Jules Verne Forum

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Re: Cousinly and Juvenile love

From: thomas mccormick <tom_amity~at~hotmail.com>
Date: Sun, 23 Oct 2005 19:38:18 +0000
To: jvf~at~Gilead.org.il

Historically, the "age of consent" laws in force in the USA would have been
considered anomalous and weird in most societies of the past. I dont know to
what extent this observation applies to the current laws of other countries.

There is a surprisingly large number of married couples in the USA in which
the husband was convicted of "statutory rape" (a.k.a. "sex with a person who
had not attained the age of consent"), and the wife was the "victim", having
married her "[statutory] rapist" as soon as it became legal for her to do
so. It has been argued that the "age of consent" law is unnecessarily
interfering in private matters. In Nebraska at this moment, there is a case
pending, in which the preponderance of members of both families are in favor
of the proposed marriage.

Also, one of the people who was interviewed by Alfred Kinsey was in prison
for this crime, having committed it on a woman of 15; he had been born in
some foreign country; I think it was Mexico. He told Kinsey he couldn't
understand what he'd done wrong because his mother had been only 14 when he
was born!

It has been argued, indeed, that contemporary Western society prolongs
adolescence (and non-adult legal status) to a degree that would have been
considered ludicrous in most epochs. Whether this is good or bad is of
course an abstract philosophical question. The question here is: to what
extent are our ideas of childhood and adulthood typical of the time during
which Verne was writing?

(Of course, we must also consider the extent to which marriage in past
epochs was a "business arrangement" between families, and governed by
parental consent rather than the choice of the spouses.)

Tom McCormick


>From: Jan Rychlík <jan.rychlik~at~seznam.cz>
>Reply-To: Jules Verne Forum <jvf~at~Gilead.org.il>
>To: Jules Verne Forum <jvf~at~Gilead.org.il>
>Subject: Re:Cousinly and Juvenile love
>Date: Sun, 23 Oct 2005 20:44:45 +0200 (CEST)
>
> > Axel in Centre of the Earth appears to be only 17 when dreaming of
> > seducing his cousin Grauben, who must be 15. Jenny Halliburt in the
>Blockade
> > Runners is only 15 when she marries Crockston. In an era when men often
>married
> > at 40 might not Verne's heroes be charged with rape or corruption of
>minors?
>
>I think this was pretty normal then. Girls get married at 15 (sometimes
>with men at 40).
>
>Sincerely
>
>Jan Rychlik

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Received on Sun 23 Oct 2005 - 21:39:08 IST

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