To jail a female teacher for 40 years with a non-parole period of 20 for having sex with a 14 year old boy is ridiculously harsh. It is out of all proportion to the severity and impact of the offence. People have served lesser sentences for murder.
The Coweta County, Georgia judge imposed the sentence on the recommendation of the Assistant DA Kevin McMurry, who said:
We believe that children deserve to be protected. This woman groomed and enticed a young boy she knew from birth to engage in these sexual acts. I crafted the sentence to take these things into account. We want to send a message that this will not be tolerated. I wanted to ensure she would receive a harsh sentence which recognized the life-long impact and damage done to this child. Children are important and they deserve to be protected. She abused her position and the trust bestowed on her from the family and she had to be punished for this.
Sounds like a political speech to me: an attempt to create a moral panic and then establish his law and order credentials with the frightened Christian folk of Coweta County. Kevin McMurry is currently running for Superior Court Judge in Coweta County. The election is on July 31 this year, so remember to vote Kevin McMurry if you want to protect your innocent children from Satan’s army of child molesters.
I am not suggesting Shannon Schmieder hasn’t done anything wrong or a 39 year old woman having sex with a 14 year old boy should be legal. My point is that the sentence in no way represents “the life-long impact and damage done to this child”, which would probably not have been very much if everyone from his mother to the legal authorities had not made such a huge song and dance about it, telling him he’s a victim of a child molester and that he’ll require extensive therapy.
Listen to his mother:
We were told by investigators that our 14-year-old was a victim of child molestation. This was horrifying and unbelievable … Words can't begin to explain the heartache we've experienced this past year and the betrayal we've endured … We've all been in counselling for several months … We are continuing to hurt. We will struggle in fully trusting again.
Get over yourself, woman. You make it sound like your son was molested by some dirty old man and will now be confused about his sexuality and so full of guilt and self loathing, he’ll need an army of therapists just to prevent him becoming a hopeless drug addict.
“My son has had his innocence stolen from him!”
He’s a 14 year old, obviously heterosexual boy, for Christ’s sake. If he’s like most other 14 year old boys, he’s probably seen plenty of pictures and videos of women significantly older than him doing a lot more than he did with Shannon Schmieder. He probably whacks off half a dozen times a day. What do you imagine he’s thinking about? His baseball card collection?
What’s going to damage him more? The affair with a 39 year old woman or everyone he knows from his mother to legal authorities to counselors telling him he’s been molested, is a victim and that he has to be in counseling for months to deal with “what’s happened to him”?
How is he going to react when he fails at something later in life, as we all do? Tell himself it’s all because he was a victim of child abuse? Know that’s not the cause, but use it as an excuse to everyone else? Treating him like a victim will increase the likelihood of him acting like one.
Can you imagine therapy sessions with his mother present? She will fuck him up far more than Shannon Schmieder.
Where’s his father in all this? Even if he’s not around, surely there is some sensible, male authority figure who can sit down and have a balanced talk with him, with his hysterical, smothering mother as far away as possible.
“So, you’ve been poking a teacher, mate? Well, look, you haven’t done anything wrong and no-one is blaming you. How are you feeling?
You know that someone her age shouldn’t be having sex with someone your age, don’t you? You understand that she’s in trouble with the police and you might have to go to court and tell them what happened, even though you might be embarrassed?
If you do have to go to court or talk to the police, we’ll all be there to help you. Just say what happened. No-one is going to blame you. If you don’t want to tell all the details, you don’t have to.
Are you finding it a bit much with all the fuss everyone is making? Is it embarrassing at school? I understand. Probably best not to make a big deal about it at school. It’s OK to talk to your best friend, but if you don’t like people saying things, just tell them you don’t want to talk about it.
If you’re ever upset or feel like you want to talk about anything or that people are pushing you into something you don’t want to do, you know you can always come and talk to me and I’ll help you, don’t you?”
That’s all that needs to be said to a teenage boy. He doesn’t want all this attention. The biggest risk to this boy is making him feel a victim and drawing him into a huge production, which appears to be more about his mother’s feelings than his.
His is not the same situation as a 14 year old girl who has been having sex with a male teacher. He won’t have to endure being called a slut by his male and female peers and the bullying and ostracism she is likely to receive from her female classmates. A girl in this situation will almost certainly face far stronger and more varied social pressures than a boy, be more at risk of psychological damage and need far more counseling.
He hasn’t been molested by an older male, so there’s no gay angle to make him feel dirty and ashamed and confused about his sexuality … and before the gay identity politics brigade start blowing their whistles and screaming “Homophobia! No-one should be made to feel dirty and ashamed about being gay!”, homosexual molestation of kids IS worse, because it is highly likely to confuse them sexually before they have begun to properly understand any feelings they might have.
Although sexuality is a lot more fluid than most people would like to admit, the fact remains that the overwhelming majority of people are not gay. If a significantly older man has sex with an underage boy, or a woman with an underage girl, the power relationship and position of trust which is being abused could be the principal cause of the younger person’s sexual response, not their “true, gay feelings”. They might be going along with it because they are impressionable and weak and acquiescing to the authority, rather than enjoying any of it.
The same could be said about heterosexual sex with an underage person, however it is highly likely they are heterosexual anyway, so the confusion regarding sexual identity will almost certainly be much less, particularly if they often think about having heterosexual sex anyway, as most teenagers do (particularly boys). They’ll be doing it for real in a couple of years anyway.
If the young person is gay, already out and comfortable with this, there’s probably not nearly as much of a psychological impact, but such a person would be quite mature for their age and probably near the age of consent anyway.
There have been many cases of essentially heterosexual boys, molested by male teachers when young, who have been far more fucked up by the experience than if they’d had sex with a female teacher. The reason is because of the shame and confusion they feel.
Some feel weak, less of a man because they went along with it, despite not feeling any attraction. It’s bound up with their sense of what it means to be a man: to be able to stand up for yourself and take care of yourself.
For others, there is a nagging seed of doubt that they can’t shake. Am I really gay? Then why do I like sleeping with women? Or do real straight guys enjoy it much more? Do I dislike gay men because of my experience, or is it self loathing? How could I ever tell my girlfriend / wife about this? What will she think of me? I certainly wouldn’t want any men I know to know about it. They would look down on me.
Whatever the feelings and whatever the reasons, a much greater state of psychological confusion and distress is overwhelmingly more likely to result from an underage, but pubescent boy having sex with an older male than with an older female. In fact, if she was halfway decent looking, the boy would probably enjoy it and his stature would increase in the eyes of his friends. The real danger is if he falls in love with the woman, which could equally happen with a young girl and an older man.
An underage girl will receive social censure and quite possibly bullying from her peers regardless of the sex of the older person, although it will almost certainly be greater if the older person is a woman. She’s more likely to be able to talk about it though.
If the sex is with a prepubescent child, that’s at the upper end of the scale regardless of gender, although I suggest homosexual molestation is still marginally worse and should attract a greater punishment because the child is probably heterosexual and therefore more likely to suffer greater psychological damage.
If the sex is with a pubescent child, an older man and underage girl is definitely worse than an older woman and underage boy, because the boy probably thinks about sex with older girls and women many times a day anyway and will not face the same censure from his peers as the girl. Homosexual sex with underage girls or boys does deserve a greater punishment because of the greater psychological confusion and distress it will almost certainly cause, unless the underage person happens to be gay, already out and comfortable with their sexuality, which would be rare for an underage child.
So, what punishment is appropriate for Shannon Schmieder?
Certainly not 40 years’ jail. That is ridiculous. It is in no way a “sentence which recognized the life-long impact and damage done to this child”, which if the case is handled correctly, wouldn’t be much.
She is described in the press reports as a “39 year old elementary school teacher”, which gives the impression that she seduced one of her students. In fact, she wasn’t even teaching at his school. However, her profession probably does make her conduct worse, since though not actually being the boy’s teacher, or even teaching at his school, he still would have looked up to her as an authority figure. It’s an abuse of social authority and power, which warrants punishment of itself, as a deterrent.
She’ll never teach again. Even without a custodial sentence, she’d probably have to leave town, but almost certainly couldn't leave the state until her probation was up. Her face has been splashed not just across the local papers, but the internet. It’s cost her a considerable amount in legal fees. None of these are trivial.
Let’s be honest: although the boy won’t have the memory of losing his virginity with his first serious girlfriend, he’s a teenage boy. If he was more or less normal before the affair, he will have very few detrimental, long term effects as a direct result. His real problems appear to be his smothering, hysterical mother and the assistant DA turning a matter which should be handled quietly and discreetly into a public production. Their goals and needs seem to be being placed before the boy’s. Surely his well being should be the highest priority here? I suggest that would be best served by having a male whom he respects available to talk to any time he needs and otherwise being allowed to get on with his life.
If I’d been 14 and fucking a much older woman, maybe I’d have been led astray a bit, but at least I would have enjoyed it. If found out, I’d just want everyone to fuck off and leave me alone. That’s probably what this boy wants too.
Based on the above, I wouldn’t have given Shannon Schmieder a custodial sentence at all. I’d have given her 12 to 24 months, fully suspended, plus 1,000 hours of community service cleaning graffiti or feeding the homeless or something else useful, plus compulsory therapy.
When a much older man is fucking an underage girl, we think of him as a dirty old perv and a predator, which is probably true. But when it’s a much older woman with a teenage boy, the first thing many would ask is "What’s wrong with her? She must have some psychological problems: low self esteem, loneliness."
I know that in some cases, the woman is a predator, but surely a criminal psychologist’s report can help a court distinguish between the two.
I don’t think Shannon Schmieder is at the predator end of the scale. Have a look at the pictures of her in the article. She’s not exactly top shelf. Probably sad and lonely.
This is precisely the type of case where a mature judge should decide the sentence, not follow the “advice” of a careerist prosecutor or the victim impact statement of a hysterical mother who thinks her son is still 8 and playing with Matchbox cars.
Let’s make sure this engineered moral panic doesn’t take hold in Australia.
Paedophiles who prey on prepubescent children should be locked up for a very long time and subjected to lengthy periods of strict monitoring upon release, with the possibility of reincarceration under the Mental Health Act. But let’s recognize that an older woman having sex with a teenage boy not too far from the age of consent is still wrong, but not even remotely in the same league.
Let’s also recognize that if the wellbeing of the boy in such a case really is paramount (as it should be), the best approach may be making as little fuss as possible, especially not telling him he’s been a victim of child molestation and needs ongoing therapy.
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