I agree. It’s revolting.
Against my better judgement…
First, let me say that there may be cultural differences between our countries, and I apologize that I am not completely conversant with what is implied by the wedding vows taken in Britain. For all I know, killing or raping one’s spouse in may be not only accepted, but in fact lauded when one or the other has a bit too much drink. If so, please let me know and I’ll confine my comments to *this * country alone.
However, assuming that our countries “have really everything in common nowadays except, of course, language”, your argument is (of course) ludicrous. The woman in your example had every opportunity to go for a walk, take in a movie, read a good book on a park bench, but instead chose to go for the cleaver because she had “been provoked”. What is the threshold of provocation? Someone who “won’t shut up and goes on for hours”? Paperboy who left the paper in the rain? The idiot in the car behind you who won’t stop honking even though you can’t go anywhere?
I’m comparing it to murdering a random stranger completely unprovoked, not to going for a walk.
I think I actually kind of see what Cryptoderk is saying–there’s a difference in sentencing between crimes committed in the heat of the passion (I think the term is manslaughter, but I know Jodi or Bricker will come in to correct me) versus cold-blooded premeditated murder.
But from a moral standpoint, dead is still dead–just as raped is still raped.
But what a woman should or should not do is in tandem with taking precautions(and by the way I wouldn’t dream of saying such a thing * after the fact * of a tragic incident). The way I see it,the OP had a frightening experience that thankfully had a happy ending. So, now maybe she is more aware of the fact that as selfsufficient and aware of her surroundings as she may be, there are some situations that simply are not a very wise idea to put oneself in. That a man should not rape anyone is kind of a given and not really worthy of discussion. As far as the man in the OP, it’s not his responsibility to make her or anyone feel comfy and cozy. You want to be a denizen of the night; be prepared to deal with others who might be out late. I mean, it’s inappropriate for him to approach her late at night in a deserted laundromat, but it’s a-ok for her to * be * in said laundromat? Why is doing laundy at midnight any more “normal” than a dude just hanging out? What’s he to make of the situation? He didn’t assault or otherwise commit a crime against her, so let’s get off the rape angle for a moment.
She’s pissed because he made her feel uncomfortable. The reason she was uncomfortable was because it was late at night and she was in a deserted location. That tells me that somewhere in her own mind she knew she could possibly be in dangerous situation * to begin with *. I think the poster who mentioned her lack of personal responsiblity said it best. Hell no she’s not responsible for another’s actions, but she is responsible for not putting herself in harm’s way. If you don’t think a woman, alone after midnight in a deserted location isn’t a potentially dangerous situation (please note; I am not saying anything resembling “asking for it”) then I’m afraid we’ll have to agree to disagree.
Idiot. Try reading my post again. I said that the woman could have gone for a walk rather than murder her husband. Not a random stranger. Even with the logic that you are exhibiting here, I still have to believe that you deliberately misunderstood.
However, look at it this way. The victim in question is your brother, and you find that he was just murdered. Would you say “Gee, I’m so glad that it was his wife who chopped him up and stuffed him in a steamer trunk, rather than a random stranger?”
Yes, the woman could have gone for a walk rather than murder her husband. So what?
All I was saying is that the murder this hypothetical woman committed was less bad than one in which she killed a random stranger for no reason. Do you disagree with that?
I apologize. Your wording was terse, and I thought you were twisting my words.
Very well - I do disagree. I don’t consider a marriage license (or an informal relationship for that matter) to be an excuse for assault or murder. If the woman had a reasonable means at her disposal of distancing herself from the thing that offended her, and instead chose violence, then no - she is no different then someone who took a life of a random stranger.
In fact, given the example that you posted, someone who took the life of a random stranger could well be mentally ill, and therefore deserving of some leniency. Assuming that woman was sane, then she had a tendency toward violence, and a low threshold of self restraint. If she could be provoked to violence once, then presumably she could be provoked again.
It’s nice to see marital rape taken so seriously. Less than thirty years ago, when I was in junior high school, it was not a crime in the U.S. to rape your wife. In fact, there was no such thing as raping your wife, because your wife agreed to have sex with you when you got married.
There was a lot of discussion about this when lawmakers started to consider making marital rape a crime. I heard a whole lot of people voice the same thoughts that cryptoderk has voiced.
Geez, I just realized this thread really got hijacked.
Uh oh. :eek:
So you’re chiding her for putting herself into a risky situation, but also ridiculing the idea that she felt at risk?
What the fuck? Did I somehow pass through a wormhole into the Moron Universe?
Uh, maybe I’m the one in a wormhole, but aren’t they the same thing? Forgive me if I’m not understanding what you’re trying to say.
No, I’d say they’re more like opposites. “You were dumb to put yourself at risk. You were also dumb for feeling scared, because you weren’t really at risk.”
I suppose a true risk would take the form of a wild-eyed psychopath holding a dripping machete, and not a chivalrous young knight out and about after midnight, smoking pot in public and performing his one-man “neighborhood watch” duties for the fairer sex.
I remember a story about the so-called “Thirty-Second Rapist”, but I don’t remember that he was hearing-impaired - only that it took him a whole thirty seconds to get that she was serious about wanting him to stop, after they’d been consensually going at it for a while. There was something about money or property being involved as well, as in it was financially to her and some other woman’s benefit for him to go to prison. Obviously an open-and-shut case exactly as if he’d dragged her off the street, held a rusty knife to her throat, and violated her while ignoring her anguished screams.
Last I heard, he’d been sprung, but I believe a substantial amount of the intended damage had already been done.
Where does this go? Well, maybe to the conclusion that the phrase “every woman knows a woman who has been raped” may well be true and I shan’t even say "for a given value of ‘raped’ " but it still doesn’t imply a grave risk of actual harm to a woman alone in a laundromat at midnight.
Yeah, this guy was not keeping an eye on me to make sure I was all right, or some shit. He had a distinct aura of creepiness about him. I needed more quarters to finish drying my laundry, but had no more cash and didn’t want to drive to the 7-11 to get some because I honestly thought if left alone he’d steal my underpants or something. Not a normal guy.
I figured I’d get a lot of shit for “putting myself at risk” but I did not see the situation as terribly risky until Creepy showed up.
(WOOKINPANUB, I’m not sure what neighborhood you were thinking of, and how 9th and 30th could be worse than that. It’s a fair to middling neighborhood, not an affluent, low-crime area but not the ghetto. 9th and 30th S, maybe not so great, but 9th and 30th N just a normal working class/middle class neighborhood. I live on 8th St and 3rd N, to give you an idea of my frame of reference. I don’t find this neighborhood (or most others in the city) to be terribly frightening.)
I want to emphasize that I did not see the situation as an unreasonable risk when I arrived. Not a horrible neighborhood (just not the greatest), cops hang out at the 7-11 down the street. Several things made me uncomfortable-
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The appearance of Mr. Creepy walking down the street. Like I said, foot traffic and even bicycle traffic in that neighborhood after 11 is unusual. That alerted me that something was a little off.
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His decision to sit down at the bus stop, when no buses were running, and he had clearly seen me walk into the laundromat. People that sit at bus stops at night usually do it because they have no other place to go or they’re up to no good. Now, if he had unrolled a blanket and slept on it, not too scary, because I’d say homeless people sleeping on bus stop benches do not frighten me or appear to pose a significant risk. I encounter them often in my neighborhood.
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His approaching me and asking for a light, then offering me pot. Now he definitely knows I’m here alone, and the second sentence out of his mouth involves an illegal activity. Whether you believe pot should be legal or not, a person who will approach a complete stranger and with no other indication that I might be “cool” (no conversation before making the offer, I wasn’t wearing a Legalize It shirt, etc) making an offer to smoke me out strikes me as off in some way. I could be an off-duty cop, I could call the cops, whatever.
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Finally, his decision to sit in the laundromat with me when I made it clear his presence was not welcome. In hindsight I wish I had told him, “Get the fuck out of here and bother someone else you creepy fucking bastard,” but I didn’t.
It pissed me off because it doesn’t take a whole lot of common sense to figure out that a woman who is alone at night would be frightened by the attention of a man. It pisses me off that men don’t realize that in general, most women would not welcome the attention of a strange man, even at 3 in the afternoon on a bustling street in plain view of other people. Don’t say “Hey, baby” as you ride by on your bike, don’t ask me where I’m going or what I’m up to as I walk home from the convenience store at noon. Does that really work for you, or are you trying to figure out whether I’m a prostitute or not? (must be a really unsuccessful one if you think that, considering I don’t wear clothes that show off the goods and actively avoid catching the eye of passing gentlemen)
I refuse to live in fear. Most people make judgement calls on how much risk they’re willing to take, otherwise no one would leave their house. I don’t feel I was in the wrong by choosing to do laundry alone at night, because I’ve got a rather nocturnal schedule these days and I needed to get it done ASAP. I think I take necessary precautions by being aware of my surroundings, especially at night or when alone, and being capable of defending myself (for example, I’ve taken down a friend who is 6’, 200 pounds and put him in a full nelson when he was drunk and trying to start a fight with another friend of mine because he was mad he was dating his ex-girlfriend. I also went to a rough high school and got in a lot of fights, and most of my friends can attest that I don’t start fights, I finish them). Getting a knife would not be a bad idea, I should check out the applicable laws.
I think the problem is different experiences. I didn’t come from a great neighborhood, I didn’t go to a great school, I’ve lived in shitty neighborhoods because I couldn’t afford any better. Hell, I still live in what many would see as a dodgy neighborhood. A fun pasttime while sitting on my friend’s porch and chatting is playing “count the crackheads.” What strikes me as a “bad” neighborhood or “risky” situation obviously differs from others. Not that I’ve ever lived in a straight-up ghetto (well, IMO anyway), but wouldn’t you think that someone who did grow up in a neighborhood where an outsider would lock their car doors and pray not to hit a red light would see that neighborhood as normal and keeping an eye out for crackheads as par for the course?
Someone who grew up in lily-white suburbia would see a working class neighborhood on the outskirts of downtown as a bad neighborhood, but to me it looks just like the place I grew up. That’s not scary, it’s being approached by creepy guys that’s scary. Obviously, YMMV.
To go back to the original topic, while I realize you were scared, and am sorry about that,I don’t know that this guy really did anything wrong. From your account, the guy asked you for a match and chatted you up. You didn’t indicate that he said or did anything threatening, or obscene, or did anything specifically to suggest you were in any danger.
I’m sorry you were scared, but I don’t know that pitting the guy is appropriate.
“Creepy” has a very high false positive rate, after all. Fine for detecting danger, but useless as evidence against someone.
You refuse to live in fear, you choose for yourself what risks to run, you know how to look out for yourself and you could probably kick all the ass you needed to if it came to that…
and yet a random weirdo is putting you in fear just by talking to you, and in fact you think no man should ever talk to a strange woman even in broad daylight with witnesses present.
Gotcha. How about arguing for a compulsory curfew of all males after sunset while you’re at it?
This part of your story rubs me the wrong way, as a guy. You say that the mere fact that this guy was out on the street late at night indicates that he was probably up to no good. Well, so were you. I guess you must be a suspicious character, too, right? I don’t know how you can assume that this guy didn’t have some legitimate business to do, just like you did. Even if he just felt like taking a walk at night, that might be a little weird, but it’s not nefarious.
Now, once you progress to the part where he’s offering you pot and making creepy advances, I’m on the same page. (And I don’t doubt that he creeped you out even though the actual conversation seems innocent enough-- body language is everything.) But before that-- other than the fact that he was a man and you were a woman, why was there any reason to assume that his intentions were any less reputable than your own?
And, as might be expected, it wasn’t a cut and dried case. He was having sex with a family friend with, apparently, the consent of his wife.
The friend was uncertain about the act, although she’d done it at least twice before. She was hesitant, felt it wasn’t right, and sought confirmation from his wife before starting. However, the jury felt that she had been emotionally coerced into it and certainly had said that she wasn’t happy whilst it continued. He withdrew at least twice during the act, after she’d said that it wasn’t right and recommenced after she’d reconsidered.
It was also alleged and believed that she tried to push him away for up to 30 seconds before he finally did so, although this may have been because he was at the point of orgasm at the time. Nevertheless, the jury felt rightly or wrongly that as he knew she was uncomfortable with the situation, despite initial consent, he should not have continued penetration once she said she did not want to proceed. It was the act of her pushing him away that was deemed as the crucial unmistakable sign in this case, hence the 30 second issue.
Specifically, this is a reasonable synopsis of that point, from the judge’s summing up before sentencing (my bolding):
"From the questions asked by the jury I proceed
upon the basis that you are not criminally liable
for the last act
of initial penetration … Your
criminal responsibility results from the
continuation of penetration either after she
had
withdrawn her consent or after any mistake on
your part had ceased to be honest and reasonable.
On the evidence
I find it difficult to identify
the period of the continuation after the critical
moment. It is however enough to say
that it was
an appreciable time, perhaps up to 30 seconds,
after she commenced to try to push you away from
her.