OT Doing the ironing. RR

The law should give the benefit of the doubt (innocent until proven
guilty) but where it can be proven that a man knowingly took advantage
of someone he knew did not really know what was happening, it's
rape. Or are you saying that taking advantage of the mentally
handicapped is okay if they say `yes'?

 

Google for, "drunken consent is still consent", and you will find that it is
pretty much exactly the case. If a woman can't remember consenting, how can
she remember *not* consenting either.

 

MongFuck. If it isn't a legal term, it damn well should be

 

So what happens to the law on fraud? If you take advantage of
someone's gullibility or stupidity to sell them Tower Bridge, surely
that's their problem?

On the face of it, yes: the alleged crime was essentially obtaining
sex by deception, which amounts to rape, I would think (although the
precise legal definition might be different). If he had convinced a
religious woman that Jesus wanted her to do it, we'd be agreed that it
was de-facto rape. I don't see much difference. Whether he would be
guilty of rape if the facts had been proven is another thing.

 

Rape is not necessarily about what a woman says. If a man has sex,
honestly believing he has consent, it's not rape and it comes down to
`reasonable belief'. That's why `drunken consent' cases usually lead
to acquittal, rightly, in my view, because there is no way to *prove*
what was said and what anyone honestly believed. That's not the same
thing as saying that deceiving someone into sex is legal.

 

i don't know about that. if he were innocent until proven guilty, someone
would have to prove that jesus *didn't* want her to do it.

 

What if you delivered London Bridge?

 

You could just tell them where to collect it from.

 

they'd have to make even more visitbritain employees forcefully redundant.

 

Exactly such a thing has happened, and it was rape. Take a look at the
various religious communities where the `elder' gets his pick of the
young female initiates.

 

It depends on the kind of deceit, no?

 

Me neither

 

I have a problem with the general separated concept of rape I think. The
special treatment demeans serious physical assaults not involving sexual
interference and the courts act accordingly. If you have ever given (or
received) a really serious kicking, it dwarves the damage of a rape
involving psychological coercion or even minor physical trauma. I'm sure it
plays on the victim just as long and hard too.

 

Now define "mentally competent".

 

You beat me to it. Psycological manipulation (whether by religious
means or any other means) can make people do all sorts of things that
they otherwise wouldn't have done. Rape doesn't have to include
physical coercion.

The fact is our brains are programmable - and often against our will.

Phil.

 

Which is a great ideal but falls down sadly in practice. Why? Because
people lie - and hence you can't trust what they say. So you then have
a choice - you either trust no-one, trust everyone or find a boundary
somewhere between. Most people take the third choice (fortunately) but
not everyone is good at picking where the boundary is.

I know I wasn't - and probably still are not because I tend towards the
'trust people too much' end of the scale. Which is OK most of the time
until you discover that you have been lied to and manipulated by
someone for the own agenda for years..

Phil.

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, M J Carley

What about when the president of a country abuses his position to impose
unwanted sexual contact on a woman?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6619077.stm

(It's worth remembering exactly how deeply some religious types are
fucked in the head)

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I wouldn't go *quite* that far. I'm prepared to trust that a proportion
of people do tell the truth for a proportion of the time..

Um.. I think the the lying isn't the reason for the big brains but a
consequence of.

Well - if you want to take it to extremis - yes. But any arguement
taken to extremis fails.

Well quite.

There is a burden on society to protect those who are not capable of
protecting themselves and a burden on each of us (as members of
society) to not damage that society by destroying other members of
society[1]. Where the line of that comes differs for each one - the law
is there to set the minimum shared standard.

Phil.

[1] Starry-eyed idealist mode firmly engaged here. Rose-tinted
spectacles at max.

 

Not that that would ever happen in a secular state of course! Perish
the thought that somewhere as humanist as (say) North Korea would have
a leader that had a large harem of wives.

Human nature is human nature - whether it's expressed through religion
or politics.

Phil.

 

that belief is opposed to the majority of current scientific thought.

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/sci_cult/evolit/s04/web1/kmccormick.html