that I have trouble even comprehending it.

Thankfully, I was never preyed upon as a child myself so I've only heard accounts from others who had been, but I'm sure it's hard for a lot of victims to wrap their heads around it too. I would probably spend the rest of my life trying to understand the mind of someone who did that to me. Not as some form of forgiveness, more of a probably hopeless search for a deeper motive even if it was purely a crime of opportunity.

Ugh. The world is so horrible.

[–] Duranie@midwest.social 7 points 9 months ago

Someone close to me was raped the first 5 years of his life by a relative, and has been in therapy (very successfully) ever since. When someone that young experiences ongoing trauma like that, it fucks all the developmental areas in life including the reward/feel good parts of the brain. There are things that the brain becomes wired for that can't be undone, but with effective treatment can be managed.

Under the best circumstances recovery is incredibly hard, without therapy and proper support it's not surprising someone could go off the rails like this. Not saying that this predator was abused because I don't know, but it's statistically likely.

[–] Drivebyhaiku@lemmy.world 28 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

From what I understand for some it's just the tools they have at their disposal to get affection or sex in a very low effort or ego flattering way. To a teen, having a car, a place where there's no parents calling the shots and any kind of income is a huge and enviable power gap. The person's experience with other relationships means that they don't tend to go all in on the younger partner either the way a person experiencing love for the first time does. So you have someone who remembers that all consuming need to hold onto that first sacred relationship enough to mechanically exploit it so they can either shift all the work onto their younger partner and keep them on the back foot by threatening to end things or push their younger partner to do exactly what they want because to them the relationship is just one of a potential many. That disposition towards relationship fungibility means you have solid leverage.

Youngsters also don't have any real experience with autonomy. A kid is used to being told what to do and accepting inequity in power balances as normal. Rebelling in the face of adult authority structures also means there's a lack of seeing adults as peers to whom they can seek advice and benefit and trust their experience and more as just unfair weilders of social power that need be avoided so to transgress means you ditch the social structures that are the most able to spot the red flags.

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[–] deegeese@sopuli.xyz 9 points 9 months ago (1 children)

There’s a huge difference between 12 and 22. The power imbalance means there can’t be meaningful consent.

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[–] mateomaui@reddthat.com 26 points 9 months ago (2 children)

The Tampa Bay Times reports that police stopped Zinger and a minor after they tried to steal from a Nordstrom store over the summer. “Zinger identified herself to an officer using her name, but stated she was born in 2009. The officer could not find information on her with the date of birth she provided, but found an Alyssa Ann Zinger who was born in 2001,” the article said.

Not at all the brightest bulb there.

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[–] Red_October@lemmy.world 16 points 9 months ago (4 children)

The part that really confuses me is... wtf is a Homeschooler? Obviously this isn't a parent teaching their own child in a homeschool setting. Context makes it sound like they advertise as someone who will come teach a child who is being homeschooled... but isn't that just, you know, a teacher? Who the fuck is going to all the bother of homeschooling their kid, presumably specifically to keep them from going to a regular school, only to then hire some fucking rando off the internet to do it for them and providing even less accountability and background certainty than even a public school?

[–] NucleusAdumbens@lemmy.world 24 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I assumed they meant she posed as a kid who is home schooled

[–] MayvisDelacour@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Yeah I did too, it tracks since she gave her birth year as 2009 to cops when caught stealing from a store, when investigated she was actually born in 2001. On a side note, God damn people born in the 2000s are becoming adults? When did I get so old? Make it stop!

[–] echodot@feddit.uk 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

1977 is a far away from the 2000s as the 2000s are from now, which is both super obvious and somehow surprising.

[–] HerbalGamer@sh.itjust.works 7 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] Zoomboingding@lemmy.world 5 points 9 months ago

We're almost a quarter of the way through the 21st century

[–] echodot@feddit.uk 11 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

Actually my godmother does this so I know a bit about it.

It does sound sort of confusing at first but there's more than one reason to homeschool someone usually it's done if the kid requires special handling.

Useful for when they're even massively ahead or massively behind other children. It can be helpful in both cases for them not to actually have to be in a class with other kids and that way the lesson can go at whatever pace they're comfortable with whether that's accelerated or slowed down.

Or sometimes they have a medical issue that makes going outside difficult or dangerous.

Although I have no idea how it would work in this context since she apparently volunteered her services to children who were the wise wouldn't be to make use of it.

[–] OneWomanCreamTeam@sh.itjust.works 13 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Another pretty common reason is religious or personal concerns about the school system. I was homeschooled all the way through highschool because my mom was afraid I'd learn gay people exist if I went to real school.

[–] BreadstickNinja@lemmy.world 7 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Begging the question - when did you learn that gay people exist?

[–] HerbalGamer@sh.itjust.works 9 points 9 months ago

Sometime before they choose that username, I'm guessing.

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[–] Malfeasant@lemm.ee 5 points 9 months ago

Sometimes it's religious. My daughter was due to start kindergarten at the tail end of COVID lockdowns, so my wife and I were looking at options that didn't involve her sitting in a room with 20+ kids... There are people that will homeschool small groups of kids, like 5 or so, and the public school system will pay them per kid so there's no out of pocket cost to the parents. We interviewed with one family, and it was looking like it might be worth doing, they were obviously religious, but not obviously nutjobs, and I'm ok with my kids seeing that religion is out there as long as it's not being forced on them... But then the mom said those magic words, evolution is "just one theory" and I couldn't get past that. We ended up enrolling her in an online kindergarten.

[–] Blackmist@feddit.uk 7 points 9 months ago

Homeschool parents are often mad as a bag of cats.

They certainly would hire some rando based on a chat about Jesus rather than checking actual qualifications.

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[–] Sharpiemarker@feddit.de 11 points 9 months ago (3 children)

Greaaaat, here come the incels.

[–] SendMePhotos@lemmy.world 30 points 9 months ago (2 children)

OH MAN THAT'D BE SO HAWT WHY COULDN'T THAT BE MEEEEE

[–] Sharpiemarker@feddit.de 10 points 9 months ago

It's 50/50 people who wish it was them and people who only hate her because she's a woman and wouldn't say a thing if a man had done the same thing. But damn her being attractive, young, and feeeeemale

I'm all for holding people accountable based on their crimes and not their gender.

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[–] treefrog@lemm.ee 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Good! Women who sexually assault men or young men or boys or girls, should be held just as accountable as men.

I had to explain to my gf, I ask everytime I go down on you. When you go down on me you assume it's a yes and never ask.

Men value consent too! And underage boys are not mature enough to consent to having sex with an adult!

[–] Eheran@lemmy.world 7 points 9 months ago (13 children)

If you are partners that is silly. There is no need to ask for permission for everything as if the other is some random person. You both know each other etc. and should you not like it, can speak up. Everything else would be really odd in a partnership.

[–] voracitude@lemmy.world 6 points 9 months ago (6 children)

Hey man, if they want their partner to check with them, you have no right to tell them they don't have a right to it. I personally would have a massive problem with my wife just taking my cock in her mouth without asking. I'm intact, and if it's before my shower or after a long day there is probably smegma under my foreskin. I do NOT want the woman I love to be getting that in her mouth. It's disgusting and makes me feel gross.

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[–] oDDmON@lemmy.world 5 points 9 months ago (7 children)

According to a search warrant obtained by the Tampa Bay Times, that platform was Snapchat.

Figured one of the image based platforms.

The warrant detailed additional information about at least one relationship that allegedly spanned from May through September. Zinger allegedly sent explicit material to the minor and “engaged in sexual activities several times” with him.

I don’t get the mindset that leads to these kinds of actions.

[–] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 6 points 9 months ago

Good! Means you’re normal.

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