In sex assault laws, definition of consent varies widely

Story here. Submitter's comments are in the first comment. Excerpt:

'For two months now, as accusations of sexual misconduct have piled up against Harvey Weinstein, the disgraced mogul has responded over and over again: “Any allegations of nonconsensual sex are unequivocally denied.”

Consent is a concept central to law on sexual assault, and will likely be an issue in potential legal cases against Weinstein, who is under investigation by police in four cities, and others accused in the current so-called “reckoning.”

But the definition of consent — namely, how it is expressed — is a matter of intense debate: Is it a definite “yes,” or the mere absence of “no”? Can it be revoked? Do power dynamics come into play? Legally, the definition varies widely across the nation.

“Half the states don’t even have a definition of consent,” says Erin Murphy, a professor at New York University School of Law who’s involved in a project to rewrite a model penal code on sex assault. “One person’s idea of consent is that no one is screaming or crying. Another person’s idea of consent is someone saying, ‘Yes, I want to do this.’ And in between, of course, is an enormous spectrum of behavior, both verbal and nonverbal, that people engage in to communicate desire or lack of desire.”

“It’s pretty telling,” Murphy adds, “that the critical thing most people look to understand the nature of a sexual encounter — this idea of consent — is one that we don’t even have a consensus definition of in our society.”'

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Comments

"The long and the short of it: Men can go to jail for failing to get the consent of the woman, but the law doesn't clearly define consent. I guess men are supposed to figure out what lawyers and judges can't figure out--and are held accountable if they get it wrong."

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It seems people need religion. Religion is something you suspend critical thinking skills for and just believe in anyway.

Women and their wants are our new religion. Logic and reason as foundations for evaluating ideas for sensibility get tossed when discussing women and sex.

Just as society was finally getting over religious thinking in re the supernatural, it's taken up women as a replacement.

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