The other thing this undermines is giving the student someone who they can trust to talk to about issues that are happening.

From the simple "I don't want to look stupid asking this Q in class." to the "My <parent> abusing me."

I never had real trust in my teachers growing up, but I know others that did.

I agree almost completely. Legislation like this comes from really good intentions and wind up becoming incredibly stupid laws.

As a father, I can sympathize quite a lot with the intentions of the bill. For the reasons that you deftly articulate, it's clearly bad legislation.

I say that I agree almost completely with your posting because I'd like to call "bullshit" on the following statement:

"Parents need to monitor their children's lives to make sure their kids aren't getting into everything."

Of course they should and they typically do. Sometimes that doesn't work. The harsh reality is that this monitoring would be impossible even in the best of circumstances. A very common sentiment is that children can be completely controlled by their parents and any deviation from that ideal is the fault of the parents.

It turns out that children are human beings with their own ideas about what is appropriate and they aren't nearly as wise as their parents.

There are laws that come from the same place in a parent's heart that do make sense. For example, imagine that a twenty-two year old man begins a sexually active relationship with your sixteen year old daughter. In most states, we have a law for that. We, as adults, know that that's pretty fucked up. We also know that it's going to fuck up the daughter's life pretty badly if not curtailed soon. Isn't it nice that these laws are on the books?

My point is that, as vigilant and responsible as a parent may be, you can't control or thoroughly monitor a particularly angst-ridden teenager. Anyone who says you can is out of their mind.

You can lay the foundation and that is all.

After that, you need as many tools as you can get to put in your toolbox and, when it gets to a certain point, some of those tools need to be legal ones.

Before someone calls me a bad parent, I have three children and they all turned out great. Calling me or their mother a bad parent is a non-starter. I need only wiggle my finger at three beautiful people that are very obviously contributing to society and are an absolute joy to meet and get to know. Nobody that knows them isn't charmed as hell.

I say that I sympathize with the spirit of this bill because I couldn't imagine a teacher privately messaging one of my kids over the Internet. My reaction would be, "What the fuck are you doing?" It's weird and there seems to be very little need for it.

The bill is stupid and wrong, but I understand its genesis.

.

There's a much simpler solution -

Hire adults to be teachers and monitor them.

My point is that, as vigilant and responsible as a parent may be, you can't control or thoroughly monitor a particularly angst-ridden teenager. Anyone who says you can is out of their mind.

Absolutely agree with this whistleDick. You can't monitor most other teens 24/7 as well. Trying is an exercise in futility, much like trying to nail Jello to a tree. Besides, if you're monitoring your children constantly, how are they supposed to learn from their mistakes. Wonderful that you want them to learn from your mistakes, but that's not practical. Everyone has to learn for themselves. That's part of becoming *gasp* an adult!

This is a crude attempt to control the very small minority of teachers who do not behave appropriately. Do tenure, unions and the near impossibility of getting rid of a bad teacher have something to do with this? I'd vote yes.

If the profession policed itself, you wouldn't have this problem. We are inundated with ridiculous laws already - I see no reason why teachers should be exempt.

Does it over reach? Yep. Is the whole former student, unconstitutional? probably. Do I support it? hell no.
I'm a bit curious how former student is defined. Should be easy to define it to apply only to school aged children and not adults (18+) after they graduate, which the complaint hints that it does.

To me I find it a bit funny in that it is a complaint about teachers (mainly women) who are finally getting treated equally to men, by being socially and legally assumed from the get go to be pedophiles.

A high school friend of mine lost her father to suicide. He blew his head off with a shotgun in their livingroom. Our then social studies/geography teacher who was also an assistant pastor at a local church helped her get through the aftermath and continued to be a father figure to her throughout high school. He walked her down the aisle when she got married. I guess in MO that would have gotten him 5-10??

For example, imagine that a twenty-two year old man begins a sexually active relationship with your sixteen year old daughter. In most states, we have a law for that. We, as adults, know that that's pretty fucked up. We also know that it's going to fuck up the daughter's life pretty badly if not curtailed soon. Isn't it nice that these laws are on the books?

Given throught 90% of human history 15 yr olds were MARRYING 20 yr olds and having babies, I dnt really see the point in such laws.

Isnt anyone else disturbed by the trend of the ever expanding childhood?

Used to be your parents could let you drive at what ever age they felt appropriate if they were in the car. Now its so illegal for someone under the age of 16 to drive I read a news report of a 15yr old being arrested for illegally driving when he took the wheel for his mother who was having an astmatha or allergy attack and drove her to the hospital.

And in alot of state if you are under 18 it is illegal to have nore than one passanger with you.

Used to be you could drink at 16, now its 21.

As far as insurance goes your provisionally a chid until 25.

Its illegal for teenagers of the same age to have sex, legally they are both abuseres and vitcims. In the few areas of the country where it is legal for someone under 18 to have sex thay can still e arrested for child porn if they take pictures of themselves.

My mother has a photo of me whenI was a baby running around with my diaper off - she could face 10 yrs in prison for having that picture.

Seriously how long until the prudes, prohibitionists, and religous nut jobs who hate the very idea of sex make 21 the legal age of consent?

There aint a whole lot of difference in maturity levels between the average 16, 18, and 21 yr olds these days

Its far past time we stop treating sex like something mystical and sacred only to be understood by the unseen sages and deal with it like everyother subject that effects our lives.

Actually on over half of the states 16 is the age of consent so there would be no problem with a 16 year old dating a 22 year old. There's a huge percentage of high schoolers that date college students.

What lujlp said. Make it a double, actually.

Childhood is dress rehersal for adulthood. It is usually the only time you get to take a mulligan.

Mashable notes that "inappropriate contact between students and teachers is at the root of the legislation," which is "designed to protect children from sexual misconduct by teachers, compelling school districts to adopt written policies...."

Hello, this is Father Time talking to you from cranky old age of 52.

Y'know, punk children, once you get to be my age, there are certain phrases in language which no longer seem like economical expressions of ideas... They begin to sound like prayers. They begin to sound like incantations.

"Legislation designed to" is one of them. That locution doesn't even affirm that the solution is at hand, or that government will be the one to apply it if it is... It merely demands to be patted on the head and loved because it means well.

See also "protect children from sexual misconduct by teachers". Is this really, really a growing threat? Truly? Can the expansion of the hazard be attributed to something besides the government?... Something like, I dunno, broken homes? Because if it can, then maybe the solution isn't going to come from government, and maybe it shouldn't.

Listen, go watch C-Span. Turn it on, two or three channels of it, day or night for the past 30 years. And you'll see some fucker or fuckette promising to makes things better... By offering a response to something that's a problem. And no person wants to be seen arguing on the side of The Problems.

And here we are.

I think: The smartest, most attentive people in the world —the people who buy debt as investment— have figured out that government means too much to us. And so now they're going to raise the price of it.

Apparently, the real threat is our own government (please forgive the thread-jack, Amy):

http://www.brasschecktv.com/videos/government-corruption/why-the-justice-department-doesntcatch-banksters-terrorists-and-other-enemies-of-the-nation.html

Allright, almost ALL phrases are "in language", but I haven't had coffee, so don't fuck with me.

Consider this doorknob from Massachusetts. Obviously, the problem isn't Republicans or Democrats, or the Tea Party or anyone else. The problem is that the markets are changing their valuation of our debt.

Is it in anyone else's interest, BESIDES Senator Kerry's, to pretend the problem is partisanship?

I mean, OBAMA won... The debt limit was raised, more than ever before. Why should Kerry still be afraid of the Tea Party?

Because they were right, that's why. Fate and markets are proving they were right.

As you plunge down the mountainside, you may have better things to think about than whether the last switchback was to the left or to the right.

This seems completely unconstitutional to me at several levels. Not just freedom of speech, but freedom of assembly.

It's also blindingly stupid. Teachers connecting with their struggling students can make a huge difference in the lives of those students.

Do also note that this very much has roots in the marxist theories of students being blank slates and in the almost cultish worship of childhood. The modern way Americans teach teenagers is extremely perverted in this way; us parents who are trying to teach our children to be adults are being constantly thwarted by nannies and the nanny state who insist that childhood be extended into the twenties. (And is exacerbated by the damn minimum wage laws which make it difficult for teenagers to learn responsibility at a tedious job.)

I suppose we should all start carrying around release/permission forms.
On day at work my boss (male) said to me:
I hope you know I don't mean this to offend you, or to harass you, or make you incomfortable. I hope this ok, but I wonder if you could tell me what perfume you are wearing because I'd like to buy it for my wife.

Now how sad is it that he had to basically recite a whole sexual harassment disclaimer before he asked me a question.

I guess electric dog collars that activate whenever we touch another human being are soon to follow.

lujlp said: Given throught 90% of human history 15 yr olds were MARRYING 20 yr olds and having babies, I dnt really see the point in such laws.
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For starters, just because humans had certain laws and traditions for centuries on end didn't mean they weren't awful. Footbinding, for one, lasted 1000 years. Any doctor today will tell you that at the very least, it's unhealthful for BABIES to be born to teen mothers, because for one thing, the birth weight is likely to be dangerously low. Very likely, the main reasons teen girls used to get pushed into marriage - when they weren't already pregnant - were that 1) women were expected to die in childbirth anyway, so why waste food and resources on them when you could marry them off, and 2) the ever-constant obsession with virginity and controlling the female libido. Since girls knew perfectly well that they might die in childbirth, I doubt THEY were the ones who wanted the early marriages to take place.

Not to mention that pre-20th century, when life expectancy in general was so much lower, maybe parents just didn't care that teens don't tend to like - or love - the same people ten years later. ("When we order you to get married to save the family honor, you do it. Period. Chances are one of you will die before 40 anyway, so what's the big deal?")

In other words, there's a good reason you don't hear of very many modern girls clamoring to marry before they turn 20 - assuming they're not already pregnant. They KNOW there are too many perfectly good reasons not to, and they have reason to believe in their futures in general.
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Isnt anyone else disturbed by the trend of the ever expanding childhood?
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I'm bothered by helicopter parenting and all the little responsibilities / life skills that many teens used to have and now often don't, such as holding a part-time job before age 20.

Other than that, I think we have to take changing circumstances into consideration. When you think of the teen driver fatality rate, why is it so radical for Dr. John Rosemond to say that driving at 16 only made legal sense a century ago, when neither cars or most roads allowed for speeds over 20 m.p.h. or so?
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Used to be you could drink at 16, now its 21.

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And given how many people in their 20s are highly unqualified for marrying, voting or drinking outside the home, I don't see what's so great about letting teens have those legal rights.

As a Missouri resident, I read about this law in disbelief. Teacher probably made up close to five percent of the population in the small town I grew up in. They were integral parts in our communities. They are the first lines of defense in teaching students that we could all go beyond the failures of our parents.

Where I grew up, teachers have one the of the highest salaries in the community. The teachers' kids wore clothes bought from the mall instead of Wal-mart or the thrift store. The teachers' kids had actual houses instead of trailers and shacks. If you were lucky, you had a teacher's kid as a friend.

Now, how is my Facebook friend of any other friend's parent and/or grandparent different from this? And why should anyone's job be legally threatened by who they keep as friends?

I'd like to add, since statutory rape laws are about what the older party should or should not be doing (and not whether or not the younger party wants to continue the relationship), I think that a good simple rule would be: If the younger party is under 17 AND there's at least a four-year difference, that should automatically be called rape. For those who complain that's unfair, I would ask: What's so unfair if it applies to older parties of both sexes? Don't complain that finding out your younger partner's real age is too much work. Society has more important things to worry about.

@lenona
I find it very disturbing that someone would compare a young marriage to footbinding. I feel maturity level among twenty year old boys and fifteen year old girls are often times not that far apart. And I sure don't see what is wrong with letting eighteen years old marry.
"Controlling the female libido" is feminist bullsh!t. No good man, even a hundred years ago, had any desire to restrict the pleasure his partner got from sex. Female sexual repression has always and will always be mostly from other women...I can see you calling a woman that enjoys having sex with multiple partners horrible names.
If women died in childbirth because of their young ages, why don't we still have the same death rates among our pregnant teenage girls?
I am disturbed that by 20 years old, we don't expect people to completely support themselves. As college students, up until the age of 26, they are required to use parental income for federal aide.
I married at eighteen, not pregnant. I also bought my own home. Something my parents never did. I made more an hour the year I turned nineteen than my mother ever has. I'm sorry that you think my generation is a bunch of losers, but at sixteen years old I knew I'd give my life so that this great nation could let jerks like you say, think and worship whoever they wanted to. I knew that thousands had already died for such a noble cause.
I also knew at sixteen years old that if anyone tried to take those same rights away from me, I'd be first in the revolution line...I grew up in the hills and we're taught missing is a waste of bullets.

"When you think of the teen driver fatality rate, why is it so radical for Dr. John Rosemond to say that driving at 16 only made legal sense a century ago, when neither cars or most roads allowed for speeds over 20 m.p.h. or so?"

Considering that driver instruction in the USA is a complete joke, this is more complex than it sounds.

And there are a lot more young and capable people than is granted here. Again, an entire generation is labeled by the stupidity of a few.

"There's a huge percentage of high schoolers that date college students."

I know I did. Thank god for older women.

> As a Missouri resident

Where?

Cat sayeth:

I feel maturity level among twenty year old boys and fifteen year old girls are often times not that far apart.
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That hardly makes it OK for EITHER of them to be marrying. What's your point?
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And I sure don't see what is wrong with letting eighteen years old marry.
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Well, for starters, how many such marriages last, percentagewise? And what are the odds that they'll be safely divorced BEFORE an innocent baby becomes part of the "family"?
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I can see you calling a woman that enjoys having sex with multiple partners horrible names.
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Name-calling is childish and unacceptable. That hardly means that casual sex is harmless, emotionally or otherwise.

The first time I read the 1980 book "Changing Bodies, Changing Lives" as a teen, I found this passage and was utterly bewildered by it. Quote from a 16-year-old: "You know how it's okay for a guy to go around telling everybody about how horny he is and bragging about how he's going to get some this weekend? Well if a girl ever said those things, everybody would call her a slut."

That is, I thought: "What ARE they talking about? Where I live, it's NEVER civilized for boys to talk like that - at least not if there's any chance any girls might be within earshot or might hear about it later on. Besides, I can't imagine any boy I know actually trying to make good such a boast."

(Granted, I went to a rural boarding school, so there may well have been a certain unusual, strong decorum between the kids, who had to live so closely together at all times. After all, if you actually slept with someone and then broke up, you'd have to put up with a lot of awkwardness - and whispering. At any rate, I don't remember any boys making themselves any more admired by being randy - or pretending to be.)
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If women died in childbirth because of their young ages, why don't we still have the same death rates among our pregnant teenage girls?
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Sorry if you misunderstood me, but I didn't say they died because they gave birth in their teens. I said that WOMEN were expected to die in childbirth anyway - and regardless of age, they often did, far more than nowadays. So society may well have thought "why should we have to support our daughters until their 20s when they're going to die in childbirth no matter how old they get?"

Not to mention that while poor women have always worked for pay, that didn't mean it was OK to do that INSTEAD of getting married - unless she couldn't get a husband or wanted to be a nun.
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I'm sorry that you think my generation is a bunch of losers,
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Where did I label any particular generation??