to think this is not an example of rape?

[hereidrawtheline]

I really do not mean this in a hostile way. But I know someone whose boyfriend says he was raped by a woman and I just cant get my head around it.

The circumstances were they were friends, she wanted more, he didnt. He told her so. Then one night they got high together and had pretty standard vaginal sex that she initiated by making the first move. He was by his own admission on top for at least part of the sex.

He then said the next day she raped him because she knew what his wishes were and she turned him on while in a drugged up state knowing he couldnt act on his principles.

Now I understand he regrets what happened and I dont personally think either of them are on a moral highground & also probably not top of the IQ charts - I say this because I have the wider picture of this guy generally drifting around doing bugger all while he smokes pot and rants about the man. All of which done singly is acceptable but when combined for years on end does somewhat detract from your intellectual appeal factor. So it is just as fair for a guy to regret sex as a girl, we are all susceptible to doing stupid things under the influence. I see that as unfortunate but not necessarily rape. I mean, if he had an erection and was on top its hard to call it that surely? Or am I being really sexist without realising it? Of course a man can be raped but like that??

Been bugging me for years actually this all happened many years ago & the guy went to rape support groups and everything.

So AIBU?

I don't think this is rape at all. If they were only high on weed then I have serious doubts he was completely incapable of saying no, and the fact that he was on top proves that IMO.

If he was in a fit state to get on top he was in a fit state to consent, not rape at all.

How can it possible be? They were both impaired for sure, but unless he was impaired to the stage that she could either physically dominate him or otherwise intimidate him, which he clearly wasn't as he actively participated in sex, then no, its not.

Its nothing to do with gender. If a woman is drunk/high and a man (also impaired) she has previously said no to made a move, and she gets on top of him and has sex, thats not rape either. Its a bad decision for sure, but its not rape. He said she turned him after he said no? I find that really offensive to be classed as rape actually, and I speak from experience.

I think the question could be looked at like this:

Tuesday you say you do not want to have a romantic/sexual relationship with X.

Friday you and X get high together and have consensual sex that X initiated - post marijuana.

Saturday you say you were raped.

"For example, if a woman got very very drunk and passed out and her boyfriend had sex with her while she was in this state - where she could not give her consent would be rape - even if she would have consented had she been asked. "
without a doubt. and on the other side of the coin a woman going out to a night club and getting herself smashed drunk and consenting to sex with a stranger would not be rape, even if she never would have given consent had she been sober.

the issue of consent is one of the trickiest issues with regards to rape, because as dittany quite rightly pointed out earlier, not only is it necessary for the victim to not consent, the defendant must not reasonably believe that the vicitm consented.
so in the example of the op, while morally she might have known that he wouldn't have sex with her when sober but simply thought that drugs had lowered his inhibitions and now he clearly did want to have sex, it's quite clear that she could very easily believe that he was reasonably consenting.

I think that this is the crux of why rape has such a poor conviction rate - any suggestion that a victim is complicit means that people assume they consented.

Victims of rape can still be victims even if they are engaged in the act.

Rape takes many different forms - some are very very clear and some are not.

Well you would believe he was consenting if he was on top and admitted to being turned on, wouldn't you? How could you think otherwise?

"clearly the important element is they were both on drugs so neither had good sound judgement? "

Try using that in the case of man on woman rape

It's rape if he said no. Regardless of erection. That can happen almost automatically.

I'd say getting on top of someone and shagging them is a pretty clear sign that you consent to sex

Issues around consent with regard to intoxication are indeed complicated, but it is not, and can not be called rape if you have sex with someone you wouldn't have shagged if you weren't drunk but you were fully conscious and a willing participant.

The very idea that that is rape makes a mockery of the crime of rape.

This guy sounds like the kind of man who tries to take any issue that affects women and turn it around so that it is sexist to mention it because men suffer it to. So we can't discuss DV, because sometimes women hit men, and that is far worse because of the stigma. And we can't discuss rape, because some men are raped, and that is worse, because of the stigma etc.

Hang out on Comment is Free for an afternoon if you want to see this particular line of misogyny in action. I once saw a thread where a majority said it was sexist and offensive to draw attention to the high mortality rates of pregnant women in sub-Saharan Africa because men there had it hard too.

Momdeguerre I want you to know I understand how terrible it is to be raped and it having taken place on the less obvious end of the spectrum where consent seems understood. I am really not trying to make it harder for men and women who have been raped by spreading an idea of doubting their word. But surely the word has to be used responsibly and I never felt in my gut that he was doing that.

yes it is why rape convictions are so low,because except in the most blatant of cases with signs of struggle/evidence of threat etc, it can quite often come down to one persons word against the other and it asks the jury to go inside the mind of both parties for want of a better term, and look at what might have made them reasonably believe wether or not consent was present.

out of interest what do people believe could be done to improve the conviction rates for rape cases without infringing on the rights iof the accused etc (right to face your accuser,innocent till proven guilty etc) as while i doubt anyone could disagree with the fact that the conviction rate for rape cases is pathetic, what can be done in a practical sense?

I'm with skidoodle here: it doesn't sound as if he said "no" and was ignored or even was incapable of saying no - rather he regretted what had happened: "slightly" different thing.

Without wanting to trivialise this issue at all: this reminds me of that weird case about 25 years ago of the strange woman whose name I forget (someone will remember) who kidnapped a bloke, chained him up and forced herself on him. She was prosecuted for this and came up with the immortal quote "I'd ski down Everest naked with a carnation up my nose for him" . She turned up in the news recently because she'd cloned her dog.

Sorry, what I meant to say was there's obviously a difference between OP's friend and his regrets and the bloke who was chained up against his will.

Oh I remember that! The Mormon bloke?

Mayor - good question - I deal with both parties in about 2-3 reports of rape per week. A number of allegations are clearly ficticious and the impact on the accused can be huge and mud sticks - even where anonimity is preserved - in small communities everyone knows. I frequently manage the ongoing repercussions too.

I am equally supportive of prosecution of people who make false accusations. Sadly this rarely occurs through lack of evidence and, more frequently, mental health issues.

Even where a prosecution against an alleged victim is not possible there are other makers/information which may be collated in respect of them which can assist with future allegations.

I think rape is possibly the hardest offence to prove - it so often involves a private act between people who know each other well which is then tried in the press.

That's the one. I can't remember if him being a Mormon was part of the whole mess or whether that was just an added detail picked up by the press.

Her name was Joyce McKinney (or something very similar to that) and his name was Kirk something. I think she was convicted of sexual assault and false iimprisonment at least. It was (I am amazed at how much trivia my brain retains really) a wierd case. She was obsessed with the bloke, he ddn't want to know, and he was trying to stay a virgin. I wonder what became of him? I always felt sorry for him as he had become such a joke yet it must have been very distressing for him.

Joyce McKinney.

Crikey, SGB: you remember more trivia than me, that's saying something. although when I saw the dog story recently I did instantly remember her!

I felt sorry for him too.

Cross-posted with SGB! I hadn't heard the dog-cloning thing though.

"I am equally supportive of prosecution of people who make false accusations. Sadly this rarely occurs through lack of evidence and, more frequently, mental health issues."

see as a young man in the later years of school and then college this was one of my greatest fears, because like most of my peers i spent many nights out on the lash and had casual relationships. sometimes i wouldn't remember going home with a girl the night before so i'm sure there are occassions where i went home with them and they didn't remember it the next day, and you are right mud sticks.
so i used to be fairly vehement about the prosecution of false allegations spouting out the usual "she could ruin a life/should do the same amount of time" etc
however i'd like to think i matured and the problem i now see with prosecuting false allegations is that like rape it can only be done in the most obvious of circumstances (i.e. woman clearly caught out in a lie/the man having a watertight alibi putting him somewhere else when he was supposed to be raping the victim), otherwise we could end up with situations where a woman is raped, comes forward,goes through the ordeal of trial only for the man to get off because rape is so hard to prosecute, and then turn around and charge her with making flase accusations and/or perhury if she gave evidence in court.

*perjury

Absolutely correct and where there is an obvious bias towards victims. Most genuine rape cases are very difficult to prosecute because forensic evidence can usually only indicate that intercourse has occurred.

Juries are not very sympathetic unless there is clear evidence of your traditional form of rape - eg. if the woman has not fought back then the assumption is that she asked for it or agreed to it. It is even harder where the victim is a sex worker or victim of domestic abuse.

Men are usually the victims of false allegations but these are frequently disproved before court by careful investigation - the threshold test for prosecution is actually pretty high and the chance of you being prosecuted, wrongly, is low. Shame it does not remove the allegation.

i know someone who made a false allegation of rape and was sent to prison for it and branded evil.

trouble is though that the bloke she accused was an absolute cunt and while yes on that occassion he hadn't raped her,e had almost certainly raped others and was certainly also guilty of statutory rape and sexual assault. he told so many lies about her and made her out to be a psycho and himself a lovely bloke. A couple of years later he was imprisoned for raping a young boy.

i can see why she made the allegation-she was trying to get an evil fucker locked up.

Of course he wasn't raped! Rape means being penetrated against your will. He wasn't.
Ergo, not raped.

In fact, he got an erection (which can be involuntary) then got on top of a woman and stuck his willy in her, which is not involuntary. Unless she had a gun to his head or had made a threat of violence (which might have seen off the erection) she can't have forced him to stick his erect penis in her vagina. It is totally ridiculous. What a stupid man. I sometimes think men cannot bear to let women have anything they can't have. He'll be demanding the right to have a baby next.

wtf has dog-cloning got to do with it ???