"Obviously there are psychological issues when an adult, especially an adult in the caregiver/educator field has the capacity to develop intimate feelings for a child."
There's no one-size-fits-all to this scenario. First of all, English-language dictionaries cannot seem to agree on the definition of a child. One dictionary defines a child as a boy or a girl before puberty, but another defines it as someone below the legal age of majority.
Sure, if you argue that adults who take a sexual interest in prepubescent children are wired together the wrong way, you will not get much of an argument from anyone. And, yes, I agree with you that anyone who would become infatuated with their students should not be in the teaching profession in the first place. However, if you're describing two people each on opposite sides of the legal age line falling in love with each other by chance, I believe that there should be at least some room for compromise so long as neither party is still in the crayons-and-playground phase of their life. I mean, one day I read about this one married couple in their forties out in California in which the husband was in trouble for failing to register on the sex-offender registry. The husband had to register as a sex offender, because he had willing intercourse with his wife back when she was 17 years old and he was 19 years old. Now how ridiculous does that get?
"I think that there should be stiffer laws/punishments, such as life in prison without the possibility of parole for such an offense. I think that there should be zero tolerance or forgiveness when something like this occurs; there is no such thing as “I messed up” when it comes to compromising a child’s innocence. These acts forever ruin a child and the families; it is a tragedy."
You might want to rethink that position. When I lived out in California, the 3-strike law was instituted there. That is, it didn't matter what anyone was convicted of, they still got life in prison on their third conviction under that law, even if it was for something as petty as sticking a slug in a gumball machine. As a result, the prisons became so overcrowded that the prison system started having to release dangerous felons early. Punitive austerity in the criminal justice system usually causes more problems in the long run than it solves in the short run.
If our criminal justice system goes sending a 23-year-old man to prison for life every time his 15-year-old girlfriend gets caught passing him off to her parents as a 16- or 17-year-old boy, not before long our prisons across the United States are going to be so overcrowded that public officials may be confronted with the prospect of having no other choice but to release dangerous felons earlier than they should be released.
And, yes, I get it. Teachers are in positions of authority over students no matter how close to 18 years old those students are. However, keep in mind that when lawmakers impose stricter and harsher prison sentences and penalties against educators who violate the age-of-consent laws, courts can become more inclined to acquit these individuals on jury nullification. It's becoming a regular thing in Connecticut. Prosecutors can whine that jury nullification is a recipe for deviant anarchy in that event, but the doctrine of jury nullificatin will never go away inasmuch as many Americans see it as a bulletproof vest against oppression from the government and the ruling establishment.
Also, it usually is not the act itself that ruins a "child" and families but rather the societal zealots in the legal system who do so, and it's because these public officials really don't care about the collateral damages that ensue when they turn their prosecutorial pursuits into witch hunts. Here's the proof. Back in 1986, this one 15-year-old girl refused to testify against her 28-year-old boyfriend in a statutory-rape case, and the prosecutor turned around and got the judge to lock her up in a juvenile detention facility on contempt charges. Later on, the prosecutor acted as though he was doing it out of the kindness of his heart and for the girl's own good, but I don't believe he was concerned about anything but getting a conviction. The girl's father was okay with the prosecutor's actions, but I don't think he would have been if he had seen the movie Born Innocent starring Linda Blair. This happened in Connecticut.
Child advocates are mostly hypocrites, and the child-victims industry is mostly about profit rather than protection. If these people really cared so much about the youngest citizens of our nation, they would be fighting to end parental testamentary freedom instead of seeking to raise the statutory age of consent as high as they can do so in every state jurisdiction. I mean, if a father sexually molests his daughter, he should not have the right to cut her out of his will in retaliation for her decision to report him to the authorities. You never hear about any of these self-proclaimed child advocates doing something to change the inheritance laws for the better here in the United States.
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