Is it rape to have sex with someone who has been ordered to have sex with you...

In My Humble Opinion
1

by someone OTHER than you, when the prospective lover cannot refuse that order?

There’s a thread going on in CS that mentions Star Trek: specifically the notion that Captain Kirk had sex with a different alien chick every week. This thread led me to a website purporting to debunk that notion, that web site specifically mentions an episode in which Jimmy-Boy, while captive on some duplicate-Roman-empire planet, finds a slave girl in his bed. Said girl has been sent to seduce him so that he’ll be more amenable to his captors’ demands.

I remember this episode, and I’ve always assumed he had sex with the slave girl. I don’t think he was EASY about it, but he did it. Not some much because she was hot (which she was) but because he’d figure if he rejected her they would (a) punish her and (b) send someone else to seduce her, and if he rejected the second girl he’d be back to (a). And, of course, the slave girl was hot.

Anyway, this thread is not about that episode; otherwise it would be in CS. It is instead about the ethical dilemma. Would you be willing to have sex with a person under the circumstances named? Why or why not?

2

Well, the simple question is: are they capable of giving consent?

So on one extreme, you can say that, Yes, it is rape since one party cannot give their consent and therefore, it is always wrong.

On the other extreme, you can say that cultural norms create, approve and reinforce this situation, so that, No, it isn’t rape, it’s a condition of servitude. That slaves are not legally or morally entitled to their own consent.

The truth lies somewhere in the gray area in the middle.

Personally, if I found myself in a similar situation, there’d be a hundred questions that would determine my actions. If they would harm her (and possibly me) if I failed to take advantage of her, and if they were checking to see if I did, and if she was not disagreeable to the proposition; then hell yes, I’d fuck her! But if they were going to harm her if she didn’t, but she didn’t want to, and they were NOT checking to make sure that I did; then I wouldn’t touch her, but I’d lie and say that I did.