13yr old fathers baby

?

What about the parents ? How on earth does a 12 year old end up in sitation where he can impregnate a girl ? This is so wrong, and actually quite sad.

I read this earlier online too. I have extremely mixed feelings about it.

On the one hand, the baby certainly doesn't look like it'll go without any love or care. But on the other.... how much support (be that educational financial or emotional) can a 13 yr old boy provide for a baby?

But the thing that really upset me, was the boy is still staying over at the 15 yr old girls house. And goes to school straight from there in the mornings. Have they learnt nothing?

My first thoughts are WTF was a 15 year old girl doing having sex with a 12 year old. Look at him, he's a baby.

I read that the Girlfriend was 15, which is really icky.

I really hope that they make the best of this situation.

Can you imagine what the "one night of unprotected sex" must have been like - 5 mins of a kee trembler maybe? I feel so sorry for the little lad - look at the size of her compared to him.

He doesn't look like he could be capable of impregnating anything.

What a messed up situation for both families.

I wonder if she'll have to sign the sex offenders register.

Seriously, what values are people teaching their children these days ?

That's what I was thinking. Am I too cynical for thinking that if I he was my son, I would be asking for a DNA test?

He's 4ft tall, according to the Torygraph.

Oh my days, as we Sarf Londoners say. ?

I thought you had to be over 16 or an adult? I did wonder myself.

Looking at him, he doesn't look like he's even hit puberty. I would personally demand a dna test if it was my son.

The argument, as far as I know, is that an under-12 cannot, under any circumstances, be able to give consent. Since he was over 12, c'est la vie.

Still revolting.

I just feel revulsion at the whole thing, particularly the fact that he looks like he should be at primary school. I remember having crushes etc at 15 and they were not on small boys.

Good lord. My first thought when I saw the picture of him and his girlfriend was that she was his mother! He is tiny, I just can not compute him being the baby's dad - the brain keeps telling me he's the brother.

Very strange - but in fairness to him, he sounds like he's going to give it a good shot.

He does look very young for a 13 year old. My brother's a quite young looking 11 and looks much older than him.

It just looks so wrong! I think it's more unnerving because he looks just a bit older than my son who is 6. He looks like the baby's older brother.

If it was a 15 year old boy getting a 12 year old girl pregnant all hell would break loose!

Those poor silly children.

Another one who would be demanding a DNA test- the article says that his voice hasn't even broken yet. So he's certainly only at the very beginning of puberty, if at all...

Disclaimer: no idea at what stage sperm production starts etc.

Am I reading this right? at first it says they wanted to have a baby, but then it says it was a night of unprotected se*x. Was it just an accident then, and they decided to keep the baby?

WseraphinaS - that boy does not look capable of fathering a child. Cannot believe she would sleep with him, that's just grotesque.

I think it's meant to read as they wanted to have the baby, as in after they discovered she was pregnant....?

It's a sad case of "children having children" the boy doesn't look much older than 8/9 imo. The girl looks alot older than him, he looks more like the baby's big brother.

Terribly sad.

Its a really sad case.

I can't imagine how she ended up in bed with him really. I had crushes as a 15 year old and they were all older by a fair way

I feel very uncomfortable with that view. If it were as simple as 'teaching values' we'd all read a book during pregnancy and society's ills would be cured.

There is, of course, a place for self discipline. And it's important that children are taught this, as well as right and wrong. However, self discipline comes from self respect and self esteem and IMHO these are things that have to be encouraged and can't be taught. We have no idea of the reasons why these two children had sex - they could have simply been irresponsible, unaware of the consequences (unlikely IMHO), too immature to assess the real risk (more likely IMHO), needing comfort or affection, one of them could have been predatory - who knows?!

As the mother of an 11 year old boy, I can only hope I have taught him right from wrong, and that he has a positive self esteem. However, in the same way as vandelism, drug taking etc, I can't physically prevent it from happening, I can only hope he is wise and self respecting enough not to risk his future by destructive activity; at some point I have to let him go.

They look like two vulnerable children to me - and the sad thing is their child is even more likely to be vulnerable. In my personal opinion, I don't think I would condone the son living with the girls' parents but, on the other hand, if he wants to take responsibility for the child it's incredibly difficult to balance, isn't it?

It's so sad, he really is just a little boy. It can't be much fun for her either. It's so scary that children can have children.

Did anyone else notice the visual resemblance between her and Karen Matthews? I noticed it when they were reviewing the papers on tv this morning.

Clairy - can you imagine that your son would even be comtemplating sex at his age though? (I don't mean that it as weirdly as that sounds!) H and I were discussing it a lunchtime and when I was 12 all the boys I knew didn't even like girls. Unless they had loads of lego (me) or had loads of other cool stuff (not me) or was good at bmx-ing! I'm only 29 so it wasn't that long ago. But it seems such an enormous shift in society. I know I don't have huge dealings with young teenagers but I can't imagine this at all!

Hmm, well that's hard to say. He's had a girlfriend his own age - who was waay more advanced than him, and they went on a date to the cinema. She wanted them to share a drink with two straws ?

Having said that, he's a middle class from a relatively stable background. I hope he feels loved and respected, we've taken great care to try to make sure he does. I think that's a mile away from some of the situations children are brought up in. J simply expects to go to university, he's eagerly contemplating careers and knows that income means a better standard of living. He knows you work hard to get what you want. He's already started to visualise the future he could lose. A child who lives in chaos may not be thinking past the next meal, let alone the rest of their lives. If they are offered affection / attention in the meantime, I can imagine it would be a heady mix.

With all due respect, I don't think it's as simple as children these days are more sexually advanced. I am 35 - I lost my virginity at 16, but remember being at a party where an 11 year old friend (I was 12) lost her virginity to a boy who was 13. I am sure it has always been thus.

Aw that's really sweet ?

I appreciate I was more naive than some people at school. And there were a sprinkling of girls who got pregnant at school but none were younger than fifth year. I don't know what I'm trying to get at really. Maybe it's the point that someone else made about at 15 you didn't fancy 12 year old boys - you fancied a 20 year old pop star (or equivalent). It's all just a little bit gross and desperately, desperately sad.

Clairy, I think thats sort of the point though, you are establishing values in your son taht will hopefully mean that he does not make these catastrophic decisions. Many parents don't. They avoid the topic until its too late; they bury there heads in the sand thinking that their child is different, or more often than not, as evidenced by the comment in The Sun, they expect schools do it for them.

Where are parents' sense of personal responsibility these days? Again, I'mrunning the risk of sounding like an old lady at the age of 27, but seriously, there is always someone/something else to blame. Schools should do better at sex education; Magazines make my 8year old daughter dress like a tart; its their genes that make them fat, nothing to do with the amount of crap I allow them to eat; my son's friends are a bad influence - they made him doit etc etc.

You cannot protect your child from everything, but it is your job as a parent, no-one elses, to teach your child right from wrong and instill asense of morals/values etc into them. You can't assume other people will do it for you.

And Clairy, I think youngsters these days are more sexually advanced. I'm only 27, and it certainly was not the norm for 12, 13 and 14 yearolds to be having sex. I lost my virginity at 18, most of my friends were between 16-18 too. I only know of one girl in my "group" who had sex at whatwe considered an early age. She was 15. I went out with my younger brother's girlfriend and her mates recently. They are aged between 18-21 and not one of them (out of 9 girls) was older than 16 when losing her virginity. Most were 14, one was 13. And sadly, I don't think they're the exception, I think they're the rule now.

I think if there's a judgement to be made here, it's on the parents who thought it was appropriate for them to share a room. I mean, wtf??

Just because he looks baby faced doesn't mean he hasn't got a whole forest of pubes down below and a man muck factory to go with them. Mildred - many boys are flogging the dolphin before they leave primary school.

I'm glad this story is so shocking as if it weren't so shocking it would be indicative of a far wider problem. I do think the boy's looks are a gift to the red tops and if he had bum fluff and zits, he'd never been in The Sun in the first place.

Macca, I think you're over generalising. Maybe it's because of my teaching background that I have seen kids in all sorts of situations - from full time carers, to those with alcoholic / addicted parents, to those with learning difficulties, to those who rebel etc etc etc. I really don't think it's fair to assume that 'some people' assume that others will bring up their kids for them - which people exactly? I can't say whether you're right or wrong because you're generalising, but I think you'd be surprised. It really isn't a them and us situation, each circumstance is different. The tragedy is the endless cycle of chaos and poverty.

I also think the point about children being sexually advanced is a moot point too. I didn't lose my virginity until I was 16, but experimented pretty heavily from the age of 13 - what's the difference really? I am sure some kids of 13 are sexually active these days, but others don't have sex until they're older. Really, I can't see that it's any different than it ever was.