Magical 18 or Adult Age

[leon]

In Vatican State (!) you can have sex at the age of 12.

Vatican City uses the laws of Italy in this matter. Wikipedia says the age of consent there is 14, with a Romeo-Juliet exception that says that it's allowed for a 14 year old to sleep with a 13 year old.

Yes it's 14. There is plenty of disinformation on the web about this. In 1929 the age of consent in Italy was 12, and so the same was true then in Vatican City. However, since that time the Italian law has been changed, and so the laws of Vatican City changed automatically with them. So Romeo and Juliet could do it legally with no exceptions required. Juliet is 13, but the age of Romeo is never revealed. He could be anywhere between 14 and early 20s. Since Mercutio, Tybalt and Paris are probably about the same age as Romeo, my guess would be he was more likely around 16 or more... In the original novel, Romeo and Guilietta, Guilietta is 18. Shakespeare made her younger at a later time, probably to make his play more accurate for the time and place.

So that means you can act in a pornography movie (with your parents permission) at 16, but you can't buy the same movie yourself?

The US considers the production of child pornography to be a different offense than that of statutory rape. IIRC, in the US, all participants must be over 18, and the studio needs to keep documentation of that.

Yes, it's 18 in the US, regadless of state laws. But as papillon stated, there are many such absurdities in other countries.

I recall a lawsuit against the company that produced Grand Theft Auta 3 San Andreas. A mother bought Grand Theft Auta 3 San Andreas (rated 16+) for her 14-year old son. After "hot coffee" scandal, the rating for GTA was changed to 18+, so she sued the company. What I learned from this example? Having sex with your girlfriend is wrong (unless you are 18+), but killing prostitutes for fun is OK (as long you are at least 16)

There's something of a difference between playing a video game that lets you kill prostitutes for fun, and actually killing prostitutes for fun.

My point was that there are often double standards with game rankings when it comes to violence and sex.
This gets rated 15+ or 17+ (depending on country) - http://blog.hexagonstar.com/wp-content/ ... odbath.jpg
This gets rated 18+ (SFW) - http://img1.mmo.mmo4arab.com/news/2010/ ... e_gta2.jpg

[Aleema]

18 is about the age you graduate High School in America, and I imagine that's why the cutoff is there. It's where your life begins to take course, so it's obviously a time when you should be able to make adult decisions. You don't really mature until several years after that when you're not ushered through life anymore.

As for 18 being the age of consent, the way I see it, it's not just about older people taking advantage of children (but that is a very real threat), but also: how old does a person have to be before you're allowed to impregnate them/make them a parent? There are definitely some age ranges I would consider off-limits, based on that alone.

[papillon]

how old does a person have to be before you're allowed to impregnate them/make them a parent?

Logically, then, the homosexual age of consent could be lower because you can't get pregnant that way!

(I know at least at some point in England the opposite was true.)

[Aleema]

how old does a person have to be before you're allowed to impregnate them/make them a parent?

Logically, then, the homosexual age of consent could be lower because you can't get pregnant that way!

Sexuality isn't in the logic; a person, no matter their gender, shouldn't be made to be a parent at such-and-such age. =P Though I do realize there are holes in this logic to begin with. It would ban all sex under the limit, I believe.

[Ramidel]

how old does a person have to be before you're allowed to impregnate them/make them a parent?

Logically, then, the homosexual age of consent could be lower because you can't get pregnant that way!

(I know at least at some point in England the opposite was true.)

Age of consent laws differ between gender combinations in many places. Also, in some cases they differ between sex acts (for example, in some places the age of consent is higher for anal sex than vaginal, which means that homosexual males have a higher de facto age of consent). However, I know of no case where sex is legal "unless it might result in pregnancy."

[Ramidel]

Sexuality isn't in the logic; a person, no matter their gender, shouldn't be made to be a parent at such-and-such age. =P Though I do realize there are holes in this logic to begin with. It would ban all sex under the limit, I believe.

Heterosexual sex is somewhat more likely to lead to pregnancy than homosexual sex.

[Gear]

In the state that I live, the age of consent for heterosexual couples is 17. The age of consent for homosexual couples is 18. But I live in the southern region of the United States, where the general consensus is that homosexuality is a demonic attempt to destroy peaceful, god-fearing, white-supremacist families.