Reading the news over the past few days I was surprised to see how five teens in New York City were being tried as adults in what is set to become a landmark case for the US, one of the countries with the highest number of rape cases in the world.
The teens, aged 14-17, have been arrested and are standing trial for raping an 18-year-old woman who was drinking with her father in a Brooklyn playground.
The case to try the teens as adults has struck a chord among the global community because it is something that brings with it ground realities all across the region and the world.
Teen rape is a major issue elsewhere. In India, the rape and death case of a 23-year-old medical student in New Delhi made big headlines back in December 2012.
Among the culprits was a then 17-year-old boy who was said to be the most brutal of all the rapists in that infamous case.
This rapist, whose actions could have caused the death of the victim, was released late last year after serving just three year in jail. His freedom was a big disappointment to the public and many staged a protest.
The release of the convicted rapist, which was linked to his young age, prompted the usually slow and lethargic parliament to pass the so-called "Juvenile Justice Act" that would convict a rapist aged 16-18 years old as an adult -- a two-year reduction from the previous law which regarded people over 18 years old as an adult.
Despite a protest from some lawmakers, the bill was passed on Dec 22 last year by the upper house in India.
We in Thailand are not that far from the things that are happening all around the world as is evident from the vernacular Thai media where cases of rape and other crime are splashed all over the front pages of the press, not to mention television news channels.
Although Thailand's rape cases are nowhere near the numbers seen in India or United States, the sheer number of cases that has emerged in the past few years is astonishing.
And the number of murder or other crimes committed by teens in Thailand is also high. This week, news reports of teens fatally shooting someone "by mistake" created a shock.
Brawls and killings among rival college or vocational school students have become common but yet these teens are never tried as adults.
The reason is because Thailand continues to take the benchmark of 18 years of age as the "adulthood" age, without realising the fact that children these days are maturing far faster than our generation or our parent's generation.
If you have children or nephews/nieces at the age of 10 years old (or even below 10 years), you would know what I am trying to say here.
At times they will ask questions which we in our era would not have known or thought about until we were in our teens.
The teens on the other hand are as mature as when we were in our early 20s and this is only a gap of one generation we are talking about.
Survey after survey has shown how the young generation has developed quickly over the years and with this has come the development of sexual appetite at a younger age.
This subject could be a taboo for many but we should think logically.
Surveys conducted by the Public Health Ministry over the past few years showed that a number of children at the young age of 15 have experienced their first sexual encounter. Many believe the age could be lower by a year or so.
So with these things in hand, is it not time for authorities to take the step to possibly amend the laws in accordance with the changing times?
Laws put in place in our parent's generation may not apply to our generation and certainly would not apply to future generations, and therefore it is necessary we change in accordance with time.
Rapists today could be young in terms of their ages. But given their physical maturity these days, their intentions and actions should be the determining factor in putting them on trial either as an adult or as a juvenile.
The date of birth which has been the determining factor for the past few decades needs to become an obsolete way of determining the penalty for the crimes they commit, be it rape, murder or other crimes.
Umesh Pandey is editor of Asia Focus, Bangkok Post.