statutory rape is a crime like it or not and although we don't know the whole story we know that Haley was 15 at the time her teacher had sex with her and by the looks of it, it was her first time so it is fair that MC is angry and mad about this, it being consensual or not but lets see how they deal with it when they take a trip to their home town next month.
this is why you could have chosen to not to do anything with sandra, his relationship with her wasn't ideal anyways, not that i think sandra was a bad girl in fact i think if we could have a dedicated path for her i would play it but since day one tension was in the air between Haley and MC and i personally chose to stay on Haley dedicated path and since i didn't choose any intimate course with sandra i didn't feel that guilty about cheating on her with Haley either(although i kinda liked it if we had a choice to not go out with such a good person in the first place, but she was a bridge between us and our boss so .....)
"Statutory rape is a crime..."
It's only statutory rape if it involves sex with someone under the age of consent.
I know Americans pretty much think their laws are there for everybody, but in reality whether it is statutory rape and thus a crime very much depends on the age of consent and as far as I know that's not even 18 years old in all of the US states.
In Germany it's 14 (unless it's a relationship where the older person has power over the younger one), in fact most countries in Europe set it between 14-16, which means it wouldn't be a crime there.
Yes, Haley's Story seems to be set in the US, so it would technically be a crime there, but even given that, that doesn't change that I think that at least someone 15-16 years old is old enough to decide to willingly have sex, even if the other person is over 18.
I still think that it's wrong for a teacher to have sex with a pupil/student, but it definitely isn't rape for me if it is consensual.
In fact, I think if we are being honest we all had teachers we would have loved to have sex with, if given the chance.
And hell if I know how that would have hurt me. As if magically having sex with someone older than 18 would traumatize you and sex with someone below that age wouldn't.
For me the repressed position many Americans have in regards to sexuality has led to a culture, which pretty much denies to acknowledge that people under the age of 18 are still sexual beings (at least publicly, while at the same time having young singers strut their stuff in music videos, that look like softcore porn), but for me it's just plain wrong that a 19 year old kid gets treated like a rapist because he had consensual sex with his 17 year old girlfriend.
It's completely fucked up and has probably ruined many people's live and otoh people get girls senselessly drunk at frat parties, rape them and get of with a short probation. It's just completely insane.