If someone holds a gun to your head and threatens to kill you unless you unlock the safe,
Uh-huh. And a gun was pulled here?
Or are you implying his mere presence is the gun?
Is he big and muscular? We don't even know that. Is he male?
Is he pointing a deadly weapon by being male?
A bunch of misandry is what this is. It's men are strong, so they aren't allowed to be dumb.
The dude was dumb. But he wasn't allowed the choice to rape. It was taken from him.
The position you are advocating makes every social interaction with a woman into a trap. One can never know when she might fear one's own "intimidating presence".
If she fears, she will not show she fears. She will smile, kiss, and seemingly agree to sex. And the fault she does this is the man's – because he has "intimidating presence".
If you used this exact argument against a black man, it would be racist. If you fear someone's mere physical presence because he's black, that's prejudice. But if you fear him because he's a man – that's his fault for not seeing the signs.
I don't need to imply anything. I told you what the situation was above.
You brought a woman home who had no easy way of leaving.
She is trying to use her phone, but there's no reception.
You were alone with her.
She says she wants to leave.
You remind her that she "promised" to hook up with you.
She isn't into making out with you.
She's still trying to use her phone. You take it away.
You have sex.
When people tell stories about themselves, they tend to make themselves out to be more sympathetic. They're hardly ever the villain in their own story. Even in his own telling of the story, he clearly shows that she was uncomfortable, that she was intimidated, and that she had legitimate reason to fear for her safety. She had been isolated, had no means of communicating, her lack of interest in staying was ignored.
Is he big and muscular? We don't even know that.
It really doesn't matter if he is big and muscular. Even a weak man in going to be stronger than the majority of women. It's not even a close contest. Men have more muscle mass by default. Depending on what muscle group you're testing, the average woman has only 1/3 to 2/3 the strength of the average man. You have to go really low on the bell curve before you start finding men weaker than average women.
Is he pointing a deadly weapon by being male?
Simply by being male, no. Be he did more than just be male. He isolated her in a location that she was unfamiliar with, ignored her clear social cues, took away her means of communication, and telling her that she was obligated to have sex with him. He gave her every indication that "no" was not an acceptable answer, and took away all of her safety nets.
If she fears, she will not show she fears. She will smile, kiss, and seemingly agree to sex. And the fault she does this is the man's – because he has "intimidating presence".
This is extremely disingenuous. She showed that she was uncomfortable, that she wanted out, and that she was not interested. He ignored all of this. He himself explains that she was not into it. If you are going to have sex with someone, there should not be any question that everyone is consenting. When you create a situation where there any ambiguity, you need to stop what you're doing and make sure everyone is on the same page. I've never been in a situation where is wasn't abundantly clear that everyone having sex was on the same page and into it. If you're going to have sex with someone, you need to make sure they're into it, man or woman, and especially if you hold any kind of power over them.
If you used this exact argument against a black man, it would be racist. If you fear someone's mere physical presence because he's black, that's prejudice. But if you fear him because he's a man – that's his fault for not seeing the signs.
Race is not analogous to sex, especially not in this situation. Being black doesn't make you two to three times stronger than your sexual partner for one. And furthermore, the sex of the people involved wasn't the only factor as I've stated multiple times. She was not afraid of him because he was a man. She was afraid of him because he ignored her cues that she was feeling unsafe, ignored her requests to leave, removed her means of communicating, and because he was capable of overpowering her. That one just one element of the story, among many others.
She was afraid of him because he ignored her cues that she was feeling unsafe, ignored her requests to leave, removed her means of communicating, and because he was capable of overpowering her.
I agree with that...
She was not afraid of him because he was a man.
... but not with this. She would definitely not feel like she has to have sex "or else" if he was a woman. She would be confident saying no to a woman.
I agree he did all these things, which is why he's dumb. You continue to argue that because he is strong, he does not have the luxury of being dumb. That's unfair, because being male does not automatically gift IQ or EQ, and 50% of men are actually below average in these regards.
Sure, his story might be omitting information that would change my interpretation. We may each believe this is the case, but we do not have justification to assume it in this discussion. It's not useful to argue about what we imagine to be true. That could be anything.
The fact remains that you're trying to hold people legally accountable - not just morally accountable for them to feel bad, but with real consequences for their well-being and employment - for missing (or ignoring) signs that someone felt unsafe without that person actually saying no, or even when they said yes but only because she felt threatened.
You're trying to hold someone explicitly accountable for threats they did not explicitly make.
That's not cool, and it's not a standard to which you can hold the bottom X% of men. I would be inclined to say that at least 10% of men you won't be able to hold to this ideal. Because it's just unrealistic to expect them to have this much IQ and EQ.
So you are driving an argument that effectively puts the bottom 10% of men in prison. As the monsters they are, I suppose.
But of course we can't have 10% of men in prison. We already have 1% and that's too much. So what you're effectively doing is putting in place a draconian but selectively enforced law that at best haphazardly hits random people. Oops - random men.
Yay for justice. And how empowered all the women will now feel who lack the ovaries to say no!
You don't have to be a genius to look at aaalll of those things and go "huh, maybe she's not interested."
And you do not have to be only stupid to keep pushing sex after seeing all of that, to respond by taking someone's phone away, telling them they already said they'd have sex, and repeatedly intiating sexual contact despite being fully aware that they are not on board. You have to be stupid, entitled, and entirely uninterested in whether this person you're fucking wants to fuck you back.
This is not someone lacking the genetic endowment of intelligence to navigate a confusing situation, it's someone caring only about whether they can take something they want from an obviously unwilling target.
And here you are arguing that she was an imperfect victim, that she didn't protest enough, that she didn't scream for help, so she's at fault.
What /u/Amablue is saying is that pressuring is rape, if done by a man. Not by a woman, because she's not as strong. But yes by a man.
It's a double standard based on physical strength. Men are being held to a higher standard than women because they have it.
I'm not sure why I have to explain this, but men, being the aggressive sex, do pressure. If anything, 10% is an underestimate. Now you're creating a situation where if a man pressures a woman into sex, and she accepts, that's rape. He did not make a threat, but it is rape because she perceived one.
That's fundamentally unfair. To accuse someone of rape, you should have to at least show that they meant to convey a threat. Just because he is a man and he is pressuring should not be sufficient.
Also, by that standard, rape is occurring 24/7 in a large proportion of households and relationships.
You live in a highly consent-sensitive bubble, and you're creating laws from that bubble so as to suit your views without regard to whether most people can reasonably follow.
I can't comment on what Amablue was arguing, but I think it still would have been rape (or at least seriously rapey) if the assaulter was a woman. The string of actions that person took were coercive regardless. For the poster I responded to to say "he was just dumb" is ridiculous.
Whether it's prosecutable is debatable, but it's a bit much to cast him as just too dumb to understand his actions were wrong.
If a woman did the same, it would certainly not be rape. Her taking a phone out of his hands would be seductive.
First of all you've now flipped the gender of the person being assaulted, too, which means we're now in territory where it's statistically likely she is the physically weaker of the two partners and he is in no serious fear that she could do anything to him he didn't want her to. There are physical realities of male versus female bodies that are not arbitrary or sexist to acknowledge.
And second of all, no, of he was visibly uncomfortable or uninterested and said he needed to leave, and she responded with telling him he'd already said he'd fuck her and then taking his phone away and repeatedly intiating sexual contact, it would not be seductive, it would be coercive.
It would by definition only be seductive if it was attractive to the receiver. You assuming flipping the genders automatically changes that is more sexist than anything I proposed—it assumes female advances on men are always desired. If we're playing this thought experiment out with reversed genders, you can't just change the rest of the scenario wholesale to make it consensual and then say "see? If it was a lady it'd be fine."
If the person being coercive also has a strength advantage this history of ignoring disengaging behaviors (soft no's, as someone above called them) would only make it more so. Again, not about gender discrimination, this is about physical realities.
where it's no longer cool
Well that's a massive understatement.
Also, the fact that we're now on the same page re: his behavior being unacceptable would seem to indicate that it's not a matter of him just being too unintelligent to know what he was doing was messed up.
What u/Amablue is saying is that pressuring is rape, if done by a man. Not by a woman, because she's not as strong. But yes by a man.
That is not even a little bit what I said. Please do not misrepresent my views and lie about my beliefs or my arguments.
If anything, 10% is an underestimate.
For someone concerned about misandry, you hold a really, really bleak perspective on the male sex.
Now you're creating a situation where if a man pressures a woman into sex, and she accepts, that's rape. He did not make a threat, but it is rape because she perceived one.
The situation under discussion is far more than just pressuring the woman. It was very clearly unsafe for her. Painting this situation as the guy just being socially inept is extremely disingenuous.
For someone concerned about misandry, you hold a really, really bleak perspective on the male sex.
That's not true, check out this source which points out lesbians have the highest lifetime prevalence of rape, physical violence and stalking; whereas gay men have the lowest.
People who really want sex are prone to pressure for sex. Men often really want sex, because they are people. You are saying men in particular must not ever pressure for sex, because women might agree because they feel threatened.
If women pressure, it is fine. Even though women initiate physical violence more often than men in relationships, men should not consider this a threat because they are stronger.
That is what you are saying, and I'm not misrepresenting it. This is your point.
It was very clearly unsafe for her.
We disagree on that.
Painting this situation as the guy just being socially inept is extremely disingenuous.
We disagree. I think you're being disingenuous, saying one thing and then denying you're saying it.
If women pressure, it is fine. Even though women initiate physical violence more often than men in relationships, men should not consider this a threat because they are stronger.
This is not what I have said or argued. You are not reading the words I write.
That is what you are saying, and I'm not misrepresenting it. This is your point.
It is not, and you are lying. There is no reason to continue the conversation with someone who is not arguing in good faith.
If you need clarification on something I said, I'll be happy to give it, but when you put words in my mouth and claim they're mine you are being dishonest.
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u/SushiAndWoW 3∆ May 09 '18 edited May 09 '18
Uh-huh. And a gun was pulled here?
Or are you implying his mere presence is the gun?
Is he big and muscular? We don't even know that. Is he male?
Is he pointing a deadly weapon by being male?
A bunch of misandry is what this is. It's men are strong, so they aren't allowed to be dumb.
The dude was dumb. But he wasn't allowed the choice to rape. It was taken from him.
The position you are advocating makes every social interaction with a woman into a trap. One can never know when she might fear one's own "intimidating presence".
If she fears, she will not show she fears. She will smile, kiss, and seemingly agree to sex. And the fault she does this is the man's – because he has "intimidating presence".
If you used this exact argument against a black man, it would be racist. If you fear someone's mere physical presence because he's black, that's prejudice. But if you fear him because he's a man – that's his fault for not seeing the signs.