10-year-old boys have been charged with raping an 8 years old girl

[rootX]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/8417317.stm

They were arrested after an eight-year-old alleged she had been assaulted while playing in a park off College Way, Hayes, on 27 October.

I found it bit surprising but not much when I read about the similar incidents in the past:

http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/valleyfever/2009/07/kids_accused_of_sexually_assau.php

There was also another story from Britain where young kids assaulted a young girl because she had some issues with one of boy's girlfriend. But aren't 10 years old bit too young even to think of these things? I believe their motives for carrying out these crimes are not similar to those of adults.

 

[Sorry!]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/8417317.stm
I found it bit surprising but not much when I read about the similar incidents in the past:

http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/valleyfever/2009/07/kids_accused_of_sexually_assau.php

There was also another story from Britain where young kids assaulted a young girl because she had some issues with one of boy's girlfriend. But aren't 10 years old bit too young even to think of these things? I believe their motives for carrying out these crimes are not similar to those of adults.

Wow. This is quite astonishing. I remember in elementary school (beginning in kindergarden) kissing girls and such, sometimes against their will (ahhhh weird games you play when you're young.) but it never escalated to something I would consider 'rape'. I wonder what exactly had occured... that seems slightly weird for me to say but it's merely for me to understand why exactly 10 year olds are being charged with rape. The second article you posted clearly indicates that a form of sexual assault had taken place since they allude to medical and physical evidence.

One thing that I find weird is that yes, the girl was a child, but so are the suspects. I do not think that it should be forgotten when these boys are put on trial.

Something I find more bizarre about children breaking the law are those 'serial-killer' children. They just creep me right out.

 

[rootX]

The information provided is not enough to conclude that it was a rape so I am also having hard time believing that they actually committed rape.

I wonder if the victim was a male, it would also be classified as a rape.

 

[Sorry!]

I wonder if the victim was a male, it would also be classified as a rape.

Ah this is true, I never thought about that at first but the article does say '8 year old girl' so.

EDIT: I noticed in the article it says they are charged with counts of 'attacking a female under the age of 13'; is this what they just call 'statutory rape' in Britain, I don't know..

 

[ideasrule]

But aren't 10 years old bit too young even to think of these things? I believe their motives for carrying out these crimes are not similar to those of adults.

My friend liked a girl and tried to take her clothes off (not by force) in kindergarten, and he's a pretty typical guy. These boys are not typical.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

The information provided is not enough to conclude that it was a rape so I am also having hard time believing that they actually committed rape.

Many children who are sexually abused will preform the same sorts of abuse on other children.

 

[hamster143]

I wonder if the victim was a male, it would also be classified as a rape.

Given the age difference, probably yes. (Notwithstanding the fact that it's technically more difficult for a female to rape a male than vice versa.) In the United States, some states have laws that restrict statutory rape to occurrences where the attacker is at least 3 years older than the victim. But with children as young as that, 2 years should provide enough difference in size & physical strength for the victim to be unable to resist the assault.

 

[leroyjenkens]

On the second link:

The victim had to be removed from her home by Child Protective Services because her culturally backward parents blame her and feel like she's brought shame on the family.

I usually respect cultures, no matter how weird they are, but this is just the opposite of logical behavior.

 

[DaveC426913]

On the second link:

I usually respect cultures, no matter how weird they are, but this is just the opposite of logical behavior.

It's not the culture at fault; it's the parents' interpretation of their culture.

Philosophies don't commit crimes; people commit crimes.

 

[Sorry!]

It's not the culture at fault; it's the parents' interpretation of their culture.

Philosophies don't commit crimes; people commit crimes.

Hmm Dave, I have to disagree. Culture is not something that is 'interpreted' it just is what it is at the time.

Culture is just a term used to describe the main ideas, knowledge, and values of a particular society. A lot of African societies view women, girls, as needing to be 'pure'(in a religious sense) and to maintain the ability to grow up to bear many children with their spouse. When a girl is raped many of these peoples view them as spoiled. It really is tragic but it really is part of their culture.

However if it wasn't a main idea followed by the society and they said 'well it's part of my culture' then it's just wrong; it's not part of their culture. So if the parents did this yet back in their African homeland (I'm pretty sure the report said Liberia?) it wasn't what society that they came from normally did then it is not even part of their culture, it's just what they decided to do. In this case however it is part of their culture and it is wide spread all throughout Africa. A problem with this however is that Liberian culture since their wars has involved rape as almost a normal event. Many Liberians refuse to talk about the problem of rape though, even the community that this girl comes from did not accept the boys confessions, or the medical findings. Instead they say that the American culture is to be blamed for portraying sex all over the place. (They just don't like to admit what happened back in their homeland):

Many people in the community are not convinced the boys raped the girl, despite the confessions the boys gave police and a doctor's examination that, police say, showed the girl had been sexually assaulted. They say the kids may have been experimenting sexually but the police have blown the case into something much bigger. They point out the boys talked to police without parents, guardians or lawyers present. Maybe they misunderstood the police, or maybe they gave police confessions out of fear because in Liberia, people are afraid of the police.

Rape was only recently made a crime in Liberia, where sexual violence is still rampant. And no one wants to talk openly about how the widespread use of rape during the war - and even in the refugee camps - physically and psychologically traumatized Liberians. They would rather make excuses or deny that rape continues to be a problem. They try to handle it, as she put it, "in the family, the Liberian way."

Many things that are part of African culture when brought to our countries will be viewed as illegal. For instance punishment of children, it is not uncommon for them to beat their children with hard objects such as large sticks, rattan switches, or just plain old belts. Another popular punishment for children is putting hot pepper on to sensitive areas of the childs body... eyes, genitals... anywhere pain will be inflicted.

It should be noted this isn't only a problem from Liberia but from many African nations. Zambia comes to mind considering the adults there believe that if you have HIV and you have intercourse with a child you will be cured. They also have sex with children who were relatives of a deceased person. The widow has sex with a child relative to 'appease the spirits' of the deceased.

 

[leroyjenkens]

It's not the culture at fault; it's the parents' interpretation of their culture.

Philosophies don't commit crimes; people commit crimes.

Cultures aren't infallible. Some cultures really are that bad. Simply blaming her for getting raped isn't so bad compared to honor killing, where they kill the girl for getting raped and "shaming the family".
Of course the culture doesn't anthropomorphize and physically kill someone, but that doesn't mean the culture is free from criticism.
The people are the ones you blame, but the people and the culture both suck.

 

[ideasrule]

It's not the culture at fault; it's the parents' interpretation of their culture.

Philosophies don't commit crimes; people commit crimes.

It's not Nazism that was at fault in WWII; it was Hitler's interpretation of it. It isn't racism that was responsible for the Jim Crow laws; it was people's interpretation of racism.

Some cultures are abhorrent, period. Some promote human sacrifice, rape, murder, torture, and persecution. There's nothing to "interpret"; a culture IS the sum of a population's "interpretation".

 

[hamster143]

Culture is just a term used to describe the main ideas, knowledge, and values of a particular society. A lot of African societies view women, girls, as needing to be 'pure'(in a religious sense) and to maintain the ability to grow up to bear many children with their spouse. When a girl is raped many of these peoples view them as spoiled. It really is tragic but it really is part of their culture.

And it's not something specific to African societies, either. Try reading the Old Testament. There are all sorts of gems hidden inside, such as one to the effect that if a husband were to find that his wife is not a virgin, he should have her stoned to death.

Our modern Western society is very unique. It allows some things that most cultures throughout the history found abhorrent (such as premarital sex, atheism, or interracial marriages), and disapproves of many things that most cultures, including our own not too long ago, found natural (such as slavery or corporal punishment). It does not mean that our culture or theirs are abhorrent, it's just that we have different worldviews.

And who knows, maybe it won't even last. The fertility rate of the western civilization as a whole is well below replacement, and people in Liberia and Zambia still have 6 or more children per marriage. The only reason countries like France and Spain experience population growth is because of the influx from third-world countries. There's a good chance that, 50 years from now, our weird worldview that it's okay to for the kids to be "experimenting sexually", and it's okay for 35-year old women to be single and childless, and it's okay for gays to marry, will be pushed out of existence because all carriers of the worldview will die out, and their lands will be taken over by Liberian immigrants.

 

[Pagan Harpoon]

It does not mean that our culture or theirs are abhorrent, it's just that we have different worldviews.

When someone here says that another culture is abhorrent, I think it can be assumed that they mean that it is seen as abhorrent by their own culture. If you say something like "That doesn't mean they're abhorrent, just different." Then the whole concept of morality and related ideas lose all meaning, as there is obviously no a priori, universal morality.

 

[ideasrule]

Our modern Western society is very unique. It allows some things that most cultures throughout the history found abhorrent (such as premarital sex, atheism, or interracial marriages), and disapproves of many things that most cultures, including our own not too long ago, found natural (such as slavery or corporal punishment). It does not mean that our culture or theirs are abhorrent, it's just that we have different worldviews.

Morals, like science and mathematics, have progressed over time. People once thought absolute government was desirable. A rational investigation concluded otherwise, and liberty is now one of our core values. People once thought torture was OK. Then it was realized that not only were false confessions being extracted, information blurted out during torture was highly unreliable, and torture came under condemnation. People once had religiousness as their number one moral value. Then came the Renaissance, when they realized the secular Greeks and Romans had scaled heights far beyond those of their immediate Medieval predecessors, and secularism took over.

It scares the hell out of me that today, so many people think that everything that's part of a "culture" is OK. What happened to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Enlightenment ideas that every Western country adopted with pride?

And who knows, maybe it won't even last. The fertility rate of the western civilization as a whole is well below replacement, and people in Liberia and Zambia still have 6 or more children per marriage. The only reason countries like France and Spain experience population growth is because of the influx from third-world countries. There's a good chance that, 50 years from now, our weird worldview that it's okay to for the kids to be "experimenting sexually", and it's okay for 35-year old women to be single and childless, and it's okay for gays to marry, will be pushed out of existence because all carriers of the worldview will die out, and their lands will be taken over by Liberian immigrants.

There's also a chance of our "weird worldview" that criminals be punished being moved aside in favor of "pour acid on the girl who dishonored our family by being raped". Anyhow, are the Islamic people you know as radical as the people in Iran, Saudi Arabia, or wherever they came from? Emigrants usually have some level of respect for the country they're entering.

 

[Proton Soup]

don't be so judgmental on past societies for their views on sexual purity. they did not have the luxury of modern medicine to prevent the transmission of disease.

 

[Sorry!]

I would say that a majority of people following these cultural views are African. In which case people who are from 'developed' nations simply do not understand how Africa works. It is not like our societies. We can see this more clearly when we look at it's history along with British rule as well as trying to help those countries become democratic. It is simply not the way they operate over there.

You think that your culture is better? That's good for you... they think their culture is better.

 

[Pagan Harpoon]

Unless you want to adopt some utilitarian scale on which different cultural takes on morality can be graded, the idea of one culture being "better" than another does not even make any sense unless it is done from the viewpoint of a particular culture. If you attack the ability of people to say that a foreign culture is bad because it permits actions that we see as immoral, then you attack the ability of people to make any moral judgements about anything and then this whole area falls apart. A serial killer has a different mini-cultural sphere built up around himself, so he is not subject to my morality, so I cannot judge him?

 

[hamster143]

Morals, like science and mathematics, have progressed over time. People once thought absolute government was desirable. A rational investigation concluded otherwise, and liberty is now one of our core values. People once thought torture was OK. Then it was realized that not only were false confessions being extracted, information blurted out during torture was highly unreliable, and torture came under condemnation. People once had religiousness as their number one moral value. Then came the Renaissance, when they realized the secular Greeks and Romans had scaled heights far beyond those of their immediate Medieval predecessors, and secularism took over.

It's not so much the realization of superiority of modern morals, as a shift from collectivism to individualism. Most traditional societies are collectivist - people have to work together in big groups to survive. In the last couple of centuries we've been moving away from that. Consequently, we're adopting more and more moral perspectives which conform to the idea of "individual freedoms", even if they are questionable or outright bad for the society as a whole. Things such as widespread acceptance of homosexuality, or a shift from extended families, to nuclear families, to single people stuck in a casual-dating loop into their 30's.

By the way, ancient Greeks weren't that secular. Many advances in science were made by Muslim scientists during the Islamic Golden Age.

Anyhow, are the Islamic people you know as radical as the people in Iran, Saudi Arabia, or wherever they came from? Emigrants usually have some level of respect for the country they're entering.

That depends a lot on the circumstances. When emigrants come to the country where their culture is poorly represented, they tend to assimilate quickly. When they come to the country with big pre-existing enclaves of their people, assimilation can stop completely. Los Angeles was a quintessential Western city just a few decades ago. Today, almost a third of all residents don't even speak English.

 

[Loren Booda]

In the District of Columbia a few summers ago, a girl was reported to have been raped in a crowded public swimming pool.

 

[T.O.E Dream]

although it's a serouis situation, i can't stop laughing.

lol!

 

[rootX]

In the District of Columbia a few summers ago, a girl was reported to have been raped in a crowded public swimming pool.

What kind of rape that was and how young the girl was?

 

[Pinu7]

Morals, like science and mathematics, have progressed over time.

What do you mean by "progress?" A change of moral standards overtime does not mean it is superior, in fact, I find there is no logical correlation between them.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

We could certainly start another thread on moral/ethical philosophy in the philosophy forum. We should probably not have the debate here.

 

[rootX]

We could certainly start another thread on moral/ethical philosophy in the philosophy forum. We should probably not have the debate here.

When in the OP I was more thinking of if the those children act should be defined as an act of rape but this is general discussions .. :rofl:

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

When in the OP I was more thinking of if the those children act should be defined as an act of rape but this is general discussions .. :rofl:

Generally speaking I would say that yes it is rape. Legally speaking its not usual for a 10 year old to be charged with rape. As I noted children who have been abused (and/or witnessed abuse, I should add) often similarly abuse other children. Most likely the authorities are investigating this possibility and are keeping the children for both questioning and protection.

 

[Loren Booda]

What kind of rape that was and how young the girl was?

The girl was preteen and I believe the act involved penile penetration.

 

[ideasrule]

What do you mean by "progress?" A change of moral standards overtime does not mean it is superior, in fact, I find there is no logical correlation between them.

"Progress" means improvement: improvement to people's quality of life, improvements to justice, improvements to law and order. In the Medieval Ages, you could be burnt for witchcraft. Now, society is much more informed and witch hunts don't exist in the Western world. I call that progress. In the Medieval Ages, kings had absolute power and rarely respected human rights. Now, the head of state is chosen based on ability and there are checks and balances on his power. I call that progress.

 

[Muppetmaster]

Played kiss chase at that age. But rape is unbelievable?

 

[cristo]

EDIT: I noticed in the article it says they are charged with counts of 'attacking a female under the age of 13'; is this what they just call 'statutory rape' in Britain, I don't know..

Statutory rape is defined as sexual activity with someone under the age of consent (16). Sexual activity with a female under 13 is a more serious charge (aimed at protecting children-- a maximum sentence of life imprisonment can be issued, as opposed to 14 years for statutory rape >16), and one for which there is no defence of consent.

 

[Galteeth]

When someone here says that another culture is abhorrent, I think it can be assumed that they mean that it is seen as abhorrent by their own culture. If you say something like "That doesn't mean they're abhorrent, just different." Then the whole concept of morality and related ideas lose all meaning, as there is obviously no a priori, universal morality.

Morality and objective reality are not in the same league, and should not be judged with the same tools. I think for anyone's morality to be consistent, it has to be universally applied. Moral relativism is the same as no morality.

 

[Galteeth]

Unless you want to adopt some utilitarian scale on which different cultural takes on morality can be graded, the idea of one culture being "better" than another does not even make any sense unless it is done from the viewpoint of a particular culture. If you attack the ability of people to say that a foreign culture is bad because it permits actions that we see as immoral, then you attack the ability of people to make any moral judgements about anything and then this whole area falls apart. A serial killer has a different mini-cultural sphere built up around himself, so he is not subject to my morality, so I cannot judge him?

Exactly. I remember these kids used to run my pockets back in middle school and try to beat me up, and a few ultra pc girls would say, "well you shouldn't judge them for that, that's their culture." I would counter saying, "well perhaps it'm my culture to judge them for doing that" and they'd say "that's stupid."

 

[Galteeth]

A slight caveat: Cultural differences are a factor in determining the motivations of people, and ignorance can be a mitigating factor. For example, I worked with a Nigerian immigrant who told me he was going to "stalk" some girl he wanted to marry. I was confused, but I eventually understood that what we call stalking would be considered sincere and honorable courtship in his culture (apparently to prove that his affection was real and not just for a brief sexual encounter). I explained to him that it didn't work that way in America, but clearly, he was not in the same category as a "stalker" in a western culture.

 

[ideasrule]

A slight caveat: Cultural differences are a factor in determining the motivations of people, and ignorance can be a mitigating factor. For example, I worked with a Nigerian immigrant who told me he was going to "stalk" some girl he wanted to marry. I was confused, but I eventually understood that what we call stalking would be considered sincere and honorable courtship in his culture (apparently to prove that his affection was real and not just for a brief sexual encounter). I explained to him that it didn't work that way in America, but clearly, he was not in the same category as a "stalker" in a western culture.

And if that person refuses to change his behaviour after you told him this, what would you think of him?

 

[player1_1_1]

Its not possible for 10 year old boy to do such a thing. It must be american food with big amount of steroids etc, which makes organism to grow more quickly