Consent

Great Debates
21

This is the point in the “discussion” where you tumble ass over tea kettle back into the silly conceit you started this thread with. You seem not to have read a single critical or contradictory response to your original post or if read they apparently did not register.

Lets recap…

1: It is unreasonable and illogical and well just plain foolish to think that a man (or woman for that matter) in the throes of passion is going to STOP IN THE NAME OF LOVE and ask permission to proceed even if they are receiving tacit encouragement from the other party to keep going.

2: This “we can avoid raising rapists” statement is such a magnificent monument to clueless social engineering hubris it’s simply breathtaking. Think for a moment…of the population of potential “rapists” in the sexually active male population the ones most likely to make this unlikely little pre-coital inquiry are… well I’ll let Shakey Jake reiterate.

“If the purpose is to prevent/curtail rape and sexual assault, I don’t think it would make much difference. I just did a quick search and was unable to find data, but how many rapes are of the true “I thought she consented” variety - where she didn’t resist or voice a “no” but truly didn’t want to and felt pressure/coerced, and he innocently went ahead? Very few I would guess. And those men who coerce to obtain sex would likely coerce a “yes” to a YIP question. It’s sort of like preaching to the choir - those men who would employ YIP are the least likely to impose unwanted sex on a woman.”
To sum up, few individuals in the heat of foreplay (man or woman), are going to want to play this little “overt permission” game because it impedes the spotaneity of sex for both men and women which, quite frankly, is a major part of the appeal of the act. Normal people just aren’t wired that way physically or psychologically.

Secondly, this little overt permission tarantella assumes that a significant component of date rape is primarily a function of male cluelessness, insensitivity or stupidity and if only men were “taught to ask permission” they could be guided to the right path. I’ve got a news flash for you… it’s not.

Leaving aside the head cases who claim rape on the basis of "I didn’t say “No” but I didn’t specifically say “Yes” either and he was so eager I just let him do me without struggle or comment… and now I feel I was violated, these aside, true date rapists not insensitive, they are are rapists period. If a women says NO! and the man holds her down and penetrates her anyway this is a violent act and this type of person is the last (the very last) who will worry about “obtaining verbal consent”.

22

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I remember when they implemented this policy and I remember thinking of how ridiculous it was. May I kiss you? May I hug you? May I place my left hand on your right breast? How does one enforce such a policy?

It seems to me that it would just be a he said she said thing. Or if he forgot to ask if kissing was ok does that invalidate all the yes answers that came afterward?

Marc

23

How many women are convicted of rape for having sex with a drunk man? After all he couldn’t consent. Even if he came on to her wouldn’t it still be rape?

Marc

24

Is this true, in a legal or moral sense? Set aside the ‘passed out drunk/completely incapacitated’ scenario (obviously consent can neither be given nor implied). I go out to dinner with a woman, we have a few drinks, we both get mildly/moderately drunk, and end up in bed. Under ‘normal circumstances’ she probably wouldn’t have hopped between the sheets. So, is this rape, because “the possibility that she doesn’t want to have sex includes the possibility that she would not consent under ‘normal’ circumstances, even if she’s consenting at the time.”? I would hope not, and I shudder to think what this line of thought would portend for women in their quest to be truly treated as equals.

Shaky Jake

25

Possessed as I am of a, shall we say, aggressive personality, this has always been my own personal standard, as I don’t want my wants to overpower his. I also figure if you’re not at least talking a little bit during sex (or at least foreplay) you’re probably not enjoying yourself; I see sex as communicative, if for no other reason than to give the other person an out if they’re really not comfortable with the way things are going. So, yeah, if we’re kissing and whatnot and things start to progress, I will stop and say, “OK, you sure you want to do this?” I totally leave the decision up to them, because I have no problem saying no. And, yes, there have been times where he’s pulled back and said, “Um, yeah, maybe not.” Fortunately, most of the time it’s “Shut up and kiss me!” :slight_smile:

Esprix

26

Yes, if you believe or are aware that if your partner would not consent if he or she were sober and you have sex with him/her, that is morally rape (IMHO) and in many states legally rape as well.

What do you think this portends for women’t quest to be treated as equals?

27

I wasn’t speaking about a priori knowledge that a partner would not consent sober, and then getting them drunk to take advantage of them (but this still presents some problems)

Nothing in that about knowing she wouldn’t consent under “normal circumstances”. So, I am morally guilty of rape, and perhaps legally guilty as well, if we go out, have a great time, a few drinks, jump into bed - she enthusiastically - and unbeknownst to me she wouldn’t have done so under normal circumstances?

This is where the ill winds blow for women’s equality, and some - but by know means all - feminists don’t quite get this. It comes down to being accountable and responsible for ones’ own actions. I didn’t pour liquor down her throat against her will. She willingly imbibed. I didn’t coerce her into bed. She was a willing partner. I have no possible way of discerning what her intentions/inclinations would have been under identical circumstances excepting level of sobriety. Yet I am still responsible for her actions. This harkens back to the 50s or earlier, with women having to be sheltered, treated differently, protected, because they are less capable. If I have to suffer the consequences of my behavior when I’m drunk, so does this hypothetical woman. She was drunk, her judgement was impaired, and she did something she didn’t want to do? Yea, me too; get in line, I’m on the pity pot right now ( as someone earlier asked, why doesn’t she get charged with rape - I was drunk and of diminished capacity myself). One set of rules for everyone - you’re responsible for your own behavior.

Picture this little male chauvinist rant: " Well little Missy, heh heh, y’all just can’t handle your liquor, can ya? Might be just best if ya didn’t drink at all - who knows what ya might do. Oh, maybe you can handle one of those fru-fru wine spritzers, but you better leave the hard stuff to us big boys. Fact is, you women don’t know quite what you want most of the time, do ya? Changing your mind, all flighty, doing stuff you don’t want to because…hell, I don’t know why you end up in that pickle. Maybe your minds just aren’t as strong as us men’s’. Better leave all the heavy lifting in this ole’ world to us men. We put you in charge of some corporation or somethin’… who knows what you’re likely to do from one day to the next - you sure don’t. You jump into bed, and then you decide next day that you didn’t want to, and it’s the man’s fault. No sir, you better man handle the important things. Run along now and fix me something to eat."

Do you get it? I need someone to finish my thought here, because I’ve been sitting for some time now trying to find the right words, but once you abdicate responsibility for your own actions, or assign responsibility for your actions to someone else, you give up…(this is where my problem is)…credibility…autonomy. If you’re not responsible for your actions, then perhaps someone else should make your decisions for you -keep you from making those bad decisions.

Part of freedom is the freedom to make our own bad choices.

Shaky Jake

28

What about if a woman wants to, and uses alcohol as an excuse to say yes? Let me give an example to clarify what I mean. A few years ago I was working in a mall. In a store across from me was a cute chick. We talked a lot, ended up dating for about two weeks. We never did anything more than kiss and a bit of petting. We broke it off and stayed friends. A few weeks later the Superbowl rolls around. She invites me out with some of the people she works with. We get drunk, end up in bed together. We talk some the next day, and what happened was this. She wanted to sleep with me, and didn’t have the courage or something to do it sober. So is that rape? She gave consent drunk that she would not have given sober. But she knew going in that that would be the outcome.

29

The problem of drunken consent isn’t really that she’s too drunk to consent; it’s that, from your perspective, you can’t consider her to have ‘normally’ consented. That means that you’re going ahead with the act without her responsible consent, which is rape, depending on the aftermath. If she says “I wouldn’t have done it if I was sober”, you can’t reply “but I honestly believed you consented”

Look at it this way: I’m sure you’ve done something freakishly stupid while drunk, something that you would never, ever do when sober. In that case, it’s clearly the fact that you were fucked up that you did it, and you can’t be said to have decided to do this embarassing thing in the same way that you decide to do something embarassing out of normal poor judgement or just a sober mistake.

This is the position in which a woman can be when she has sex while drunk - she wakes up the next morning, remembers what happens, and is immediately horrified at what she’s done. Maybe she gave in to an insistent frat boy; maybe she slept with her brother. If she made a booze-soaked decision that she would never make otherwise, one can’t say that she ‘normally’ consented. It’s analogous to duress: a woman who consents to sex because I’m holding a knife to her throat is not ‘normally’ consenting.

If you’re in a long-term relationship, or you two got drunk while acknowledging sex would happen, or you know that the woman regularly gets drunk and has sex, then you can be fairly confident that, under ‘normal’ circumstances, she would consent. In these cases, you’re confident enough that she won’t regret it that you’re willing to risk it. But think about that: you’re still risking it. She may reflect and decide that, at the very least, you took advantage of her.

In your case, Nanook, this woman had decided previously, and continuously during the whole time, that she wanted to have sex with you, so there probably wasn’t a point at which she was confronted with the decision while being too drunk to consent. I’d say it’s not rape.

Drunken consent is a very hazy area, given that the lack of responsible or ‘normal’ consent is a matter of degrees, depending on how drunk one is, how one normally drinks, etc. Personally, I stay very far on the safe side, and won’t sleep with a woman the first time if she’s noticeably drunk.

This puts me in mind of a long story. If you don’t want to bother, skip to the next post.

I was seeing a girl who was studying Victorian literature at the time. She was fascinated by the idea of ravishment - rape to which a woman secretly consents.

The idea is that there can be pleasure from being made powerless, and in a complete freedom from responsibility for sex. In rape, a man (generally) forces a woman to have sex against her will; in ravishment, a man forces a woman to have sex against her apparent will, but in accordance with her secret desires.

You can see how fucked up the Victorians were. There were other issues, like a Victorian women being so noble and pure, and a man so base and vile, that he worships her so much that he can’t control himself, and forces himself upon her in a fit of lust. That makes the woman the passively powerful one. It also gave Victorian women an opportunity to have and enjoy sex in a time when women were supposed to “lie back and think of England”.

So this woman I was seeing teased me nearly to death, and said things like “no doesn’t always mean no” and “sometimes, you have to be forceful”. My suspicians were confirmed after we broke up: she wanted me to ravish her. She couldn’t tell me that, because then it would be a rape game, and not really ravishment, since she wouldn’t be truly powerless with a safety word available. Also, she hadn’t driven me to a mad frenzy of passion in which I lost all control.

It was pretty clear to me what she wanted me to do, but I couldn’t do it. As I thought about it, I was raping her either way, and hoping to find out afterwards that I’d only ravished her, which would have been okay. That idea scared the hell out of me, and I held off. In retrospect, I made the right decision: I would have had to be a rapist, whether it was a ravishment or not.

For me, this has always illuminated the essential dilemma of consensual sex: unless consent is constantly clear by word or action, there’s always a certain risk the man is taking that he will obtain consent afterwards, in one form or another. Generally, the risk is so miniscule that it’s pragmatically nonexistent. But it’s always there.

30

Rosie wrote:

The same thing is (or at least was) true at Antioch College, which is in the San Francisco Bay Area. And under these same Antioch College rules, you are completely and totally forbidden to boink someone who is drunk. (As Bill Maher commented on Politically Incorrect, “Do these people ever get laid?!”)

31

hansel wrote:

This seems to be the central theme of every novel written by Rosemary Rogers.

And of that scene between Dominique Francon and Howard Roarke in Ayn Rand’s novel The Fountainhead.

32

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Uh, “depending on the aftermath”? Either it’s rape, or it’s not - the aftermath has nothing to do with it.
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Explain to me why not. How does her irresponsible/regrettable behavior become my problem? Again, we’re not talking about any coercion - she drank, she got drunk, she hopped in bed. Taken to an extreme, we better call off sex entirely. There are a multitude of reasons why someone might engage in an act today that yesterday or tomorrow they wouldn’t have: I was happy, I just got a raise, I felt unusually lonely, I woke up horny for the first time in my life…in other words, under “normal circumstances” they would have behaved differently.

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Absolutely - I’ve done more than I care to remember. But in each instance, I was responsible for my behavior, I was accountable for what I did. It wasn’t someone else’s fault for not saving me from myself.

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  1. I notice you didn’t say “wake up horrified at what he did to her”. She did it, was a willing participant. She wakes horrified about it, and it’s his problem? He raped her because she did something she later regrets?
  2. Men wake up horrified sometimes too. Is the woman I slept with a rapist?

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Please. You may like to think it is analogous to holding a knife to her throat, but it is far from so. In fact, that is a horrible analogy. I’ll leave it at that; I’ll get too pissed if I have to explain the vast difference between the two.

I said it before: if you start abdicating responsibility for your actions, you give up your autonomy. You get drunk and sleep with someone you otherwise wouldn’t have slept with? Life is like that sometimes - we make mistakes, and we (hopefully) learn from them. What one shouldn’t do is blame others for one’s mistakes. The “I was drunk or I wouldn’t have slept with him so it’s rape” line is unseemly, and insulting to women, as it implies that women are less capable and shouldn’t be responsible for their actions and decisions. You can’t be responsible for your decisions? Fine, we’ll make them for you, or keep you in a position where your decisions are inconsequential. And we’re back in what were bad days for women and men.

That’s not the world I want to live in, nor do I think most women want to live in it either
Shaky Jake

33

It’s rape if she doesn’t consent. The question of whether or not it’s rape arises from your limited perspective (i.e., you don’t know what’s going on in her head): she doesn’t say ‘yes’, and she doesn’t say ‘no’, so you assume that the lack of a ‘no’ is a yes, and you continue. If she’s stone cold sober, her lack of a ‘no’ (or its non-verbal equivalent) is almost a certainly an implicit ‘yes’, because you assume she’s aware of what you’re doing, and would stop you if she wanted you to stop. If she’s barely conscious from all her drinking, is her lack of a ‘no’ still an implicit ‘yes’? If she comes around long enough to realize that a man’s on top of her, humping away, and can’t make herself heard if she can even form the thought to say ‘stop’, is there still an implicit ‘yes’? (the last happened to a friend, and I’m willing to call it a rape).

Well, let’s be clear. I’m not talking about a girl who got giggly off a few margueritas, or even got hammered in a bar and woke up next to someone. I’m talking about a woman who goes near to automatism, and finds herself in a position where her drunken judgement tells her to get it over with because she doesn’t have the strength to stop it.

Frankly, a woman who gets drunk and comes on strong has very little claim to rape. Responsibility doesn’t disappear with alcohol.

It’s a legitimate fear for a man that a woman will accuse him of rape in a borderline case where people will be willing to at least believe that he took advantage of her. Post-coital regret is not the same as an inability to consent. But at the far end of being drunk and still vertical, you must admit that the choices made are so far from perfect as to be effectively determined by the alcohol.

You’re always responsible for your actions, no matter how drunk you are, or under duress, insofar as you have to live with the consequences, and will (hopefully) learn from the experience. But it’s ridiculous to say that in every case, you are totally and completely responsible, when circumstances obviously determine your decision.

34

It seems we’re talking about different circumstances, and largely agree. My post of 7/27, where this veered off into the nature of consent:

I thought I had made clear that I was talking about someone who was “mildly/moderately drunk” and willingly - enthusiastically even - bedded someone down, but perhaps I didn’t make that clear enough.

I was specifically responding to this:

I took “consenting at the time” to mean some outward display(s) of willingness - a verbal “oooh I want you inside me” or a nonverbal action, such a helping me disrobe, disrobing herself,(you get the picture) - and objected to the implication of “he should have known I didn’t want to despite all appearances and despite my actions, so he raped me”.

I still have some problems with the “not knowing what’s going on in her head” bit - we never know what’s going on in someone else’s head, we only infer it by their various means of communication - but that is likely a whole 'nother discussion

Shaky Jake

35

And if the woman has engaged in kissing, fondling, groping etc., on the sofa and then removes her own clothing, takes the guy by the hand and leads him into the bedroom and onto the bed and then says “I wouldn’t be doing this if I wasn’t drunk?” Is the guy supposed to stop? If he does have sex with her, is he a rapist? What if he says “Neither would I” and then they do have sex?

This actually happened to me, back in the late fifties, before women were “allowed” to have sex freely.