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'EDITORIAL: Safe school czar' encouraged child sex with an older man

Using the source American provided, it would appear that Jennings did not in fact break the law, at least the one that American sourced.

Read page 1-17 on the PDF at the last link.

A case came up in which a teacher was charged for failing to properly report suspected sexual contact between a 12 and 13 year old. He was found non-guilty by the appeals court, because the court stated that the person engaged in acts of abuse needed to have some kind of authority over them for the teacher to be required to report the abuse. Given that it is unlikely the man Brewster met in the bathroom was someone who had authority over him, there is no evidence that Jennings violated that law.
 
Zyphlin said:
The issue is, likely, that the guy who is supposed to be the "Czar" in charge of "Safe Schools" willingly and seemingly knowingly violated the law and seemingly encouraged the continuation of an illegal relationship revolving around statitory rape, which is seemingly being viewed as "okay" because its two males. I sincerely wonder what the outrage would be if it was a underaged girl sleeping with an over aged guys she met as a bus stop and the teacher didn't report it. I think the point isn't calling for him to be "punished", but more to the point that he shouldn' be in a position as the head person on "safe schools" in this country.

I don't have a HUGE issue with what he did, however I can kind of agree that someone with a history such as that being in charge of helping make schools "safe" worries me and is just yet another in a long line of examples that highlight one of my biggest issues with Obama prior to being elected...his horrendously poor judge of character.
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I don't see the "encouraging" part from what I have seen. What I saw is the guy put in an uncomfortable position, and acted in what he felt was the best manner for the child. He could not stop the child from what he was doing, so he counseled safe sex. Had he informed the parent, he would have lost the trust and respect of kids, had he just told the kid not to do it, he would have been ignored.

I do not think the sex or orientation of any of the participants is relevant. The guy in question did not have sex with underage kids, nor did he encourage kids to have sex. The villain in the piece is remote.

What I do object to is the absolute lying in the title. The guy is not a "czar", nor did he encourage child sex.
 
rathi said:
Using the source American provided, it would appear that Jennings did not in fact break the law, at least the one that American sourced.

Read page 1-17 on the PDF at the last link.

A case came up in which a teacher was charged for failing to properly report suspected sexual contact between a 12 and 13 year old. He was found non-guilty by the appeals court, because the court stated that the person engaged in acts of abuse needed to have some kind of authority over them for the teacher to be required to report the abuse. Given that it is unlikely the man Brewster met in the bathroom was someone who had authority over him, there is no evidence that Jennings violated that law.
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thank you. i read your earlier post. it would be interesting to hear what the "victim" has to say NOW.
 
Redress said:
I don't see the "encouraging" part from what I have seen. What I saw is the guy put in an uncomfortable position, and acted in what he felt was the best manner for the child. He could not stop the child from what he was doing, so he counseled safe sex. Had he informed the parent, he would have lost the trust and respect of kids, had he just told the kid not to do it, he would have been ignored.

I do not think the sex or orientation of any of the participants is relevant. The guy in question did not have sex with underage kids, nor did he encourage kids to have sex. The villain in the piece is remote.

What I do object to is the absolute lying in the title. The guy is not a "czar", nor did he encourage child sex.
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The kid is picking up guys in the bus stop bathroom and you feel that the responsable, adult, correct thing to do is to just tell him to use a condom?

As far as what he told the kid, I'd love to know. I'd like to know what the "Advise" was that sent the kid away smiling and happy. The OP describes it as "allaying" his doubts about the situation. Nothing from any of this seems to be insinuating that he suggested to him that picking up strangers a bus stop restroom is a dangerous thing (arguably more dangerous potentially than an STD), or that what he was doing was illegal, or that it qualified as rape/abuse, etc etc. It seems he sympathized, gave advise on how to conduct safe sex with the older man he met in the bus stop rest room, and gave other advise that had the kid "Smiling" for the next two years.

You know, I can understand a teacher not wanting to break a kids trust if the 14 year old comes and talks to him about having slept with a 15 year old class mate. However if its with a 25 year old that they met in the bathroom of a truck stop and went home to have sex with them, then I'd be exceedingly worried about trusting my children to that individual if the only seeming advise they gave the child was "wear a condom" and said nothing more of it to the parents or authorities. And this is the guy we're (seemingly from what the OP is saying) supposed to be trusting to help steer safe school policies for the nation?
 
liblady said:
thank you. i read your earlier post. it would be interesting to hear what the "victim" has to say NOW.
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I would love to hear someone like Right who has legal training to comment, but it could be argued that someone "of age" has "authority" over someone under age that they can unduely use to pressure them (even passively) into sex. I imagine the ruling was made for the notion that two under age individuals engaging in consensual sex is not one using undue influence and authority to essentially cause the sex to happen as they are peers, which is significantly different then an adult and a child.
 
Well, if we're discussing the ethical aspect of it, is there some magical resistance to that "influence and authority" that this younger partner would have gained in the next few months leading up to his sixteenth birthday, since the age of sexual consent is sixteen in Massachusetts? I've never been acceptant of the premise that increased age even if accompanied by increased experience and knowledge somehow grants an older person the ability to exert hierarchical influence on a younger person; though we'd regard a relationship between a 25 year old and a 65 year old as aberrant, there are few who'd regard it as unethical and fewer still who would call for its illegality. I instead accept the libertarian distinction between rational and irrational authority drawn by Mikhail Bakunin in his statement, "Does it follow that I reject all authority? Far from me such a thought. In the matter of boots, I refer to the authority of the bootmaker; concerning houses, canals, or railroads, I consult that of the architect or engineer. For such or such special knowledge I apply to such or such a savant. But I allow neither the bootmaker nor the architect nor the savant to impose his authority upon me."
 
sad how every issue that arises, the left is bending over backwards into a pretzel trying to find outs for Barry's failure's
 
sad how every issue that arises, the left is bending over backwards into a pretzel trying to find outs for Barry's failure's
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And the right turns to outright lies and distortion in order to attack him. I must say I was disgusted with the journalism a turned up digging for facts. I didn't find a single article from any side that wasn't blatantly partisan and deceptive.

The department that Jennings belongs to shouldn't even exist. The No Child Left Behind Act was a stupid bill, and trying to dictate such policy at a national level is a bad idea. The individual needs for each school cannot be determined with a one size fits all mentality. Handling the problems of a gay kid going to highschool in San Francisco is going a bit a bit different from Little Rock.
 
For one thing, "statutory rape" isn't even the relevant legal charge in most cases; it's simply a generic term used to cover all similar legal offenses and probably deliberately designed to draw associations with violent or coercive sexual assault where none exist. For another thing, the age of sexual consent varies from state to state, so while a sexual interaction between a 16 year old and a legal adult would be lawful in Massachusetts, it would be illegal in my home state of California, for example, since the age of consent here is 18.
 
Agnapostate said:
For one thing, "statutory rape" isn't even the relevant legal charge in most cases; it's simply a generic term used to cover all similar legal offenses and probably deliberately designed to draw associations with violent or coercive sexual assault where none exist. For another thing, the age of sexual consent varies from state to state, so while a sexual interaction between a 16 year old and a legal adult would be lawful in Massachusetts, it would be illegal in my home state of California, for example, since the age of consent here is 18.
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irrelevant. the enforcement of it, based on the states guidelines, is unaffected by a mandate to act. It does not standardize, it does not override. it just says, if by your states laws, it occurs, report it.
 
Agnapostate said:
The age of sexual consent is 16 in Massachusetts, with separate ages of consent for homosexual sex having been invalidated as unconstitutional by Lawrence v. Texas. I see little to regard as unethical in Brewster's encouragement of disease-prevention measures in a relationship that likely would have occurred anyway and would have been (or should have consistently been), legal if the younger participant had been a few months older. :shrug:
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Not only that, but there was no evidence, was there? Other than the minor's comments.
The whole story could've been BS to impress an admired older confidante.
There's hardly any point contacting the parents of a minor who allow said minor to travel freely to Boston and spend the night there unsupervised whenever the mood strikes him.

I was a mother at 15; I don't consider 15-year-olds children, and the guy in this article responded exactly as I would've to such a disclosure from a 15-year-old, whether gay or straight (although in addition to 'safe-sex" warnings, I might've added some warnings about the risks of picking up strangers at all, ie that they could commit violence against you).
I see nothing inappropriate about this guy's response.
I don't know if it's legal or not; it seems appropriate to me.
 
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