fuck off you idiot.
Maybe I am not getting this right. If she is passed out they should lock him up. If she was just high or drunk then she should be held accountible for her own actions and her attorney should be taken out back.
BIG DADDY
Just clarifying.
Thats utter BS. Any law that equates drunkeness as automatic incapacitation belittles the status of the adult to being a child that must be protected by the law. If being drunk means an automatic “no” to sexual advances (just as insanity or being underaged) then it must be equal to both sexes. If a drunk man has sex with a sober woman, then that man can call rape as well. And what happens if both say they are drunk? If thats a quick acquittal, I’d claim to be drunk as well, wheres the proof?
The example given by BioHazard is the drunk woman forcing herself on a sober man where the man relented. That is not rape.
California law:
Date Rape
n. forcible sexual intercourse by a male acquaintance of a woman, during a voluntary social engagement in which the woman did not intend to submit to the sexual advances and **resisted the acts by verbal refusals, denials or pleas to stop, and/or physical resistance. **The fact that the parties knew each other or that the woman willingly accompanied the man are not legal defenses to a charge of rape, although one Pennsylvania decision ruled that there had to be some actual physical resistance.
I agree with BIG_DADDY, people should start taking responsibility for their actions And they should not use the legal system to bludgeon bad dates for their irresponsibility.
In the past confusion between having a fantasy of something and actually wanting it happen has lead jurors to acquit rapists. There was a case I read where a guy read a diary of a woman without her consent and used the rape fantasy therein to excuse his rape of her and the jury bought it. Also admitted in the case was the fact that she was sleeping in the nude. Note she did not know him intimately and did resist and was beaten and injured during the attack.
Fantasy, especially sexual fantasy does not mean you want something to happen. I have sexual fantasies that don’t even involve me that do involve various forms of non-consensual violence that I think should never really happen to anyone. I am aroused by the story of O, but I do not in anyway want to participate in that sort of scenario. Conflating fantasy for wishes or even actual consent is henious and has lead to actual rapists going free.
It is ok to have sex with a woman up to the point where she says no (verbally or physically) and in the event she is incapacitated (unconsious, incoherant, deluded, demented, physically restrained or mentally coerced) then the law decides for her.
Yes but IIRC 3 times the “court” (it was a campus court) decided that it WAS rape of the girl by the guy.
This is the “Lack Case” at brown unniversity. She didn’t pressure the guy into sex, but she was found to be the sexual aggressor.
http://www.brown.edu/Students/ACLU/ILack.html
So by CA law a guy cannot be date raped by a girl? Thats discrimination!
Rule of thumb:
Unless she is capable of saying “yes” the answer is no. Everyone should know and understand that.
Absolutely agreed.
But (and you knew there would be a but) - what are the legal guidelines regarding one person’s ability to ascertain whether or not another person is “capable” of saying “yes”? And, no, I’m not talking about a girl being falling-down, slurring drunk - that behavior is easily recognizable, and your point stands - she’s not capable of sex, so the answer is “no”, no matter what she says.
But there’s a line in there somewhere, and I can’t figure out where it is. Examples:
Scenario 1: Guy/girl go out, she has a few drinks, she’s presenting as a reasonably sober person - a little giddy, a little happy perhaps, but having a great time, talking clearly, walking straight. He thinks she’s sober, or at least still mentally cognizant. In reality, she’d blow over the legal limit in a breathalyzer. Should the guy have sex with her? If she’s *legally * drunk, but presenting as sober (i.e. capable of consent), is the guy still raping her if she consents?
Scenario 2: Guy/girl go out, they both have drinks, get a little (or a lot) drunk. They have sex. She regrets it the next morning. Did he rape her? Wasn’t he too drunk to give consent, also? How, in his drunken state, should he be expected to recognize that she, in her drunken state, didn’t really mean the “yes” that she gave the previous night?
In other words, the girl is allowed to get drunk, and should not be responsible for her actions. But if the guy gets drunk, he is responsible for not only his own actions, but by extension, her actions as well.
As a woman, I have zero understanding or sympathy for men who rape - be it stranger rape, acquaintance rape, date rape, you name it.
But I wonder if someone can explain how the alcohol factor/capacity to consent can be handled in a manner that seems fair to both parties in the equation?
Excuse me? Where does it say that Mary has SEX in order to conceive Jesus?
No sex, no rape.
Actually, deborak, I’d have to say it was rape in neither scenario. If a woman says yes, regardless of whether she’s drunk or sober, then she has given consent. If she knows she’s inclined to say yes when she’s drunk, perhaps she should either drink less or be careful of whom she gets drunk with.
I have little tolerance for people who rape and even less for those who then try to claim the victim somehow asked for it, but I don’t expect people to read minds. I haven’t been in that position, but I would hope I wouldn’t say yes to anyone when I was drunk who I wouldn’t say yes to when I was sober. Then again, I’m a bit prudish and hopelessly blunt. When I say no, I do mean it. When I’ve said yes, I also mean it just as whole heartedly.
CJ
Well, I’ll be honest with you - there have been a couple of times where I’ve had a bit much to drink and regretted it the next morning. The difference? I hit myself over the head for my stupid behavior, rather than claiming “rape”. I wouldn’t expect the guy to be able to judge either my level of drunkenness or my capacity to consent.
But the way I’m reading some of these laws (and maybe I’m wrong), it sure seems that the law puts an awful lot of pressure on the guy to be able to ascertain whether the woman is capable of consent. As I said, falling down drunk is a no-brainer. The rest of the time, judging a person’s capacity to consent by the amount they’ve had to drink seems like a proposition doomed to failure.
The solution, for me, is to be very, very careful about drinking now, especially with first dates*. But, see, the onus is on me, not the guy. Just my way of dealing with the risks.
*Obviously, if the guy drugs the girl without her knowledge, that’s an entirely different scenario.
Rape is always the rapist’s fault. It is wrong (and morally obscene) to suggest that rape is ever all the woman’s fault, in the sense of exonerating her attacker from blame.
The reason some people (including me) are hesitant to say that rape is never the woman’s “fault” is that it’s too much like saying there’s nothing a woman can do to avoid being raped. Thinking like that will result in more women being raped, and none of us want that on our conscience.
what do you define as rape - the definition has been broadened over the years and I don’t think this statement is true anymore.
Let me see if I understand this correctly. Are you saying that if a rapist buys someone dinner or takes them to a movie, then it’s not really rape anymore, or just a lesser form of rape?
Yes, it’s still rape, but at least you aren’t going to be charged with it. If your partner tells you that it’s perfectly fine to have sex with them while they’re sleeping before you have sex with them, then it’s not rape in any sense of the word.
Another “depends what you mean by fault”.
If you mean fault in the sense of causality, yes, it can be the victim’s fault.
However, if you mean fault in the sense of moral responsibility then no, never, absolutely not.
Rape is sex without one partner’s consent. I would hope that is fairly clear.
“Broadened” definitions that include sex where both parties consent are not rape. Where there was an actual rape, I stand by my statement that it is always the rapist’s fault.
Right. Under the standard defintion of rape (an assualt) it is not really a sex-crime so much as an act of violence. Thus, “revealing clothes” or “going into a bad area” are NOT, repeat not a cause for rape. So- if it is an assault-type rape- then the answer is clearly NO! “Asking for it by her revealing clothes”- is such bullshit.
However, we then get into current “PC” definitions of rape, which include such things as “saying yes to sex when one is too drunk to really completely understand & give the consent”. Then we get doubtful, and it depends on “facts & circumstances”. Did the “rapist” intentionally get the “rapee” drunk to have his way- knowing her sober answer would be no? (in this case, yes, it is “rape”) Or did the dude truly think he had informed consent- being as she got drunk on her own, and prior encounters had led him to a reasonable beleif that this “was the night”? In that sort of case I would still not want to use the word “fault” for the victim, but the facts & circumstances would indicate some responsibility on her side. As Deborak so wisely said these laws do place an awful lot of pressure on the guy to ascertain her level of informed consent. IMHO- in SOME cases- an unfair amount. SOME level of responsibility must be born by both sides.
Here is some of the problems I have with your earlier statement that rape is always the rapist fault.
Quite clear but there is a obvious difference between ‘without one’s consent’ and actually being told ‘no’ or ‘stop’.
If you are told to stop and don’t that is unquestionably rape, if she (lets use she as our victim here) has not consented but does not say anything as he (lets use he as our potential rapist) starts doing the deed, I’m not so sure we have rape here; if we do I would say it is partially if not entirely her fault for not letting him know to stop. However I would call it rape if she was passed out, heavily drugged, too scared to say stop.
I’m saying that calling this rape takes away from the word rape. Rape used to mean something like a stranger beating, stripping and $#&*% you, most likely leaving you for dead. This is a horrible horible crime. I just can’t see date rape in the same light and I think a new term should be used as not to dilute the meaning of rape (perhaps non-consenting sex).
This is not to say that daterape can’t turn into a nasty rape with beating and such, but it is not used as such. It has gone so far as regretting who you slept with in the morning is now called rape by some.
My main point from before is that the word rape has been so diluted that instead of thinking of a horrible crime you are thinkig of what the person really menas by rape - is it the horrible crime or did she wake up with second thoughts?
Just a guess here, but I’d be willing to bet that most rape victims would prefer the beating over the rape.
Unlike raping the person with whom you just had dinner, this is not rape.
k2dave, while rape is one horror I’ve been spared, I would think that being raped by someone trusted would be every bit as horrible a crime as anything a stranger would do. May be more so, because there are a lot more people who will blame the victim or diminish the seriousness of the crime because she knew the perpetrator.
If consent is denied, what takes place is rape, whether it’s the proverbial stranger in the bushes or the guy who won’t take “No” for an answer. Speaking for myself, I’m likely to be on guard against the stranger in the bushes. I’m a lot less shielded on dates.
CJ