Suchergebnisse

Since the mid 1990s, the sexual abuse of children has become a high-profile topic and concern in UK society. For the media the enemy is obvious: outrage focuses on the paedophile, an evil, cunning and highly dangerous stranger who attacks, sexually abuses and even kills children. In this scenario children are innocent and vulnerable victims in need of protection. The UK government has responded to these concerns through legislation, most notably the Sex Offenders Act 1997, the Sexual Offences Act 2003 and the Criminal Justice Act 2003. These legal measures have shaped the entire field of children and sex in complex ways. On the one hand, legislation has increasingly brought young people into the reach of the law by criminalising and punishing much consensual underage sex. On the other hand, special premises are applied to young perpetrators of coercive sex, effectively treating them more leniently than adult offenders. This paper traces the dynamics shaping this complex and often contradictory legal approach to young people and sex. One important factor concerns the law dealing with a reality of child sexual abuse which is much more complex than the media image of evil adults forcing innocent children into sex. A quarter of all child sex offences are committed by minors (Cawson et al. 2000), but they do not conform to the stereotype of the paedophile. A second influence concerns media opposition to all underage sex, including consensual sex, grounded in moral concerns about teenage pregnancy or childhood innocence. In conjunction these factors create twin pressures for the government to legislate against all underage sex yet exempt young people from being treated as 'proper' child sex offenders by the law.

This article discusses how the development of efforts to marriage age maturity in Indonesia. This effort is not only as a manifestation of the government in responding to marital problems such as the prevalence of underage marriages, also as another means to curb the behavior of some people who still often deviate marital age regulations through requests for marriage dispensation in court. The research findings conclude that there are important arguments that need to be considered for the government's efforts to reduce the rate of underage marriage in Indonesia, such as through the marriage age maturity program. This can be started by building integration or cooperation between institutions in order to maximize the function of the rule of law and their respective social roles, so that underage marriage can be minimized as well as possible.

AbstractChild marriage, specifically the marriage of underage girls, is a crucial social problem that cuts across religions and cultures and can be considered as violence against children and women. Currently, the media is one of the strongest public spheres to combat this problem apart from national and international laws and agreements. This study aims to analyse how the child marriage problem is represented in the Turkish print media within the framework of feminist theory. The analysis is based on 246 news reports related to child marriages. The study found that even though the issue has been identified as a problem in the Turkish print media, it has not come to the forefront. Rather, the newspapers have normalized the issue of underage marriage, especially through the use of language.

Introduction The underage drinking problem is becoming a cause for concern in Hong Kong as young people are exposed to an environment with easy access to alcohol. In particular, the off-premise sales of alcohol to underage youth are entirely subject to the industry voluntary code of conduct. Without appropriate legislative changes and enforcement measures, underage youth in Hong Kong could find it relatively easy to obtain the alcoholic beverage in off-premise outlets. Different studies were published to evaluate the effectiveness of interventions for reducing the sale of alcohol to underage youth in off-premise outlets. Aim and Objectives 1. To identify the effectiveness of interventions on restricting off-premise alcohol sales to underage youth 2. To suggest policy and intervention measures to regulate the off-premise alcohol sales to adolescents in Hong Kong based on the findings presented in this review. Methods Literature in this review included articles published in the last 10 years (2003-2013). The literature search was undertaken in the following two pronged method. 1. To identify relevant articles, the following databases were used: PubMed and MEDLINE. The search term: "Alcohol Drinking/legislation and jurisprudence"[MeSH Terms] AND ("2003/01/01"[PDAT]: "2013/12/31"[PDAT]) AND ("adolescent"[MeSH Terms]) were applied. 2. Manual search was conducted according to the bibliographies and reference lists of the articles that were being reviewed. Inclusion and exclusion criteria were applied. Results Numerous articles have been identified regarding interventions to reduce underage access to alcohol in off-premises and shift retailers' behavior in the sale. Such interventions included, but were not limited to responsible beverage sales and service training, intensified compliance check, enhancement of non-compliance penalties, reward and reminder visit and media advocacy. Community based interventions targeting off-premises sale were found to be successful in affecting the behaviour of the retail staff. There was a variation in the magnitude of effects among the studies and this was associated with the intensity of the interventions and the publicity. A decaying effect of interventions was also observed. Conclusion This review identified that implementing a legal purchasing age combined with intensification of compliance check and enhancement of penalties were effective in reducing sales of alcohol to underage youth in off-premise venues. On the basis of the findings, policy suggestions for Hong Kong were presented. ; published_or_final_version ; Public Health ; Master ; Master of Public Health

The goal of this article is to illustrate how a person-centered analytic approach can inform our understanding of alcohol use motivations in underage college students and to build off of a related analysis with legal-aged students. Data come from 2,346 students who were under 21 years old and reported using alcohol in the past year in the 2013 Indiana College Substance Use Survey. Latent class analysis identified four underage drinking motivation subgroups and examined associations between subgroup membership and alcohol-related behavior and consequences. The groups varied in their combination of alcohol motivations and their alcohol-related behaviors and consequences. Results for the present study confirm the variability in motivations for alcohol use and provide valuable information about the characteristics of those groups at highest risk, which can inform content and intensity of prevention efforts targeted at underage college students.

Abstract.  Currently, Michigan residents can avoid the national drinking age of 21 by crossing into Ontario, where the drinking age is 19. This paper explores the impact that border crossings, connecting areas with different minimum legal drinking ages (MLDA), have on motor‐vehicle fatalities. We analyse border crossings connecting Michigan to Ontario as well as to its surrounding states in the period in which Michigan's MLDA was raised to 21. Using a 'differences‐in‐differences‐in‐differences' approach, we find that the MLDA change did not contribute to increased underage fatalities in border‐crossing counties.

Most countries have a legal age of consent, setting the minimum age for the involvement of a young person in sexual relationships. Engaging in a sexual relationship with a person below this age is defined as abuse, even if the minor has consented. At the same time, underage young people often see themselves as knowledgeable agents across a range of situations, including having sexual relations with older persons. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, this article examines the role of the construction of agency in young people's understanding of different types of sexual situations — from consented sex to situations of physical coercion — involving a minor girl and an adult man. How do constructions of agency affect the labelling of different situations and the attribution of responsibility to the persons involved? The article further discusses how the concept of agency interlinks with gendered sexual scripts in the process of interpretation, thereby reproducing gendered vulnerabilities. The concluding section considers how a contextual approach to youth agency may inform preventive efforts.

In the aftermath of the Civil War, state judges lost their long-held right to inquire into the legality of federal detentions. Habeas corpus—once almost solely the business of state courts—was largely transformed into a federal remedy. We argue that the wartime furor surrounding underage enlistees was a key factor in driving this legal change. Whereas scholarship on the use of habeas corpus at this time generally concentrates on cases involving freedom of speech or political association, thousands of parents and guardians also petitioned Union authorities and state courts to retrieve children who had enlisted without their consent. Parents, who understood their control over the personhood and labor of minors as one of the bedrocks of American liberty, angrily protested the state's abrogation of their rights, while state court judges fought to retain their jurisdiction over such cases. We illuminate these conflicts by drawing on a rich array of sources that capture the perspectives of federal and state court judges, Lincoln Administration officials, elected representatives, military officers and parents, and minors themselves. In the process, we show the halting, contested nature of debates over habeas corpus, the outcome of which ultimately redefined the relationship between American citizens and their government, preventing aggrieved parents from using state courts to safeguard their rights against federal and military authorities, and blocking state courts from querying the legality of federal detentions of any kind.