Legally forced marriage of minors in the USA :-(

[DrP]

Unless I am misreading things it is still legal in the USA for a parent to consent to the marriage of a child to, er, anyone. This gets even more disgusting when the person is a child and has to marry her rapist. Read this:- https://edition.cnn.com/2018/01/29/health/ending-child-marriage-in-america/index.html

HOW is this legal in a country that describes other countries that do this as 'shithole' countries? Surely when your president hears of this there will be an outrage and he will do something about it no? For the love of god!!  

I did not know whether to put this in Politics or Religion as it seems that this is more to do with the church shunning rape victims and abortions and preferring the lifetime enslavement of the victim to the rapist rather than suffer the shame of a girl being raped and the sin of abortion. FFS! Why are people in the USA not shouting and demonstrating about this to change the law? How is it tolerated in this day and age?

So - do you think Trump will outlaw this? Why didn't Obama or any of his predecessors do it? How is it not bigger news? It is totally fucking despicable  -  50 years ago!...  Nothing done about it - still legal!  In a country where the church and the law are supposed to be separate, how does this still happen?   

 

 

[Endy0816]

He can't directly pass law, but unlikely in the extreme that he would do anything.

Seperation of Church and State, generally means law treads lightly on matters that may fall under religious freedom. May or may not be relevant in this case.

Note UK law was fairly recently changed on this and according to one article the parental consent loophole is still not fully closed.

Edited February 25, 2018 by Endy0816

[StringJunky]

1 hour ago, Endy0816 said:

Note UK law was fairly recently changed on this and according to one article the parental consent loophole is still not fully closed.

16 is the minimum age, conditional on parental consent, here.

[Endy0816]

11 hours ago, StringJunky said:

16 is the minimum age, conditional on parental consent, here.

Yeah, same in Florida at present. A second bill has also been introduced with a restriction on the age difference(to 2 years). Personally second one feels more likely to pass.

 

[DrP]

Being fair  -  and to play advocate against my own points, it was only a few hundred years ago that a woman would have sought to have been married at the age of 11 or 12...  that wasn't so many years ago and I doubt we have evolved our sexual preferences since then.  I think that society constraints and the almost linch mob like criticism anyone gets if they claim they fancy someone half their age has a lot to do with what we, as a society/civilization, attune our own attitudes to.  (seems as though money makes you less evil in societies eyes though - if I at 46 claim to fancy a 25 year old I am disgusting...  if a 70- year old millionaire wants to date a 19 year old then that is seen as normal and OK/acceptable).

Do grown men still find 12 year olds attractive? Do they just not even go there in thinking and display a behaviour that has been modified by society? Is a man that fancies a teen age girl evil? (obviously if they act on their drive then maybe - certainly by societies standards...  but is this natural?). Are we no longer attracted to 12 year old girls because we have conditioned ourselves not to be? Is it natural? We have evolved in our thinking but what about in our natural drives?

Sorry if some of this is controversial.. I think they are fair questions related to the topic though. I think the evolutionary drive to procreate is a good point...  Did men fancy 12 year olds in the past because they had no choice but to get the girls young to ensure they would be old enough to look after the kids when the parents grew up...  or was this the sexual age of preference? If so then what has changed?

 

[NortonH]

If you intend to enforce this law then you are effectively discriminating against followers of some religions in which younger women and girls can be married off.

The Perfect Man, Mohamed PBUH, married Aisha at six years old and consumated the marriage three years later. 

i expect to hear now from all the islamophobes.

 

[pavelcherepan]

On 3/1/2018 at 11:05 PM, DrP said:

Being fair  -  and to play advocate against my own points, it was only a few hundred years ago that a woman would have sought to have been married at the age of 11 or 12... 

This is most definitely false. Although it is a common misconception. 

Quote

In 1275, in England, as part of the rape law, the Statute of Westminster 1275, made it a misdemeanour to "ravish" a "maiden within age", whether with or without her consent. The phrase "within age" was interpreted by jurist Sir Edward Coke as meaning the age of marriage, which at the time was 12 years.

Quote

From 1619 to 1660 in the archdiocese of Canterbury, England, the median age of the brides was 22 years and nine months while the median age for the grooms was 25 years and six months, with average ages of 24 years for the brides and nearly 28 years for the grooms, with the most common ages at marriage being 22 years for women and 24 years for men; the Church dictated that the age when one could marry without the consent of one's parents was 21 years. A large majority of English brides in this time were at least 19 years of age when they married, and only one bride in a thousand was thirteen years of age or younger.

 

[DrP]

On ‎09‎/‎03‎/‎2018 at 1:58 AM, pavelcherepan said:

This is most definitely false. Although it is a common misconception. 

 

Cool - +1 for looking up some facts. So... only one bride in a thousand was married at 12. Still... that's still quite a few.  I am also thinking that before 1275 it might have been more common....  else why the need for the law change? - I will have to research it....  maybe you are right and girls as young as 12 or 13 weren't found attractive a thousand years ago....  my point is that it wasn't seen as that bad a thing compared to todays thoughts...  and what was the consensus 1000 years ago or 2K years back or even 3K? I know it would be hard to know...  but I am pretty certain that this isn't a long enough period for man's sexual drive to be influenced much by evolution. I think our thinking has evolved faster than our drives maybe.

 

Also - remember I am playing advocate here and am interested in what the science has to say about the evolution of our sex drive...  I might get time to read more about it at a later date. I personally am not attracted that way to young teen girls...  but is this due to my mental conditioning or my evolved sexdrive?

 

 

 

[zapatos]

On 3/8/2018 at 4:18 PM, NortonH said:

If you intend to enforce this law then you are effectively discriminating against followers of some religions in which younger women and girls can be married off.

No, you are not. A law that prohibits marriage licenses to underage girls is stopping civil marriages, not religious marriages. Nothing prohibits the church from performing and recognizing a marriage ceremony for anyone they like.

[CharonY]

Apparently child marriages are in some cases happening to circumvent statutory rape persecution. Link.  

Quote

From 1999 to 2015, more than 1,000 15-year-olds married in Missouri. Of those, The Star’s review of data shows, more than 300 married men age 21 or older, with some in their 30s, 40s and 50s. Assuming they had premarital sex, those grooms would be considered rapists.

 

[Endy0816]

2nd Bill passed, still needs our governor to sign off on it, but I think we can call it a win at this point.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/377834-florida-passes-ban-on-child-marriage