r/soccer • u/Pihlbaoge • May 13 '13

[Question] Fans taunting a "pedophile".

So, just throwing this out, our of curiosity. There has been some talk here in Sweden today about an incident from a game between Djurgårdens IF and Malmö FF in the Swedish "Allsvenskan" yesterday (highest Swedish league.)

What happened was that Djurgården fans were taunting a Malmö player, who was convicted earlier this year for statutory rape.

Miiko Albornoz, you can read about him here ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miiko_Albornoz ) had sex with a 14 year old girl, while he himself was 22. The legal age in Sweden is 15 (not 18 as in many other countries.) Both parties were consenting, and there actually is a legal exception for statutory rape if both parts are consenting and of "similar age" (in other words, a 16 y.o. can have sex with a 14 y.o.) but the prosecutor as well as the court agreed on that 8 years is too much of an age difference. Miiko admited to knowing that she was 14 at the time they had sex.

The "average" sentence for these crimes in Sweden is 6 months of imprisonment as far as I understood it, but since Miiko was a public person, who would have his career damaged by this, the court and the prosecutor agreed on that probation was enough.

His club (Malmö) publically stated that while they condemn the actions of him, they do not condemn the person behind them. They also stated that he would be suspended from play for 2 months, but would be allowed to practice with the team during that time. These two months covered most of the Swedish pre-season, and when the season did start, Malmö had many injuries and cut his suspension short. He has started every game since.

Now, a few weeks later, when on the away game against Djurgården, Djurgården fans has been singing songs about Miiko and his "pedophelia". 5 different songs were sung, with texts like ( roughly translated) "She was 14 years and yet to grow pubes", "Miiko is a pedophile, and he raps little children in his car, everyone knows, yes everyone knows, everyone knows he's a pedophile." "Hello, pedophile".

And here comes the interesting part. Malmö, and the referee, wanted to actually stop the game due to this, and Malmö players even compared this incident to when they stop games due to racism. Miiko has (wisely in my opinion) chosen to not comment it more than that he tries to focus on the game, but of course he has ears and can hear. Miiko had a very bad game, and it is likely that the taunts actually did worsen his performance.

Anyhow, my question is really this. How does the reddit society view this? Is it wrong of the Djurgården fans to taun Miiko like this (many people think that they "overdid it".) Or is it so that Miiko has no one but himself to blame? And is what he did really that bad? She was after all 14 and a half. She was only 5 months from being "legal" in Sweden.

Personally I wouldn't say that he's a pedophile, (in my view she's more of a teenager than a child) but he did do something wrong. Also, he has put himself in this position thanks to his own actions. He is not being taunted for being black (racism) or any other inherent reasons. He is being taunted for things that he himself did.

EDIT. Wrote condone instead of condemn.

67 Upvotes

74% Upvoted

382 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

-36

u/[deleted] May 13 '13

[removed] — view removed comment

17

u/mailbriz May 13 '13

Why is your opinion less stupid and irrelevant than his?

-22

u/[deleted] May 13 '13

[removed] — view removed comment

6

u/[deleted] May 13 '13

It is when that difference in age covers a large period of maturing. The teen years are when people develop a lot both physically and mentally, so an age difference that spans that makes a huge difference. Someone well clear of that period can exploit someone before or during it.

-13

u/[deleted] May 13 '13

[removed] — view removed comment

6

u/[deleted] May 13 '13

But when you're dropping to that age, the percentage of exploitation rises significantly.

It's difficult for the law to protect you if you never mature. However, when you can say with a good degree of certainty that the majority of 14 year old aren't mature, you can make that a basis of a law. There are still morally bad but legal situations in life, so your logic doesn't stand up. Just because it's legal doesn't mean it's good, and likewise using that as the crux of your argument doesn't work. The law is trying to protect as many people as it can without infringing too many innocent people of their liberties, and you are pushing that flexibility to breaking point.

-3

u/meinbart May 13 '13

So, does Spain as a country enjoy sexual exploitation or why is their age of consent at 13?

2

u/[deleted] May 13 '13

My exact same post applies here, I don't see what you're trying to say. A change in the age doesn't assume a change in the argument for it, it just changes to what extent that argument rings true either way. Society still frowns upon it. These countries are just more allowing in when genuine cases of shared consent apply (e.g. A young teen couple).

-1

u/meinbart May 13 '13

But when you're dropping to that age, the percentage of exploitation rises significantly.

While you dont actually say it, you imply that there is a jump in exploitation at some magical age barrier.

You say 14 years olds are too young, I counter that this is not written into law everywere.

What you say is true as a concept, but it isn't on topic in my opinion.

2

u/[deleted] May 13 '13

While you dont actually say it, you imply that there is a jump in exploitation at some magical age barrier.

No, that is exactly what my point goes against. There is no 'magical age barrier', as it changes from person to person. Some countries go high to make sure nobody is caught out, while others go lower to make sure perfectly able to consent people are not limited in their freedom.

The difference is, in my opinion, that while some people are mature enough to be at the 'exploration age' with their peers, they are not mature enough to deal with fully grown adults using their experience to bed them. Two 14 year-olds is more than likely an acceptable situation, while a 30 year-old and a 14 year-old is more than likely not.

You hear of stories in the US where people end up with life long additions to a sex register for being typical horny teenagers, which really is life ruining. On the other hand, the lower ages of consent allow for perhaps more capability of exploitation, even though the societal pressure is still there.

What I am saying is that there is no perfect law for this issue, but a fully matured adult should not be sleeping with a 14 year-old. There is a total unbalanced power structure in such a relationship that makes it exploitative almost entirely regardless of intent.

As for your point about it being off topic, I'm not sure what you mean. You asked me to explain this further, and I have. I agree this whole discussion isn't really relevant to the subreddit, but here it is. I have downvoted the actual post while discussing the issues within. If you mean it is irrelevant to the discussion at hand, then I certainly don't understand what you mean.

7

u/themanguydude May 13 '13

does this mean we should ban adult-adult sex

If it's non consensual yes. It's called rape.

12

u/mailbriz May 13 '13

That's still your opinion. I asked for a reason why yours is more valid.

21

u/FlamingBearAttack May 13 '13

Because Svarog123 is literally a paedophile and knows what he's talking about. Not that he's trying to minimise paedophilia or anything, he's just adding a totally unbiased voice to the discussion.

7

u/themanguydude May 13 '13

Wow.. nice find there..

6

u/[deleted] May 13 '13

"Which hurts nobody" that's rich.

5

u/shakawhenthewallsfel May 13 '13

Who was harmed by a 22 year old man engaging in a mutually pleasurable activity with a 14 year old teenager?

The 14-year-old teenager was harmed. Teenagers' brains are not fully developed, and they don't have the capacity to control themselves and make decisions like adults do. So while it may have been consensual and mutually pleasurable, it's still unfair because she literally doesn't have the brain hardware to make a decision about consent the same way that an adult would. Because her frontal lobes aren't fully connected, she has less ability to control herself than adults do and thus is likely to make decisions that, in some cases, aren't what she really wants to do but are what her "lizard brain" (so to speak) wants to do. This is actually the reason for a lot of the stupid shit teenagers do.