Sexual Crime: Trivial? Serious? Treatable?

Abstract

Standards of sexual conduct are highly culture-bound. In parts of the United States, solitary masturbation was, until recently, a crime. In countries governed by Mohammedan laws adultery is still a serious crime. Consensual homosexual behaviour between adult males is still a crime in most legislation within the United States, as it was until earlier this year in Scotland and still is in Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. The age at which a female becomes a legitimate target for sexual intercourse varies remarkably from one European country to another. In our own relatively recent history the age was twelve, now it is sixteen.