Statutory rape laws refer to the laws that protect minors from sexual abuse. The term is mainly used by the government to refer to individuals who are within a given age limit, and who are unable to give consent to sexual activities. Therefore, engaging in sexual contact with such people is considered a rape case. While the proponents of the statutory rape laws have greatly praised the laws for their ability to reduce the number of rape cases witnessed, the opponents on the other side have completely disagreed with the proponent's assertion. .
Basically, the opponents argue that the statutory rape laws are patronizing to the girls and discriminatory to the boys. A number of reasons have been cited by the opponents to validate their claim. Therefore, in this paper, I will provide a coherent and critical argument concerning my topic of study. While the statutory laws are meant to protect both the female and the male minors from sexual abuse, boys who are sexually abused by the females have often been ignored. This makes the statutory laws discriminatory in nature. In addition, a significant number of individuals who serves as a statutory rape in prisons are women. This has made some decisions regarding rape cases unfair and discriminatory to the boys. It is very rare to find a woman being prosecuted after sexually engaging in sexual intercourse with a minor boy. .
According to (Russell 507), the statutory rape laws does not hold similar penalty for both sexes. Russell further asserts that the statutory laws only favour females while are discriminatory to the boys. His claim rests on his assumption that very few females have actually been prosecuted for allegedly insulting minor males sexually. To provide a background of my research topic, I will document a case in which both minors participated in sexual activities but the boy ended up being prosecuted. In this case, a 14 year old boy was charged with statutory rape for participating in sexual activities with three girls.
