So you're a parent that recently learned that your 14-year-old daughter is pregnant, and the father of your unborn grandchild is a 22-year-old man. What are you going to do? Call the police and have him arrested and charged with statutory rape? It might seem like a good idea at the time, because you likely wouldn't have that same option if your daughter's baby daddy was the same age as her and, in this event, you have a quick, easy way of getting rid of that boyfriend for a while.
It's a short-term solution for a long-term problem. However, when your daughter turns 18, do you honestly believe that she's going to continue to allow you to stay in her life?
We now live in an era that many adult children are going no-contact with their parents here in the United States; and even though the American statutory-rape laws' role in this so-called trend never gets talked about, you at least have to question whether it has any kind of impact on it.
I mean, you need to take everything into consideration. If your 14-year-old daughter's 22-year-old boyfriend is violent, abusive, and controlling with your daughter, then she'll probably be more than happy for you to get him permanently out of her life. However, if she is really, really in love with this man and he wants to care and provide for both her and their baby, turning him into the police is going to make you out to be the enemy. Do you really want to go down that road?
Throwing your daughter's 22-year-old boyfriend in jail is also going to create financial complications for your daughter and the grandchild of yours that she is carrying further down the line. If she marries this man once she comes of age and he gets out of prison, she, this man, and your grandchild will likely be struggling on a household income of $11,000 a year.
An income that low might get your daughter, the father of her child, and your grandchild a trailer in Allenville, Missouri or in some other isolated town that nobody has ever heard of. Let's remember that your future son-in-law is now going to be on the sex-offender registry because of you, and that predicament for him is going to limit his job opportunities and living options. Your daughter and your grandchild will have to suffer these hardships alongside him.
All right. So you've heard all of this pedophile-panic propaganda on television and on the Internet about adult men who have relationships with teenage girls that are still in school. Well, that's all it is. PROPAGANDA! Your daughter's boyfriend may be a number of things, but he is not a pedophile. A pedophile would be hanging around your 7-year-old kid instead. Your daughter is a teenager, not a little kid.
I'm sure that there have been many parents that have walked in your shoes. The problem is that they may not have made the wisest decisions in dealing with their underage daughter's pregnancy by an older boyfriend.
Say what?! You want to get your rifle and waste your daughter's 22-year-old boyfriend? I understand that you are furious at him. However, keep in mind that the police and the courts will not likely be understanding with you about your motives for killing the young man. Your daughter will probably never speak to you again, and you won't be getting any visits from her in prison. Therefore, you can scratch that idea.
It turns out that there is no easy solution to a situation like this, but I will say this one thing about it. The police don't care about you or your daughter. The District Attorney and his or her assistant attorneys don't care about you or your daughter. Also, probably the judge won't care about either one of you either.
If you report your daughter's 22-year-old boyfriend to the authorities for getting her pregnant, sure, the police that investigate the matter will pretend that they are on your side. They will give you a song and dance about how they're parents too and understand your frustrations. The prosecuting attorney will even warm up to you and mislead you to believe that he or she is concerned about your daughter's well-being and safety.
However, after the trial is over and your daughter's boyfriend goes to prison, none of them will even remember your face or your daughter's face. The judge will be happy to move on to his or her next case on the court docket. It sounds so cold and callous on their part, because it is cold and callous on their part.
Your daughter will likely decide to keep the baby so that she'll continue to have some kind of connection with the father of it. Arguments and shouting matches between you and her will ensue. Life will not go back to the way it was before your daughter ever met the father of her baby. You and your daughter will become more distant from each other than you could ever imagine was possible.
Occasionally, you will see public service announcements on television and elsewhere trying to put the blame on adult men for all of teenage girls' problems, including underage pregnancies. The people who pay to broadcast those advertisements will try to brainwash you into believing that these men purposely get these young girls pregnant, when reality has it that most of these pregnancies are unplanned.
Below is a news clip about a public service announcement attempting to demonize any adult man who has ever fallen in love with a teenage girl by screaming, "It's statutory rape!" This advertisement is sensationalistic at best.
An Anti-Statutory-Rape Campaign Took Place In Wisconsin Back In 2009
What these same advertisements will not tell you is that sending the adult father of a pregnant teenager to prison is only going to create needless problems for the young girl and her baby. She won't be getting child support money from the baby's father, because he will be locked away in a correctional facility. After he gets out and if he marries the girl, the baby is going to grow up with the stigma of having a father convicted of a sexual offense.
Now, I understand that some of you parents may live in a state jurisdiction that has mandatory reporting laws for you regarding any type of sexual offense involving a minor no matter how old that minor is. I never said that you were not going to be confronted with difficult decisions once you find out that your 14-year-old daughter is pregnant with a 22-year-old man's baby. Florida is the worst state jurisdiction there is in the Union in view of these issues.
You might have to take your daughter and move to another state. There's no quick solution. However, don't let any knee-jerk reaction take over your decision-making process either. Everyone loses in the end in that event. You don't want to drive your daughter into hating you forever. If she's 14 years old and pregnant, she's likely to get emotional over every little thing you say and do.
At the end of the day, American statutory-rape laws are way too harsh insofar as they are breaking families apart. Such laws definitely need to be changed and seriously reformed. If your teenager is in high school or even middle school and you discover that she is pregnant with an older boyfriend's baby, look before you leap.
You don't want to be that elderly parent on your deathbed someday that has not seen their daughter in decades. Sending your daughter's boyfriend to prison could place you in that tragic position someday.
Many of you are probably wanting to ask me the million-dollar question. "Do you have kids?" I don't believe that I need to dignify that question with an answer. What I have stated herein is a product of critical thinking. Regardless of whether someone is a parent or childless, they either have that attribute or they don't.
Conventional wisdom holds that doing the reasonable thing is better than basing your decisions purely on your emotions and anger. You should do what's right rather than what's selfish.
Join me in my mission. I'm your Spaceship Captain reporting to you.馃槂
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