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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To not automatically support my male friend (potentially triggering!)

383 replies

User14356 · 10/01/2018 02:21

Agh this is keeping me up tonight, sorry if it’s a bit rambly

My very close, male friend (totally platonic) picked up a woman last weekend at a club. I had left earlier in the night, from what I was told, they were drunk, she had a screaming argument with her friend and then he took her home. Things were done but they didn’t have full sex.

Cut to today and I get a worried message from my male friend saying he has been contacted by this girl saying he took advantage, he is a sex offender and that she’s going to go to the police. This text message was sent at 4am and badly spelled so the assumption is that she was drunk.

I want to believe my friend, but I’m now massively morally split, between not wanting to call this girl a liar, but then not being there for him if the accusations are blown out or false. For now, I’ve been supportive. Is there any way to manage this situation without taking sides- AIBU to have doubts about my friend?

OP posts:
Guavaf1sh · 10/01/2018 08:51

Support your friend. Innocent until proven guilty

FreddieClaryHorshieLion · 10/01/2018 08:54

Btw, I absolutely agree, false rape accusations are rare.
But this isn’t a genuinely accusation yet. It’s a drunk textmessage.

it is imo possible that she was drunk, maybe got egged on by a friend or was angry (you said they had an argument?) and wrote a drunk text message.
Support your friend but keep an open mind.

Oh, and your friend needs a lawyer. ASAP.

FreddieClaryHorshieLion · 10/01/2018 08:55

A genuine accusation.

Idontdowindows · 10/01/2018 08:55

You are NOT unreasonable to NOT automatically support your male friend.

Innocent until proven guilty pertains to the justice system. Normal human beings like you and I are free to have our own judgement or opinion about guilt or innocence. We are not obligated to suspend our own judgement while waiting for the courts, if they get involved at all.

The incidence of false claims wrt sexual assault and rape is about the same as for other serious cries. This means that the vast majority of these claims is true, even if they do not make it into a court of law.

So simply on the statistics alone, the chance is pretty good that your friend did something that could rightfully be considered sexual assault.

Lots of people whose friends say "oh, I know him so well, he could never do something like that!" turn out to actually be very capable of doing the things their friends thought they could never do.

AssassinatedBeauty · 10/01/2018 08:57

No one here knows what happened. It's irrelevant that you might have gone home with someone, drunk, and not been assaulted. It doesn't mean that it doesn't ever happen or that it hasn't happened here.

GOLDENLiquidAngel · 10/01/2018 08:59

If your friend is on Facebook the accused.me.uk group is very helpful and he and you will both get support.

CorbynsBumFlannel · 10/01/2018 09:03

I wouldn't support your friend. The fact you are having doubts means it's something you feel he might do. Not someone I'd want as a friend.

Shineystrawberrylover · 10/01/2018 09:03

He took home a drunk and vulnerable woman and stuff happened and he's surprised she's pissed off?

Taylor22 · 10/01/2018 09:05

How drunk was he? Maybe he should start thinking if he was in the right frame of mind to consent.

Arseface · 10/01/2018 09:13

I also think your friend has been guilty of slightly dodgy behaviour. She was clearly upset and drunk. Ideally he’d have declined any sexual advances at the time and, if he wanted to take thinks further with her, arrange to meet another time.

However, we don’t live in an ideal world and we don’t always behave in the way we’d like to. Your friend was drunk too and seemed to believe there was full consent.

If it was my friend, I’d be clear that I didn’t think he was a sexual predator/offender but that I found his behaviour sleazy and morally dubious.
I’d be supportive but hope he’d learn a lesson from this. Not nice behaviour on his part.

Arseface · 10/01/2018 09:14

things further

FreddieClaryHorshieLion · 10/01/2018 09:15

I absolutely agree with the idea of enthusiastic consent (that the absence of no doesn’t mean yes) and that the inability to consent (like being very drunk) means that one could not give consent.

However:
(I’m assuming that this woman did decide to go with the OP’s partner and that he didn’t drag / carry her.)

There were two people. Two people that argued with each othe, two people that decided to go home together (and that’s all we know for sure), two people that were drunk.

And yet there is only person that is regarded as emotionally vulnerable and only person that was apparently unable to take responsibility for her actions.

The fact that quite a few posters automatically make these assumptions is imo problematic.

I am a woman. And I don’t see why I should be the one that’s emotionally vulnerable after an argument (and not the man I was arguing with. Most likely DH, nowadays). I actually feel like this assumption is patronising and genuinely misogynistic.

FreddieClaryHorshieLion · 10/01/2018 09:18

For now, I’ve been supportive. Is there any way to manage this situation without taking sides- AIBU to have doubts about my friend?

Yes, absolutely. Tell your friends to go to a solicitor ASAP, maybe tell your friend to make screenshots of everything pertaining to this evening and then stay out of it.

Be his friend. Not his solicitor, private investigator etc.

alotalotalot · 10/01/2018 09:21

I'd be supportive without taking sides but I'd also be reading him the riot act.
The bottom line is that your friend was reckless in taking home this drunk woman (who was already in an emotional state presumably, from arguing with her friend), and then engaging with her sexually. Regardless of whether he is guilty of a crime in the eyes of the law, it's not stellar behaviour.

Idontdowindows · 10/01/2018 09:21

Nobody is regarding the woman as emotionally vulnerable or unable to take responsibility.

If the man wants to make a claim of being sexually assaulted on the basis that he was unable to consent, then clearly he should do so, and he is able to do so under law. At that point, she will also be looked at in terms of consent or non-consent.

MorrisZapp · 10/01/2018 09:22

I think the girl had an argument with her own friend, then the guy took her home.

I dunno. Even the taking home part sounds sexist when analysed. If two adults get pissed and head to a location together, why is it the man doing the taking? It makes women automatically passive.

I had many one night stands in my youth and I wasn't sober for any of them. Thats pretty much the nature of one night stands.

It's worrying to me that men are supposed to be fully aware and responsible when drunk but women aren't. That's treating women like children.

FreddieClaryHorshieLion · 10/01/2018 09:26

Idont

Several posters seem to do that.

TsunamiOfShit · 10/01/2018 09:30

I also think your friend has been guilty of slightly dodgy behaviour. She was clearly upset and drunk. Ideally he’d have declined any sexual advances at the time and, if he wanted to take thinks further with her, arrange to meet another time.

They were both drunk. How do we know who took advantage of who? Why didn't she arrange to meet another time to take things further? Why should he accept all responsibility of what happened and she none?

They are both adults, they were both drunk. Equal responsibility of what happened here I'd say. (Unless he forced himself on her, in which case of course it's rape.)

ItsNachoCheese · 10/01/2018 09:34

Id support him as a friend but tell him to seek legal advice also

EggsonHeads · 10/01/2018 09:37

Was he already drunk when you left? He could hardly have taken advantage if he wasn't in his right mind either. Situations where both parties are drunk it is more likely that both weren't thinkingclearly anfboth misunderstood the situation a great deal. One of the many reasons why drunken sex is such a bad idea (it's also a pretty stupid thing to do to take someone home who has just got into a screaming match in front of you tbf). You don't have any reason to believe he has done something wrong beyond the word of sone girl you don't know-or do you? Would you really doubt him if you thought he was of good character? That would be unreasonable.

crunchymint · 10/01/2018 09:39

I would think he is guilty. Balance of probability. No one ever wants to believe that someone they care about is a rapist.

FreddieClaryHorshieLion · 10/01/2018 09:39

They were both drunk. How do we know who took advantage of whom? Why didn't she arrange to meet another time to take things further? Why should he accept all responsibility of what happened and she none? They are both adults, they were both drunk. Equal responsibility of what happened here I'd say. (Unless he forced himself on her, in which case of course it's rape.)

  1. He isn’t saying that she took advantage.
  1. Anyhow, yes. I do think that you’re generally ‘right’. But I also think that it depends on how drunk either of them was. was she floppy / nearly passed out and he still had sex? Was he slightly buzzed and she absolutely ‘shitfaced’?

That’s the ‘problem’ nowadays. Well, actually is imo a definitely improvement, but anyhow). We used to believe that ‘no means no’ is enough. But it isn’t. Because sometimes someone is unable to say no or unable to consent.

It’s great that’s we recognise this nowadays. But it also leads to us getting into areas where it gets complicated.
How drunk was she? How drunk was he? Was he sober enough to recognise that she might have been unable to consent? What does the OP mean with ‘take her come’? Did she want to go home with him or did he ‘simply’ grab a drunk girl....? Did she initiate whatever happened or did she just ‘let it happen’?

swingingSixties · 10/01/2018 09:41

On balance of probability, with the sparse information you have, you think he sexually assaulted her?

You do men and women everywhere a disservice.

swingingSixties · 10/01/2018 09:41

Above was to crunchymint

MuseumOfCurry · 10/01/2018 09:43

The bottom line is that your friend was reckless in taking home this drunk woman (who was already in an emotional state presumably, from arguing with her friend), and then engaging with her sexually. Regardless of whether he is guilty of a crime in the eyes of the law, it's not stellar behaviour.

Is her behaviour less than stellar for picking up a drunk man and taking him home?