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Anonymous ID: 81b256 July 30, 2019, 7:03 a.m. No.7258008   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>8026 >>8275

>>7257996

https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/dershowitz-responds-after-1997-statutory-rape-is-an-outdated-concept-op-ed-resurfaces/

 

Dershowitz Responds After 1997 ‘Statutory Rape Is an Outdated Concept’ Op-Ed Resurfaces

 

Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz, who was criticized for the better part of Monday due to the resurfacing of a 1997 op-ed he wrote (“Statutory Rape Is an Outdated Concept”), has offered a response on Twitter to former George W. Bush chief White House ethics lawyer Richard Painter: “I stand by the constitutional (not moral) argument I offered in my controversial oped.”

 

Before we get to what Painter said, let’s delve into the context. It was a New Yorker profile that first drew renewed attention to this 1997 op-ed. Connie Bruck, in “Alan Dershowitz, Devil’s Advocate,” wrote the following about the op-ed, in which Dershowitz made a case for lowering the age of consent to 15:

 

Dershowitz has not shied away from provocative ideas about sex and the law. In a 1997 op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, he argued against statutory-rape laws, writing, “There must be criminal sanctions against sex with very young children, but it is doubtful whether such sanctions should apply to teenagers above the age of puberty, since voluntary sex is so common in their age group.” He suggested that fifteen was a reasonable age of consent, no matter how old the partner was. He has also argued against punishing men who hire prostitutes. In a 1985 article, in the Gainesville Sun, Dershowitz proposed that a john “who occasionally seeks to taste the forbidden fruit of sex for hire” should not be arrested. The nonprofit executive recalled his discussing the idea in class: “He said, ‘Prostitutes know what they’re doing—they should be prosecuted. But you shouldn’t ruin the john’s life over that.’ If I had raised my hand to challenge that, I would have been singling myself out as—God forbid—a feminist.”

 

To no one’s surprise, this profile made waves; Painter was one of many to make note of it.

 

“Why is @AlanDersh trying to lower the age of consent in this op-ed? 15? Really?” he asked. Painter then quoted Dershowitz’s words (“Reasonable people can disagree about whether [the age of consent] should be as low as 14”) before intentionally quipping as follows: “ls @AlanDersh kidding (pun intended)? Does he really think that?”