Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Morrigi]

Even if that is true Reelya I am something who utterly despises lying.

I HATE how justified people think themselves when altering statistics, misrepresenting facts, and outright lying all to serve a greater purpose.

I had to read an essay written by a MEMBER OF CONGRESS on why revisionist history is good and we should always teach altered history over real history.

Revising views on history in light of new information is common practice, and failing to do so is considered to be dishonest among historians.

That isn't revisionist history. Revisionist history is when you alter history in order to benefit the current beliefs of the time.

If you change history because we found out something new that is just updating it.

It's also known as historical revisionism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_revisionism

What? In my senario, both partener enthousiastically consented, but one of them was actually pretty drunk

And I'm saying this is a contradiction in terms, because you cannot consent if you're truly pretty drunk (terminology which pretty strongly evokes images of being past the point of impaired judgment or what you should have assumed as an unacceptably high chance of impaired judgment).

In almost all states in the U.S., that is not rape.

It may not be "Rape" but it is illegal in nearly every state (often this situation goes by other names in statute like various forms of "sexual assault," etc., but practically same thing)

Assuming that the person SHOULD have reasonably been able to tell that their partner was inebriated (which seems obvious if they're "pretty drunk"), that is. Not noticing something that any normal (sober) person would have noticed doesn't get you off the hook for stuff.

If the simple act of having sex while inebriated was illegal and enforced, colleges would have no students left.

[Phmcw]

What? In my senario, both partener enthousiastically consented, but one of them was actually pretty drunk

And I'm saying this is a contradiction in terms, because you cannot consent if you're truly pretty drunk (terminology which pretty strongly evokes images of being past the point of impaired judgment or what you should have assumed as an unacceptably high chance of impaired judgment).

You can and routinely do. I'd argue that a majority of newly formed relation involve the cusumption of alcoholic brevages in significant quantities. I'll also argu that there is no way to know with precision somone's intoxication level, who are in some cases very misleading.

It may not be "Rape" but it is illegal in nearly every state (often this situation goes by other names in statute like various forms of "sexual assault," etc., but practically same thing)

I'll ask for evidence, because I didn't see any. For incapacitation due to alcohol, I saw plenty, but none for impeared judgment.

[GavJ]

The enforcement is double underlined and bolded there. No it is not enforced.

And I don't think it should be if neither partner wants it to be. (I in general object to government having the right to prosecute crimes between private citizens with no charges filed of any sort, unless murder or something where the victim cannot press charges.)

But why shouldn't it be enforced if charges are pressed?



Also it is pretty dramatic to say there'd be no students. I'm pretty confident people wouldn't wait until all of their classmates were arrested before changing habits...

[Phmcw]

The enforcement is double underlined and bolded there. No it is not enforced.

It's not in the law either. You're fully responsible of the decisions you take while drunk. And contract you sign while drunk may be enforcable including commerical contracts.

You're flately, factually wrong. The only case considered is when peoples are incapacited. Or near incapacited.   

But why shouldn't it be enforced if charges are pressed?

Personal responability. Don't make everyone but yourself hold the burden of your own damn actions.

[Bauglir]

I guess the question is about the extent to which sex becomes something that's done to you as much or more than it becomes something you do as alcohol gets involved. I think I've made pretty clear that I don't think there's a solid line at any particular point of intoxication. But for some reason people seem to think that means I hate sex or something.

[Rolepgeek]

The enforcement is double underlined and bolded there. No it is not enforced.

It's not in the law either. You're fully responsible of the decisions you take while drunk. And contract you sign while drunk may be enforcable including commerical contracts.

You're flatly, factually wrong. The only case considered is when peoples are incapacitated. Or near incapacitated.   

You are responsible in the fact that you made those decisions. That is not the issue here. The issue is that you guys seem to be saying 'if someone gets drunk, and then gets pressured into having sex or someone takes advantage of their drunken state so that they have sex with them, that shouldn't be considered rape because "they should have known what they were getting into"'. Which is the same logic as 'if someone walks home from a club at night, and is wearing revealing clothing, and someone forces themselves on them, that shouldn't be considered rape because "they should have known what would happen"'. You are minimizing rape by saying it can't happen because it's the victims fault. That's called victim-blaming. It happens way too much already. Also, the fact that you don't get to decide whether they're just feeling 'regret' or were actually raped. You don't know if someone did slip something into their drink, or the emotional trauma that can be caused even just from not knowing what happened and waking up alone, naked, with the room smelling like sex. If someone drugs them, and someone else who is unaware that they were so drugged, takes advantage of their drugged state, that is rape.

Rape is, in the end, for prosecution purposes, a matter of intent. It is not moral to convict someone who wasn't taking advantage of someone, or honestly didn't realize they were. However, the cases in which they weren't are vastly outnumbered by the times they were; thinking 'she's drunk; maybe I'll get lucky' is an example of the first steps on that course to taking advantage of them. That's the sort of thing I've been trying to talk about.

However, I also don't think two people can mutually rape each other. Rape involves sex without the consent of the other party. If they are trying to have sex with you while you are trying to have sex with them, that is pretty clear consent as far as I can tell(and yes, normal sex can become rape; consent can be taken back).

Rape for people who have been traumatized and need counseling and the like is not a matter of intent, it's a matter of perception. Because whether they were trying to or not, you perceived getting raped, and that is the part that leaves scars. You don't get to tell someone 'you were not raped'. Just like you don't get to tell someone 'you belong to me'(leave aside bdsm for the moment, please?) or 'you could get over your mental issues if you just tried harder'. Or 'you can stop being gay if you want to'. That's not how it works. You can ask them if and why they want to press charges, and get their view on things. You cannot solely use their view, since there are cases in which people fake being raped (and in all honesty, those people disgust me almost as much as rapists; more, in most cases) to get what they want/revenge or the like. However, you certainly cannot use only the accused rapist's view.

That, plus the really fucked up shit with what happens if one of them gets pregnant and laws concerning that.

At heart, it's a simple issue. Dealing with it is not a simple issue, however, and trying to do strawman claims with the way the law should work is ridiculous. It's always going to be a case-by-case basis.

Having sex with someone while they are drunk is not necessarily rape.
Having sex with someone who didn't actually want to for XYZ reason, is rape, however.

Trying to protect people from being accused of rape, and by extension, rapists, is just as bad as trying to attack people who falsely accuse of rape, and by extension, actual rape victims. You can't claim 'it will always be their responsibility to avoid being raped while drunk'. You can, however, claim that it will always be your own responsibility to avoiding raping someone while they are drunk. Or while you are. Or at all. Just don't fuck people if they don't want you to fuck them. Really pretty simple, at heart.

[Reelya]

Wow, big pile of strawman attacks there. People are saying "ALL drunken sex IS RAPE" right in this thread. Apparently disagreeing with that is no different to saying women who wore revealing clothes were "asking for it"

Great way to argue there, create a huge controversial stew of things nobody has said, accuse everyone who disagrees with you of "secretly" saying it. then debunk said pile of things nobody said. Hooray - you win.

Rape for people who have been traumatized and need counseling and the like is not a matter of intent, it's a matter of perception. Because whether they were trying to or not, you perceived getting raped, and that is the part that leaves scars. You don't get to tell someone 'you were not raped'.

I haven't seen people in this thread arguing that at all. Mostly, anyone who doubts the survey figures is more likely to cite the figures of women who claimed they were raped as the reliable figures. The # of women who perceive an incidence as rape is a more reliable indicator of the amount of traumatic experiences than some figure inflated by advocacy research that might included 75% of cases where women brushed off an incident as minor, but the researchers conflate this with traumatic rape. Like it's been mentioned in some articles that some surveys include "forced kiss" or "attempted forced kiss" in their 20% of women who have been sexually assaulted, and supporters of these statistics are actively hostile to any attempt to break these stats down by context. That's directly conflating someone trying to kiss you (and failing and giving up) with actual completed rape.

[Bauglir]

The thing that bugs me is that the people arguing that don't ever really make any clear distinction, and some (like Phmcw) are clearly arguing about how to define it in the context of personal experiences. The only time in the last several pages surveys come up is when there's a need to ward off this argument, and the rest of the time the conversation goes on being about how people ought to behave.

[Neonivek]

Apparently disagreeing with that is no different to saying women who wore revealing clothes were "asking for it"

There is kind of a big difference. The natural concequence of getting smashed is drunken sex.

The natural consequence of being sexy isn't rape.

[Rolan7]

What he is saying is that you are effectively cloak and daggering. You are more accurately fighting alcohol culture then rape culture.

I'm not saying anything about your right to get drunk. Go get as drunk as a fish every day if you want to. Just don't also rape people...

If by "fighting alcohol culture" you mean "raping people is something we like to culturally do while drinking" well then sure, guilty as charged, I guess I'm fighting alcohol culture in that context then. 


More specifically:

Other outcomes <-------Alcohol culture ----->  Rape culture
                                                                     ^
Other factors-------------------------------------/


The red portion is what I am fighting. Which has the effect of lessening (but not eliminating) rape culture (indicated by orange) and also removing the PART OF alcohol culture that might include raping (which should not be too controversial), also indicated by partial orange

If you think drunk people shouldn't screw each other, then please make that case.  But calling consensual sex "rape" is nonsense, and leads to particularly ridiculous concepts like "mutual rape".  It lumps actual rape in with consensual sex.  It's pointing at victims of actual rape and saying "Oh, I got drunk once and did something I regret - I'm a rape victim too!"  The more people take this absurd redefinition seriously, the less impact the word "rape" has.

You've made decent arguments that people should, to be on the safe side, refuse sex with people who are particularly drunk.  I respect that, and agree it should be a factor in practical decision making.  If someone's gotten themselves drunk and is making bad decisions, it's likely unwise to be involved.  I think most of us agree on this point.

To call someone a rapist simply for accepting drunken advances, though, is to misuse a loaded term for a temperance agenda.  It's an insult to actual rape victims, non-teetotalers, and common sense (in the case of mutual rape).  It weakens a word which should never lose impact.

[Neonivek]

I think though Rolan7 is they are trying to think out the old "getting someone drunk so you can sleep with them" aspect.

I brought it up with a friend and their opinion was mostly that no one MAKES you drink and that they should have self-awareness enough to prevent this sort of situation (don't booze yourself up just because someone keeps buying you drinks). Though they did say someone who does that is a big douche.

I still have a hard time taking either side.

[Playergamer]

...Jesus. Uh...forbid me for intruding, but could you try to avoid Flanderizing each other's arguments? It's painful to read.

[Neonivek]

...Jesus. Uh...forbid me for intruding, but could you try to avoid Flanderizing each other's arguments? It's painful to read.

I am not saying that is their ENTIRE argument. I am saying people are taking scenarios and making rules around them.

A perfectly sensible thing to do.

[Playergamer]

Not talking specifically to you Neo, talking to everyone.

[Rolan7]

I think though Rolan7 is they are trying to think out the old "getting someone drunk so you can sleep with them" aspect.

I brought it up with a friend and their opinion was mostly that no one MAKES you drink and that they should have self-awareness enough to prevent this sort of situation (don't booze yourself up just because someone keeps buying you drinks). Though they did say someone who does that is a big douche.

I still have a hard time taking either side.

Yeah, convincing someone to make bad decisions is douchey...  It's awful that it's so common.  We have so many ways to convince people to do what we want at their own expense.

People have to be allowed to make bad decisions, though, and be held responsible for them.  I don't consider myself a cynic, but skepticism is a survival skill.