What's your opinion on this UK ruling involving gender and sexuality?

I think it’s bullshit. I get why her partner might be pissed about being tricked, but deception is a risk you take in relationships
– the government should not get involved in these situations. If this type of thing is illegal, then it should also be a criminal offense to present yourself in any false light. If this were the case, a lot of people would be in prison for falsely presenting themselves as decent human beings. We’ve all been fooled in relationships – if you don’t like it, stay single, but lying to get laid shouldn’t be a crime.

ETA: I just read the article. So, what happened is that “M” got catfished. Maybe she should reconsider starting relationships online from now on. This poor Justine girl has to register as a sex offender for life for that? That just pisses me off.

That is all kinds of f’ed up. I mean, are we going to prosecute the guy who pretends to be rich? The woman who lies about her age? The only way I can see this being a valid thing is if the ‘dating fraud’ costs the victim money or gives them a disease or something. And having her register as a sex offender is just ridiculous.

I’ve seen this before, and it really makes me sick. Punish her if you absolutely must, but three years of prison plus registering as a sex offender for the rest of her life? I daresay, that judge seriously deserves prison time themselves for destroying a life this way. Sounds like that girl needs therapy and help, considering all the turmoil about sexual identification that was described in her early teen years. Maybe some sessions to try and teach her not to deceive peeps this way, but @livelaughlove21 nailed it as far as that’s concerned. In this case, you should probably arrest everyone who ever cheated on their partner. That judge can seriously go to hell. They went way too far.
I mean there’s things in relationships that happen that are just as bad as this, sometimes worse…I mean, “Previous U.K. cases have found that concealing one’s marital status, wealth, age or HIV diagnosis from a sexual partner does not invalidate consent.” wat And that judge is talking about manipulation and deception? Smooth move, bro.

If enough people get pissed off and speak against a given sentence, has it ever actually happened that the sentence was either removed or altered? Because this is completely fucking ridiculous. I don’t know much about UK’s regulations and views on this kind of stuff, but this particular situation sucks big time.

Wow. Talk about overreaction. Having to register as a sex offender is absolutely ridiculous. Transphobia at work here definitely.

What a mess. Poor girl. To me, any judgement would need to rest on the intention to mislead or deceive. I’ve only read the Salon article but it seems fairly obvious that she was, and possibly still is, confused. To punish her for this, and certainly to incarcerate her, seems like an enormous overreaction and I can’t see how registering as a sex offender serves a purpose either. I can’t see how she had any intention to cause harm. She wasn’t lying if she, at that time, identified as male. She wasn’t misrepresenting herself.

I can also understand why a young person, who was struggling to figure out who they are, would not have the capacity to have this discussion when they develop emotional feelings for a person. Surely any argument around whether this was a crime would have to revolve around her intent to deceive and cause harm to the other person? That intent isn’t here in this case from my limited knowledge.

In some places, an 18-year-old who has sex with a 17-year-old is a “sex offender” and a 17-year-old who sends a picture of her boobs to her boyfriend is a “child pornographer”. These designations are often ridiculous. And this is no exception.

Reading The official court document sheds a little light on the matter.

The argument was “The case for the Crown was that M’s consent was obtained by fraudulent deception that the appellant was a male and that had she known the truth, she would not have consented to acts of vaginal penetration.”

JM pled guilty to the charges and then appealed the sentence. Her sentence has already been reduced to “substituting for the term of 3 years detention, a term of 9 months detention in a young offender institution suspended for two years, together with a suspended sentence supervision order.”

This boils down to her not serving any jail time so long as she stays out of legal trouble for 2 years. If ANY charges are brought against her during the suspension time, that 9 month term and/or the supervision order (parole) MIGHT be added to any subsequent conviction penalty.

Is this case sad? Yes, insofar as it went to court at all.
Is it a reason to get up in arms? I don’t think so. It seems the court took both parties interest into consideration and acted accordingly.

Anybody can make a political agenda statement by selecting “facts” to make a point. It’s rarely black and white when you do some basic research.

I think the courts got it right. As for the lifetime sex offender part, they were both sex offenders, even if “Scott” was using the situation to prey on “M”. Being it is Europe, I suspect they were both over that nation’s legal limit to engage in sex with whom they pleased. It was surely deception. It would be the same if I presented you with a Shelby Cobra, made you believe it was a Shelby Cobra, took your money and said nothing, then when you get home the Cobra emblem falls off and you discover it is a clone on a VW body. You would not say, “Oh, well, I should have figured out something like this was likely”, and go about your way. Here the gender was the “buy sign”. Would “M” still have gone that way with the relationship had she KNOWN THE TRUTH FROM THE BEGINNING? Probably not, she was shopping for a summer sausage not a taco or Lil’ Smokey.

@Hypocrisy_Central Your comparison makes no sense.

Say I’m a cheater. I cheat on every guy I date. However, I don’t tell these dates this little fact up front. Instead, I let them find out the hard way. In other words, I deceive them to get what I want – be it sex or just kicks. If they knew I was a dirty little slut from day 1, would they have gone about the relationship anyways? Probably not. Will I be arrested for this and forced to register as a sex offender? Absolutely not. And why? Because the state doesn’t give a shit, and they shouldn’t. Am I a bad person? Probably. Am I a criminal? Negative.

You can’t compare lying to someone about your genitals to buying a car. That’s ridiculous. People lie about who they are to get laid all the time. Sucks, but ‘tis life.

And how the hell are they both sex offenders?

Additionally, there is no official record that JM is required to register as a sex-offender. There is a 3-year restraining order which prohibits JM from contacting M.

@livelaughlove21 You can’t compare lying to someone about your genitals to buying a car. That’s ridiculous.
I don’t think so, it goes to intent. As you said, if you were the neighborhood bicycle (everyone gets a ride) and it is known by all then they know what they are getting in for. If you did that and were married but didn’t have the ring on then it would be deception. The reason there is no law against it doesn’t make it any less of a deception. That just shows that politicians, which are some of the worse cheats and adulterers, chose not to call it or treat it as it is less they get snared by their own trap.

And how the hell are they both sex offenders?
In ways you may not agree, so, I won’t go there.

Then there’s this article

If this is tl;dr, it’s summed up in the last paragraph: “So there is nothing in this written judgment that would impact negatively on the legal right of trans people to keep their biological history secret from sexual partners.”

@Hypocrisy_Central Uh, we’re talking about the law here. We’re not talking about morals or arguing whether this is deception or not (and no one has said that it’s not). So, your argument doesn’t have much to do with the question.

@livelaughlove21 @Hypocrisy_Central Uh, we’re talking about the law here. We’re not talking about morals or arguing whether this is deception or not (and no one has said that it’s not). So, your argument doesn’t have much to do with the question. If you go by what I first said it does, morals notwithstanding. The intent of “Scott” was to commit a form of fraud. Whether or not if she was the town slut, took her ring off, went to a bar, picked up a guy, boinked his brains out for him to discover after he has been smitten, that she was off limits. There is no crime attached to that deception, but it is no less deception. In the case with “Scott” her deception has a legal penalty. Law is not always totally logical but then, that is the way man handles it, so……………

@Hypocrisy_Central There is no crime attached to that deception, but it is no less deception. In the case with “Scott” her deception has a legal penalty.

Which is it? You just made a statement and then claimed the opposite in the same breath, so to speak.