By Sara Girardi
To consent to any form of sexual activity means that you freely choose to partake in that activity, without any use of pressure, while fully understanding what you are agreeing to. This means that you cannot give consent if you are under the influence of alcohol nor drugs. No one else can give consent on your behalf and you can revoke this consent at any time. On top of that, you do not need to explicitly say no to revoke or deny consent. Actions like trying to leave and struggling clearly demonstrate a lack of consent. If you are in a situation where you are too afraid to act defensively or leave, the law does not consider this to be consensual. Although this is a relatively simple definition, the question still remains: how do we apply this legally?
For starters, we can talk about the age of consent. In Canada, the age of consent depends on the age of the person, the kind of sexual activity, and who the sexual partner is. Generally, the age of consent is 16 years old. This means that anyone who is 16 years of age can consent to having sexual relations with another person of that age or older. With this said, there are some situations in which a 16-year-old cannot consent; in these cases, a person must be 18 years old to consent. Examples of this include cases of prostitution, pornography, partaking in anal sex, or if the sexual partner involved has a relationship of authority or trust with the person or if they are dependent on that person. This includes a variety of individuals such as family members, doctors, babysitters, teachers, et cetera.
What about people younger than 16? Is any form of sexual activity illegal for these individuals? In short, the answer is no. There are two exceptions where people under the age of 16 can consent to a sexual activity. First, anyone who is 14 or 15 can consent to sexual relations with another person that is less than 5 years older. This means that a 15-year-old can give consent as long as the other individual who is 19 or younger, while a 14-year-old can give consent to someone that is 18 or younger. The second exception states that someone that is 12 or 13 can give consent to another person as long as the other person is less than 2 years older. People under the age of 12 cannot legally give sexual consent, ever.
Any sexual activity performed without consent is termed sexual assault. There are many forms of sexual assault, but the word itself refers to a forced sexual activity in which the person that is assaulted is not physically harmed. Sexual assault causing bodily harm is similar, except the person attacked has been injured. A person might also be threatened with a weapon by their attacker or a third-party. And finally, aggravated sexual assault is sexual assault that causes life-threatening injuries. Sexual assault is classified as one of these forms of attack and will be prosecuted accordingly.
There are also different forms of sexual assault offence—rape is not the only offence. The first offence is being invitation to sexual touching, which refers to asking a person less than 16-years-old to touch you for a sexual purpose. Second, sexual interference is the act of touching a person younger than 16-years-old for sexual purposes. Third, luring a child refers to contacting a young person online to arrange a meeting in order to commit sexual offences. Fourth, voyeurism is the act of watching or recording someone without their knowledge for sexual purposes. However, this definition only applies to circumstances in which the person would assume they had privacy. Fifth, sexual exploitation refers to engaging in a sexual activity with someone in a position of authority or trust. It is also an offence to publicly share or sell private images or videos without consent. Notably, this can still be considered an offence if the person did consent to having their images taken but assumed their images would have been kept privately at the time they were taken. All of these offences, along with all forms of sexual assault, are punishable by law and have varying sentences that would generally be determined in court. For more information on the various punishments and criminal charges associated with these crimes, please visit the links below.
In general, our legal system outlines the need for consent in any given sexual situation and recognizes a lack of consent as a sexual offence or sexual assault. From both a legal and an ethical perspective, in any sexual situation it is crucial to remember the importance of freely given consent and to respect no as an answer.
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