question about sexual encounter

[havetoask]

Sorry, the title is a bit wanky, I feel a bit stupid asking this question though.
I've namechanged for this one.

If you meet a man and you end up back at your house, and then go to bed, and this is the maybe tmi bit.....

If you have never had sex before and your body clams up and he can't get inside you, but he forces it in, and he knows he is hurting you quite badly but carries on, making you bleed, is that ok? Would that be considered a disastrous sexual encounter or would it be more serious?

This happened a long time ago, but I can't stop thinking about it and it's not a nice feeling. Plus, I didn't have sex or get intimate with anyone for a long long time after that. I can't believe I'm posting this now. Am I overreacting?

Something similar happened to me (except he did give up and stop trying, and I was saying no albeit in a feebly sort of way). I didn't see him again, but at the time and now I don't think it was a sexual assault. I think he was inexperienced, I was inexperienced and I allowed myself to get into a vulnerable position - where things went further than I wanted them too.

After that I was more careful. Made sure I knew how I was getting home for example. And became more proactive about not just letting things happen to me. And I will have a talk with my boys about not letting their hormones take over and not putting themselves in that sort of situation either.

I think it is very unhelpful to say that unless a woman has uttered the word no she cannot have been raped.

Reminds me of a thing in our local paper about prostitution and trafficing etc. A customer said that he stopped if a prostitute said no to what he was doing, but if they were just crying he carried on.

I am sure that yugoslavian women with guns to their heads and a line of soldiers at their door did not actually utter the word 'no' either... it does not lessen what happened to them.

This is what I mean. HTA had a bad expereince. But it shouldnt; be equated to women under tacit or explicit threat, whether by guns or otherwise.

And I am not saying the word no has to be uttered.

There is no need to be so hostile to nuance in this issue. recognising the subtletly of a problem is not denying it.

Does there have to be threat or assault to call it rape?

Dittany, Is it possible for you to engage in a reasonable discussion about this without getting abusive?

If not please do not address any posts to me or do yourself a favour and stop reading mine if they provoke such a response.

There is room of many opinion on this thread. Critical engagement is not the same as arguing. The mein of your posts suggests you are quite emotiuonally vulnerable when discussing this. I reapsct that and have no wish to upset you. But be assured you are not the only person on this thread to have been raped or have an unequivical perspoective on matters. I will not engage with you critically on something that you are obvioulsy still in turmoil and pain about. Please respect that and stop poking me with abusive sticks.

hi havetoask

so sorry that you had that experience

It sounds awful although lots of people do have awful physical experiences of losing their vaginity - but obviously you had an awful emotional experience too. I would really recommend counselling as a way of talking through the experience and coming to terms with what happened and moving forwards. From what you have said it sounds as though he was clueless rather than intending to cause you harm, but it isn't possible for any of us to tell you what his motives were from this distance. Good luck xxx

MP you say it sounds as if he was clueless and didn't mean to cause any harm - but then go on to say that obviously no-one can know what his motives were. But haven't you just put your interpretation of events into the mix as well?

havetoask's opening post said "he forces it in, and he knows he is hurting you quite badly but carries on, making you bleed". That doesn't sound like inexperience to me, does it really to you? I would have thought lack of foreplay, not being very aware of partner's enjoyment were down to inexperience. What happened to havetoask sounds very different to me.

A possibly interesting question: is rape the man's intention or the woman's?

Not sure I get you TBM.

Is it only rape when a man is willingly forcing himself on a woman. If he is an oaf and she doesn't want it but he's so far up his own backside he doesn't notice, does that mean he's not because he didn't realise.

The bloke that raped me said he thought I'd changed my mind (when I stopped hitting him and moving away and telling him I wasn't interested) so does that make it OK cause he thought I was OK with it so then it's not rape?

Something else, I was told off by someone for saying I was raped and calling him a rapist because he hadn't been convicted.

No, the man's perspective has nothing to do with it. He may try to use it as a defence. Men have been found to see 'come on' signs when non are there, something most of us will have expereinced but which has not been scientofically measured. This is part of the way on which an objective investigation into rape and the situations it arises around, can be very helpful for women and rape victims in general - if it is known that men are likely to see positive signs when non are there, they will be less likely in being aboe to use this as an exuse.

And you don't need a conviction of rape be be a rapist. Tell whowver told you that it is obsurd.

In the UK, the figure for successful prosecutions lingers around the 5-7% mark. This, along with other statistics from the last British Crime Survey, inform us that only 15% of rape victims report the crime to the police and that of those that do, 70% fall out of the process before it reaches court. Add to this a false allegation rate of 2-3% and we get the picture that, even with a conservative bias, over 90% of rapists are getting away with it.

Many of these men will not have a conviction of rape in their record, but they are rapists still.

It's like saying someone isn't telling a lie just becasue they aren't found out.

It wasn't that long after so they got just a little bit of abuse!

I do think that's the problem with the justice system, it always will be unless you can find something from Star Trek! Some people get away with crime and some people get falsely found guilty. Just like with CRB checks, they can only say what you've been found out at.

Thought you might find this interesting:

From Sexual Offences Act 2003:

Rape

(1) A person (A) commits an offence if?
(a) he intentionally penetrates the vagina, anus or mouth of another person (B) with his penis,
(b) B does not consent to the penetration, and
(c) A does not reasonably believe that B consents.

Assault by penetration

(1) A person (A) commits an offence if?
(a) he intentionally penetrates the vagina or anus of another person (B) with a part of his body or anything else,
(b) the penetration is sexual,
(c) B does not consent to the penetration, and
(d) A does not reasonably believe that B consents.

Sexual assault

(1) A person (A) commits an offence if?
(a) he intentionally touches another person (B),
(b) the touching is sexual,
(c) B does not consent to the touching, and
(d) A does not reasonably believe that B consents.

It doesn't say that the victim has to say no for it to be rape or assault. It is saying that the victim has to give some signal of consent which makes the perpetrator reasonably believe that they want it. The question here is if the OP's body was resistant to penetration and she was crying out in pain and bleeding would it be reasonable for the man to believe that she consented when she let him put her into positions which he was aggressively ordering her into. In my mind it is NOT reasonable.

In a court maybe they could argue that some women like it rough and painful and her going along with the positions was the sign of her consent. It is hard to prove whether this is what the man thought or not. I don't reckon he would have been convicted if it went to court but I'm inclined to think he was a bastard and didn't care if she was enjoying it or not.

I think if a man wants to have rough sex with a woman he should have discussed beforehand with her what they both like and agreed on how they would do it and agreed a signal she could give which he would recognise as meaning he should stop. He should not assume that all women like it rough.

A decent man should pay attention to how the woman feels during an act (sex) which has the potential to hurt her and if she looks like she is in pain he should ask her if she is ok about continuing or not. If he does not he is either thick, very inexperienced, insensitive to the point of being on the autistic spectrum or an uncaring bastard!

Whether or not this man would have been convicted of rape, the effects on the OP have been the same as if he would have been convicted. Even if he didn't intentionally rape her and wouldn't be convicted, he did nevertheless rape her in my mind because she did not want it.

HaveToAsk, please don't feel bad that you didn't say no or fight him. I know that feeling of just 'freezing' in shock and fear and being unable to. Then you feel you can't call it rape, but that leaves you not being able to process it because you feel if you tell people they will say it can't be called rape and then you feel you don't have a 'justification' for feeling the same way as someone who can say they have been raped according to the legal definition. You feel people won't think you have a right to feel the way you do and will think you are being stupid. But you are not being stupid and you do feel those things don't you. You deserve some help in dealing with those feelings and feeling that someone believes you about how you feel and understands.

I can't say I've been raped even though I've been penetrated without my consent vaginally (by fingers), anally (by fingers) and orally (forced tongue kissing by grandfather when I was a child). (Not all by the same person.) It was never a penis so it was not rape but do you think the effect on how I felt/feel is any different? I did not say no or fight the perpetrators. I was under 16 and I was scared and shocked by what was happening. I froze. Because it wasn't a penis and I didn't say no I couldn't call those incidents rape and for years I didn't deal with how I felt about it because I didn't feel anyone would take me seriously if I told them. I didn't think they would think it was serious enough for me to be complaining. I therefore didn't think I should take myself seriously and tried to banish and bury the feelings. Doing this made it all worse.

When I eventually told a good therapist and he was shocked and told me the law and he also said words like rape, sexual assault, sexual abuse and child abuse I was shocked. I argued with him at first that these words did not apply. I could not process my feelings until I fully accepted what had happened though.

In summary what I'm saying is, please get some help for how you are feeling because you deserve help because even if you can't legally define what happened as rape, the way it has made you feel is the same as if you could legally define it as rape and this is serious.

Great post ActingNormal!

To go with that, I can be quite rough but I'm a great believer in SSC (safe, sane and consensual) that goes back probably way past my first time. If I had wanted to be in that car I would have probably enjoyed it (although not been trying to move out the way like that) and for me that was one of the worst things!

Monkeytrousers - the man's preception does have something to do with it - see AN's defunition of rape. A criminal offence cannot be committed without the relevant state of mind (mens rea).

Grammaticus - it has to be a reasonable perception though.

It seems to me to read that if a woman is crying and asking him to stop, even if he thinks she is consenting, it's an assault because it's not reasonable of him to think she's consenting under those circumstances.

So in a way it's not about the man's perception at all, but what the woman indicated to him about what was happening.

I don't know where that leaves people who freeze though - it's really common not to fight back/say anything as your brain can't believe what's happening.

Is this part of the reason conviction rates are so low?

By law yes, but it shouldn't and that is what I'm working on.

And the 'reasonabel' thing is defined by men for men - it's this kind of male perspective bias in rape prosecution policy that I hope to affect and change in some way.

As it seems men can misunderstand women's signals and women can 'freeze' and be unable to say they don't want something when they are feeling shocked, it seems a good idea to talk to our sons (when they are at the right age) about making sure it is what the woman really wants before they do anything. Tell them to say "Is this ok for you?" and not do anything unless she says yes. And if they have any doubts because the woman is looking pained or they aren't sure how to interpret her noises and body language they should say something like "Does that noise mean you are not ok? Are you happy to continue?" and unless she says it is ok, stop. We don't want our boys to rape/accidentally rape someone or get accused of rape.

We should talk to our daughters about the fact that they don't have to do anything they don't want to do and even if they have started but it isn't feeling good they are allowed to, and should, say something like "This is hurting, please stop". Tell them about making it clear what they want and don't want because if they don't and then they accuse someone of rape/sexual assault/harrassment it is likely that the law won't take it seriously. This may not be the way it should be but it is the reality so we should protect our children by teaching them these things.

Thast is sadly true at the moment - the stats tell us that is the case.

This sort of education should peraps also be part of sex ed at school, but the science behind it has to be solid. Roads to hell being paved with good intentions sometimes

why do I open these threads?
I was raped when I was 11 - am trying to understand the point of view that because I didnt make any sound at all he might have thought I was consenting and therefore it is ok.