I find this article and then subsequent poll numbers very disturbing

[julialnyc]

Nebraska man charged for sex with wife, 13
Families support couple, but prosecutor calls union ‘repugnant’

Updated: 6:57 p.m. ET July 26, 2005
LINCOLN, Neb. - A 22-year-old man faces criminal charges in Nebraska for having sex with an underage 13-year-old girl, although he legally married her in Kansas after she became pregnant.

The man’s lawyer said the couple, with their families’ support, “made a responsible decision to try to cope with the problem.”

Matthew Koso, 22, was charged Monday with first-degree sexual assault, punishable by up to 50 years in prison. He was released on $7,500 bail pending an Aug. 17 preliminary hearing.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8716780/

Do you agree with Nebraska's decision to prosecute a man for having sex with his young but lawful wife? * 37639 responses


Yes. She was underage, so their marital status is irrelevant.
37%

No. They are legally married and the state has no business interfering.
57%

Not sure.
6%
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8717631/

[cssmall]

1. Marry'em off young so's they can have lotsa babies.

Fucking sorry ass creeps.

[julialnyc]

2. poor girl

not only embrace the creep who molested your daughter, but hand her over to go live with him and be his wife????

[mwb970]

4. Some people have no respect for their own property. (n/t)

[etherealtruth]

3. I can only agree with the prosecutor ...

... this entire situation is REPUGNANT.

Most (but not all) of our "fellow" dU'ers share our opinion http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1655690

[julialnyc]

6. that's why I find the msnbc

poll numbers very disturbing!

More think this guy is A-okay????

[etherealtruth]

7. I am "with you" ...

I can NOT fathom how anyone could find this situation OK. This is nothing more than parental and state sponsored pedophilia.

[MsTryska]

18. i don't think they think it's OK......

but as the law stands now - it's legal - and therefore the state has no business interfering.



jsut like with the Schiavo case - what goes on between a husband and wife is nobody's business but their own.


i find it repugnant as well - but i too have no choice but to side with the majority.

[julialnyc]

20. but he only married her

because he got her pregnant.

The pregnancy (sex) came previous to marriage.

It's like marrying someone so that they can't testify against you in a crime

[MsTryska]

25. well if they can try him for events that happened

prior to his marrying her, and it does not vioalte any of his constitutional rights (and consequently our consitutional rights) more power to them.


if they can, without getting into the territoy of statute limitations, double jeopardy and habeus corpus (?) then fine.

[etherealtruth]

21. The crime occurred prior to the marriage ...

...why would that absolve him of guilt or responsibility?

[MsTryska]

27. look at how the poll is worded:

"Do you agree with Nebraska's decision to prosecute a man for having sex with his young but lawful wife?"


the answer to that question should be NO from anyone who values their privacy rights.



if the poll question was worded some other way - such as:

"Do you agree that Nebraska should prosecute a man for having sex with a minor - despite the fact they consequently got married?"

then my answer would be different.



are they prosecuting him for having sex with her after marriage or before marriage?


after marriage - no dice, before marriage - sure go ahead.

[etherealtruth]

29. Actually I had not noticed the wording of the poll itself (thanks) ...

the prosecution seems to be for impregnating her prior to the marriage.

The only goo that could some from this would be for Kansas to change it's archaic law ...

[MsTryska]

32. yeah...and that's what we really should be spending our energy on.....

the Kansas law needs to change, most definitely.


might have worked when everyone lived on farms and women looked and felt 60 at 30, but not in this day and age.

[damntexdem]

10. That's right: not all.

That a prosecutor finds something 'repugnant' does not give him the right to overturn existing law.

[ProfessorGAC]

14. Didn't The Assault Happen BEFORE The Marriage?

The answer is yes. Getting married is NOT a way to avoid prosecution for a crime already extant.
The Professor

[julialnyc]

17. the sex came first

thus the marriage for the sheer fact that she became pregnant (they don't even try to hide that)

[Jacobin]

23. My, we are condemning premarital sex

:-)

[etherealtruth]

26. Between consenting adults NO

Between adults and children: EVERY TIME

[julialnyc]

28. with pre-teens and adults

definitely!

[etherealtruth]

19. My understanding was that the state did in fact have ...

...laws against "the sexual abuse of children." Why would a subsequent act (marrying the child)make the crime OK?

[bostonbabs]

5. let's see

a rapist/child molester wraps himself in the sacrament of holy matrimony to evade prosecution of his crime and the "parents" of the victim support the criminal not their CHILD.....I want to vomit.I want to ask the 57% would they allow a man who impregnated their 12 year old to do this?

[damntexdem]

11. OK, I agree this much: the mother was disgusting is allowing the marriage.

And I agree that the Kansas law should be changed.

But I don't agree with giving prosecutors the right to intrude on valid marriages out of personal views as to what is repugnant. Allow that, and the next prosecutor will find that "sodomy" practiced between you and your significant other, or perhaps just use of birth control, is "repugnant" -- and will want to prosecute YOU.

[ProfessorGAC]

15. How Are They Intruding On Marriage?

The crime has already occurred.
The Professor

[julialnyc]

8. from msnbc piece

snipped......The couple were married in May by a judge in Hiawatha, Kan., just across the state line from Falls City.

Nebraska allows people as young as 17 to marry if they have parental consent.

Kansas law, however, sets no minimum marriage age, although case law sets the minimum age at 14 for boys and 12 for girls. The marriage must be approved by both parents or guardian, or by a district court judge, said Whitney Watson, spokesman for Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline. A judge also must approve if only one parent approves.

Koso’s lawyer, Willis Yoesel, said the girl’s mother and Koso’s parents approved of the marriage. He said the girl’s father has not lived with the family for some time.

‘The families are all united’
“It seems to me like they, as much as they could, made a responsible decision to try to cope with the problem,” Yoesel said.

“The families are all united in this effort,” Yoesel said. “I don’t know who is complaining. ... What benefit is there to anybody in the prosecution of this young man?”

There was no comment from Koso, who does not have a listed telephone number.

[damntexdem]

9. Yeah, I'm disturbed that only 57% want to leave a married couple alone.

Nebraska could have prosecuted for the pedophilia before there was a marriage. But when the state can intervene with a married couple, we may head back to the days of prohibiting birth control even for married couples, ignoring domestic-partner rights, regulating sexual practices of married couples, and so on. I'm in favor, instead, of Nebraska's recognition of the validity of marriages contracted in other states, including gay marriages in Massachusetts.

If you don't like the law that allows those as young as 12-years-old to marry, then target the problem: the Kansas law that allows this.

[1monster]

22. Agreed. And since all states recognize legal marriage of the other states

these charges are bogus. They cannot prosecute him for being legally married to the girl.

I have a sister who got pregnant to a 21 year old when she was just turned fifteen (they had been "dating" for several months). They were married when she was about five or six months pregnant when she could no longer hide the pregnancy.

The person I blamed most for was my mother (and my father for not being the man he should have been and for creating a certain atmosphere). I told her when she told me (over the phone... I live over 1,000 miles away) that my fourteen year old sister was dating a 21 year old to put the breaks on it. I didn't know the 21 year old, but I knew his brother. My mother laughed at me. "Oh, she'll be fine."

GRRR.:grr:

That said, 28 years later, they are still married.

Offer marriage counseling and make sure the kid finishes her education. But let's not put the daddy in prison creating another fatherless child. Let him try to do the right thing.

Keep an eye on him, though, to make sure that he is not a pedophile... While a 22 year old should be far beyond a 13 year old, that is not always the case. Some 22 year olds are younger than they should be and some 13 year olds seem a lot older than they are.

[CoffeeCat]

12. How could anyone NOT find this repugnant?

Sex between a 22-year old man and a 13/14 year old girl is called child sexual abuse.

It's illegal.

It's illegal because of the disparity of power here. A 22-year old man has experience, maturity and knowledge about sex that a 13-year old girl does not have.

Consensual sex between a 13-year old girl and a 13-year old boy is not a crime--because the exploitation, manipulation and abuse is not present.

A 13-year old is easily manipulated by a 22-year old man. Child sexual abuse and incest happens to many 13-year olds who are incapable of defending themselves or understanding what is happening to them. They lack the cognitive and intellectual abilities to think and reason as an adult does.

The laws protect children from adult predators because children are vulnerable. A 13 year old is a child. A 13 year old isn't even mature enough to have a driver's license.

Most pedophiles use distorted rationalizations to make their abuse of children ok in their own minds: 1.) The child wanted to have sex with the adult, 2.) The child is mature and knows what he/she is doing, 3.) The molestation (which the pedophile views as consensual sex) is not harming the child.

Anyone erroneously believing that this 13 year old was "ok with this" or wasn't harmed, or wasn't exploited--is adopting the viewpoint of the pedophile.

Furthermore, there are pedophiles who are specifically attracted to young teenagers. The attraction is not benign--it causes trauma and psychological problems for the teenage victims.

This is not just "bad" behavior. Or a mistake. Or an error in judgment. This behavior is a crime stemming from an unnatural attraction to children/young teens.

It's also no big surprise that this girl's family allowed this pedophile who impregnated her--to marry her. The family is horrendously dysfunctional. This 13-year old girl is probably a victim of incest--which is probably what made her more defenseless to this predator. Incest victims are often raped and molested by a long string of people because they've learned that they have no boundaries and that their bodies are not their own. The mother who allowed her daughter to be victimized--is probably an incest victim too. She was incapable of protecting herself as a child--and has grown accustomed to exploitation--so she repeats the cycle and allows her daughter to be sexually abused. This family probably has a generations of incest within it.

This is a very sad story, and one that should outrage and sicken anyone.

Anyone defending sex between this 13/14-year old and this adult man--is defending pedophilia and the perpetrator/pedophile mindset.

[Jacobin]

16. Only in VERY recent times is your condemnation widely held

Men in their twenties and thirties very commonly married young teenage girls as late as the early 1900's in this country. Check out some old gravestones showing the birth and death of couples buried side by side.

This was due to any number of factors including a dearth of eligible mates in rural areas where traveling 20 miles took a day or more.

The idea that a man and a woman to be married must be nearly of equal age, both in their twenties or older, etc is quite provencial and frankly Puritanical, imho and is an attitude of extremely recent vintage

[ProfessorGAC]

24. Maybe The Recent Vintage Is An Epiphany Of Common Sense

You really think that just because some people used to do it, that it's ok for a 22 year old to be sexually attracted to, and take action upon that attraction toward, a 13 year old girl.

You really think that the aversion to adults having sex with children is puritanical?

Give me a break. Maybe we've just gotten advanced enough to see the intrinsic dichotomy and inequity of such relationships.
The Professor

[MsTryska]

33. on the bright side.....

when she's 22 and he's 31 they'll be at around the same maturity level.....


just trying to lighten things up....

[julialnyc]

34. yeah, but look at the role women played back then

thank God my parents didn't hand me over as a child to some man just because my ancestors in 1900 might have.

[CoffeeCat]

35. Flawed thinking...very disturbing

Seriously, your words sounds like something right out of the Nambla Handbook. I can imagine that Nambla rationalizes pedophilia, using the same kind of logic, by saying something like, 'Only recently has society placed such condemnation on adult/child relationships that were once common.'

That kind of thinking is disturbing and suggests a grown man sexually abusing a child or a teenager--should be allowed.

You can't rationalize a 22 year old man sexually abusing a 13-year old child. I don't care what you think happened back in the day.

It is true that today, society takes more seriously the crimes of child rape, incest and molestation--that is due to solid evidence of how damaging and traumatic these crimes are for the victim. We're more enlightened now. Research in child development and trauma have come a long way to demonstrate that children and preteens who are sexually exploited by adults--suffer serious and lifelong consequences.

There are support groups for incest victims in nearly every city. Therapists specialize in treating children and teenagers who have been sexually abused. There are more resources because we've evolved and we've become more enlightened.

You're probably right that this kind of perverse, abusive relationship happened more in the 1900's than it does today. That doesn't mean it was right. Segregation was the norm. So was denying rights to women and discriminating against them. It was also legal for factories to operate in unsafe conditions. According to your logic--the shedding of aberrant, unjust behavior--and replacing it with enlightened, decent behavior--is old fashioned.

I tell you what--most adults who were traumatized as children and teens because they were sexually abused--all hope that society continues to abolish and condem sex crimes against children. It's the predators and the pedophiles who want to bring back the good old days, when sexual abuse and incest remained a sick secret--or when people looked the other way.

A grown man traumatizing a child or a teenage girl--because he wants to get his needs met by sexually abusing her--is not a good thing--no matter what time in history it happened.

[1monster]

30. I don't like the idea of 13 year olds having sexual relationships with any

one, period.

However, I am aware (being in the eduacation business) that quite a few kids as young as thirteen are ARE having sex, and ususally with those who are four and more years older than they are.

I personally believe that one should wait until age twenty-five and have been financially independent for at least a year before having sex... but what I believe isn't what happens.

The girl is pregnant. How is it going to help her to have the child's father in prison? Especially since they are legally married?

When a girl that young is having sex, I blame the parents. If a thirteen year old is left to be alone with a twenty-two year old man, then the parents have seriously failed in their duties. (My son is thirteen, and believe me, there is no way, no way, I don't know where he is and who he is with every hour of the day.)

Teenagers are not generally well-equipped to withstand the temptation of a seduction.

It is not easy to keep tabs on children all of the time, however, good parents will set perimeters for their children that the children will find easier to keep than to defy.

Good parents will also armtheir children with as much knowledge as possible to resist seduction.

[rman]

13. so uhm, they may get married but they may not have sex?

that makes sense.

[Robbins]

31. Problem

I believe strongly that is two people consent to having sex the government needs to stay out of It. some 13,14 year olds of today
are not Innocent victim,and want sex. And If they get married then
prosecuting them further shows how Marriage is a joke. I am one Liberal who wants the Government out of our bedrooms.