By far, the central issue within the Age of Consent law is responsibility and accountability. It is more than seeing people under a set age as physically or emotionally immature. It is seeing them as irresponsible. That is, people under a set age are not responsible for their actions. This brings up several issues. The first is property.

Today, we've come to the point where "kidnapping" has been replaced by "child stealing". For a long time, parents have been legally responsible for their children up until the age of eighteen. Parents ar held accountable for their children and teens running away. Society blames people on the streets who "exploit children". "Report the sale of tobacco to a minor", so that the old person who does the selling can be put behind bars. Blame is shifted everywhere except on "kids". If they get into trouble, the parent was not keeping close enough tabs on the child. However, in this day and age, we have gone far overboard in our effort to "protect children". Parents are encouraged to interrogate their teenagers and teens are in turn portrayed in television adds as really wanting deep down inside for their parents to be nosey. Adults scream if their privacy is infringed on, yet they constantly invade their children's privacy. Invasion of privacy implies ownership. Privacy is not an effort to hide, but a natural extension of individuality in the form of independence. All responsibility that comes with human dignity is now the property of the parent. This, however, leads to a problem. If someone is sheltered from all responsibility for his actions, what will he be? That's right: irresponsible. Instead of so desperately trying to take away responsibility, parents should be handing it out. Then, when the inevitable day comes that their son is at the set age to be legally responsible for his own actions, he won't be overwhelmed.

The Age of Accountability is a concept started by the Protestant churchman idea which is in great contrast with the word of the Bible. In our modern society, we have adopted this concept to become the Age of Consent. If someone were to say, "That little child is going to hell," a woman would cry out, "How dare you! My children are angels. They're going to heaven." For men today who believe in the Age of Accountability, it still holds its classical definition. Accountability begins whenever self-awareness begins. Knowledge is a sin, after all. If you don't know what you're doing, you're not responsible for your actions. Yet, children and teens aren't that dumb. Self awareness usually occurs within the womb. Even sexual awareness often occurs before puberty. While the Bible says that we are all sinners who are responsible from before birth for our actions, it also says that we can be saved at any age and then no longer be responsible for these burdens. Christ takes on the responsibility. However, adults are far from divine. That is another problem with giving adults all the responsibility for younger people. Simply put, adults today are irresponsible. Many of them were themselves sheltered from responsibility or have always been running from it. Adults in this country are obsessed with sex. Although no longer teenagers and biologically sexual, they take drugs to get their sex drive up. Adults recklessly engage in sex to the point of sexually transmitted diseases then blame the responsibility on "other people". Then, when young people ("kids") act like these adults, the blame is shifted to the media. And then we simply say that "kids that age" are irresponsible. So, then, what is the adult excuse?

Teenagers with responsibility are just like adults with responsibility. We need not look back that far in history to see this. The problem is that we over shelter children an teenagers today. A few centuries ago, people constantly saw their parents or siblings die from diseases and such. However, modern Disneyfication, in its attempt to create a false reality, is stifling young people. The biggest perpetuators of this are mothers. Today, mothers are even going out on all boy camp outs with their sons. Their sons feel trapped, like they can't talk or be open. Unless boys become fed up and really demand their independence, they will be smothered (s-mother-ed). Mothers today don't encourage friendship unless they approve and the boy still have "time for just the two of us." So, how will a modern boy feel? Will he hate men or long for them? Will he become dependent or fight with his mother? Will he be immature and irresponsible from all the overprotection or will he rebel and take control of his life? You see, the problem is not that too many teenagers are rebelling against their parents (as many adults would have you believe). It's that too many parents won't let their children grow up. That is why there are so many people living at home into their twenties. That sheltering environment can become all they know and their parents are just as much to blame. We condemn teenagers who rebel, but that is their only hope for escape. Although, biologically, teens don't feel like "little kids", they are conditioned to feel that they are, or to rebel to prove them wrong. When someone tries to overprotect someone (like putting them into a straightjacket), the "protected" either conforms or fights against the "protector". Adults create defiant children and teens by stifling them. Parents should prepare their children for the real world at an early age instead of worshiping their beauty and perceived purity. It's mothers who are constantly starting child agencies because of their attraction to children. They spread the propaganda of child innocence. It shows their emotions dominate their logic. Most fathers would never be so hung up over "children are so special", but men aren't the ones with the biggest say in this country anymore. When you hear people saying "oh he's only a college kid", you know something's wrong.

Another optical in responsibility is that American adults don't want children to be smarter than them. Asians accept this inevitability (as the brain isn't used as much once out of school), yet we say things like "don't get smart". Basically, we're telling children to be dumb just as we tell them to reckless and irresponsible by the way we treat them. Schools and especially parents should be teaching responsibility. Sure, with our sugar-buzzxed kids, adults should start with baby steps, but it should start early. Make kids and teenagers feel responsible and they'll feel needed. Don't just say "do this" and "do that". Show them what happens when the responsibility is neglected. Don't overwhelm them. Show them what to do and offer to help when you can. Let them understand that you have responsibilities of your own too. Never patronize them with things like "that's grown up work." I was responsible for the daily laundry in my family since I was eight. I knew what happened if I went a day without doing it. I knew how little clothes my father had and how quickly he would ruin them. I was responsible for completing set chores in order to receive a small cash allotment for completing them. I knew the value of money. The only way someone can be responsible, even if you think of them as irresponsible, is to give them responsibility. Sure, he may mess up a few times at first, but that's why it's so important to learn responsibility before being thrust into the real world (real, as opposed to the Disney world).

I believe strongly in personal accountability. If you are capable of having sex, whether you're eight or eighty, you need to be responsible for that capability and what you choose to do with it. Some people argue that making young people accountable for their consent would make men go out and rape children or teenagers and it would be justified because of the law. Yet, is raping a woman justified because sex with women is legal? A lower (or no) AoC merely makes both parties responsible when both parties do consent. Also, the law doesn't change people's perceptions. Just as a woman can easily be seen as the victim of rape, so can a child. Even if untrue, they would believe the woman or the child over the man. if the relationship doesn't work out, the child or teen can claim molestation in the same way that a woman can claim rape when she is hurt emotionally.

The bottom line in the "problem" with teenage sex and the AoC is that either adult and teenagers have less sex, or teens still have sex (illegally). Teens grow up from childhood seeing how important sex is to adults. How can adults expect someone to spontaneously become responsible at eighteen when they are long past that age and still not responsible? You see, adults want two worlds--one for them where they can do anything, and another for their children. They love the sex in movies and advertisements, but they don't want "kids" in that world: "You get out. This is for me." However, there is only one world. Adults say "if everyone else can have all this sex, why can't I?" Teens aren't any different. Humans learn by example. Don't tell someone (even a child) that he can't do something you do and he is capable of doing (sex, alcohol, etc.).

Baby Boomers (which currently make up a large segment of today's influential population) see teenagers as irresponsible because they were teenagers during a time of "free love", drugs, the Beatles, and war protests. What they don't realize is that times have changed. Their concerns are from their own teenage years. Some teens today are irresponsible when given responsibility, but many are very responsible. There has to be A students to make up for the slackers. It's no different than with adults. They obviously haven't learned that much. They're afraid to be elderly, so the term is now "mature adult". Unfortunately, the time period they grew up in left them with a distorted sense of self. They feel the center of the universe and long for youth and to feel "invincible".  Unfortunately, the reason they felt so god back then is because their hormones weren't yet declining. Today, they can't be reckless, but they want to be. Yet they project that onto today's youth instead. They don't want to admit it's all about them and cradling their ego by making everyone else into immature children. This is truly the "me generation", but it's not because of children or teens. It's because of adults. Americans can't control themselves. We eat in excess, drive SUVs, shop in excess,  etc. It's not simply that we have more because Japan has more. Yet, most Americans are overweight, triple what it was in 1990. There are now "fat acceptance groups". This is what happens when a generation of hippies runs the country. Responsibility and accountability are vital to the survival of our society. All of us--at every age--need to learn self control and responsibility. It's time to stop discriminating against a certain segment of the population and treating them as unthinking objects to possess simply because of age (a number). Adults have proven that they are not responsible with their power over children's lives. They certainly have not "earned" it. Children and teenagers are human beings. They're going to make mistakes. They're going to act irrationally, just like adults do each day. That's life. Part of God's gift of free will is the responsibility each person has for his or her life. Every choice we make has consequences. God could make the choices for us, but what's the part of life if you're not free to live it? Even if we do make some mistakes, taking responsibility for our actions reaffirms one of our greatest gifts: free will. It is truly what makes us human.