I was young once. Make it quick and get out of here.

December 5, 2013 4:14 PM

"My friend Nick and I planned another prank. We thought it would be funny to scare a couple of friends while they were hanging out with some girls. We drove over to their house and crept up to the living room window with ski masks pulled down over our faces and realistic-looking water guns in our hands..." Participants in We Are All Criminals tell stories of crimes they got away with. via

From the about:

The participants are doctors and lawyers, social workers and students, retailers and retirees who consider how very different their lives could have been had they been caught. The photographs, while protecting participants’ identities, convey personality: each is taken in the participant’s home, office, crime scene, or neighborhood.

The stories are of youth, boredom, intoxication, and porta potties. They are humorous, humiliating, and humbling in turn. They are privately held memories without public stigma; they are criminal histories without criminal records.

The project is in and of Minnesota, which has "the 8th highest rate [in the country] of people currently under some form of correctional control – that is, in jail, in prison, on probation, or on parole."

posted by postcommunism (24 comments total)

Ugh, the underage sex ones are full of gross defensive self-rationalizations, predictably.
posted by elizardbits at 4:30 PM on December 5, 2013 [4 favorites]

Most of these crimes are actually not that impressive, and a lot of it is just seems to be white people patting themselves on the back for getting away with drug offences and petty crime because no one cares white people use drugs or commit petty crime.

And, by "no one," of course, I mean "the State."
posted by absalom at 4:30 PM on December 5, 2013 [4 favorites]

"Hey, do you want to be filmed talking about crimes you committed but were never caught for? We are not cops fyi"
posted by FAMOUS MONSTER at 4:31 PM on December 5, 2013

I mean, that's not the project statement at all, but that's the feel I get from a number of the participant stories and shots.
posted by absalom at 4:32 PM on December 5, 2013

this is like dogshaming but with people.
posted by sweetkid at 4:42 PM on December 5, 2013 [2 favorites]

It was the mid 60s. I was a reporter and she was the most sophisticated woman in the room.

I was on assignment, picking up the local color at a cocktail party for a big show that was about to hit Broadway. There were dozens of beautiful women in the room, each vying for attention, eager to be the next leading lady.

I knew why she was there. Her father was the director, and famous in his own right, but she seemed to have no interest in the cast or the hopefuls. I think she just liked being noticed, and she was. I thought her the most beautiful woman present. In those days, I was not an unattractive young man. I had a prestigious scholarship, I was a football hero. I was a young man for the world’s fight.

I was 23 and she was 15. But I’m telling you, she was a young woman. Not a girl. She was a woman of the world. She’d been to school in Europe!

how has this man not shot himself

the next sentence:

I suppose it was sexual assault by definition, given her age.

posted by Rustic Etruscan at 4:43 PM on December 5, 2013 [7 favorites]

We Are All Criminals is a documentary and policy project that highlights the (at times) arbitrary and (at times) racially and economically disparate impact of criminal justice system and the resulting criminal record on hundreds of thousands of people in Minnesota.

By telling the stories of people who committed crimes but were never caught, WAAC seeks to expose the false dichotomy of criminal and ‘noncriminal,’ by seeding dialogue change regarding ‘criminals’ and records, privilege, redemption and second chances.
posted by Wordwoman at 4:47 PM on December 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

"Hey, do you want to be filmed talking about crimes you committed but were never caught for? We are not cops fyi"

HOMER: Hey, see you're watching the ball game. Looks like a good one. Any of you involved in any illegal activity? Cause I could sure go for some. How bout you, Lenny?
LENNY: You sayin' you want to commit a crime, Homer?
HOMER: Maybe. But first I need to hear about some other crimes to get me fired up.
CARL: You mean like the time you was running moonshine out of your basement?
BARNEY: Or that telemarketing scam you pulled?
HOMER: Uh... Like those, but involving you.
MOE: Oh, you mean like the time Barney beat up George Bush?
HOMER: Barney? That was me! And I'd do it again!
posted by Sys Rq at 4:58 PM on December 5, 2013 [3 favorites]

how has this man not shot himself

Because he's the kind of guy who probably likes to argue that ALL men are hardwired to want underaged women and he can't help his biology etc.

In short, because he's a creep and gross.
posted by discopolo at 5:13 PM on December 5, 2013 [3 favorites]

Lots of trespassing, mostly on local farms, some minor vandalism relating to the trespassing, one time a fire we made burned down a fence but it wasn't me that started it guv, underage drinking, the odd doobie, and more software piracy than you would ever think possible pre-mass adoption of Internet (cheers Royal Mail!).

Wait, is this not that kind of thread?
posted by Artw at 5:22 PM on December 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

You guys I totally smuggled some Kinder Eggs over the border from Canada last summer. Sorry I don't have an instagrammed picture of me cleverly hiding my face to go with that sordid tale of this Minnesotan Gone Wild.
posted by Elly Vortex at 5:34 PM on December 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

Oh, man, thank God the statute of limitations has to be up on pretty much all of my crimes. I could be up there pretty easily. Well, except not living in Minnesota.
posted by klangklangston at 5:49 PM on December 5, 2013

Most of these crimes are actually not that impressive, and a lot of it is just seems to be white people patting themselves on the back for getting away with drug offences and petty crime because no one cares white people use drugs or commit petty crime.

I don't think that's the point of this at all. The point is that many people spend years and years in jail for shit that other people never get caught doing- and when that person is someone like a judge who tried weed, or a business owner who trespassed on private property, no one bats an eye. Youthful indiscretion! Yet society is perfectly happy locking up other people for the very same crimes. That's why this exists, not to impress people with super cool crimes.
posted by showbiz_liz at 5:56 PM on December 5, 2013 [12 favorites]

how has this man not shot himself

Because there's an argument to be made that a 15-year-old might be able to give knowing consent to sexual activity? Not every 15-year-old certainly, but physical age isn't a measure of mental capacity and there are some people of 15 who can make more-informed decisions concerning sex and consent than some less-mature people in their 20s.

All statutory laws are an attempt to put a hard measure on something that is by nature fluid. There are 15-year-olds who could make more informed voting decisions than some stunted, shallow adults. And yet all non-felonious adults are allowed to vote and no 15-year-olds are.

I'm certainly not an expert on this, but I don't even think what he did would even be illegal in every US jurisdiction, particularly not in the 1960's.

I've mentioned this here before, but under the laws of the state in which I grew up, I committed statutory rape-- my high school girlfriend was in the class behind me. But she had skipped a grade and was 2 years and a few weeks younger than I. The state law set that sexual contact between a legal adult and a minor was criminal if the parties had two birthdays between them. In the months leading up to my 18th birthday, our sexual activities were perfectly legal. Then I turned 18, and for three weeks I was, in the eye of the state, a rapist. Then my girlfriend turned 16 and everything was cool again.

I haven't had the urge to shoot myself.
posted by Mayor Curley at 6:03 PM on December 5, 2013 [10 favorites]

Yet society is perfectly happy locking up other people for the very same crimes. That's why this exists, not to impress people with super cool crimes.

I think it would be a lot more effective if each of these stories was paired with one from someone who had the book thrown at them.
posted by cosmic.osmo at 6:52 PM on December 5, 2013 [11 favorites]

I understand statutory rape is grey but I think as a culture we need to stop making it seem more grey than it needs to be. Two students in the same school a few grades apart seems like it should be handled different than someone who is 5 years past highschool and really has no business having sex with someone who is at most a highschool sophomore.

The more we make these "but some situations are ok so maybe there just shouldn't be any laws about this or moral reasoning about it because it's all grey" that often seems to come with these conversations is frustrating.

Everyone thinks their statutory rape situation is the exception and because there's was ok maybe we shouldn't judge anyone anywhere for going after a minor teen because if their mature enough they're fair game. I don't think that's a coherant message to send. The point is that teens do NOT, even a mature teen, understand what life outside of highschool is like, or have any capacity to care for a child by themselves in today's society. They can't handle the repercussions of dealing with the often life altering consequences of a pregnancy or an STD at that age and for an adult to put that on a minor who doesn't even have a job if birth control fails or a condom breaks is extremely abusive. In some states teens can't even access an abortion without parental consent and therefore may be denied one, and for some people feeling forced into EITHER an unwanted abortion/adoption/parenting can be extremely traumatic.

What's more teens are extremely easy to manipulate into unprotected sex and statistics bear out that the rate of unprotected sex for teens with much older partners is much higher than teens with other teens. Teens are extremely vulnerable to older partners even just three or four years older.

I think not just legally, but socially we need to get a little more clear about what is or isn't ok here and create a stronger message about what that is so that at least people who want to do good can get a clearer message of what's expected of them and why. Children deserve adults to get a little more clear about it. However I do think that young adults in their late teens and early 20s are still developing and I feel like there could be a gradient in terms of sentence or "sex offender" labeling. It is definitely a complicated and not easy issue.

But I do think we can have clearer values and policies than just "if she seems mature the stat rape laws don't apply to me because those laws are useless"

There's got to be a better way as a society to deal with it than that.
posted by xarnop at 6:56 PM on December 5, 2013 [17 favorites]

Big diff between 16 and 18, and 15 and 23.
posted by elizardbits at 8:13 PM on December 5, 2013 [10 favorites]

I definitely got away with a ton of stuff because I'm white. One time I tricked my own government into fighting an illegal war based on lies so I could fund my friends companies and get cheap oil and then I let my other friends gamble away the world economy. Now I live on a farm and feel a little guilty about it but mostly I eat steak burgers I'm George W Bush btw in case you didn't get the reference. I didn't do 911 tho.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 10:07 PM on December 5, 2013 [7 favorites]

should have put in a reference to paintings of Jay Leno there, PA - oh well
posted by koeselitz at 10:41 PM on December 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

Big diff between 16 and 18, and 15 and 23.

15 and 23 is just as legal as 16 and 18 in 2/3 of Europe. I guess that's why he came up with the "world citizen" thing for her. He was in the USA though, so (tough) luck.

I could rack up 5 years (European!) prison time easily myself. Mostly as a child/juvenil though. Being white middle class and looking like an harmless little angel sure helps. Also chose your victims wisely.
posted by ZeroAmbition at 10:44 PM on December 5, 2013

If you have to justify it -
posted by From Bklyn at 11:45 PM on December 5, 2013

I haven't had the urge to shoot myself.

Sure, hold your nose and ask me why I'm retching from the smell of cat shit. The passage I quoted reeks of petty evil, as does the rest of the essay. He knows the gap between a 23-year-old man and a 15-year-old girl is unacceptable, but he has to justify it to himself because, at the end of the essay, he says he still sometimes fondly remembers her in her thin summer dress. So he trumps the girl up into a woman of the world because - get this - she'd gone to school in Europe, and he trumps himself up into a strappin' young lad who just couldn't help going for - and getting - "the most beautiful [vulnerable] woman present."

And that's aside from her grotesque father the director, who is another can of worms himself, and this bit:

She was a sweet, sweet woman, but it was destined to be over. I had a set ticket to grad school overseas and she was, well, too young.

If I ever became this dishonest, I hope I'd have the guts to get a gun and bite it.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 5:21 AM on December 6, 2013 [1 favorite]

Rustic Etruscan: "how has this man not shot himself"

Mayor Curley: "Because there's an argument to be made that a 15-year-old might be able to give knowing consent to sexual activity?"

Yeah - sorry, Mayor, but on this one Rustic Etruscan is right on the money. There is a time and place for arguments about the nuances of sexual development and the variability in age thereof; and then there's this:

I suppose it was sexual assault by definition, given her age. After a couple of hours, we made our way back to the hotel where her father’s security detail were waiting for us at the entryway. They were armed!

They brought us up to his room and I—an oft-disciplined Catholic boy—was certain it was going to be very bad. When he figured out I was a reporter, however, he brought out the Scotch. I suppose he thought he could charm me into writing a good review. I said little as he encouraged me to see more of his daughter. I wondered how she felt, hearing her father offering her up for a bit of publicity. But for that moment, I was happy to drink his Scotch rather than suffer his punishment.

I wish I could put it better than Rustic Etruscan did, but he was rather eloquent and quite correct. This man is a miserable piece of scum. He happily went back to this girl even after it became clear that she was being given to him as payment for a good review. And he has the vain arrogance to act as though her father is guilty of sin in which he himself has no part, when he is more guilty of that sin than anyone else in the story. Suicide would almost be too dignified.
posted by koeselitz at 6:51 PM on December 6, 2013

He happily went back to this girl even after it became clear that she was being given to him as payment for a good review. And he has the vain arrogance to act as though her father is guilty of sin in which he himself has no part, when he is more guilty of that sin than anyone else in the story.

Yeah, that's the crux of it, actually. As people have illustrated, her age becomes a factor when it's used against her to make her a form of currency. The ethics of their age difference is just the lead-up to the nasty ramifications.

I stand corrected, that guy is loathsome.

I should have recognized that, but I'm defensive about that sort of thing-- realizing after the fact that a peer's parents could theoretically ruin your life for something mundane and worrying about it for a couple years will do that to you.
posted by Mayor Curley at 5:40 AM on December 7, 2013 [3 favorites]