Laws
Legal Age of Consent
The legal age of consent in California is 18.
This means that someone under the age of 18 can't consent to sex, therefore any sex that is involved with someone under the age of 18 is statutory rape, even if both people involved are under 18.
The "Romeo and Juliet Clause" is a law that some states have that either invalidates or makes the punishment much less for statutory rape if the people are close in age. In California we have the version where if the defendants are within three years of age from each other the crime is a misdemeanor instead of a felony.
Gender is not a factor in law's surrounding rape, any gender can be a perpetrator or a survivor and can be prosecuted for rape and/or statutory rape.
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Alcohol and Drugs
The age of legal use of alcohol and cannabis in California is 21.
No matter whether it’s legal or not, some people are going to drink or smoke illegally, P4C knows that, but we want to remind you that decisions made when in a sexual situation while on substances have a higher possibility in resulting in sexual assault/violence due to there being a literal inability to give consent.
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Incapacitation is when someone is legally incapable of making a decision. At this point, someone can't voluntarily offer a yes or no and/or can't weight factors/ consequences.
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A person can’t legally consent when incapacitated. So sex under the influence is not consentual.
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It is very hard to tell if someone is incapacitated or not. Some people may not realize that they’ve committed sexual assault because they didn’t know the other was incapacitated and that they were just not able to give consent.