No, how will that help? You have a young mother, probably ill-equipped, and a baby on the way. What form of punishment is going to make that situation improve?

It is a crime already. A crime of Stupidity

It already carries a life sentence!

You must be kidding! Let's make everything in the whole wide world a crime.

no. there is no law of how old someone must be when they are "allowed" to have sex, nor SHOULD there be a law about tht. the way people live their life is their own business. making a law that teenage pregnancy is a crime would be giving the government waaaaaay too much power over our lives. no one should have the right to tell a person tht they are not old enough to be a parent, so they have to be punished by the government. we need to seperate personal opinions from whats fair when it comes to making laws. this is America people: land of the FREE. we should be free to live the way we want.....without people telling us we CANT do this, and we CANT do tht...

That would be stupid. Being a teen parent is hard enough without being labeled criminal on top of it. How does a jail sentence or fine help the teen parents raise the child better?

NO. wouldnt that lead to MORE abortions?

NO!

No. It's like closing the barn door after the horse got out. Too little, too late. Unfortunately, unlike closing the barn door, there would be a great many negative things that would come from it. Teens would still have sex, but illegal abortion rates would be on the rise (and/or we'd be finding more babies in dumpsters). Those who choose to continue the pregnancy would be put in an even more difficult position, etc. I do disagree with the person who said there should not be a minimum age for sex. There must be laws about the minimum age as well as acceptable age gaps for minors having sex with adults. If there were not, our children would be left susceptable to pedophiles and we would have no way to get them off the streets. (Except an old fashioned lynch mob, of course.) Those who are having sex under the age of consent are not nor should they be criminalized. They need to be better educated.

No. What if a teen wants to get pregnant and the parents are ok with that? While I may think it's a bad decision, it's a personal choice and they have a right to make that choice.

Execution sounds like a suitable punishment.

Yes why not, teen parents are treated like scum anyway :P

no, if it is accidentally!

no! speaking biologically, humans should be reproducing as soon as they feel necessary, be it 20 or 15! (although nowadays education and careers limit things rather annoyingly...)

Is misdirected passion a crime or a lack of self control?

No, because it would be silly if someone could get married at sixteen, but get punished for breaking the law by getting pregnant three years later.

If the girl is underage and the guy is not it already is a crime. Who are the criminals here? Parents perhaps for not raising their kids to have pride in their bodies and not pass them around like cheap beer? :)

WHAT!!!???? Boy is this a misdirected application of the idea that everyone must go to college. It used to be more common to have children in your teen years than later, and perfectly respectable, provided you were married and settled first. I truly believe it is academia that is selling this idea that teen pregnancy is bad, because they want to milk $40,000 t0 $250,000 out of you first, depending on the college and your course of study. No, we don't want young teens having babies, but if high schools were still doing their jobs, an 18 year old would be set to make a living and hopefully in a decent job just after graduation. My grandparents were, and that was during the Depression. We still need electricians and plumbers and mechanics, and a trade track graduate should be able to be a journeyman plumber and making enough to support a child, if we hadn't nearly criminalized trade tracks in high school. It is absolutely ridiculous how we are robbing kids of their early productivity in relentless competition for a few top jobs. We've managed to extend childhood to almost thirty now. Its bad for kids, its increases dropouts rather that decreasing them, and its bad for the economy. I think its time to let go of this idiocy and try to build a productive economy again, built on responsible, married young people.