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Rape, Consent, and the Presumption of Innocence

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Posts

  • DarkewolfeDarkewolfe Registered User regular
    _J_ wrote: »
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    Time moves forward, not backward.

    I'm not sure I agree with you on this. I'd think you'd want to hedge that at "Our perceptions of time appear to follow a linear progression that can't be reversed."

    For the purpose of this conversation, the idea is that consent is forward looking, rather than backwards looking.

    At Time-1 Player A consents to have sex with Player B at Time-2. Time-2 occurs; sex happens. Later, at Time-3, Player A cannot revoke the consent that occurred at Time-1 and Time-2.

    As to the metaphysics of time? That’s another thread.

    Oh, sure, but if I could be pedantic with anyone, it'd be you. You stated that you knew time was linearly progressive. You and I both know that's not true and you were imprecise in your language use.

    What is this I don't even.
  • _J__J_ Pedant Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    Time moves forward, not backward.

    I'm not sure I agree with you on this. I'd think you'd want to hedge that at "Our perceptions of time appear to follow a linear progression that can't be reversed."

    For the purpose of this conversation, the idea is that consent is forward looking, rather than backwards looking.

    At Time-1 Player A consents to have sex with Player B at Time-2. Time-2 occurs; sex happens. Later, at Time-3, Player A cannot revoke the consent that occurred at Time-1 and Time-2.

    As to the metaphysics of time? That’s another thread.

    Oh, sure, but if I could be pedantic with anyone, it'd be you. You stated that you knew time was linearly progressive. You and I both know that's not true and you were imprecise in your language use.

    Well, I didn't claim that I "knew" time was a linear progression. I claimed that time moved forward. Which was silly, given that time doesn't move.

    Alright. I'll admit imprecision.

    Well played, sir.

  • SticksSticks I'd rather be in bed.Registered User regular
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    Sticks wrote: »
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    Sticks wrote: »
    In this case, I don't know what ramifications could possibly be reasonable. You are talking about charging a child with lying to the police 10 years after the fact. The really scary thing about that is apparently having a child means you, as a father, have a non-zero risk of going to prison and being put on the sex offender registry. I guess it's a reason to not be a shitty father, but still...

    edit: I also wonder if the scenario might not be that he DID rape her, but she feels guilty about "ruining his life" or something along those lines. My understanding is that it is not an uncommon emotion for victims to feel towards a perpetrator that they knew well.

    Wow. That's some serious victim blaming from you. Your misandry is disgusting. You're blaming an innocent man who had his entire life taken away from him.

    Wow, my wondering about a plausible alternate scenario constitutes "serious victim blaming" and misandry? I think you just revealed a whole truck load of your own bias.

    But of course, I was stating categorically that this is how it went down, the scenario I proposed logically makes no sense, and we know 100% all of the facts from a single news article so there is no reason for speculation or playing devil's advocate.

    I apology profusely to the entire thread. I gnash my teeth and tear my clothes in abject remorse for my despicable actions.

    Or you were engaging in exactly the same sort of victim blaming that this thread was designed to discuss, but in an ironic role reversal.

    Just so I am 100% clear: Mentioning that something might have gone down some way other than what was reported in an article constitutes blaming the victim?

    There is exactly zero room for observations or speculation, regardless of intention or (lack of) seriousness?

    Because it seems like you read a lot more into what I posted than is actually there and then decided to act the goose by launching into an attack on my motivations and/or beliefs.

    Would it help if I prefaced my statement with, "Just an odd thought I had, what if..."?

  • DarkewolfeDarkewolfe Registered User regular
    Sticks wrote: »
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    Sticks wrote: »
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    Sticks wrote: »
    In this case, I don't know what ramifications could possibly be reasonable. You are talking about charging a child with lying to the police 10 years after the fact. The really scary thing about that is apparently having a child means you, as a father, have a non-zero risk of going to prison and being put on the sex offender registry. I guess it's a reason to not be a shitty father, but still...

    edit: I also wonder if the scenario might not be that he DID rape her, but she feels guilty about "ruining his life" or something along those lines. My understanding is that it is not an uncommon emotion for victims to feel towards a perpetrator that they knew well.

    Wow. That's some serious victim blaming from you. Your misandry is disgusting. You're blaming an innocent man who had his entire life taken away from him.

    Wow, my wondering about a plausible alternate scenario constitutes "serious victim blaming" and misandry? I think you just revealed a whole truck load of your own bias.

    But of course, I was stating categorically that this is how it went down, the scenario I proposed logically makes no sense, and we know 100% all of the facts from a single news article so there is no reason for speculation or playing devil's advocate.

    I apology profusely to the entire thread. I gnash my teeth and tear my clothes in abject remorse for my despicable actions.

    Or you were engaging in exactly the same sort of victim blaming that this thread was designed to discuss, but in an ironic role reversal.

    Just so I am 100% clear: Mentioning that something might have gone down some way other than what was reported in an article constitutes blaming the victim?

    There is exactly zero room for observations or speculation, regardless of intention or (lack of) seriousness?

    Because it seems like you read a lot more into what I posted than is actually there and then decided to act the goose by launching into an attack on my motivations and/or beliefs.

    Would it help if I prefaced my statement with, "Just an odd thought I had, what if..."?

    Well, it's been clearly established in this thread, and others like it, that idly speculating about whether a rape victim/accuser is lying is morally reprehensible. So I think that accusing someone who, by all evidence, was innocent of a crime yet lost years of his life of being a rapist is pretty despicable too. It pretty clearly shows that you are far more likely to view men as rapists than admittedly lying women as liars. Shows your bias, as you said.

    What is this I don't even.
  • SticksSticks I'd rather be in bed.Registered User regular
    I clearly missed the part where we banned speculation when dealing with rape. It makes sense in the context of blaming the victim 'cuz "rape culture." I'm not sure the reverse applies since that culture is pretty squarely aimed at the victims of rape and not the perpetrators, but I also really don't want to have that conversation so I'm willing to cede the point.

    The issue I have is with your seeming overreaction and pop-psych evaluation of my supposed bias from a throw-away observation. Show me where I've demonstrated that I am a misandrist. If I have this bias, it should probably show up in more than one post as an afterthought.

  • DarkewolfeDarkewolfe Registered User regular
    Sticks wrote: »
    I clearly missed the part where we banned speculation when dealing with rape. It makes sense in the context of blaming the victim 'cuz "rape culture." I'm not sure the reverse applies since that culture is pretty squarely aimed at the victims of rape and not the perpetrators, but I also really don't want to have that conversation so I'm willing to cede the point.

    The issue I have is with your seeming overreaction and pop-psych evaluation of my supposed bias from a throw-away observation. Show me where I've demonstrated that I am a misandrist. If I have this bias, it should probably show up in more than one post as an afterthought.

    If you don't want to have the conversation, don't then follow it up with a statement which ignores the parts where you're wrong and opens a new debate. You were being extremely unfair and demonstrating quite clearly the misandry that leads to so many people being afraid of falsified rape claims, even WITH a presumption of innocence. Even when the victim has been shown to be innocent, you off-handedly accuse him of being a rapist, one of the vilest accusations possible, then try to downplay your flippant character smear.

    What is this I don't even.
  • bowenbowen How you doin'? Registered User regular
    And this is why arguing about semantics is dumb.

    not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
  • inlemurinlemur Registered User regular
    I've been lurking this thread (instead of participating) because usually rape or rape-related threads go nowhere interesting, but I want to say that mcdermott has just been killing it here. Very nice work; I want to argue with you about all sorts of things.
    mcdermott wrote: »
    I see misogyny because most of the "harm" we're talking about from a sexual encounter that was consented to while too intoxicated to remember (and which is regretted later) seems to come from our sexual norms, many of which are pretty misogynistic. For instance, since it seems to me bodily autonomy is maintained (chose to get drunk, then while drunk chose to consent regardless of mutual benefit) there's no real "harm" in such an encounter. It seems like the only way this can be seen a a "harm" from which the victim must be "made whole" stems from our idea that sex is a thing of value that generally flows from women to men, and that the sexual value (or even personal value) of women is somehow reduced if they "give too much of it away." That sex is a thing "given" by women or "taken" by men. Otherwise, what's the issue with a drunken mistake? What's it matter if you got "mutual benefit?" You lost nothing, and you made the choice. You move on.

    You've touched on this idea twice, and nobody has responded to it yet, but in my own independent thinking I've come to the same conclusions. I think this is a thing somewhat like "privilege" (which is an idea with significant merit which is unfortunately most often misunderstood, poorly defined, or misused) in that it is difficult for those to whom it applies (all of us) to perceive it due to our limited cultural and societal points of view. I like to think of it as women's sex having more intrinsic value than men's; naively this sounds like a good thing for women, but the consequence is that individuals feel asymmetrically harmed in situations that are (now) symmetric.

    I think that the societal value of women's sex, rather than being merely the result of misogyny, is rather due to the biological and social predicament of women in pre-modern times. Once upon a time (not that long ago, in fact), if a man and woman who were both drunk had a sexual encounter, the woman was indeed put in a much more physically and socially dangerous position. If a man unambiguously raped a woman, he was committing a crime against her which was much greater than it is today. A woman's value was once tied tightly to her ability to produce legitimate children to her husband, who in many cases effectively owned her. By taking away her sexual choice, a rapist is not just physically assaulting her but taking away much of her value as a person to society. This is the reason that raped maidens were able to force their rapist to marry them in Biblical law: while that sounds like something a modern person would never consider, in those times it might have been a preferable situation, as she would likely never be able to marry another man. In other societies, the rape victim's fate could be far worse.

    In modern times we think of old societies as misogynistic, as they largely were. However we have inherited their principles in ways that we are not always able to perceive or reconcile with our own ideals. Women's sex is still more highly valued, as mcdermott illustrates. I would argue that the modern sexual situation is very nearly symmetric due to the inventions of birth control and paternity testing. Culture and society have not yet caught up with these inventions, and thus we still grapple with the issue of sex being implicitly something that women give or lose and that men take or receive. This implicit misogyny is apparently so subtle or ingrained in society that it does not seem to have been addressed significantly by feminism, though I'll admit I am not familiar with a broad range of feminist philosophies.

    XBL - remura
  • bowenbowen How you doin'? Registered User regular
    One wonders what the solution to that would be, as a more equal concept.

    not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
  • SticksSticks I'd rather be in bed.Registered User regular
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    Sticks wrote: »
    I clearly missed the part where we banned speculation when dealing with rape. It makes sense in the context of blaming the victim 'cuz "rape culture." I'm not sure the reverse applies since that culture is pretty squarely aimed at the victims of rape and not the perpetrators, but I also really don't want to have that conversation so I'm willing to cede the point.

    The issue I have is with your seeming overreaction and pop-psych evaluation of my supposed bias from a throw-away observation. Show me where I've demonstrated that I am a misandrist. If I have this bias, it should probably show up in more than one post as an afterthought.

    If you don't want to have the conversation, don't then follow it up with a statement which ignores the parts where you're wrong and opens a new debate. You were being extremely unfair and demonstrating quite clearly the misandry that leads to so many people being afraid of falsified rape claims, even WITH a presumption of innocence. Even when the victim has been shown to be innocent, you off-handedly accuse him of being a rapist, one of the vilest accusations possible, then try to downplay your flippant character smear.

    No, that new debate opened by that comment is the one I didn't really want to have a conversation on. I'm perfectly willing to continue arguing what my apparent motivations and biases are and how wrong I was. However, the more I think about it, the more it seems to be tied to the issue we are having.

    It seems to be your contention that I cannot make idle speculations about this scenario, not because speculation is inherently wrong, but because the subject is rape. I agree that speculation as to whether a victim is lying when she claims to be raped is not helpful because society places a great deal of skepticism and pressure on the victim already. I disagree that this same logic carries over when we talk about the falsely accused perpetrator. We are simply talking about a man who was falsely imprisoned for a crime. Speculation should be A-Ok again.

    If you disagree with that, I'm fine with it. The original comment was not some vitally held belief of mine, but a simple observation of "hey based on the facts presented, this thing could have gone down like this instead of like that." So, I'm sorry I ruffled your feathers with the inane shit that goes bouncing through my head. It isn't the first time I've stuck my foot in my mouth in such a fashion, and it certainly won't be the last.

    The issue I have is how you originally seemed to be attacking me instead of the comment. I'm a misandrist, and apparently disgusting. I have this huge bias. etc. Which is a pretty big leap to be making and a huge overreaction.

  • DarkewolfeDarkewolfe Registered User regular
    Sticks wrote: »
    It seems to be your contention that I cannot make idle speculations about this scenario, not because speculation is inherently wrong, but because the subject is rape. I agree that speculation as to whether a victim is lying when she claims to be raped is not helpful because society places a great deal of skepticism and pressure on the victim already. I disagree that this same logic carries over when we talk about the falsely accused perpetrator. We are simply talking about a man who was falsely imprisoned for a crime. Speculation should be A-Ok again.

    This is the part of your thinking which is illogical. Men are the only ones likely to be accused of rape and falsely imprisoned as a result. They are both bad situations, and your insistence that it's perfectly fine to imply that a man who has been PROVEN innocent is a rapist, while questioning whether someone who is simply an ACCUSER is being truthful implies that you have a deep-seated bias. Not only do you only place a standard of evidence on men, you actually disregard actual evidence that defends a man.

    What is this I don't even.
  • rockrngerrockrnger Registered User regular
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    Sticks wrote: »
    It seems to be your contention that I cannot make idle speculations about this scenario, not because speculation is inherently wrong, but because the subject is rape. I agree that speculation as to whether a victim is lying when she claims to be raped is not helpful because society places a great deal of skepticism and pressure on the victim already. I disagree that this same logic carries over when we talk about the falsely accused perpetrator. We are simply talking about a man who was falsely imprisoned for a crime. Speculation should be A-Ok again.

    This is the part of your thinking which is illogical. Men are the only ones likely to be accused of rape and falsely imprisoned as a result. They are both bad situations, and your insistence that it's perfectly fine to imply that a man who has been PROVEN innocent is a rapist, while questioning whether someone who is simply an ACCUSER is being truthful implies that you have a deep-seated bias. Not only do you only place a standard of evidence on men, you actually disregard actual evidence that defends a man.
    Where are you even getting the gender has Anything to do with it?

  • SticksSticks I'd rather be in bed.Registered User regular
    You are the only one who is focusing on gender, which is why the continued accusations that I have some bias against men is fucking baffling to me. Gender is completely incidental in the observation I made. I will agree that you could infer from my comment that I might have a bias, but you are taking that inference as indisputable proof. I place a standard of evidence on men. I disregard evidence that defends a man.

    The only thing I actually did was not think through that comment and how it might be perceived very carefully prior to posting it.

  • DarkewolfeDarkewolfe Registered User regular
    There's an inherent gender bias built into this whole discussion, though. This discussion originated in resolving a way to avoid victim-blaming, and then you went and blamed a victim. Now you are repeatedly defending your having done so as not as significant, primarily because he was a MAN who had a decade of his life taken away, rather than a WOMAN who was raped.

    What is this I don't even.
  • SticksSticks I'd rather be in bed.Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    There's an inherent gender bias built into this whole discussion, though. This discussion originated in resolving a way to avoid victim-blaming, and then you went and blamed a victim. Now you are repeatedly defending your having done so as not as significant, primarily because he was a MAN who had a decade of his life taken away, rather than a WOMAN who was raped.

    No. You're just going to have to take my word on this since I'm indisputably in a better position to judge my own intentions, but I was commenting on the situation of "child A accuses adult B of rape. B goes to jail. A later recants." The only difference between B being male and B being female is that B being female is statistically less likely, which is completely irrelevant when you are dealing with a specific case.

    The comment above that (in the same post) was dealing with gender and statistics when I mentioned that being a father apparently carries a non-zero risk of being falsely accused of rape and going to jail for it. Being a mother does not carry the same risk.

    Sticks on
  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    There's an inherent gender bias built into this whole discussion, though. This discussion originated in resolving a way to avoid victim-blaming, and then you went and blamed a victim. Now you are repeatedly defending your having done so as not as significant, primarily because he was a MAN who had a decade of his life taken away, rather than a WOMAN who was raped.

    In fairness, that distinction may not have been intended, though due to how our society views rape its nearly unavoidable. Rape is something that is perpetrated by men. Even when it's against men. We don't see women as perpetuating non-statutory rape, and I suspect if it wasn't for the law needing to be gender neutral we'd not even see it there. Not for post pubescent boys and older women, at least.

    It's why most can't seriously see pursuing charges if a man claimed to be drunk beyond memory and wouldn't have consented otherwise. The assumption is that if he's hard*, he's willing, and consent is a given. And I think that ties back in to the whole "value of sex" thing inlemur was getting at. He didn't lose anything, he received something. His benefit is somehow assumed.

    But the short point of this post is that only men are seen as rapists....so there's an inherent sexism in blaming (or questioning) the victim of an admittedly false accusation in a way you wouldn't have previously questioned the accuser.


    * - Ignoring for a moment that sexual assault can occur absent successful penetration, let alone to orgasm. Distinct from rape, generally, but subject to the same implied gender biases.

    mcdermott on
  • SticksSticks I'd rather be in bed.Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    But the reasoning behind not questioning the veracity of a rape victim's claims (outside of an actual police investigation) is that it directly contributes to an atmosphere that discourages reporting of sex crimes and blames the victim for not preventing the crime in the first place. That negative aspect outweighs any value that such speculation might contain (which is generally very very little). This holds true regardless of gender of the victim.

    No such atmosphere seems to exist with regard to the falsely accused. In fact, there seems to be a general outpouring of support from most of society in such cases. Questioning the facts in such a situation doesn't seem to contribute to anything negative, so there is no obvious reason to withhold from this sort of speculation (although it still doesn't hold much value, and I very much regret even editing that into the post since it resulted in this last page and a half).

    edit: sorry I should clarify I meant falsely imprisoned not accused. My speculation isn't likely to contribute to an atmosphere of not letting the falsely imprisoned free.

    Sticks on
  • Gandalf_the_CrazedGandalf_the_Crazed Vigilo ConfidoRegistered User regular
    Are you relieved, Sticks, to have finally been outed as a virulent misandrist? No more need to run, the jig is up. You're free.

    PEUsig_zps56da03ec.jpg
  • SticksSticks I'd rather be in bed.Registered User regular
    You'll never take me alive!

    My one regret is that I couldn't hate the world to death.

  • rockrngerrockrnger Registered User regular
    mcdermott wrote: »
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    There's an inherent gender bias built into this whole discussion, though. This discussion originated in resolving a way to avoid victim-blaming, and then you went and blamed a victim. Now you are repeatedly defending your having done so as not as significant, primarily because he was a MAN who had a decade of his life taken away, rather than a WOMAN who was raped.

    In fairness, that distinction may not have been intended, though due to how our society views rape its nearly unavoidable. Rape is something that is perpetrated by men. Even when it's against men. We don't see women as perpetuating non-statutory rape, and I suspect if it wasn't for the law needing to be gender neutral we'd not even see it there. Not for post pubescent boys and older women, at least.

    It's why most can't seriously see pursuing charges if a man claimed to be drunk beyond memory and wouldn't have consented otherwise. The assumption is that if he's hard*, he's willing, and consent is a given. And I think that ties back in to the whole "value of sex" thing inlemur was getting at. He didn't lose anything, he received something. His benefit is somehow assumed.

    But the short point of this post is that only men are seen as rapists....so there's an inherent sexism in blaming (or questioning) the victim of an admittedly false accusation in a way you wouldn't have previously questioned the accuser.


    * - Ignoring for a moment that sexual assault can occur absent successful penetration, let alone to orgasm. Distinct from rape, generally, but subject to the same implied gender biases.

    As the friend of a man who was violently raped by a woman I am going to have to disagree here.

  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    You may disagree in that you personally understand that sexual assault of grown men by women is a real thing that can happen (though I imagine the odds of anybody in this thread having a personal connection to it were slim).

    If you disagree on the general bias of society, I don't know what to tell you.

    Besides, moving away from forcible rape, I'd say few would disagree that men are less likely to be taken seriously if they were to make a claim of rape due to voluntary intoxication. And they'd expect no better, because society conditions them to think they have no claim of harm, where a woman would.

  • SticksSticks I'd rather be in bed.Registered User regular
    I wonder (oh shit here I go again) if the mechanics of sex don't also play a role in that perception. I.e. it is more traumatic to be forcibly penetrated than to be forced to penetrate, so if a woman rapes you in this way then it's "not such a big deal."

  • rockrngerrockrnger Registered User regular
    mcdermott wrote: »
    You may disagree in that you personally understand that sexual assault of grown men by women is a real thing that can happen (though I imagine the odds of anybody in this thread having a personal connection to it were slim).

    If you disagree on the general bias of society, I don't know what to tell you.

    Besides, moving away from forcible rape, I'd say few would disagree that men are less likely to be taken seriously if they were to make a claim of rape due to voluntary intoxication. And they'd expect no better, because society conditions them to think they have no claim of harm, where a woman would.

    So we base rape off of society now?

    What do you call it when a man rapes a woman?

  • HamHamJHamHamJ Registered User regular
    That sounds really sexist.

    While racing light mechs, your Urbanmech comes in second place, but only because it ran out of ammo.
  • jothkijothki Registered User regular
    We're starting to drift back into culture here, which is probably a bad idea given the previous thread.

  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    rockrnger wrote: »
    mcdermott wrote: »
    You may disagree in that you personally understand that sexual assault of grown men by women is a real thing that can happen (though I imagine the odds of anybody in this thread having a personal connection to it were slim).

    If you disagree on the general bias of society, I don't know what to tell you.

    Besides, moving away from forcible rape, I'd say few would disagree that men are less likely to be taken seriously if they were to make a claim of rape due to voluntary intoxication. And they'd expect no better, because society conditions them to think they have no claim of harm, where a woman would.

    So we base rape off of society now?

    What do you call it when a man rapes a woman?

    I do believe that when somebody rapes somebody else, I call it......rape?

  • rockrngerrockrnger Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    mcdermott wrote: »
    rockrnger wrote: »
    mcdermott wrote: »
    You may disagree in that you personally understand that sexual assault of grown men by women is a real thing that can happen (though I imagine the odds of anybody in this thread having a personal connection to it were slim).

    If you disagree on the general bias of society, I don't know what to tell you.

    Besides, moving away from forcible rape, I'd say few would disagree that men are less likely to be taken seriously if they were to make a claim of rape due to voluntary intoxication. And they'd expect no better, because society conditions them to think they have no claim of harm, where a woman would.

    So we base rape off of society now?

    What do you call it when a man rapes a woman?

    I do believe that when somebody rapes somebody else, I call it......rape?

    "A woman can't rape a man."

    "My friend got raped by a woman."

    "Society doesn't think so, plus it doesn't happen a lot. Who cares."

    I just don't get what you are saying.

    rockrnger on
  • inlemurinlemur Registered User regular
    mcdermott wrote: »
    You may disagree in that you personally understand that sexual assault of grown men by women is a real thing that can happen (though I imagine the odds of anybody in this thread having a personal connection to it were slim).

    If you disagree on the general bias of society, I don't know what to tell you.

    Besides, moving away from forcible rape, I'd say few would disagree that men are less likely to be taken seriously if they were to make a claim of rape due to voluntary intoxication. And they'd expect no better, because society conditions them to think they have no claim of harm, where a woman would.

    This nails it and is incredibly important. All of the logic and reasoning and technical/legal talk that we're doing in this thread is fantastic and interesting, but the reality is that people have incredibly traumatic emotional experiences as a result of situations which, analytically, are symmetric. As empathetic people, we want to remedy this situation and prevent these traumatic experiences from occurring, which is the general objective of a lot of the discourse in this thread attempting to define or redefine consent in such a way as to prevent drunk ambiguous rape or punish those who overstep the bounds of what some believe should be considered consent or non-consent. Real people have real traumatic experiences. I want to emphasize that I am not diminishing them.

    Except that, as mcdermott points out, we don't consider analogous non-sexual situations the same way. If the consent of a drunk individual is not legally or morally considered "true" consent, then intoxicated purchases are potentially fraudulent, intoxicated exchanges are potentially theft, etc. Sex is, for some reason, special. More precisely (there are exceptions, of course, but generally speaking), women's sex is special, and the reason is that society conditions us to feel that way. I elaborated on my own speculation of how society ended up that way, and why it is no longer relevant (at least to the same degree) as it once was in a previous post.

    The solution to this problem, as I see it, is a shift in the social value of sex. I am going to deliberately rephrase my argument in a very harsh way, because when I have explained it to others, they have perceived it that way and I want to anticipate the rebuttal: Put bluntly, the problem in some cases is not what happens to women, but how they feel about these things. This appears to trivialize the emotional experience of people who have been in these situations (I think at this point it should be clear that none of us are talking about forcible rape, unconscious rape, etc. but about the limits of consent re: the state of mind of the parties in question), and I want to be clear that it does not. A boy and girl, in similar states of intoxication, have sex. In the time afterward, the girl comes to feel that she was taken advantage of, and while she doesn't press charges, feels strong emotions about her sexual vulnerability, guilt, anger, etc. The boy in question does not feel this way. While analytically this is absurd due to the symmetry of the situation, I am not judging or advocating judgment of the girl's feelings. She is justified (not in any grand or legal sense, mind you) in them because they are a reflection of her society.

    What I am suggesting is that her feelings are not necessary: that society can change its values such that women's sexuality is not valued as it is, and that we can move from (generally subconsciously) perceiving sex as something that men do to women to something that men and women do together. This is a tremendous task which will likely take generations, as our bias and cultural values are ingrained into our languages and our laws. But in my opinion the first step is honestly identifying the social factors at work.


    XBL - remura
  • PaladinPaladin Registered User regular
    there are less men that turn down sex than women or whatever
    if society perceives that it's okay, then it's okay. Self fulfilling prophecy.

    also statistics isn't helping any, men commit violent crimes at 10x the rate of women. Those are extremely favorable odds for profiling

    Marty: The future, it's where you're going?
    Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
  • rockrngerrockrnger Registered User regular
    inlemur wrote: »
    mcdermott wrote: »
    You may disagree in that you personally understand that sexual assault of grown men by women is a real thing that can happen (though I imagine the odds of anybody in this thread having a personal connection to it were slim).

    If you disagree on the general bias of society, I don't know what to tell you.

    Besides, moving away from forcible rape, I'd say few would disagree that men are less likely to be taken seriously if they were to make a claim of rape due to voluntary intoxication. And they'd expect no better, because society conditions them to think they have no claim of harm, where a woman would.

    This nails it and is incredibly important. All of the logic and reasoning and technical/legal talk that we're doing in this thread is fantastic and interesting, but the reality is that people have incredibly traumatic emotional experiences as a result of situations which, analytically, are symmetric. As empathetic people, we want to remedy this situation and prevent these traumatic experiences from occurring, which is the general objective of a lot of the discourse in this thread attempting to define or redefine consent in such a way as to prevent drunk ambiguous rape or punish those who overstep the bounds of what some believe should be considered consent or non-consent. Real people have real traumatic experiences. I want to emphasize that I am not diminishing them.

    Except that, as mcdermott points out, we don't consider analogous non-sexual situations the same way. If the consent of a drunk individual is not legally or morally considered "true" consent, then intoxicated purchases are potentially fraudulent, intoxicated exchanges are potentially theft, etc. Sex is, for some reason, special. More precisely (there are exceptions, of course, but generally speaking), women's sex is special, and the reason is that society conditions us to feel that way. I elaborated on my own speculation of how society ended up that way, and why it is no longer relevant (at least to the same degree) as it once was in a previous post.

    The solution to this problem, as I see it, is a shift in the social value of sex. I am going to deliberately rephrase my argument in a very harsh way, because when I have explained it to others, they have perceived it that way and I want to anticipate the rebuttal: Put bluntly, the problem in some cases is not what happens to women, but how they feel about these things. This appears to trivialize the emotional experience of people who have been in these situations (I think at this point it should be clear that none of us are talking about forcible rape, unconscious rape, etc. but about the limits of consent re: the state of mind of the parties in question), and I want to be clear that it does not. A boy and girl, in similar states of intoxication, have sex. In the time afterward, the girl comes to feel that she was taken advantage of, and while she doesn't press charges, feels strong emotions about her sexual vulnerability, guilt, anger, etc. The boy in question does not feel this way. While analytically this is absurd due to the symmetry of the situation, I am not judging or advocating judgment of the girl's feelings. She is justified (not in any grand or legal sense, mind you) in them because they are a reflection of her society.

    What I am suggesting is that her feelings are not necessary: that society can change its values such that women's sexuality is not valued as it is, and that we can move from (generally subconsciously) perceiving sex as something that men do to women to something that men and women do together. This is a tremendous task which will likely take generations, as our bias and cultural values are ingrained into our languages and our laws. But in my opinion the first step is honestly identifying the social factors at work.

    That's a lot of words to say "suck it up."

    I would say that the concept of violation of your body is much larger than any social construct. To go back to my friend, society told him that being a man he should just be happy to be having sex but he was messed up by it. Why?

  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    rockrnger wrote: »
    mcdermott wrote: »
    I do believe that when somebody rapes somebody else, I call it......rape?

    "A woman can't rape a man."

    "My friend got raped by a woman."

    "Society doesn't think so, plus it doesn't happen a lot. Who cares."

    I just don't get what you are saying.

    You put that bolded in quotes, but if you go back to my post it is pretty clearly not what I was saying. I never claimed that a woman can't rape a man. It was absolutely clear from my post that I was talking about the perception of society, not my own, and furthermore it was pretty clearly implied that I saw this as a bad thing.

    If you aren't going to bother reading my posts, I will stop responding to you.

    Here, I'll requote it, now try re-reading it and see if you still get the bolded (above) from it.
    In fairness, that distinction may not have been intended, though due to how our society views rape its nearly unavoidable. Rape is something that is perpetrated by men. Even when it's against men. We don't see women as perpetuating non-statutory rape, and I suspect if it wasn't for the law needing to be gender neutral we'd not even see it there. Not for post pubescent boys and older women, at least.

    It's why most can't seriously see pursuing charges if a man claimed to be drunk beyond memory and wouldn't have consented otherwise. The assumption is that if he's hard*, he's willing, and consent is a given. And I think that ties back in to the whole "value of sex" thing inlemur was getting at. He didn't lose anything, he received something. His benefit is somehow assumed.

    But the short point of this post is that only men are seen as rapists....so there's an inherent sexism in blaming (or questioning) the victim of an admittedly false accusation in a way you wouldn't have previously questioned the accuser.

    See the bolded bits in the first paragraph of my quote? Do you see how, taken as a whole and in context, it's pretty clear that "[r]ape is something that is perpetrated by men" was not intended to be a statement of my own position, but rather a description of our societal standard (note the use of "we" and "our" throughout, plus the "[e]ven when it's against men" which would pretty clearly be taken with a negative connotation).

    Besides which, as somebody who keeps throwing "MRA" around in my vicinity (though not directly at me, to be fair) I'm surprised you'd assume I was claiming that men can't be raped by women. That you wouldn't see the obviously implied disagreement with the societal norm I was describing (that rape of men by women is either impossible or trivial).

    I think it's been fairly clear from many of my posts, also, that this is a societal double standard that I care about. And, in fact, it greatly colors my views regarding consent given while voluntarily intoxicated. So your "who cares" (also in quotes) is equally baffling. It's like you're reading entirely different posts than I am writing.



    Also, consider everything inlemur wrote to be quoted and limed right here.

  • _J__J_ Pedant Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    inlemur wrote: »
    I am going to deliberately rephrase my argument in a very harsh way, because when I have explained it to others, they have perceived it that way and I want to anticipate the rebuttal: Put bluntly, the problem in some cases is not what happens to women, but how they feel about these things.

    No.

    1) What is the distinction you've made between "what happened" and "how they feel about it"? That seems like a bizzare division.
    2) Both men and women have feelings. Both men and women feel ways about stuff.
    inlemur wrote: »
    This appears to trivialize the emotional experience of people who have been in these situations (I think at this point it should be clear that none of us are talking about forcible rape, unconscious rape, etc. but about the limits of consent re: the state of mind of the parties in question), and I want to be clear that it does not.

    It seems problematic to make distinctions between "kinds of rape". As if there is real rape, "forced rape", and then non-real rape that is only rape based upon the victim's feelings?

    I'll assume I'm misunderstanding, because otherwise you're...saying very monsterous things. So, could you please clarify the dfiference between rapey rape and not-quite-as-rapey-rape?
    inlemur wrote: »
    A boy and girl, in similar states of intoxication, have sex. In the time afterward, the girl comes to feel that she was taken advantage of, and while she doesn't press charges, feels strong emotions about her sexual vulnerability, guilt, anger, etc. The boy in question does not feel this way. While analytically this is absurd due to the symmetry of the situation, I am not judging or advocating judgment of the girl's feelings. She is justified (not in any grand or legal sense, mind you) in them because they are a reflection of her society.

    1) Again, both boys and girls have feelings. I'm not sure why you're creating a situation in which the female has feelings, and the male doesn't.
    2) What is this non-legal, non-grand justified feeling? It seems to be doing work in your argument, but I'm not sure what you're talking about.
    3) If your distinctino is "analytically absurd" why are you talking about it?
    4) What is rape other than "feeling as if she was taken advantage of" or "feeling that she was raped"?
    inlemur wrote: »
    What I am suggesting is that her feelings are not necessary: that society can change its values such that women's sexuality is not valued as it is, and that we can move from (generally subconsciously) perceiving sex as something that men do to women to something that men and women do together.

    I'm not sure how you would verify this claim. "We can do something other than what we currently do." It's fine to say that, but how do you know that to be true? Also, again, the "value" of sexuality argument is problematic, because you've maintained the previous distinction to women with their feelings and emotions and cry cry, and men who just fuck and don't care.
    inlemur wrote: »
    This is a tremendous task which will likely take generations, as our bias and cultural values are ingrained into our languages and our laws. But in my opinion the first step is honestly identifying the social factors at work.

    You've talked about social factors. What about natural factors? And are these really different things? Where is the line between society and nature?

  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    rockrnger wrote: »
    inlemur wrote: »
    mcdermott wrote: »
    You may disagree in that you personally understand that sexual assault of grown men by women is a real thing that can happen (though I imagine the odds of anybody in this thread having a personal connection to it were slim).

    If you disagree on the general bias of society, I don't know what to tell you.

    Besides, moving away from forcible rape, I'd say few would disagree that men are less likely to be taken seriously if they were to make a claim of rape due to voluntary intoxication. And they'd expect no better, because society conditions them to think they have no claim of harm, where a woman would.

    This nails it and is incredibly important. All of the logic and reasoning and technical/legal talk that we're doing in this thread is fantastic and interesting, but the reality is that people have incredibly traumatic emotional experiences as a result of situations which, analytically, are symmetric. As empathetic people, we want to remedy this situation and prevent these traumatic experiences from occurring, which is the general objective of a lot of the discourse in this thread attempting to define or redefine consent in such a way as to prevent drunk ambiguous rape or punish those who overstep the bounds of what some believe should be considered consent or non-consent. Real people have real traumatic experiences. I want to emphasize that I am not diminishing them.

    Except that, as mcdermott points out, we don't consider analogous non-sexual situations the same way. If the consent of a drunk individual is not legally or morally considered "true" consent, then intoxicated purchases are potentially fraudulent, intoxicated exchanges are potentially theft, etc. Sex is, for some reason, special. More precisely (there are exceptions, of course, but generally speaking), women's sex is special, and the reason is that society conditions us to feel that way. I elaborated on my own speculation of how society ended up that way, and why it is no longer relevant (at least to the same degree) as it once was in a previous post.

    The solution to this problem, as I see it, is a shift in the social value of sex. I am going to deliberately rephrase my argument in a very harsh way, because when I have explained it to others, they have perceived it that way and I want to anticipate the rebuttal: Put bluntly, the problem in some cases is not what happens to women, but how they feel about these things. This appears to trivialize the emotional experience of people who have been in these situations (I think at this point it should be clear that none of us are talking about forcible rape, unconscious rape, etc. but about the limits of consent re: the state of mind of the parties in question), and I want to be clear that it does not. A boy and girl, in similar states of intoxication, have sex. In the time afterward, the girl comes to feel that she was taken advantage of, and while she doesn't press charges, feels strong emotions about her sexual vulnerability, guilt, anger, etc. The boy in question does not feel this way. While analytically this is absurd due to the symmetry of the situation, I am not judging or advocating judgment of the girl's feelings. She is justified (not in any grand or legal sense, mind you) in them because they are a reflection of her society.

    What I am suggesting is that her feelings are not necessary: that society can change its values such that women's sexuality is not valued as it is, and that we can move from (generally subconsciously) perceiving sex as something that men do to women to something that men and women do together. This is a tremendous task which will likely take generations, as our bias and cultural values are ingrained into our languages and our laws. But in my opinion the first step is honestly identifying the social factors at work.

    That's a lot of words to say "suck it up."

    I would say that the concept of violation of your body is much larger than any social construct. To go back to my friend, society told him that being a man he should just be happy to be having sex but he was messed up by it. Why?

    Society is fucked up in this regard. Also, you said he was violently raped, implying that this was forcible? I'm assuming you mean that he was violently forced to penetrate a woman (one way or another), and not violently penetrated by a woman...only because with the latter, society probably wouldn't tell him he should have been happy to have it. But either way what society says is irrelevant, since if he didn't give consent and was instead forcibly sexually assaulted...well, he was assaulted. I'll also point out here that regardless of what society says, the law would likely have been on his side (though most states would define it as sexual assault, rather than rape, if he wasn't the one penetrated).

    Society should never tell anybody they should be cool getting assaulted, though.

    However, I don't see sex for which consent was given while intoxicated, regardless of how intoxicated, to be "assault." This is where my whole argument is coming from. That falls more under "being taken advantage of," which is distinct from "being assaulted." The former (being taken advantage of) can be punishable in many contexts, such as fraud, but usually only if the victim is actually deprived of something of value. Whereas the latter is pretty much* always punishable, and always should be.


    * - Allowing for narrow exceptions such as self-defense.

  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    4) What is rape other than "feeling as if she was taken advantage of" or "feeling that she was raped"?

    A forcible penetration, absent consent.

    Even if we ignore the whole wishy-washy "but is it really consent" argument we've had going on here, there is still the largely black-and-white world of forcible rape. Which is, essentially, just a specific subset of aggravated assault. You could do away with the criminal statutes regarding rape, and this would still be illegal under the statutes covering assault.

    * - Not necessarily penetration, either...even sexual assault absent penetration (including female on male) would still fall under unwanted physical contact, which seems like it'd still fall under assault.

    mcdermott on
  • inlemurinlemur Registered User regular
    rockrnger wrote: »
    inlemur wrote: »
    mcdermott wrote: »
    You may disagree in that you personally understand that sexual assault of grown men by women is a real thing that can happen (though I imagine the odds of anybody in this thread having a personal connection to it were slim).

    If you disagree on the general bias of society, I don't know what to tell you.

    Besides, moving away from forcible rape, I'd say few would disagree that men are less likely to be taken seriously if they were to make a claim of rape due to voluntary intoxication. And they'd expect no better, because society conditions them to think they have no claim of harm, where a woman would.

    This nails it and is incredibly important. All of the logic and reasoning and technical/legal talk that we're doing in this thread is fantastic and interesting, but the reality is that people have incredibly traumatic emotional experiences as a result of situations which, analytically, are symmetric. As empathetic people, we want to remedy this situation and prevent these traumatic experiences from occurring, which is the general objective of a lot of the discourse in this thread attempting to define or redefine consent in such a way as to prevent drunk ambiguous rape or punish those who overstep the bounds of what some believe should be considered consent or non-consent. Real people have real traumatic experiences. I want to emphasize that I am not diminishing them.

    Except that, as mcdermott points out, we don't consider analogous non-sexual situations the same way. If the consent of a drunk individual is not legally or morally considered "true" consent, then intoxicated purchases are potentially fraudulent, intoxicated exchanges are potentially theft, etc. Sex is, for some reason, special. More precisely (there are exceptions, of course, but generally speaking), women's sex is special, and the reason is that society conditions us to feel that way. I elaborated on my own speculation of how society ended up that way, and why it is no longer relevant (at least to the same degree) as it once was in a previous post.

    The solution to this problem, as I see it, is a shift in the social value of sex. I am going to deliberately rephrase my argument in a very harsh way, because when I have explained it to others, they have perceived it that way and I want to anticipate the rebuttal: Put bluntly, the problem in some cases is not what happens to women, but how they feel about these things. This appears to trivialize the emotional experience of people who have been in these situations (I think at this point it should be clear that none of us are talking about forcible rape, unconscious rape, etc. but about the limits of consent re: the state of mind of the parties in question), and I want to be clear that it does not. A boy and girl, in similar states of intoxication, have sex. In the time afterward, the girl comes to feel that she was taken advantage of, and while she doesn't press charges, feels strong emotions about her sexual vulnerability, guilt, anger, etc. The boy in question does not feel this way. While analytically this is absurd due to the symmetry of the situation, I am not judging or advocating judgment of the girl's feelings. She is justified (not in any grand or legal sense, mind you) in them because they are a reflection of her society.

    What I am suggesting is that her feelings are not necessary: that society can change its values such that women's sexuality is not valued as it is, and that we can move from (generally subconsciously) perceiving sex as something that men do to women to something that men and women do together. This is a tremendous task which will likely take generations, as our bias and cultural values are ingrained into our languages and our laws. But in my opinion the first step is honestly identifying the social factors at work.

    That's a lot of words to say "suck it up."

    I would say that the concept of violation of your body is much larger than any social construct. To go back to my friend, society told him that being a man he should just be happy to be having sex but he was messed up by it. Why?

    I anticipated that exact rebuttal, addressed it, then I got it anyway.

    But you're right, the issue cuts both ways. Men are raped, or otherwise sexually taken advantage of. Men are told to suck it up, or even expected to give a high five. I wrote a lot about society valuing women's sex more than men's, so it is of course true that men's sex is devalued. I'm not saying "women should just be like men and suck it up." Men and women are both done a disservice by our current attitudes toward sex. Changing sex from "something men do to women" to "something men and women do together" (also, men and men and women and women, etc.; this whole argument has been from a heteronormative perspective just because I'm not really able to discuss sexual issues from a different one) is a good thing for everyone.

    XBL - remura
  • rockrngerrockrnger Registered User regular
    mcdermott wrote: »
    rockrnger wrote: »
    mcdermott wrote: »
    I do believe that when somebody rapes somebody else, I call it......rape?

    "A woman can't rape a man."

    "My friend got raped by a woman."

    "Society doesn't think so, plus it doesn't happen a lot. Who cares."

    I just don't get what you are saying.

    You put that bolded in quotes, but if you go back to my post it is pretty clearly not what I was saying. I never claimed that a woman can't rape a man. It was absolutely clear from my post that I was talking about the perception of society, not my own, and furthermore it was pretty clearly implied that I saw this as a bad thing.

    If you aren't going to bother reading my posts, I will stop responding to you.

    Here, I'll requote it, now try re-reading it and see if you still get the bolded (above) from it.
    In fairness, that distinction may not have been intended, though due to how our society views rape its nearly unavoidable. Rape is something that is perpetrated by men. Even when it's against men. We don't see women as perpetuating non-statutory rape, and I suspect if it wasn't for the law needing to be gender neutral we'd not even see it there. Not for post pubescent boys and older women, at least.

    It's why most can't seriously see pursuing charges if a man claimed to be drunk beyond memory and wouldn't have consented otherwise. The assumption is that if he's hard*, he's willing, and consent is a given. And I think that ties back in to the whole "value of sex" thing inlemur was getting at. He didn't lose anything, he received something. His benefit is somehow assumed.

    But the short point of this post is that only men are seen as rapists....so there's an inherent sexism in blaming (or questioning) the victim of an admittedly false accusation in a way you wouldn't have previously questioned the accuser.

    See the bolded bits in the first paragraph of my quote? Do you see how, taken as a whole and in context, it's pretty clear that "[r]ape is something that is perpetrated by men" was not intended to be a statement of my own position, but rather a description of our societal standard (note the use of "we" and "our" throughout, plus the "[e]ven when it's against men" which would pretty clearly be taken with a negative connotation).

    Besides which, as somebody who keeps throwing "MRA" around in my vicinity (though not directly at me, to be fair) I'm surprised you'd assume I was claiming that men can't be raped by women. That you wouldn't see the obviously implied disagreement with the societal norm I was describing (that rape of men by women is either impossible or trivial).

    I think it's been fairly clear from many of my posts, also, that this is a societal double standard that I care about. And, in fact, it greatly colors my views regarding consent given while voluntarily intoxicated. So your "who cares" (also in quotes) is equally baffling. It's like you're reading entirely different posts than I am writing.



    Also, consider everything inlemur wrote to be quoted and limed right here.

    First off I would never claim someone was a MRA that didn't self identify. To me that is about as low as one could get.

    Second, I took your comments in the context of our talking about the harm of rape being a social construct. So if society doesn't think a man can be raped then they aren't harmed by it and it wasn't a big deal. My mistake.

    Back on topic, what effect does society ideas about men being raped have on your views and why?

  • PaladinPaladin Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    I don't think men are getting the short end of the stick here

    Or really the short end of any stick where male sexual practice is concerned

    I think if you're a member of a group you are describing your opinions have some weight

    Paladin on
    Marty: The future, it's where you're going?
    Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
  • _J__J_ Pedant Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    mcdermott wrote: »
    4) What is rape other than "feeling as if she was taken advantage of" or "feeling that she was raped"?

    A forcible penetration, absent consent.

    Even if we ignore the whole wishy-washy "but is it really consent" argument we've had going on here, there is still the largely black-and-white world of forcible rape. Which is, essentially, just a specific subset of aggravated assault. You could do away with the criminal statutes regarding rape, and this would still be illegal under the statutes covering assault.

    * - Not necessarily penetration, either...even sexual assault absent penetration (including female on male) would still fall under unwanted physical contact, which seems like it'd still fall under assault.

    So...are we saying that there are two parts to rape:

    1) Physical, covered by the assault.
    2) Mental, where is where the "rape" is, since it's perceptive.

    Is that the distinction?

  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    rockrnger wrote: »
    Second, I took your comments in the context of our talking about the harm of rape being a social construct. So if society doesn't think a man can be raped then they aren't harmed by it and it wasn't a big deal. My mistake.

    I think I've been clear, top to bottom, absolutely consistently, that the harm of forcible rape is obviously not a social construct. Though social norms can, and do, add harm to it. But even absent the sexual context, it's an assault.

    I will say that I think much of the harm done by sex that is consented to when (by the argument of some people with whom I disagree) said consent shouldn't be considered valid due to voluntary intoxication is largely a social construct.

    Back on topic, what effect does society ideas about men being raped have on your views and why?

    Probably leads to even greater under-reporting than among women. I think it's also what causes us to start really dissecting the nature of "consent," rather than accepting consent as consent...because absent the whole assumption that sex is a thing of value taken by men from women (and that that value can be diminished if given too freely) then there'd be even less reason to concern ourselves with the decisions people make while voluntarily intoxicated.

    Though really, even outside the context of rape, I think the gender norms surrounding sex that our society imposes lead to a whole lot of fucked up and unhealthy behavior, across genders. That obviously strays way off topic though.



    Really, though, coming back to "being taken advantage of" versus "being assaulted," I think the big thing for me is that there are few other instances where the criminal code will concern itself with you simply for taking advantage of somebody, absent the victim being deprived of property, assaulted, or tangibly harmed. From a criminal perspective, my attitude towards somebody who feels they were emotionally damaged by somebody taking advantage of them does largely land somewhere in the spectrum of "suck it up" to "take civil action." The criminal justice system generally does not, nor in my opinion should it, concern itself with your feelings. It concerns itself with the actions of the perpetrator, which is why in nearly every other crime the intent of the criminal is a key element.

    mcdermott on
  • inlemurinlemur Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    _J_ wrote: »
    inlemur wrote: »
    I am going to deliberately rephrase my argument in a very harsh way, because when I have explained it to others, they have perceived it that way and I want to anticipate the rebuttal: Put bluntly, the problem in some cases is not what happens to women, but how they feel about these things.

    No.

    1) What is the distinction you've made between "what happened" and "how they feel about it"? That seems like a bizzare division.
    2) Both men and women have feelings. Both men and women feel ways about stuff.

    I described a scenario that addresses these, so I'll answer your points there.

    inlemur wrote: »
    This appears to trivialize the emotional experience of people who have been in these situations (I think at this point it should be clear that none of us are talking about forcible rape, unconscious rape, etc. but about the limits of consent re: the state of mind of the parties in question), and I want to be clear that it does not.

    It seems problematic to make distinctions between "kinds of rape". As if there is real rape, "forced rape", and then non-real rape that is only rape based upon the victim's feelings?

    I'll assume I'm misunderstanding, because otherwise you're...saying very monsterous things. So, could you please clarify the dfiference between rapey rape and not-quite-as-rapey-rape?

    Of course there is a distinction between kinds of rape. Why shouldn't there be? There is a distinction between kinds of murder, kinds of assault, etc. Some things that we call rape are worse than other things that we call rape. Maybe we need different words to describe them, but "rape" is what we have. I think you're being disingenuous to call that assertion "monstrous".
    inlemur wrote: »
    A boy and girl, in similar states of intoxication, have sex. In the time afterward, the girl comes to feel that she was taken advantage of, and while she doesn't press charges, feels strong emotions about her sexual vulnerability, guilt, anger, etc. The boy in question does not feel this way. While analytically this is absurd due to the symmetry of the situation, I am not judging or advocating judgment of the girl's feelings. She is justified (not in any grand or legal sense, mind you) in them because they are a reflection of her society.

    1) Again, both boys and girls have feelings. I'm not sure why you're creating a situation in which the female has feelings, and the male doesn't.
    2) What is this non-legal, non-grand justified feeling? It seems to be doing work in your argument, but I'm not sure what you're talking about.
    3) If your distinctino is "analytically absurd" why are you talking about it?
    4) What is rape other than "feeling as if she was taken advantage of" or "feeling that she was raped"?

    1) You are correct, humans have feelings.
    2) I simply mean that she is not at fault for her own feelings. She has a legitimate right to feel the way she does, in spite of the fact that the other person in the scenario who had an identical, symmetric experience does not feel that way. She has the right, but she is not, in any universal sense, right.
    3) By analytically absurd I mean that an essentially identical event happened involving two parties. Her actions are as culpable as his, yet she feels that he took advantage of her. That is, if we break down the scenario and analyze the situation, neither party can be more responsible than the other due to the symmetry.
    4) This question I think has been addressed many times in the discussion. Putting rape solely into the mind of the victim is incredibly problematic from a legal perspective and also IMO from a moral one.
    inlemur wrote: »
    What I am suggesting is that her feelings are not necessary: that society can change its values such that women's sexuality is not valued as it is, and that we can move from (generally subconsciously) perceiving sex as something that men do to women to something that men and women do together.

    I'm not sure how you would verify this claim. "We can do something other than what we currently do." It's fine to say that, but how do you know that to be true? Also, again, the "value" of sexuality argument is problematic, because you've maintained the previous distinction to women with their feelings and emotions and cry cry, and men who just fuck and don't care.

    First, re: the bolded, you're putting words in my mouth. Second, I have no idea what you're asking here. How do I know that it is possible for humans to not be misogynistic in their treatment of sex? I suppose I don't. I would like the world better if that were the case though, so I'm willing to do my part.
    inlemur wrote: »
    This is a tremendous task which will likely take generations, as our bias and cultural values are ingrained into our languages and our laws. But in my opinion the first step is honestly identifying the social factors at work.

    You've talked about social factors. What about natural factors? And are these really different things? Where is the line between society and nature?

    They are different things for the purpose of this discussion, at least. They seem trivial to distinguish and categorize. Natural factors are things like anatomy and pregnancy. Social factors are anything else. Social factors can of course be based on biological considerations, as I elaborated upon earlier. For example, historically polygyny (social custom) is much more common than polyandry (social custom), likely due to the fact that in a polygamous relationship and without modern tools, it is possible to know whose children are whose (biological issue), and in a polyandrous one it is not.

    inlemur on
    XBL - remura
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