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Original poster

Does penetration = presumption of power/control?

756 replies

skrumle · 17/08/2011 10:53

Was chatting with my H last night and mentioned the Romeo and Juliet law in Ireland that's been discussed on here a few times. Anyway, when I asked if he thought it was reasonable his immediate answer was "no". I then asked him: if our son was gay, and started a conversation about a sexual experience that he was unhappy/uncomfortable about would he be more likely to feel that our son had been forced/co-erced if he was the one penetrated rather than penetrating and got a Confused in reply...

I have to be honest, when I read the original thread on here my automatic view was that to protect girls over boys like this was to deny the fact that girls enjoy sex too, almost like taking a step back. When I read the thread fully though and thought about the implications for girls I probably did start to think that girls should have more protection than boys.

So, should there be a presumption that penetration equals a greater degree of control? So two heterosexual 15yos - greater responsibility lies with the boy to ensure that this is what both of them want?

OP posts:
LeninGrad · 23/08/2011 11:05

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LRDTheFeministDragon · 23/08/2011 10:51

posie, I think you're being a bit unfair. Your posts are very hard to follow; I've struggled to understand them a lot and you have - I realize it was accidental - totally denied writing something you did write at least once. It is not easy to follow. It's not surprising we are not understanding what you're trying to say.

I do think, after stripey's pretty shocking and awful post, I wanted to take care not to offend anyone and care to distance myself from that homophobia. That is what you have to do when a conversation turns nasty, IMO. It's not a personal attack on you, it's confusion over where you stand on these issues.

I do think Milly's posts really show that terms like 'natural' and 'biology' and 'evolution' are much more fraught than at least I knew ... they can't just be flung into the discussion without us considering what they mean and whether we're being truthful about social conditioning or not.

LeninGrad · 23/08/2011 10:44

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LeninGrad · 23/08/2011 10:43

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ThePosieParker · 23/08/2011 10:38

I would think the alcohol and drug abuse would come from the negative view from society, being accepted..... (not that it should be viewed like that)

Honestly I now feel I have to qualify any comment with I am not homophobic. Ffs.

LeninGrad · 23/08/2011 10:23

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LeninGrad · 23/08/2011 10:17

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LeninGrad · 23/08/2011 10:16

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ThePosieParker · 23/08/2011 10:12

ALL OVER THE WORLD means every human does it? And it is a human feature, just like having black hair even though not every human has it. And it biologically driven, not a given. Perhaps don't respond at all SAF until you can resist putting words in my mouth. I can't be arsed to cut and paste to show how you are misrepresenting the argument and cherry picking as I'm on my phone.

Lenin, heterosexual women are not the only poorly treated women in the world, the ills of control can exist in any relationship.

startAfire · 23/08/2011 09:59

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LeninGrad · 23/08/2011 09:57

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startAfire · 23/08/2011 09:53

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LeninGrad · 23/08/2011 09:52

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startAfire · 23/08/2011 09:52

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startAfire · 23/08/2011 09:49

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startAfire · 23/08/2011 09:49

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ThePosieParker · 23/08/2011 09:49

Universal, yes. You decided that meant something homophobic.....AGAIN.

ThePosieParker · 23/08/2011 09:47

Rogue neither.

LeninGrad · 23/08/2011 09:26

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startAfire · 23/08/2011 09:19

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ThePosieParker · 23/08/2011 09:08

SAF, yet again you are offended by me responding to your offensive accudations. I have never said, insinuated or thought that homosexuality is abnormal, yet you think it's okay to keep repeating it.

Milly I neither said that people have the urge to have PIV sex all of the time either! But put the urge to continue the species was one of the reasons it has become central to our view of sex.

PlentyOfPubgardens · 23/08/2011 08:29

Great posts Milly Smile

Another thing to think about is that whereas most mammals are only sexually receptive when they are fertile, we are sexually receptive all month/year round. This would suggest that human sex has always had a strong pleasure/bonding function.

MillyR · 23/08/2011 00:48

SB, I'm not sure I can say anything concise on penetration/power. I would think the more important part of power is about denying resources to women and children, once those children have come into existence. There is then clearly an issue of power if you impregnate a woman when you know that she does not have the social bonds to procure enough resources to keep her and that child healthy.

MillyR · 23/08/2011 00:43

LRD, about size and polygamy...

Yes, but I'm not convinced it is true when applied to humans. It is one of those things that there is not a consensus on.

But I do think that people in general life overemphasise the size difference between men and women - there isn't a big difference compared to other species. The difference in size can really just be explained by women stopping growing in height earlier because they start putting their energy into menstruation. I don't think sexism/male dominance has come about because men are bigger (when they're not much bigger, and have become less so, and there's no reason to believe that won't continue to be the trend). I think male dominance arises because a lot of women get pregnant and have care of infants, and that makes them more vulnerable as a group to abuses of power. But that is just my opinion.

SB, I probably couldn't do a Q and A because I'm not an expert on evolutionary biology! I don't know a great deal about polygamy etc. I'm just more familiar with issues like birth spacing and work because I'm interested in humans and energy now. I don't know a huge amount about human origins.

GothAnneGeddes · 23/08/2011 00:42

Aren't there ancient examples of condoms and the like? There are certainly writings about the withdrawal method which date back many centuries and I'm sure the history herbalism will show lots of plants being used as contraceptives, so I do think there was more then just avoiding PiV going on.