# Girls that lie about their age to get sex **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 6, 2014, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918 "2014-11-06T19:41:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/41 "2014-11-07T19:33:27Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > I have a very hard time believeing that a 12-year old could pass for 18. Maybe most can’t, but I don’t find it that hard to believe that twelve-year-olds who could pass for 18 (at least if they’re trying to) do exist. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/42 "2014-11-07T20:00:05Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > I have a very hard time believeing that a 12-year old could pass for 18. Sure, some could. Similarly, some adult women look incredibly young; Ellen Page or Kate Mara could pass for 15. Combine (1) being tall, with (2) early puberty and (3) makeup, and you can make teens look like grownups. Wouldn’t work for MOST kids, but it does for some. Modelling turns young girls into women on camera all the time. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/43 "2014-11-07T20:05:51Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > I have a very hard time believeing that a 12-year old could pass for 18. Have a gander at [this](http://www.marieclaire.co.uk/news/fashion/160488/fury-as-12-year-old-model-fronts-australian-fashion-week.html). ---
**Author:** ![Fuzzy\_Dunlop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/848f3c/32.png) [@Fuzzy\_Dunlop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuzzy_Dunlop)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/44 "2014-11-07T20:23:09Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > What she was doing drinking at a fraternity party, with a bouncer and bartender who **were at least nominally checking IDs** , was never satisfactorily explained. What kind of lame fraternity party checks IDs? This practice seems far more pernicious and like a bigger societal problem than how hard it is to fuck a 12 year old. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/45 "2014-11-07T20:45:28Z")
> [@GrumpyBunny](#): > > Is this an actual case, or just a supposition? > > As a girl who passed herself off as a college student at age 15 (though I didn’t go around having sex with anyone), I don’t know why on earth you’d go around turning in guys you had sex with. > > Even if I were loony enough to not realize that’s just wrong, the backlash from my parents when they found out I’d been sneaking into clubs/frat parties would be more than enough to keep me from blowing anyone’s cover. > > I wonder how many of these sob stories are from cases where there is actual evidence, or if they are he said/she said cases? The case I brought up is an actual case. The young lady’s parent(s) did find out what happened, and they called the cops, who hauled her in for a rape kit. (I don’t know as I ever knew how they found out.) As far as evidence, the fact that she was boozing at a frat party at 15 was unambiguous. He did not deny consensual intercourse, and she didn’t accuse him of use of force. Beyond that, I don’t know that there was anything to say. ---
**Author:** ![epbrown01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ba0ec/32.png) [@epbrown01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/epbrown01)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/46 "2014-11-07T21:14:27Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > I have a very hard time believeing that a 12-year old could pass for 18. It depends on what they’re interested in. I’m 7 years older than my kid sister and she was quite developed at age 12. Frequently guys asked if she was my girlfriend or if she was dating someone. That was based on her looks alone. No one trying to hold a real conversation with her would have thought she was 18. I don’t have a lot of sympathy for guys so focused on getting laid they can’t be bothered to get to know the person they’re bedding, or make sensible observations. Unwanted pregnancy, STDs, possible criminal prosecution, and similar consequences are part and parcel with living with suvh a mindset. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/47 "2014-11-07T21:38:09Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Maybe most can’t, but I don’t find it that hard to believe that twelve-year-olds who could pass for 18 (at least if they’re trying to) do exist. Yes. It’s not very common, but humans are diverse enough that there are a fair number of people who look especially young for their age or especially old for their age. This is occasionally used as a plot in fiction - that the missing 14 year boy-king is actually hiding out as a 20-something file clerk in his own army as protection from assassins, or that a 22 year old secret agent is able to gain access to the target’s home by pretending to be a 15 year old child being placed out into foster care. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/48 "2014-11-07T21:45:06Z")
> [@epbrown01](#): > > I don’t have a lot of sympathy for guys so focused on getting laid they can’t be bothered to get to know the person they’re bedding, There’s nothing wrong about being focused on having sex, even entirely focused on it. Not everybody is out to find a significant other, and it’s perfectly fine this way. > [@](#): > > Unwanted pregnancy, STDs, possible criminal prosecution, and similar consequences are part and parcel with living with suvh a mindset. Knowing your partner doesn’t protect against unwanted pregnancy, and condoms are equally efficient whether you know the person or not. So, we’re left with criminal prosecution. ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/49 "2014-11-07T21:54:16Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > The problem here is with the concept of strict liability, not with the age of consent. (I can see a case for lowering the AOC to 16, but the bigger problem here is that strict liability, for _any_ crime, seems to be unfair). > > I have nothing really to suggest (other than moving to a different country) beyond, “get to know someone a bit before you sleep with them, ask how old they are, and then make sure you know them well enough to be confident they’re not lying.” Fortunately, I don’t think _most_ people are the type to lie to potential sexual partners about something as serious as this. The point of strict liability here is to strongly encourage people to do exactly what you say they should do: not have casual sex with people they don’t really know, who _could possibly_ be children. ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/50 "2014-11-07T22:24:12Z")
A couple of years ago I got called for jury duty, and they had a large pool of potential jurors to try to find 12. During the voir dire process, we got to find out that it was someone being charged for sex with an underage girl, and the questions they were asking made it clear that the guy was himself pretty young, and that a defense tactic would be that he didn’t realize she was young. The attorneys were asking if we could apply the law and, if the facts proved he was guilty of breaking the law, would be willing to find him guilty and sentence him. They couldn’t give us the details of the case yet, just examples that demonstrated what the law was. I told them that there could possibly be some situations where I couldn’t, such as a 17 year old boy having sex with a 14 year old girl that he thought was older. I’m certainly willing to say that he should be more careful, but wouldn’t be willing to completely fuck up his life by sending him to federal prison for that. Needless to say, I didn’t get picked, and I found out later that this was a case where a strip club in south Dallas had hired a 12-year-old girl as a stripper, and one of the young guys working there had sex with her. ---
**Author:** ![Namkcalb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c89c15/32.png) [@Namkcalb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Namkcalb)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/51 "2014-11-07T22:25:41Z")
“Children” and “People” are a broad term. Do you consider the two scenarios the same? “A sixteen year old boy sleeping with his fifteen year old classmate (who was put forward a year and didn’t tell anyone)” And “A fifty year old divorced man, who likes to ambush and violently rape rape primary school students” ---
**Author:** ![DingoelGringo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9d8465/32.png) [@DingoelGringo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DingoelGringo)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/52 "2014-11-07T22:30:57Z")
Sounds phony to me. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/53 "2014-11-07T23:37:59Z")
> [@Peremensoe](#): > > The point of strict liability here is to strongly encourage people to do exactly what you say they should do: not have casual sex with people they don’t really know, who _could possibly_ be children. Also, many of the statutory rape laws provide an exception if the defendant is married to the alleged victim. So there’s also some pressure against extramarital sex by making it less safe to engage in from a legal perspective. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/54 "2014-11-07T23:41:59Z")
> [@CurtC](#): > > a strip club in south Dallas had hired a 12-year-old girl as a stripper, and one of the young guys working there had sex with her. Gross. ---
**Author:** ![ZPG\_Zealot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e47c2d/32.png) [@ZPG\_Zealot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZPG_Zealot)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/55 "2014-11-07T23:50:53Z")
> [@Fuzzy\_Dunlop](#): > > What kind of lame fraternity party checks IDs? This practice seems far more pernicious and like a bigger societal problem than how hard it is to fuck a 12 year old. The kind of fraternity that doesn’t want to get kicked off campus. Under-aged drinking is treated quite seriously at many universities. ---
**Author:** ![epbrown01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ba0ec/32.png) [@epbrown01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/epbrown01)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/56 "2014-11-07T23:58:40Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > There’s nothing wrong about being focused on having sex, even entirely focused on it. Not everybody is out to find a significant other, and it’s perfectly fine this way. There’s something wrong when that focus has you bypass the common sense that prevents you going to jail for sleeping with someone underage, or handwaving using protection and such nonsense. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/57 "2014-11-08T00:42:10Z")
> [@GrumpyBunny](#): > > Is this an actual case, or just a supposition? > > As a girl who passed herself off as a college student at age 15 (though I didn’t go around having sex with anyone), I don’t know why on earth you’d go around turning in guys you had sex with. We are apparently meant to believe that this 12 year old is some sort of scheming sociopath who enjoys seeing young men sent off to prison for statutory rape. This does raise the question of why the evil pre-teen would go out of her way to provide her targets with evidence that she repeatedly and deliberately lied about her age as part of her plot to convince teenagers to have sex with her. We’re asked to believe that she sits down and writes each of them a letter (not even a text or an email, but a _letter_!) revealing her deception: > [@blueskies](#): > > Lets say that you have a 12 year old girl who lies and lies and lies to numerous boys and teens about her age. **She ends up having sex with 4+ different boys in one week then once she gets sex will send a letter to the boy saying haha i am only 12.** Lets say that young girl has gotten a std now, has had many boys and teen arrested, but continues to do the cycle of lying about her age. (Emphasis added.) If she _wants_ them to go to prison, it’s oddly sporting of her to hand them material that they can use in their defense. Going from [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_North_America#Virginia) it sounds like sex with a child under 13 is definitely illegal in Virginia regardless of the circumstances, but I imagine the judge and jury would be a lot more sympathetic towards a defendant who was himself a minor and had proof in the girl’s own handwriting that she was not only willing, but had lied about her age because she was deliberately setting the teen up to get arrested. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/58 "2014-11-08T01:50:13Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > I imagine the judge and jury would be a lot more sympathetic towards a defendant who was himself a minor and had proof in the girl’s own handwriting that she was not only willing, but had lied about her age because she was deliberately setting the teen up to get arrested. But would it change a thing? As mentioned previously, the jury being sympathetic would be irrelevant, and the jurors wouldn’t even be informed of these details. And the judge could be held too by mandatory mnimum sentences. I do think that strict liability is an issue (and minimum sentencing too, by the way). I understand that it’s intended to avoid the culprit to get away with it by pretending to not knowing her age (and avoiding knowing it), but active deception coupled with credible reasons to fall for it should matter. Who would expect a stripper to be 12 yo, like in the previous example? Not only to look 18, but to have managed to be hired in a strip joint? ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/59 "2014-11-08T02:18:38Z")
> [@CurtC](#): > > A couple of years ago I got called for jury duty, and they had a large pool of potential jurors to try to find 12. During the voir dire process, we got to find out that it was someone being charged for sex with an underage girl, and the questions they were asking made it clear that the guy was himself pretty young, and that a defense tactic would be that he didn’t realize she was young. > > The attorneys were asking if we could apply the law and, if the facts proved he was guilty of breaking the law, would be willing to find him guilty and sentence him. They couldn’t give us the details of the case yet, just examples that demonstrated what the law was. I told them that there could possibly be some situations where I couldn’t, such as a 17 year old boy having sex with a 14 year old girl that he thought was older. I’m certainly willing to say that he should be more careful, but wouldn’t be willing to completely fuck up his life by sending him to federal prison for that. > > Needless to say, I didn’t get picked, and I found out later that this was a case where a strip club in south Dallas had hired a 12-year-old girl as a stripper, and one of the young guys working there had sex with her. [Here is the case. Conviction and sentence affirmed on appeal.](http://law.justia.com/cases/texas/fifth-court-of-appeals/2010/05-08-01472-cr-6.html) The rapist, David Bell, was 22 years old and did not work at the club. He was the “boyfriend” pimp of another (older) dancer-prostitute, and “encouraged” the 12y.o. to strip there, and he attempted to prostitute her as well. Every day, Bell took the money she made dancing, and sexually abused her. Bell claimed she told him she was 19 and he believed it, but there is no mention of anyone ever trying to document her age. ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918/60 "2014-11-08T02:48:19Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > I do think that strict liability is an issue (and minimum sentencing too, by the way). I understand that it’s intended to avoid the culprit to get away with it by pretending to not knowing her age (and avoiding knowing it), but active deception coupled with credible reasons to fall for it should matter. Who would expect a stripper to be 12 yo, like in the previous example? Not only to look 18, but to have managed to be hired in a strip joint? It was not credible. > [@Dallas Morning News](#): > > According to court documents, the 12-year-old told club employees that she was 19, but couldn’t give them identification and didn’t know what year she was born if she were that age. Still, she was allowed to dance in the club, records show. Point is, relative to this thread: if you are an adult, it is incumbent upon _you_ to assure yourself that your sex partners are adults. To want to know the actual truth. If there is any goddamned reason for doubt, _do not have sex with them_. It will be your ass that gets locked the fuck up for hard time. And that is as it should be. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/girls-that-lie-about-their-age-to-get-sex/703918.md?page=4)