I'm no legal expert, but...

What a week for the law. Up in arms are the opposition politicians, to whom exactly the same bad-PR would have come had they been in power. The meedja are really whipping up a fury. I don't even know the difference between tabloids and broadsheets anymore, excepting that tabloids are easier to carry and read on the train. And, considering tabloids wear on their sleeves the fact that they exist to insense, cajole, threaten and generally use shock tactics and breasts to report the news, they suddenly seem much more honest, somehow.
The considered opinion of respected journalists doesn't seem like much when the Indo runs a Comment on how paedophiles from all over the world will be landing on our shores, because we have joined Thailand, Cambodia and Amsertdam as stops on the International "sex-tourism route". For one thing, "sex tourism" is surely a circuit, which includes a lot of Europe, and areas of the States where prostitution is legal, and pornography is nasty.
For another, surely it's time to stop this dangerous, ill-considered commentary when the P word raises its ugly head. No one likes a peadophile, that's established. But when you provide General Ignorance to a nation at large, mothers get terrorised, peadiatricians get threatened, and innocent people get hurt.
Already on Morning Ireland, the daily round up of trite newsbites, intended to be as digestable as a meusli bar and a smoothie, they are talking about the flow of prisoners from Arbour Hill. Which will surely serve to send the incensed up to Arbour Hill to "find out who the bastards are". Which will lead to tabloids and broadsheets sending up their cameras. Which could lead then to visitors who are male, and between 30 and 60 getting done over for being 'paedos that got off'. With no more proof than the fact that they were seen leaving the prison. This can't be right.
The law is there to protect the innocent as much as it is to prosecute the guilty. In fact, before that, the law is there to be used as a measure of guilt. What happened? How did it happen? Who appears to have done it? Can the answers to all of these questions be linked up reasonably?
Protecting the innocent is possibly how we got here today. I'm no legal expert, but a quick think about the facts of the law and the constitution suggests that Statutory Rape was an easy, and almost painless form of prosecution for those forcing themselves on minors. As there was no defence, there was no need to put a child to the trauma of reliving the experience, there was no media spotlight on parents, actions, etc. Simple. Straightforward. Sorted.
But no. It never could be that easy. I almost remember having a drunken conversation at about the age of 17 or 18 with a man who is now a legal expert. He was telling me then that there was no defence for statutory (which, given the age of consent was 17 for women, was a serious issue for us. Given that we were in a kitchen drinking beer and Jack Daniels at three in the morning would suggest we hadn't much of a chance of getting done for it that night, anyway...).
"Surely that's against the constitution?"
"Yes. Unfortunately, something really nasty is going to happen, and it'll all blow up"
This is the more sober translation of the conversation. There were a few curses, slurs and digressions, but you don't need to know about those.
It seems to me that this has been known about. As much as defense lawyers may be called negligent, and government officials have been called useless (which is unfair, given that the law hasn't been in existence since 1935), I think many people have had a similar conversation to the one above. So why not change it? Well, I forgot about the conversation until this story broke. So, I guess constitutional law isn't high up on the moral meter for many people. But also, wasn't it handy to have a tool that could be so executive? Just admit guilt, and away you go. No long process, no jumping through legal hoops, no media circus, no features analysis...
Essentially, as much as our outrage demands it, there is no pariah here. Or, every single one of us is at fault. This is a democracy, and as much as we hand over power to our governments to manage the country, it would be up to each and every one of us to approach a politician when we had this conversation about the law. This has been on the back burner, what seems to me a handy number to deal with the most devastating of cases without having to resort to the raw emotion of victimhood, or the cruel intention fo the villain. It was a law that opened and shut like a bear trap, taking with it the guilty party. And the guilty party are considered the lowest of the low in our society. Who in the name of Christ is going to untie that knot?
The question is not of blame. It is, of course, what do we do now?