'If a woman is drunk a man should not be prosecuted for rape'

[YouBetterWerk]

Wanker barrister on This Morning saying this right now. Great woman with counterpoints at least.
I just threw my cornflakes at the TV.

The fact that you can't see a drunk man turning down sex with a woman is incredibly worrying

I said a woman that appears keen. I would be interested to hear from men whether they would turn down sex with a woman who appeared keen when they were both drunk, because these men need educating. I doubt many sober men would pursue sex with a drunk woman.

.Eh? But if they're both drunk and she says yes, then it's not rape

Thanks,..that is what was what I wanted clearing up. Problem is she may not remember saying yes,..and him being drunk may not have had the sense to not accept the 'yes'

Sorry Petula, I wasn't meaning to be angsty so hope I didn't come across like that. I did it as well. I was just thinking around the phrasing and how it still puts some of the blame/responsibility on the woman.

'What if the rapist says the woman wasn't drunk? How can the victim prove she was?'

I am in the Police and have worked with rape victims. We take a urine sample to establish how much drink has been consumed (also allows us to test for Rohypnol, GBH etc).
When I first trained, I found it so difficult to ask victims to provide this without coming across like they were being judged, as most of the time victims already felt responsible.
It's about wording it in such a way that the victim knows that we LITERALLY COULD NOT CARE LESS if they were drunk, we don't care if they've taken drugs so long as it was with their consent.
What we DO care about is the amount of alcohol in their system (often, incidentally, supplied to them by the suspect) so it can be gained whether they were able to give true consent.
Rape is treated so much better than it used to be, certainly in my Force.

They don't need educating about when a woman is too drunk to consent. They need educating that they aren't entitled to stick their dicks into women because they want to.

you are creating scenarios that don't exist Davsmum. I wonder why you would want to do that?

no it didn't seem like that scallops, you were right to correct

I doubt many sober men would pursue sex with a drunk woman

Many girls assaulted in the UK or tales coming out of Ibiza/Magaluf etc would probably say otherwise.

A rapist is going to specifically home in on women like this as there is going to be a big difference in sobriety and he knows exactly what hes doing.

"What we DO care about is the amount of alcohol in their system (often, incidentally, supplied to them by the suspect)..." That doesn't surprise me. Rape is generally planned by the perpetrator. It isn't something that accidentally happens to women because men misread signals (especially because those men are perfectly capable of reading lots of other signals from everyone else about whole hosts of things).

"Thanks,..that is what was what I wanted clearing up. Problem is she may not remember saying yes,..and him being drunk may not have had the sense to not accept the 'yes'"

OK... I guess I'm just imagining that it's quite a small number of women who would be drunk enough not to remember having sex at the same time as being coherent enough to consent to and enjoy having sex at the same time as waking up the next day and not remembering having enjoyable consensual sex BUT remembering having sex and thus feeling they were raped.

And then bringing a successful prosecution, with the attendant normally quite unpleasant testing and questioning, not to mention life upheaval for everyone involved?

I'm sure it can and does happen but I think in the grand scheme of things, in terms of the number of rapes that are committed and not prosecuted, it is perhaps not the number one concern, when it comes to talking about consent?

BreakingDad makes a good point.
Sadly, because of arseholes barristers like this, offenders think that their credibility will be much higher than that of the victims.
Doesn't cut it if it ever gets to Court though.

Scallops, yes that's pretty common
Either on night out or at the offenders home, often with the victim unaware of how much they have actually consumed because the offender just keeps topping it up and so loses track. Hence the need for urine samples etc.

BreakingDad are you implying that a woman should not drink so that she is not the victim? The problem with this is that someone will still be the victim, unless we expect all women not to drink. In this scenario, a rapist who formerly hunted down drunk girls will find another criterion for selecting his victim.

Some women stopping drinking doesn't protect womankind from rapists. Stopping rapists being rapists would though, and that starts with stopping victim-blaming and making excuses for rapists.

Interesting you're in the Police and actually believe women don't "cry rape" all the time. That's a ratio of 1:3 against women now, I think.

It's actually really refreshing and hopeful to have a police officer who does actually believe women are raped posting on here. Hopefully, a woman who has been raped will read this and be reassured that not all Police won't believe them.

I'm really not being snarky, btw, we've had more than one Police Officer or friends of Police Officers posting about how they believe most women are lying. It's been really disheartening.

HootyMcTooty I have posted several times agreeing its victim blaming with regards to drink, women can drink and do whatever they wan't.

The poster was saying drunk women will be avoided by sober men.

They don't need educating about when a woman is too drunk to consent. They need educating that they aren't entitled to stick their dicks into women because they want to.
you are creating scenarios that don't exist Davsmum. I wonder why you would want to do that?

I think those scenarios DO exist.
I did not say they need educating about when a woman is too drunk to consent. I meant they need educating that if they are both drunk and the woman is keen - they need to think and not assume she is giving consent.
In that situation the man may truly believe it is mutually consensual. I am sure there are men in that situation who are not monsters who would want to rape someone.

I am trying to make sure I understand this and am interested in the responses to what I have asked.
After reading your posts, I am sad to say, I know a few women who have been raped when drunk. They don't realise it was rape. None of them have reported it as far as I am aware.

YouBetterWerk - I was wondering in terms of spiking of women how often does it occur, as one article I read said it happens a lot less than people believe it to.

I wondered if this was tied to them feeling that society wants them to come up with some reason as to why they were raped (victim blaming). Rather than just I went out in the evening and a guy raped me through no choice of mine.

Puffins, thank you.

I started this thread because rape has been a blight on Policing for too long, and it's tossers like this, people representing Law in 2015, that are making it harder and harder for victims to come forward, but it really is getting better. Only last year we had a massive amount of funding to go through more PVP (Protecting Vulnerable People) training, which included roleplays with real actors and a brilliant talk from an expert in rape and sexual assault.
I am sorry to hear other PC's have said they believe most women are lying. In situations like that, I would always remind them that 1 in 4 women will be raped or seriously sexually assaulted in their lifetime, yet only a tiny, tiny percentage will ever make a complaint, let alone go to court. With that in mind, it is highly likely that they will know someone who has been a victim, whether they know it or not.
I think at the moment the figure of proven false rape allegations (that is, not ones that have simply been thrown out through lack of evidence, too often I think people get these mixed up) stands at 3-4%. That is no more than any other crime.
Thank you again, and lets all be chivvied that I do honestly believe it's getting better.

As a rule of thumb, and the thing I have taught my sons now.

If you are not 100% sure that the woman you are about to penetrate with your penis is 100% able to consent and is consenting. Wait until morning. A man who respects your boundaries and respects you enough to not take a slurred response as a yes is a man who isn't a rapist. Drunk or not, it is the man's responsibility to ensure he has consent before he inserts any part of himself into any part of another human being.

It is not hard to determine whether someone is too drunk to consent. I don't know why you think it is Davsmum. You leaping through hoops trying to excuse men's behaviour is a bit sickening.

It is not unreasonable to expect a man not to penetrate a woman.

And yes lots of women are raped without even realising it. Ched Evan's victim was one of them. Do you think he misread signals? Because that is the type of scenario we are talking about.

i said this on the other thread, but can you imagine being a woman who is a victim of rape who has to stand up as a witness knowing that this barrister is for the defence? you wouldn't just know that he is going to challenge you in order to present his client's defence, he actively thinks that as a woman you are worthless and unentitled to rights

Breakingdad I have seen drink spiking quite a lot.
Please be under no illusions though that rape is a frequent call out, it really isn't (Actually I do not see this as a positive), but on the few non - historic's I have been first responder to, I know a good few have come back positive for GBH. As I said, often it will be the offender supplying the alcohol, so will either keep the victim getting steadily wasted or will slip drugs in. If possible we seize any alcohol so it can also be tested.

is it that drink spiking is more likely to be reported than other scenarios? because if as breakingdad suggested "society wants them to come up with some reason as to why they were raped (victim blaming)" then if you had been raped and you thought your drink had been spiked you might perhaps be more likely to report it. which would mean it would appear to happen more frequently if you were measuring reporting / convictions than actual occurrences

no idea if this makes sense - it's rather badly worded

Just awful that attitudes like this still exist. Supposedly educated people as well...

I am NOT trying to excuse men's behaviour, scallopsgreat and certainly not leaping through hoops to do so.
I was trying to establish if it would still be considered rape if BOTH were drunk and the man believed the woman WAS giving consent due to her responses and his clouded judgment of the situation due to him being drunk.

I am not claiming it IS ok - I was trying to find out if there was any consideration of that or whether there should be.

Even the courts go through it in more detail than claiming a man is guilty because a woman was drunk, so don't call my trying to understand this better as 'sickening'
At least I am trying to learn more and am prepared to consider what people are saying and not just assuming I know everything!

Men who rape women don't care about consent. Again this is not about how much a woman has had to drink. It isn't about women waking up in the morning and not remembering having mind-blowing sex. It is about men's attitudes towards women. It is a deliberate act.

As Puffins is teaching her sons, if a man cares about consent he won't penetrate a woman who is not enthusiastically consenting. All these scenarios about women enthusiastically consenting and then waking up in the morning, not remembering and declaring rape DON'T EXIST. Except in the minds of those wanting to excuse men's attitudes and behaviours.

Petula, yes, I know what you mean - Perhaps drink spiking is seen as a very 'clear cut' abuse of trust so less (unnecessary) guilt attached?
That being said, the symptoms of GBH and being drunk are very similar (hence why offenders use it), so victims may think they were just really drunk and then it comes back they were actually drugged.