temptotalk
Legendary Member
Actually- that is what the LAW says about EVERY CRIME.
That if you are unaware that you are committing a crime, then you can not be found 'guilty'. Look it up.
And I am not the one mouthing platitudes. You are. Saying that SOME people who do stupid, drunken, sexually suggestive things can not be held responsible for their actions... but that OTHERS who stupidly, drunkenly Respond to their stupid sexually suggestive actions are defacto CRIMINALS is a platitude that exculpates ONLY the stupidity of anyone who feels that something happened that they wish hadn't.
My story of the drunk trying to get my dick out of my pants is absolutely analogous because the ONLY difference between that scenario, and the OPs is that I was sober enough to reject her advances. Had I been semi-conscious with rum, sprawled on the same couch, and been unable to cogently reject her, she might well have gotten it out, mistaken my incoherent moaning for excitement and and wrapped her mouth around it, and I might have only then mustered the awareness to shove her off of me.
But you miss the point of the story- it was that YOUR argument, and the PC view being forwarded is that her actions constituted sexual assault. And that can CERTAINLY be argued. you CAN choose to form a cultural expectation that states EVERY unwanted physical contact or even verbal suggestion IS sexual assault... and incarcerate people for it.
But take that reasoning further... to its logical extreme, and the OP could be accused by his host of sexual assault for even suggesting he stay the night and then taking off his pants.
that is, the only criteria YOU impose to define a crime is the "offense" taken by one party. You allow no other consideration to impinge upon the accusation. And, sorry, but you have no constitutional right to live your life unoffended.
here's evidence in counter to that perspective:
They did a study of women being sexually harassed in the workplace- they trained several actors to pose as co-workers and deliver the exact same kind of ambiguous come-ons in the exact same inflection. And they dressed some of these actors as maintenance workers, some as office workers, and some as executives. Some of the actors were handsome, others were less so.
And then the had the actors swap costumes and try it all again.
And the results were telling. Women's responses ranged from finding the approach "Offensive" or even "sexually assaultive".... all the way to finding the approach "charming" and "enagaging"- but how acceptable they found the encounters correlated perfectly with the perceived affluence or attractiveness of the "co-worker".
That is, the exact same lines, delivered the exact same way, by the exact same actor, were seen as threatening if he was dressed as a maintenance worker, offensive or in poor taste if he was dressed as an office guy, and downright charming if he was dressed as an affluent executive. And when delivered by handsome men, women consistently found the advance to be more acceptable than when delivered by unattractive men.
that is, the more 'eligible' the guy, the more open women were to interpreting the exact same advance in a positive, rather than a negative light.
( this is not an indictment of women... men do exactly the same thing in being more positively responsive to what they perceive to be higher value potential mates )
Thus, the same behavior from the same persons can be either seen as offensive, or engaging, depending entirely upon context and reciprocated interest.
Ergo- in potentially sexual situations, it becomes even more critical to realize that drunk people have impaired perceptions. AND impaired ability to recognize their own conduct as signaling reciprocated interest.
Sex is NOT inherently criminal. It NOT robbery. People NEVER give other people the "impression" that they might be interested in being robbed.
Yet EVERY TIME two people 'legally' fuck, its because they gave each other the impression that they might be interested in fucking.
In fact, a rather large portion of people's time, activity and attention is absolutely devoted to social situations wherein they can have the opportunity to find people who they are interested in fucking, and who might be interested in fucking them back.
But we do not live in a world where the potentially receptive partner holds up a sign saying "open to being fucked".
We live in a world full of shy people afraid of being rejected, who might have to see these other people in other social situations and wish to retain some dignity... and so LOTS of interest in fucking gets expressed in ways that can be "plausibly denied". That is, so subtlely that they can deny even having signaled interest.
Add to this that drinking is used by BOTH sexes as both a means to lessen their own inhibitions and fears- AND as a potential "excuse" for their conduct if they should get rejected, or behave unacceptably; an excuse that everyone accepts and understands because they likely do the same.
You are ignoring the entire landscape of courting and sexuality as it REALLY is.
And You can stop pretending that the OP was actually merely 'asleep'. His description is clear- he was too drunk to even walk any distance. That implies he was passed out, not merely sleeping... and I have been around way too many passed out drunks to accept that he was incapable of drunkenly responding to touch in his semi-conscious state.
He asked to stay over. The Host might have seen that as expressed interest. The Host CHECKED if it might be interest by suggesting they could share his bed, and the OP agreed. Unsolicited, the OP took off his clothes, which was yet another signal to a drunk guy who might have thought the OP was making shy excuses to get in bed with him.
Your perspective makes EVERY mere MISUNDERSTANDING a crime. Throwing what might well have been nothing but a lonely guy who had every reason to think the OP was interested and receptive, into the same cells as murderers, muggers, gang thugs, and the kind of men who tie and torture a woman while savaging her sexually.
But that is not the core fault in your reasoning. The real fault is that you excuse the mistaken actions of one person who is drunk, but refuse to offer the same consideration to the other, over something pretty much EVERY human being actually does crave and actually does seek, amid all kinds of mixed messaging and ambiguous signaling.
I would utterly agree with your take if the Primary way sex happened was when the receptive partner signed a contract agreeing to have sex.
Hell, I would agree with you if even 10% of the times I myself have had sex it was discussed ahead of time and cogently agreed to by both parties before any physical contact occurred.
But it doesn't happen that way. Its a nuanced and complex dance is what it is. And when both parties are plastered, it becomes awkward, uncoordinated, and bumbling, but it still happens and drunken hook-ups are still a huge percentage of the sex that occurs.
And sorry if it upsets you that I am willing to defend my arguments. I am. I think it is becoming vitally important to vocally and rationally oppose the kind of ridiculous pollyanalyzing that makes university students imagine that they should not have to so much as HEAR ideas or words that they find offensive. Or that pretends that sexual signaling is perfectly clear at all times.
Whether you find something offensive is NOT justification for labeling it criminal. Its just another form of popular moralizing scold. No different than putting a scarlet letter on women others feel is too forward, what we now-a-days call Slut Shaming.
There can be NO rational 'rules' that always apply the same to human conduct because our conduct and interactions are myriad and no one is ever perfectly understood.
This is WHY zero tolerance, mandatory minimum sentencing, and 3 strikes laws are STUPID.
They remove from justice the entire concept of JUDGEMENT.
You Agree the OP showed poor judgement, But you hold the Host entirely responsible for His poor judgment to the point of criminality, and do not hold the OP responsible for his at all. You only shake your finger at the OP, yet you shake Handcuffs at his Host.
Yet- if you want to be Just, the Degree to which you hold the OP responsible for his own poor judgement MUST be the degree to which you relieve the Host of responsibility for his poor judgement.
The reason we have a Judge in a courtroom is so that the technicalities of illegality can be informed by the circumstances specific to each event that might allow better understanding of the people involved and whether anyone actually meant to harm anyone else.
I like how you took one single solitary instance. On something so important as rape...and used it to generalize large swathes of people with it.
Actually- that is what the LAW says about EVERY CRIME.
That if you are unaware that you are committing a crime, then you can not be found 'guilty'. Look it up.
I was just like "Dude, what the fuck??" and he replied "come on, man, you were moaning, so you enjoyed it".
PC view huh? So is that what you think all of this is about? Being PC?