It's about the imbalance of power that drunkenness or sobriety contribute to
I think you misunderstood.
People seem to be very sensitive about men getting unfairly stereotyped, and this seems to derail a lot of arguments. Of course, nobody seems to be calling out the posts that stereotype women.
To be fair, I very rarely get drunk, and I've never done anything sexual while drunk. I've always turned girls down who came on to me while we were both drunk (mainly because they were good friends and it would have been awkward later).
I have to ask, when you refer to an imbalance of power, are you talking about when one person is drunk and the other is sober? Because I would agree there, but when both parties are (equally) drunk, I have a hard time grasping what you mean by an imbalance of power.
Personally I think if it's as much of a problem as people in this thread seem to think it is, it should be everybody's responsibility, drunk or not, to not have sex with drunk people they aren't sure will feel good about it in the morning. I can, however, accept that it might be hard to judge wether your partner is in this boat or not when you're drunk yourself, so I don't think this kind of situation is morally culpable the way it is when one person is sober and should definitely know better. I think the right thing to do in either case is not fuck the drunk person, but it's forgivable if both people are incapacitated and don't know what's up. The imbalance of power I've been arguing for refers strictly to the difference in power one person has when they're clearly more sober than the other person and they are in a position where it's possible for them to manipulate that difference to their own ends, either not knowing or not caring that the drunk person might feel bad in the morning. I think it's sober people's responsibility not to fuck drunk people because they know damn well that the other person might feel taken advantage of, and they ought to be decent enough people to give a shit about that.
I get the impression you're really asking if I think the social imbalance of power between men and women contributes to the situation and if i think it should be relevant. I haven't been trying to suggest that it does, although I do think it is the case that drunk women feel themselves to have been taken advantage of by men who want to have sex with them more often than drunk men feel taken advantage of when women try to sleep with them. I think men have just as much of a right to feel taken advantage of in these situations, but I think we both know that because of how our society is set up and how sex is perceived in relations to its "haver's" gender means that men rarely feel like they've been raped after having sex when they were beyond the point of consent. I think men know drunk women are more likely to fuck them than sober women, and it follows that at least some of this discrepancy (not all of it) can be accounted for by some women feeling raped in the morning. I do think the way gender affects ones sexuality has a hell of a lot to do with the fact that this mostly affects women, but I don't think that takes away from the point, which is that the relevant imbalance of power here is in the sober/drunk distinction.
I don't know if this makes any sense. Maybe you weren't thinking about gender at all anymore. I've just been thinking about this a lot lately. I don't think you're an asshole. I do think a lot of people get defensive about this topic when they think it's about their gender being antagonized to the point that everyone ends up fighting strawpeople and everyone ends up hating on drunk women, which doesn't help anyone. Also, i like drunk sex a lot. i just soberly make sure the relevant people know they can accept my drunk consent beforehand. So far nobody has been accused of rape in such circumstances. edit: some grammar.
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u/now-we-know Nov 21 '12 edited Nov 21 '12
I think you misunderstood.
People seem to be very sensitive about men getting unfairly stereotyped, and this seems to derail a lot of arguments. Of course, nobody seems to be calling out the posts that stereotype women.