Women who date boys spark ethical dilemmas
http://www.venturacountystar.com/vcs/lifestyle/article/0,1375,VCS_230_3779133,00.html
By Becky Bowman, Beaumont Enterprise
May 15, 2005
BEAUMONT, Texas -- Imagine this news flash: A 30-year-old teacher in your town is having sex
with a 15-year-old student.
Does it change your reaction if the teacher is a woman and her student is a boy?
If you're a typical American, it probably does. In popular culture -- from "The Last Picture Show" to
"Desperate Housewives" to Garth Brooks' song "That Summer" -- sexual encounters between
teenage boys and older women often are depicted as romantic rites of passage, an initiation to
manhood. It's anything but lechery, predation, molestation or rape -- ways society typically judges
an adult man who sleeps with a teenage girl.
In Southeast Texas, two female teachers recently resigned or lost their jobs because of alleged
sexual encounters with teenage male students.
A number of national cases, including Mary Kay Letourneau, the ex-teacher from Seattle who plans
to marry her former student lover, reinforce obvious differences in how society views such
unseemly, often criminal, relationships.
Film, television, books, news outlets and society's expectations of men and women reinforce those
views, experts say. But the reality, they're quick to point out, is not always so simple. With such a
paradox in mind, prosecutors, juries and peers are faced with a question: Are these young men
seen as victims or merely fortunate?
Second thoughts
Michael Ferguson, a high school student in Lumberton, Texas, says he's a victim, even though he
understands the stereotypes that say he's lucky to have slept with an older woman.
"Going into her bedroom, I'll be honest, I did think that," Ferguson said. Coming out of her room,
however, was a different story.
"If I could turn back the hands of time, everybody'd be happy," he said. "It wasn't worth it. I
wasn't lucky."
Lumberton High School teacher Kathy Denise White, 39, is awaiting trial after accusations that she
had sex with Ferguson, then 17. She was indicted Feb. 8 on two counts of having an improper
relationship with a student, for each of which she could get as many as 20 years in jail and a
$10,000 fine. White has denied the allegations.
Several studies have suggested sex abuse by adult females is not as rare as society believes. A
1987 survey of male college students found more than 7 percent had sexual contacts with older
females, and half did it voluntarily, without feeling victimized.
Another study also found men are less likely to perceive those childhood sexual experiences as
abusive. Women, it said, see those acts as sexual violation, but men see them as sexual initiation.
"Male socialization encourages men to define sexual experiences as desirable as long as there is no
homosexual involvement," the study said.
A question of coercion
Even if a young man thinks he's in love, the interaction can be classified as abuse, said Lauren
Duncan, an associate professor at Smith College in Northampton, Mass.
"If you're using a position of authority to coerce someone into doing something that they wouldn't
normally do, that's abusive," Duncan said.
Psychologists often define abuse as an age difference of five years and the alleged victim is under
age 17, Duncan said.
But not everybody sees it the way psychologists do. "If you're not quite sure how to feel about it,
and (friends are) like, 'Dude, way to go!' that could recast it in your mind," Duncan said.
Sad but true, a boy who feels hurt in such a situation might not find much sympathy from society.
"We look at it in a titillating way," said Terri Miller, president of Nevada-based S.E.S.A.M.E. -- Stop
Educator Sexual Abuse, Misconduct and Exploitation -- which works to prevent abuse and increase
public awareness.
"Everybody's patting him on the back, when, inside, he's wrenching -- but he cannot openly
express his victimization."