Recent Local Happenings

Readers of this blog will remember me writing about my county rescinding its Sunday Blue Laws, only to reinstate them less than two months later, at the behest of fundamentalist county council members.

Well, they've done it again. The blue laws have been voted out yet again. I hope that this is the end of it and that this issue isn't brought up again.
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My local newspaper also reports that several cheerleaders from a local high school were dismissed from the cheerleading squad for having consensual sex with several members of the high school's basketball team in a hotel room. The only punishment meted out to the basketball players was a suspension from playing in a single game, but otherwise remain full fledged members of the team.

I thought this was 2007, not 1957. It floors me that the school administrators still can get away with such a flagrant example of the double standard. For breaking curfew -- NOT for engaging in consensual sex, as all were above the age of consent -- the one game suspension should have been applied to cheerleaders and basketball players alike. If I were the parents of these cheerleaders, I'd be raising hell about these unevenhanded punishments.
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I know I'm going to get hammered for my opinion on this next incident, but here goes. A local middle school teacher was fired from her job and now faces criminal charges for multiple instances of having sex with several 14 and 15 year old male students. She has been charged with five counts of second degree criminal sexual conduct.

While I agree that her conduct was unprofessional and that this alone is reason enough to fire her, I'm definitely of mixed feelings about her being subject to criminal charges.

For one thing, it's hard for me to see these boys as being "victims" or being coerced in any way to engage in this behavior. I'm quite certain these boys participated of their own free well, and I doubt very seriously whether any of them will suffer any psychological harm for having done so.

How can I state this with such confidence, you might ask. Well, I'll tell you. When I was fifteen, I lost my virginity to a woman twenty years my senior, and over the course of a summer, I had sex with her on many different occasions. It didn't hurt me any; indeed, she trained me well for my subsequent lovers to come. I look back upon this experience with many fond memories.

I almost feel sorry for the woman. While she should have known better to have engaged in this behavior with students, I still think that dismissal from her job and being barred from teaching underage students is a sufficient enough punishment. I don't think putting her in jail will serve any useful purpose.