Letters to the Editor
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If you can't say it's rape then you can't say no?
It's interesting how you interpret the Maryland ruling. I interpreted this to mean that once someone has consented to sex they can not claim it was rape. You interpreted it to mean once one consents that's all the person can do.
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not quite right
broadsheet's flat foot drops again - of course a woman can object to sex in the middle of it, you reductive twits...she just can't drag the man to court under claims of rape.
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I'm not sure this is wrong.
I'm sure, for example, that a woman who consents to sex that ultimately sour could still have her assailant prosecuted for assault, for example, or attempted murder. But to prosecute for rape when she's consented... lack of consent is the sine qua non for a rape prosecution.
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rape is sex without consent, if he is inside her before she withdraws consent then the entry was consensual
this is established law. Now maybe you could create a new law where it is "rape" if he fucks her till she comes then doen't pull out immediately when she orders him to (if for instance he hasn't "earned the right" to come) but this would be a departure from current law. It's kind of funny that someone would think it wasn't.
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terrifying?
maybe if your consent was just as wishy washy as your reasoning.
"Not if it hurts, not if it feels wrong, not if something starts going badly."
wtf is the legal definition of it "feeling wrong"?
from mars,
Dean
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Hmmm
I don't really know if I agree that it's rape if a woman says no in the middle of sex because it hurts or something else is going on so you want it to stop.
It's been rare, but there are a few times I've said ouch or stop during sex and the guys have been fine with it, sometimes we've resumed after I've readjusted positions or sometimes it's just a mood killer and so we stop.
I've also been in a situtation where a man is trying to rape me and the feelings are completely different. Screaming no and crying to get off me and pushing him and hitting him and the fear of being violated against my will I think is a different feeling than if I said stop in the middle and the guy didn't stop. I think I'd just wait for it to be over and then tell the guy he was a jackass and never see him again, I don't know if I'd consider it worthy of a police report, trial and jail time. I think I'd just chalk it up to lousy sex, not necessarily a crime of violence against my body. But then again, say we're going at it and then he starts to do some S&M shit, like choking me and that might make me feel fear and if he didn't stop maybe I'd be terrified. I just think that particular area of sexual relations is a little tricky.
Then again maybe a guy who won't stop is already a rapist, this girl just said yes first.
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The opinion is even worse!
http://www.courts.state.md.us/opinions/cosa/2006/225s05.pdf
It is actually *more* horrifying than the headline makes it sound. The court rested its decision on a 1980 Maryland Court of Appeals decision, Battle v. State. The rationale of Battle v. State rests on the ancient view of women as chattles, and that their chastity must be protected to preserve their value. Under this view, once penetration has occurred everything else is legally irrelevant--the crime of "rape" essentially boils down to "the taking of a woman's chastity against her consent."
It is possible that the court was trying to goad the Maryland Court of Appeals into reviewing the case and establishing once and for all that continued sexual conduct post-penetration after a withdrawal of consent *does* constitute rape. Let's hope that's the case--the view of rape described in this case has no place in any modern society.
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Here's a Situation
You are a woman and start having consensual sex with a man. After about five minutes, for whatever reason, you decide you do not want to be having sex with this man. You ask him to stop. He pulls out and you both feel really stupid and sheepish and probably will not ever discuss this out loud.
Now imagine the same scenario except that this time when you ask him to stop he doesn't. You ask again and he keeps going. You try to push him off of you but you can't. You start to thrash around and scream, and when you try to slide out from under him he pushes you back down. You cry and beg him to stop and rather than stop he pins your arms over your head and covers your mouth with his forearm so he doesn't have to hear you scream and he continues to fuck you until he's done.
How is that NOT rape?
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Some of these responses are scaring the crap out of me.
Jane Smith consents to sex. Once penetrated, she begs and pleads for you to STOP.
But you say, what, hey, just let me finish this first???
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yes, exactly
Yes, exactly, "anonymous." If a man is fucking a woman, and refuses to stop if she asks or tries to push him off or screams or begs him to stop, and he keeps fucking her, he is RAPING her. Period. I am horrified by the rest of the responses. Consent and then changing her mind AFTERWARD is one thing. Consent and then changing her mind DURING is another. If a woman tells you to stop, STOP. Gah. She shouldn't have to check her state laws!
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hell freezes over
And think not just twice but three and four and five times before you agree to shag someone.
-- Rebecca Traister
Thank you, Ms. traister, for the first mature, responsible piece of advice you've ever given to women regarding sexual relations.
It's a shame it took an antiquated law about chattel for you to finally encourage females to take some personal responsibility. No sex is without consequence; it never was nor will it ever be.
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the difficulties of applying black/white legal rules to a sexual encounter
IANAL so my response is purely a layperson's....but this situation highlights the challenges of applying the law (which tries to be as clear-cut and unambiguous as possible) to a sexual encounter.
Having sex isn't like signing a legal document, where the "moment of commitment" is the single, one-time event of writing your signature.
Having sex is one long interaction between two people -- an ongoing negotiation of what's wanted or permissable, and what's unwanted and not permissable. So oral sex may be a yes, but vaginal may be a no; anal is off limits today but yesterday it was OK, etc.
So in my limited understanding of the Maryland law -- saying yes to sex is like signing a legal document -- from that point on, you're committed to any and all things afterwards?? But that's not how sexual encounters work.
Suppose two people have consensual vaginal sex, and then the man demands oral sex, and the woman says no, and the man forces it on her. By my standards, that incident of oral sex would be rape -- it would be sexual assault. Although the couple had just had consensual vaginal sex, that didn't give the man permission to perform any further sexual act of his choosing (even if it's a second round of vaginal sex).
The issue of changing one's mind in the middle of penetrative intercourse is probably the most difficult situation to evaluate, because you're right in the middle of a consensual action when you change your mind and want things to stop.
IMO somebody who continues to have intercourse with you, after you told them to stop in the middle of things, that person should stop and if they don't, that's wrong -- but I'm not sure if I'd call it rape. To me, it's not the same as someone forcing an act on you that you didn't want in the first place.
The problem is that the law doesn't seem to be well suited to fit these kinds of ambiguous situations. It's he-said-she-said -- her word against his, unless she can show any physical evidence to the contrary -- ie can she show any signs of injury, violence or force that could be evidence that he forced her to do something unwanted after their initial consensual encounter.