Colleges Wrestle With How to Define Rape

Submitted by Mastodon on Mon, 2015-01-19 01:27

Article here. Excerpt:

'Common understandings of rape tend to involve force, coercion, or victims who are passed-out drunk. Many students have come forward in recent years to share such experiences. Last summer The New York Times published a front-page article on an alleged rape at Hobart and William Smith Colleges in which several people looked on as a football player assaulted a young woman bent over a pool table.

Other cases are less clear. Sexual interactions can be ambiguous, especially if students have been drinking but aren’t incapacitated. Research shows that women engage in sex they don’t want for a variety of reasons—including to avoid conflict, because they don’t want to be labeled a tease, and because they feel obligated. A response to the Total Sorority Move story on the website Her Campus says rape is "a big word," but "‘less rapey’ situations" should still be acknowledged.

As campuses grapple with preventing and responding to sexual assault, how students and colleges define rape is pivotal. And the definition may be evolving. What some people, including researchers, have seen as unwanted sex, others may consider rape. But conflating ambiguous sexual encounters and misconduct, some observers say, dilutes the concept of assault, and makes it hard for students to learn where the boundaries are.'

Like0 Dislike0

Comments

First, look it up in the state penal law code for where you live. There you have it.

Next, if you're a male college student or college-bound male, either go to a men's college or only have anything to do with females who live and work/go to school off-campus, and who have *nothing at all* to do with your college. And never under any circumstances date, flirt with, or even talk to if at all possible any female on campus, since being seen talking to one could be enough to sink you if she for whatever reason claims you said something to her she found objectionable, etc., in any way. Female faculty and admins are fine to talk to, but not students. As for parties, go to parties where it seems only men or mostly only men go to. Don't talk to any females at those parties. And for God's sake, don't even appear to be leaving the party with one.

No.Frigging.Kidding, guys. I am dead serious.

Like0 Dislike0
Submitted by Matt on Mon, 2015-01-19 10:09

Seriously, if colleges have a hard time defining rape, why is a college man supposed to know exactly what rape is or is not? Apparently, it's supposed to be crystal clear to him even when it's not clear to anyone else.

Rape used to be about the use of force or drugs. While those still count as rape, the typical "rape" discussed today has nothing to do with force or drugs; it's about "lack of consent." The article actually does a good job of describing how ambiguous sexual situations can be. In one case, the woman let the man have sex even when she really didn't want to--and later claimed she was raped. To me, that is not rape. And it shouldn't be--that amounts to claiming the man raped her because he couldn't read her mind and learn her true intention. (Maybe they should teach the Vulcan Mind Meld in sex ed classes.)

From looking at the comments, one conclusion I've reached that for the modern woman, rape is when he treats her exactly the same as she treats him. Women don't ask for consent; they assume it. When the man does the same thing, it's rape. They expect him to get consent from her; she doesn't expect herself to get consent from him. I don't know of a single case where a woman was convicted of rape because she failed to obtain his consent--not counting statutory rape.

Much of this discussion is also about which party in a sexual encounter is the responsible adult. We all know the answer. The man is always the responsible adult. The woman never is. Maybe we're heading toward treating all sex as statutory rape--the woman is not an adult and thus cannot give consent. This is what the feminists have been pushing. Of course, if that's the case, we shouldn't let women sign any contracts, have their own credit cards, or run the country.

The sad part of this is that sex is viewed only within one dimension: is it rape or not? That's too bad, because sex can be about much more. I've had some sexual experiences that were about love, emotional bonding, and full sensuality. In my day, we called that "making love." Today, at its best, sex is merely "not rape."

PS: I had one of those wonderful experiences last night on the Internet. :)

Like0 Dislike0
Submitted by el cid on Tue, 2015-01-20 00:53