Should Harvey Milk Have Been A Registered Sex-Offender? - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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Would Meghan's Law Apply To Harvey Milk If He Was Alive Today Doing The Same Things?

Yes, if he had sex with an underaged minor he should be registered as a sex-offender according to Law.
21
68%
No, he was within his rights to have sex with the 16 year old because they were reportedly in love.
6
19%
Maybe, if the teen was susceptible to coercion from Harvey Milk like "I'll give you a place to sleep and eat if you let me sodomize you".
3
10%
Other [explained in a reply]
1
3%
#13896608
Though I encourage anyone reading here to read the entire book quoted below, for the purposes of this poll I'll just include some relevent quotes.

Harvey Milk was a famous gay politician in California. His fame came from his very public "work with at-risk youth". However, at the same time he was reaching out to these youth, he was preying on them sexually. One of the most notable cases of this was his sodomizing a 16 year old named Jack McKinley, though there were others...as the text indicates:

"...sixteen-year-old McKinley was looking for some kind of father figure...At 33, Milk was launching a new life, though he could hardly have imagined the unlikely direction toward which his new lover would pull him." (pages 30-31)

"It would be to boyish-looking men in their late teens and early 20's that Milk would be attracted for the rest of his life." (page 24)

"Harvey always had a penchant for young waifs with substance abuse problems." (page 180)

"Harvey confided one night that at twenty-four, Doug was the oldest man Harvey had ever started an affair with." (page 237)..

“…sixteen-year-old old McKinley was
looking for some kind of father figure…within a few weeks, McKinley moved
into Harvey Milk’s Upper West Side apartment…and settled into a middleclass
domestic marriage..

Coldly agreed with a former lover’s suicide threat
“…the phone rang. As soon as Harvey heard the voice, he rolled his eyes
impatiently at Jim. ‘It’s Jack McKinley,’ he said. He paused and listened
further. ‘He says he’s going to kill himself.’…‘Tell him not to make a mess,’
Harvey deadpanned. Jack hung up.” (Source: Randy Shilts, The Mayor of
Castro Street, p. 126)


Now here's the tricky part. The age of consent at the time, as now in California is 18. Harvey Milk was in his 30s when he started having sex with 16 year old McKinley. Typical with pedophilia, as soon as McKinley's body begain to mature, Harvey Milk discarded him for younger [looking] sexual partners.

Milk was open and unapologetic about his sexual exploits with underaged and of-age at-risk youth, discarding one after the other as they matured. Again, typical of pedophilia. Today there is a law called "Meghan's Law" which requires that pedophiles be registered so that communities can recognize them and keep their children away from them. This Law didn't exist back when Milk was alive but if it had, would it apply to him?

If Harvey Milk was alive today, should he be prosecuted for sex with minors and listed on the sex-offender's registry?
#13896626
No because the age of consent is usually 16 in most countries and he wouldn't be prosecuted for sodomising. Just because California prohibits having sex with people under 18, doesn't make him a paedophile. There's a difference between sodomising a 16 year old and a 10 year-old because the former is an adolescent capable of making consent and the latter is a prepubescent child and would fall under child abuse. Anyway, I don't see anything wrong with Harvey Milk sodomising the 16 year-old teen consensually because the teen will gain valuable sexual and social experience from the act and will turn him into a mature sexually experienced adult. The sexual experience described is no more different or a harmful version of socialisation than going to a football match.
#13896775
Disgusting to say the least. What if this was your son or daughter being taken advantage of by someone in a position to do so. Young teens are extremely impressionable and are easily preyed upon by predators like Milk. Sexual activity between teens is different because they are both exploring...

If youre 35 and youre having sex with a 16 year old thats disgusting, period.
#13896790
No because the age of consent is usually 16 in most countries and he wouldn't be prosecuted for sodomising. Just because California prohibits having sex with people under 18, doesn't make him a paedophile. There's a difference between sodomising a 16 year old and a 10 year-old because the former is an adolescent capable of making consent and the latter is a prepubescent child and would fall under child abuse. Anyway, I don't see anything wrong with Harvey Milk sodomising the 16 year-old teen consensually because the teen will gain valuable sexual and social experience from the act and will turn him into a mature sexually experienced adult. The sexual experience described is no more different or a harmful version of socialisation than going to a football match.


Well child and adolescent psychologists would disagree with you there. The question wasn't "do you think he should be listed according to other countries' customs or laws, only US Law. Specifically in California and even more specifically, Meghan's Law. In the US, the age of consent is 18. Milk was in his 30s.

Read the book excerpt again in the OP. He was a serial-pedophile who preyed on "young waifs with substance abuse problems". The previous poster is right. Let's say you died and God forbid you left nothing to your teenage son. He got subsequently bounced from one family member to another, all the while grieving your death. And adolescence is hard enough as it is anyway. So he starts using drugs to numb, to cope. He starts looking for a father figure on the streets, because psychologically he is still just a child who needs and craves guidance, love and unconditional affection to bolster himself on his way to matury..as all children do.

Then he finds himself booted from relative after relative's house and on the streets. He begins to starve. He is cold. He is hungry. He meets Havey Milk [miracle!] and hears he is a "savior of at-risk youth". Harvey invites him to his apartment to shower and eat and sleep on the couch. Finally! A place to get his head together, to be safe. And then after dinner one night he finds Harvey's hand on his thigh. Harvey makes it clear through innuendo, that if he wants to continue with his affection and support, he's going to have to have sex with him. Afraid of the streets, the lonliness, the unknowns out there in the big world, your son, in his head still a child struggling with depression, he reluctantly consents. The orgasms he begins to enjoy, even while he knows in the back of his head this is not unconditional love. He senses on a real and tangible level that only heightens his depression, that instead of finding a father figure, he has found an insidious and dark master...and he is his slave. As he begins to age he notices Harvey pays less and less attention to him, and more to other, younger boys. Finally Harvey tells him to leave, that "it's not working out". Back to the streets he goes, now fully imprinted as a homosexual, something he didn't want or bargain for. He attempts to reconnect with Harvey in between drug binges to numb even more pain. Harvey rebuffs him time and again. But he keeps trying. Harvey was the closest person he had that resembled a parent after his own parent died/beat him/kicked him out [fill in the blank reason at-risk kids are on the street]...

***

Now read the OP again. Did Harvey Milk love Jack McKinley or was he just usuing his vulnerability and young age to rope him into being molested.

Then vote on the poll.
#13897710
They apparently started this relationship in New York where the age of consent was 17.

I'm not sure how far away from 17 this kid was.


On the subject of 16 year olds, if it's legal, it's legal. I don't chase after 16 year old girls but I wouldn't terribly judge someone who did. It's exploitation no doubt but don't think a 30 year old is much more capable than a 21 year old in taking advantage of high school girls.

Honestly that individual should just be judged upon by his peers.

I'm 24, if I go after a 17 year old still in high school I would be judged by my friends, and this should serve as substantial deterrent for most.

But to be honest, I don't go after high school girls because of all the backlog one has to deal with. First off, her family would probably track you down and secondly it's a very sticky situation in terms of how attached that girl would get, nevermind the gap in interests.

For reference, a friend of mine who's a year older has started dating a freshman at college, she sounds like a child and he sounds like a fucking idiot whenever he responds to her on facebook, etc. We all make fun of him a ton. But he struggles to find women his own age so what do can you do eh?
#13898040
Ideational Ontarian wrote:Honestly, even if the kid was 18 I still think it's wrong if not illegal. I can imagine that if someone in their 30's took advantage of my teenage child I would fucking kill them.


No you wouldn't, or you'd be very stupid to do so.

I'll by all accounts be very protective of my daughter if I ever have one, but I would see it my fault or her natural stupidity if she got tricked by a 30 something at the age of 17. A 17 year old should have at least some sense.


Then again I can physically admire other men and if my 17 year old daughter got screwed by a very attractive 30 year old man I care to think I wouldn't be so devastated.
#13898076
nucklepunche wrote:Harvey Milk is a saint within the Church of Liberalism.


This kind of thing happened with MLK (and Gandhi, Mandela, et al.) as well. What I think happens is that these individuals, regardless of what occurs through out the course of their lives, become known for their leadership in social movements decades before you get the whole wiki/digital biographical perspective that sponges up every possible loose detail. By then it's too late, controversies must rationally be ignored; unless your alternative is to do what Silhouette is doing, which is basically trolling gay people and their supporters.
#13898195
It's exploitation no doubt but don't think a 30 year old is much more capable than a 21 year old in taking advantage of high school girls.


Is it exploitation? As you said its kind of difficult for a 30 year old to pretend he's the love of her life. I think a short relationship with a 30 year old can be very much in the interest of a young girl. An opportunity to show off.
#13898262
These are all good replies.

Quote:
In the US, the age of consent is 18. Milk was in his 30s


Age of consent in the US is determined by state. In Nebraska and most states it's 16. And the majority of states actually have age of consent laws under 18.


Right, my bad. I meant California. That's the state where they moved to

OK, they started the relationship in New York, but that relationship was illegal there.

They apparently flitted back and forth between New York and San Francisco throughout those years they were together. McKinley worked at a theater production stage in SF, CA before he climbed the ladder to become manager there.

Found this:

Jack Galen McKinley (Born 1947- Died 1980)

"On February 14th 1980 McKinley committed suicide. He was 33, the same age when Milk and McKinley fell in love in 1963"

McKinley born 1947

1980 - 33 = 1947

1947 + 16 = 1963

Harvey Milk born 1930

1930 + 33 = 1963 Read more: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Did_Harvey_Mi ... z1megFF6UV


In California where the crime of underaged sodomy [still on the books today BTW, and because of the age difference between Milk and the teen McKinley, is a felony], they made the sex-offender registry retroactive to the early 1940s to include listing all those convicted, or even in the process of determining guilt but not yet convicted, to be registered as sex-offenders. Since as the other poster pointed out, the crime began in New York and crossed over into California during that time, and god knows how many states he sodomized the boy in on the drive to and from San Francisco, California requires any sex-offender from any state to register.

I'm thinking since the registry is a retroactive law, why not the "finding of guilt" aspect too? If this was just any old pedophile who was dead it would be one thing. But this is the ambassador of the gay-lobby in California. They have selected Milk above all other gay men to head up their "gay history" curriculum quickly mandated in schools there by the elite governance just after the voting public overwhelmingly made gay marraige illegal. Milk's illegal sodomizing relationship with the school-aged teen boy was well known, documented, and defended by gays everywhere. Still is to this day. However, that type of sexual relationship is a felony in CA where Milk is touted as a "historical hero"...get ready for this irony [and symptom of just about every pedophile there ever was or will be]..for his work as a politician where he gained notariety by his "outreach to at-risk youth".

The fact that Milk openly knew that the teen McKinley had a pervasive substance abuse problem, and because of this it was probably impossible for Milk to have sodomized him without McKinley being under the influence partially or fully of some intoxicating substance..also makes Milk qualify as a date-raper/child pedophile/felony sodomizer in the Golden State.

The fact that gays picked him to head up their PR-campaign to children is beyond bizzare. It is telling you something...
#13898276
underaged sodomy, they made the sex-offender registry retroactive to the early 1940s to include listing all those convicted, or even in the process of determining guilt but not yet convicted


All of this is illegal. Sodomy laws have been struct down by the Supreme Court, it is illegal to retroactively list someone like that, and it is definitely illegal to list someone as a sex offender who hasn't been convicted.

That aside, what Milk did should not have been illegal (age of consent should be 16, and sodomy laws are ridiculous), and Megan's Law needs to be reversed, as at best it's a waste of time, and at worst, it's material for pointless witch hunts against basically innocent people.

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