Enthusiastic Consent - I am .. confused.

[loopyapp]

So .. AIBU that the once previously highly held gold standard for consent between partners had to be enthusiastic and complete. Any hesitant or unsure thoughts = a grey area in which the other party should NOT ever step into??

I ask because (I am very new to all this so please be gentle if I've got this wrong) this sudden uprise in trans activists insisting that predominantly gay women (though men too apparently) should willingly sleep with transwomen and transmen regardless of what genitalia they have or where they are in their transition is confusing.

Are trans people really insisting that people have sex with them despite their lack of enthusiastic consent because its their right??

I must have this wrong.. surely.. we were banging the #metoo campaign drum not that long ago .. all up in arms about how both parties need to be fully able and willing to consent to engage in anything that could be considered sexual contact.. its how I've been raising my 4 boys .. its what I completely believe in .. that absolutely everyone is allowed to turn sex down at any point, even during, simply because they wish to without having to give a carefully drafted PC reason????

[Edited by MNHQ to remove poll]

@Artichokeleaves

In a way you are, because you've decided not to sleep with them simply because of their trans status

Incidentally, since you're nagging me to go out and have sex I don't want, won't enjoy, have no attraction to, but apparently have a social duty to force myself to provide so you can feel better about my gayness having been redefined into something nicer and more modern that fits you better...

who exactly will you be shagging out of a sense of duty? Or do you get to choose your sexual partners and it's only lesbians who have to lie back and think of Stonewall?

I feel

I'm sorry for what you and other lesbians are having to put up with Artichoke. The homophobia contained in some of the messages in this thread and being trotted out by Stonewall is horrendous.

It is so utterly sinister. The entire premise repulses me. How dare you try to make out that a woman hasn’t got the right to a choice as to what sex she’s attracted to. Nasty, vile misogynistic and homophobic outlook.

(By which I mean the collective you that espouses such ideology, and every individual that makes up the whole. Shameful.)

@DrSbaitso

So I feel a bit sorry for people posting like this because they are possibly having lots of sex they don't really want

Either that or they're used to coercing other people into sex THEY don't want.

That's a good point.

@DrSbaitso

In a way you are, because you've decided not to sleep with them simply because of their trans status, ie if they were born a woman you might have done.

This is laughable. Or would be, if it weren't so serious.

I'd sleep with Boris Johnson if he had been born Ryan Reynolds. George Clooney would sleep with me if I'd been born Amal Alamuddin. What on earth is your point?

Oooh are we listing all the men we’d happily fuck now? Chris Cornell (pre death obv), Matt Cameron, Nick Wire, Kurt Cobain (see CC above) Jim Morrison (do I need to say it),

Are the lesbian posters going to come on and list all the women they’d be willing to fuck too? (I know I’m top of all your lists, Brodie Dalle being very close second of course)

Know whose never going to be on any lesbian’s list of women to fuck? MEN

HTH

If your decision is purely based on the fact they are transgender then they are free to think of you as a transphobe. In a way you are, because you've decided not to sleep with them simply because of their trans status, ie if they were born a woman you might have done.

If...IF.

If my uncle had been born a woman he be my auntie.

Lesbians dont want to sleep with transwomen because they are male and by definition lesbians are same sex attracted. Of course if a given transwoman had been born a woman a lesbian might be attracted to them, based on the fact that they are of the same sex, but a transwoman is male and lesbians are not attracted to the opposite sex.

How is this so difficult to understand?

@HarrietsChariot

The BBC article raised some good points but I don't think it's a black and white issue. If someone is pressured into having sex with a transwoman that's obviously wrong. But if someone pressures you into having sex you have the freedom to say no and to walk away from them. (If they persist obviously it will become sexual assault.)

What you don't have the right to decide is their attitude to your decision. If your decision is purely based on the fact they are transgender then they are free to think of you as a transphobe. In a way you are, because you've decided not to sleep with them simply because of their trans status, ie if they were born a woman you might have done.

It's the same as if my partner wants a threesome and I agree, then when the person turns up they are black and I refuse to proceed because I'd assumed it would be a white person. I have every right to refuse, but they have every right to consider me racist because I've rejected them purely based on their skin colour, and I probably would be even if I didn't think I'd done anything wrong because I had every right to say no.

It's really not the same. It's much more like your partner suggesting a threesome, you saying you're not into that, then your partner bringing a person home for a threesome anyway and when you say you don't want to, your partner calling you racist.

You are also misunderstanding the barriers to saying no when to do so risks a campaign of hatred being launched on you. Not saying no is not the same as saying yes.

@Artichokeleaves

If your decision is purely based on the fact they are transgender then they are free to think of you as a transphobe. In a way you are, because you've decided not to sleep with them simply because of their trans status, ie if they were born a woman you might have done.

You what?

No.

I am homosexual. I do not sleep with male people. Regardless of how male people define themselves. Because I am homosexual.

Being homosexual is not like being racist. However you saying that is you being homophobic.

Essentially you're informing me I have no right to a sexuality that excludes male people from my body, because it's rude to male people. How bloody dare you?

ALL of this, above.

I find it - frankly - astonishing that even some women are telling lesbians they're "transphobic" for *not being attracted to male bodies".

That is the whole point of being a lesbian. It means women who are attracted only to women.

Quite @VickyEadieofThigh

It actually makes no sense to suggest the decision is made purely on the basis that the transwoman is transgender. Clearly is it ALWAYS based on the fact that they are not a biological female - i.e. the class of people who lesbians fancy.

Are we really back to homosexual is not a choice, it's not a whim ,it's not a preference?

Some posters aren't any better than the US conversion camps. If we nag enough, if you try hard enough, if we abuse you enough, if we beat you down enough(even metaphorically) you'll change your mind.

Porn-obsessed men feeling entitled to sex and getting aggressive about it. Anyone really surprised?

@AccidentallyOnPurpose

Are we really back to homosexual is not a choice, it's not a whim ,it's not a preference?

Some posters aren't any better than the US conversion camps. If we nag enough, if you try hard enough, if we abuse you enough, if we beat you down enough(even metaphorically) you'll change your mind.

Well on the gg thread they keep referring to the range of heterosexual peoples preferences in comparison to asexual people saying they don’t feel sexually attracted to people but enjoy sex with them anyways, and why oh why won’t us dinosaurs be happy gg will celebrate asexuality awareness for them!

So it’s not really surprising this thread is back at ORIENTATION is not PREFERENCE.

If sexual orientation is just a result of societal prejudices, why isn't gender identity?

Society is massively geared towards the heterosexual anyway. The fact that gay people exist at all is proof that society doesn't condition your sexuality.

@ABCeasyasdohrayme

Are trans people really insisting that people have sex with them despite their lack of enthusiastic consent because its their right??

No, trans people are not. There are a small percentage of people who are absolutel twats who think they can demand anything, some of those happen to be trans, but don't put them all in the same boat.

Your voting is ridiculous too, absolutely swayed one way because trans people on the whole do not demand sex from anyone.

It's not that small of a percentage to be fair - evidence suggests that transwomen commit these kind of crimes at the same rate as men. It's not a minuscule tiny number. It's significant.

@HarrietsChariot

This part is sheer utter nonsense:

“If your decision is purely based on the fact they are transgender then they are free to think of you as a transphobe. In a way you are, because you've decided not to sleep with them simply because of their trans status, ie if they were born a woman you might have done.”

By that rationale I (a straight man) would be homophobic or a misandrist by refusing to sleep with any Gay man or indeed, by the simple fact not being sexually attracted to any men! So too would every straight woman be guilty of homophobia/misogyny when it comes to refusing to sleep with lesbians and failing to find any women sexually attractive.

Of course people in the privacy of their own minds can think all manner of batshit illogical/crazy fuckwittery, but thinking it doesn’t make it any less wrong and logically unsustainable.

The decision on whom a person does or does not choose to sleep with is a private and personal affair, any attempts to socially police that is tyrannical in the extreme.

Where is the outcry over straight men being bigoted and homophobic about not wanting sex with gay men and vice versa, only heterophobic?

It's just women's bodies everybody seems to feel entitled to, and gets resentful if they are denied access.

Nobody ever tells men who they ought to fancy and why they're being mean not to. Transphobic seems to be a fancy name for what used to be "I could switch you from being a lesbian - you just haven't tried the right man yet and that would be me!"

Nobody ever tells men who they ought to fancy and why they're being mean not to. Transphobic seems to be a fancy name for what used to be "I could switch you from being a lesbian - you just haven't tried the right man yet and that would be me!"

Totally.

Oh. Another posted declaring lesbians are racist.

Ho hum!

Imagine that. Women not being allowed to have sexual boundaries for fear of some male feeling rejected and deciding that they have the right to call that woman hateful.

And this is 2021?

Real progressive, innit.

I can do a relevant threesome scenario.

Bisexual wife, and hetero husband agree to a threesome. Karen is gonna bring a female friend, and DH thinks all his Christmases came at once. Except on the day, her friend cancels, so she brings a male friend. Is the husband homophobic for not wanting to have sex with another dude, or is his sexuality a perfectly reasonable reason?

Isn't it amazing that posters like HarrietsChariot and others feel totally comfortable spaffing their homophobia all over this thread, and think other people are the bigoted ones?

@ArcheryAnnie

Isn't it amazing that posters like HarrietsChariot and others feel totally comfortable spaffing their homophobia all over this thread, and think other people are the bigoted ones?

It's alarming how palatable - desirable, even - homophobia and misogyny are when you just dress them up in the right way.

@DellaPorter

It's just a load of rubbish scaremongering not grounded in reality, another attempt to turn people against trans women.

Stop with your rape apologist propaganda! How dare you dismiss the rapes of and sexual attacks on Lesbian women! You are the lowest of the low!

Whenever you turn down someone who wants to sleep with you, they're going to feel hurt and rejected. I mean, we all know that. It may be because they're blonde, they're tall, they're male, they're not amusing, they're right-wing, their eyes are too close together. So what? If you don't want to do it, you don't - and you're not required to justify it, neither are you required to listen to any argument to persuade you otherwise.

Also, there's an implication in this thread that any lesbian will sleep with any lesbian, and therefore they ought to sleep with anyone who identifies as lesbian. This is a well-worn anti-gay trope - the idea that homosexuality is by definition promiscuous. If we take that prejudice out of the equation, we're left with

'Who do you want to sleep with?'

'A very small proportion of the candidates.'

'How do you decide which?'

'On a case-by-case basis.'

...which is what we all do, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.

@Chocolatewheatos

I am very pro-trans rights and I totally see why they feel the way they do. They want accepting as the gender they are and its shit to be rejected for something you didn't have control of and have changed. But no one is ever entitled to sex under any circumstances.

Why don't they sleep with each other then? Because it seems like the people who are saying that lesbians should have sex with them, are at the same time saying they only want to have sex with someone with a vagina. Why are they allowed to reject sex with a penis and lesbians aren't?

That's not wanting to be accepted as a certain gender. That's male entitlement.

Whenever you turn down someone who wants to sleep with you, they're going to feel hurt and rejected. I mean, we all know that. It may be because they're blonde, they're tall, they're male, they're not amusing, they're right-wing, their eyes are too close together. So what? If you don't want to do it, you don't - and you're not required to justify it, neither are you required to listen to any argument to persuade you otherwise.

But if you turn down some transwomen, you’ll be labelled a transphobic bigot in your social circle. But only if you’re a lesbian. It shouldn’t be a case of “if you don’t want to do it, don’t”. Instead it should be “if someone doesn’t want to do it with you, accept it and leave them the fuck alone.” Don’t tell the people they’re allowed to say no, that’s preaching to the converted, tell the people who won’t accept no for an answer.

Also, there's an implication in this thread that any lesbian will sleep with any lesbian, and therefore they ought to sleep with anyone who identifies as lesbian. This is a well-worn anti-gay trope

And the official position of Stonewall, not the view of people here.