Something serious - The Penal Code

After a friend told me about an article in the local press in which a 32 year old lady wrote about her 20 year old husband, we got to discussing the older-woman-younger-man relationship (with a rather large age gap where the guy may be barely out of school and the girl already in a career). This led to the discussion of teacher-student relationships. Then, rather coincidentally, it was reported in the news yesterday that the first person to be charged with having sex with a minor is a (bispectacled - ok, you wonder why that was included in the news reports) 32 year old teacher and the boy is a 15 year old student. Of course, now there are speculations of whether he is her student. This popular genre, romantized in so many mangas, is no joke. She may be heading to jail for ten years.

Another point we had been discussing, and were unclear about, which was surprisingly answered through this article - the minor need not be a girl, even consensual sex with an underaged male is now an offence. This is after the change in law to protect minors regardless of sex since Feb this year. All along, we knew the Women's Charter protected female minors but now the Penal Code protects male minors. Equality of the sexes? Reminds me too of the amendment in the rules of dog licensing...(but let's not sidetrack)...

I think, as I wrote about before (some iffy things about manga), there seem to be some elements that may be downright dangerous or immoral in manga, that is framed as being seductively appealing. Is this type of story going to promote such behavior as it may glamorize the situation or have people thinking it is right or even fantisizing about it? There is no telling, with media effects being a very iffy topic as there are so many other factors to consider. However, I would still say that at the very least these stories put the idea of such into our heads. That is the least. I think at the most, it could encourage us to think more about it. As the popular saying goes, media tells us what to think and how to think about it. To me, the stories seem to say, it may not be acceptable but it can be so fun. (erm, not!)

Did a search on google news and found at least another two similar reports on this topic on the same date. It seems this type of criminal act occurs rather often! Everyone seems to remember also remember a particular teacher-student relationship that spanned more than a decade.