Proposal for a Graduated Age-of-Consent Framework

Idea: Instead of relying on a single legal threshold such as age 18, the law could define legality through a function relating the ages of both partners. The age of the older partner would determine the minimum legal age of the younger partner. This relationship could be represented as a graph, with the age of the older partner on the X-axis and the minimum legal age of the younger partner on the Y-axis.

(Here and throughout: “yo” = years old.)

For example, if James is 20 yo, his partner has to be at least 16.5. But if James wants to be with Sara, who is 27 yo, that’s not allowed — because Sara would be the older partner, and the minimum legal age for a 27 yo’s partner is 22.

(The legal consequences would always fall on the older partner, so James will be fine if he will be in relationships with Sara)

Totally accurate representation of how the graph will look:

Why a graph instead of the current age-18 border?

To make relationships between an 18 yo and a 40+ yo illegal.
(And as a result) To make it pointless for a much older person to befriend a child with the plan of having sex with them once they turn 18 (real predator tactic).

Limitations:

I don’t know exactly where the line should be. I’m not an expert in psycology, and I haven’t done the kind of analysis needed to weigh the benefits (letting people who genuinely love each other be together) against the potential harms (trauma) of drawing the line slightly higher or lower.
If we make it pointless to wait until a target turns 18, some predators might act earlier. That said, in my view it’s psychologically much harder to act when you can’t tell yourself you’re waiting for something “safe” and legal. Imo, we should apply maximum pressure to prevent them from taking any steps in that direction in the first place.
Some people can’t read graphs. I’m genuinely wondering how their ancestors managed to reproduce without a such of practical skill.

And to make it worse, dumb people are overrepresented among criminals.

(Don’t worry — that sentence wouldn’t offend them, because they don’t know what “overrepresented” means.)

That said, if someone can grasp the concept of an age-18 cutoff, they can probably handle this principle: “If you’re not sure whether a relationship is legal, ask ChatGPT — and make sure to give it both ages.”

Why am I listing limitations? Because I don’t have the expertise to fully evaluate this idea. But since it doesn’t seem to exist in public discourse, I wanted to at least put it out there and start a conversation.

A Possible Improvement

Consider two situations:

Situation A. An 18 yo has sex with a 16 yo — not 16.5, so technically illegal. Maybe she told him she was 16.5! A six-month difference is genuinely hard to notice! Some people look younger than they are, some older. After I shave, I look about two years younger. A girl might wear heels to seem older.

Situation B. A 40 yo man has sex with a 14 yo.

Under proposed law, these fall into the same category of crime. That’s absurd. The punishment for the second case should be incomparably harsher than for the first.

So rather than one line on the graph, we should draw 3 or 4 of them. Cross the first one, and the response might be mandatory relationship ethics courses and community service — with no public registry entry. Each threshold after that should carry progressively more serious consequences.