May 21, 2015
"The quest for perfect consent is profoundly utopian. Like all such quests that ignore human realities, it points the way to dystopian nightmare."
Writes Cathy Young in a WaPo essay titled "Feminists want us to define these ugly sexual encounters as rape. Don’t let them./We need to stop prosecuting bad behavior as rape."
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Young is absolutely correct. "Rape" is being forced into sex against your will; if you decide to have sex because someone lied to you, or whined to you, or manipulated you emotionally--that may be lousy behavior on their part, but you still did make the conscious decision to have sex. The only exception to this should be a credible, imminent threat of harm (e.g., "we're having sex right now or I will beat you"). To expand the definition of rape to include lousy behavior is to dillute the term and make a mockery of actual rape victims.
Instead, empower women--make it clear that they are in charge of their own bodies and they have to take responsibility if they agree to have sex with someone, no matter how ill-advised.
That's an extremely powerful essay. A lot to think about there.
Do away with rape and go with assault and battery.
Women would be clear on it again.
Universities will change their minds about what they do only when they start losing law suits.
"Universities will change their minds about what they do only when they start losing law suits."
They're already losing law suits. They're just have to hold out for Hillary!'s feminist judges, then they'll start winning them.
According to the CDC "telling promises that weren't true" (their words) is "sexual assault."
So guys, never lie about the size of your Johnson.
Here is another sentence that the CDC considers at least attempted sexual assault: "Look, if you really don't want to have sex with me, maybe this relationship is over?"
Apparently the woman has the right to trap a man into a sexless relationship and to brook no discussion of the matter.
And in other news, "Fathers who conduct secret paternity tests on their children will face prosecution under new laws to be proposed by a Government watchdog" in the UK.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1394653/Move-to-outlaw-secret-DNA-testing-by-fathers.html
From a feminist PoV, being female means never having to say you're sorry. For why would you, when you can never be wrong?
I thought Young wrote an excellent argument. Human sexual behavior is simply too complex to fit neatly into the categories feminists have created for it.
"The quest for perfect consent is profoundly utopian. Like all such quests that ignore human realities, it points the way to dystopian nightmare."
No kidding!! The tragic flaw, conceit, evil, arrogance, take your pick, of the left is that if you can imagine the perfect outcome, it can be made to happen. If you can imagine it in words, it can be written. If it can be written, it can be codified. Once codified, it will be enforced. With enforcement, the perfect outcome will happen.
If not, it's the result of sabotage by evil people, or inadequate drafting. The inevitable result is the two-fold redoubling of effort of ever more regulation coupled with ever more vigilance against societal treason. No surprise the result of utopia is dystopia. It's also one of the two main reasons those not in favor of central control are considered evil rather than merely wrong.
I wonder whether there is a relationship between the expanding definition of rape and the notion that rape victims should be exempted from laws limiting abortions.
pfennig,
Hmmm. Good observation. If not now, there will be.
Human sexual behavior is simply too complex to fit neatly into the categories feminists have created for it.
That's why I say being an atheist is so hard. These women doubtless profess atheism, but somehow think that men and women were created in some simple, perfectly symmetrical, way that can be governed by simple rules. As if billions of years of sexual evolution can be abrogated, err, I mean "razed" and re-engineered.
"Apparently the woman has the right to trap a man into a sexless relationship and to brook no discussion of the matter."
Actually, it deprives the woman of the opportunity to try to keep a man by providing sex. He isn't trapped, but just forced to decide to leave without presenting her with an option to give more sex.
I continue to think that we need better terminology if schools are going to make caddish behavior an expellable offense. They are of course free to do that if they want to (although Young gives excellent reasons why that would be a mistake), but they shouldn't call it "sexual assault" when a boy takes advantage of a girl who's been drinking to loosen her sexual inhibitions, or when he emotionally pressures her to have sex or rough sex, and so on. Sexual assault is a crime and labelling a boy a criminal for conduct that is not a crime is profoundly unjust. Call it "ungentlemanly behavior" and call it a day.
"Call it "ungentlemanly behavior" and call it a day."
Okay, but if they plan to expel men for "ungentlemanly behavior" they'll also have to expel women for "unladylike behavior."
She writes as if Progs would take "utopian" as a criticism.
Here is another sentence that the CDC considers at least attempted sexual assault: "Look, if you really don't want to have sex with me, maybe this relationship is over?"
Apparently the woman has the right to trap a man into a sexless relationship and to brook no discussion of the matter.
I've seen that also. Apparently, men are chattel. Men have no rights to have expectations in a relationship.
I'll tell women openly: You want the man to be faithful to you --- then there are things you're going to have to do on your part. If you won't, then it's idiotic for the man to forego what he wants.
Especially since women LOVE attached men. Cheating when you're dating/married is incredibly easy. I get way more feminine attention being married than I ever received single.
Actually, it deprives the woman of the opportunity to try to keep a man by providing sex. He isn't trapped, but just forced to decide to leave without presenting her with an option to give more sex.
She could've offered more sex from the get go. She had the chance. Men aren't going to stray immediately for the most part. Some will, but those that will the women KNEW would stray quickly when they met them (while they were likely dating somebody else)
Hell, giving a guy oral more often will keep a lot of men from cheating.
I don't get how these activists can, straight faced, declare their desires as a pursuit for "equality"
Blogger Ann Althouse said...
"Apparently the woman has the right to trap a man into a sexless relationship and to brook no discussion of the matter."
Actually, it deprives the woman of the opportunity to try to keep a man by providing sex. He isn't trapped, but just forced to decide to leave without presenting her with an option to give more sex.
au contraire, she can always do that anyway, she just has to think of it herself. Let women have to be the mind readers for a change.
I liked Cathy Young’s article, the only thing I think she missed was what George Will had written about. That the rape victim on campus gets an elevated status that confers special privialages. This is a tremendous incentive for false rape stories. The Rolling Stone UVA student was given extra time to complete course work due to her trauma, she was given speaking time at rallies and other events. Everywhere she went on campus nice lady professors and feminsts were holding her hand, and rubbing the small of her back and telling her “You need anything honey? You just let me know.”
You would think that all this sisterhood support would disappear if she had made up the gang rape on broken glass at the frat house story. But it would seem not. The prestige of being a victim remains. And don’t even get me started on the mattress girl.
Someone just posted this infographic on facebook. "ooooh it's on the internet! It must be true!"
Getting guilt-tripped into giving money to a freeloading friend is not robbery.
Best line of the article.
Typical liberal--her morals and behavior should become the bar by which all behavior is judged.
Is it too Puritanical to say that marriage provides a presumption of consent, with the consent having been given official approval, witnessed and publicly recorded? Perhaps we should encourage marriage, and discourage extra-marital sex. Or is that a dystopian result?
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