Comments Elsewhere

Kennedy: “I’d also note that if a male teacher had been having sex with a thirteen year old student he might well do hard time instead of nine months.”

I agree. The difference in treatment is indefensible. The crime ought to be punished equally severely, or equally leniently, whatever the gender of the older and younger “partners.”

Lopez: “Arguments for ‘age difference’ alone don’t hold water.”

Indeed. Which is why both age difference and the youth of one of the “partners” was mentioned above. A substantial age difference is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for what I said to apply. (It’s necessary because there’s an awful lot less reason to think that another 13 year old is sleazy for sleeping with a 13 year old than to think that a 28 year old is.)

Ghertner: “If the teen has the capacity to give meaningful consent, then how is it vice, sleazy, or exploitive?”

Because there are more vices than there are crimes, in sexual ethics as in all other kinds of ethics. Fulfilling your obligation not to rape anybody is important, but why would you think that there aren’t any other moral obligations that you have? If you think (as, indeed, you should) that sexual relationships ought to take place within something at least vaguely resembling a context of equality, reciprocity, and mutual responsibility, then there are plenty of good prima facie reasons to think that 28 year olds who sleep with 13 year olds are pretty sleazy.

N.B.: I don’t think that it’s usually true that a 13 year old has the capacity to give meaningful consent to a sexual encounter with an adult twice their age. But you can apply the above at whatever age you like, depending on where you think the age of meaningful consent is and where you think the age is at which sexual encounters with much older adults stop being sketchy.

Ghertner: “Is it exploitive for college professors to sleep with college students?”

I’m not quite sure what you’re asking.

If you’re asking about students who they encounter in an academic setting (e.g. in their classes or in their departments), then yes, of course it’s unethical for professors to sleep with those students. If this isn’t obvious, it ought to be.

If you’re asking about students and professors who happen to meet each other without having any particular academic relationship to one another, then I don’t know whether it’s sleazy for the professor to sleep with the student or not. I imagine that it depends on the specifics of the case.