France has set the legal age of consensual sex at fifteen, while the age range considered was from thirteen to fifteen years old.
In recent years, France, like many other European nations, has battled with sexual abuse cases which involve children as young as eleven.
However, under current legislation, if there is no evidence of coercion or violence offenders may only be charged with sexual abuse and not rape which only carries a penalty of five years in prison and a fine of €75,000 (£66,000; $87,000).
Incredibly, across Europe, the ages for legal consent range from;
• 14 years old: Austria, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Portugal
• 15: Greece, Poland, Sweden
• 16: Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, Russia
• 17: Cyprus
Meanwhile, in the United States, the age of consent is fixed between 16 and 18 across all 50 states. However, in Mexico, “primary” age of consent could be as low as 12.
One profound case, which brought about the alteration of the legal age, involved a thirty-year-old man that was acquitted of rape after having sex with an eleven-year-old girl.
Alarmingly, sexual abuse cases involving minors are growing across Europe, is this why Facebook is surveying accounts about legalizing pedophilia?