Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 21:12:24 -0500
From: Yoshie Furuhashi <Furuhashi.1-AT-osu.edu>
Subject: Re:  M-FEM: Minors and Contracts (was Queer Kids...)


>The Queer Kids article also said that many shelters for women cannot
>accept women under 18.  Does anyone know the reason?
>
>-m

I hope somebody who knows laws concerning minors will respond to this
question from Malgosia, but in the meantime, let me offer my guesses.

As Carrol's post says, minors are deprived of many legal rights that adults
take for granted, including those about the ability to enter into legally
binding contracts and many kinds of commercial transactions.

The flip side of the lack of rights for minors is that parents (or other
adults)  have the legal ability to control minors.

So it could be the case that many shelters for women are afraid of being
sued by parents, say, for kidnapping or robbing them of child custody.

All of these complexities, along with the presence of (im)migrant workers,
continuing reduction of social welfare, a very high unemployment rate for
youths (especially youths of color), the lack of well-paid jobs for those
who have comparatively little formal education and few credentials,
immiseration of the majority of people in many parts of the Third World,
and so on, means that sex workers' rights movements alone will not be able
to improve the conditions for many people in the world who are involved in
various forms of sex industry.

Yoshie