Sex by deception

[RepeatAfterUs]

Following on from an earlier thread I this point below is in LGBT Labour's manifesto (thanks bd67th who linked)

Point 14: Review the law relating to legal issues of consent to rape and sexual offences to 'sex by deception' in order to remove potential discrimination and criminalisation of trans/gender variant people....

Now I might have heatstroke and I'm not 100% sure what that's saying...

However-Sec 74 Sexual Offences Act talks about consent and consent is:
Agreeing by choice
Freedom to choose (no duress or threats)
To have made a reasoned, informed decision
ALL ELEMENTS MUST BE PRESENT

I think the manifesto is taking issue with the last point-"informed". And consent applies to all sexual activity not just rape. So for instance a lesbian has a sexual encounter with a TW who doesn't disclose that they are a TW so the lesbian thinks it's another woman. Did the lesbian consent to sexual activity with a male? No. So the sexual activity would be an assault on the lesbian.

I think they want to over turn this protection which is pretty sick IMO

d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/lgbtlabour/pages/223/attachments/original/1446055384/Securing_Trans_Equality_(October_2015).pdf?1446055384

In some cultures the punishment for a girl/woman not being a virgin when she's supposed ti be is severe, brutal, murder is committed over this.

Snappity believes that girls/ women have to choose prison or punishment at the hands of their "loved ones". For having had sex before marriage. Or having been raped or abused as a child.

Way to go snappity!

Keep this stuff coming, you show more of how you view girls and women, and how aware you are off the variois issues we face, every time you post.

snappity Anyone is already free to ask questions or put limits anywhere they like, but the onus is not on a person to interrogate from an endless list of possible scenarios. It you have reason to believe that it would make a difference (and you know for a fact that trans status is a legit reason for reasons of sexual orientation and truth telling at the least) then the onus is on the party to disclose. Just like with insurance or any other contract that talks about with holding pertinent information. The precedent in law is well established and you aren't going to get it rolled back now.

Yes exactly as AngryAttackKittens says, sexual orientation and the biological sex of the person you are being sexual with is a universally known and cared about thing.

Would be a waste of time to try arguing about this Snappity and makes you look ever more dodgy*. How many ways can you try to make out that it is OK to deceive people? It isn't and never will be.

SarahAr lots of material facts that would influence a decsion DO have to be disclosed. And more could be tested in court. Consent can also be conditional eg the agreement to proceed based on the promise to wear a condom.

The law says that if a person has consented if he/she "agrees by choice, and has the freedom and capacity to make that choice" and that anything that denies or restricts freedom or choice may vitiate consent. Deception of identity is clearly fundamental - so fundamental that it is a given, hardly needing to be defined in law except for the existence of abusive deceivers pushing every boundary going.

I'm all for broadening the scope of informed consent and what may invalidate it.

Eg I think if you are knowingly infertile and you engage in a relationship that includes sex with someone who has made it plain that they want children, then I think you do have a duty to discuss it first. You don't have the right to decide what is important to another person or under what circumstances they should have sex, especially if your agenda is to get your end away. They may say "hey, sure we can look at the options later, carry on and fuck me", but they may also say, "whoa, actually I only want to sleep with people within a relationship that includes kids so let me think about this". Neither reaction is wrong.

If people want to have casual sex or sexual encounters outside a committed relationship or with people they don't know well, then that is fine too, but let's treat it like sport and have everyone play by the same rules and being open and honest.

And have open honesty carry forward to more realtionships. Lauramipsum Promising to marry someone and having sex etc whilst having no intention of marrying them probably be punishable under the law. Why not? It hurts people every bit as much as stealing their money by deception and can be a psychological wound. You would have to prove it though. And it would generally punish more men than women, so of course no one will want to consider it or consider it in the public interest to stop some men being such bastards.

And let's face it, many men who had been deceived by a transwoman would probably not want to go to court because of the the fear of humilation, or suggestions that he wanted it really etc and so I would think it is massively under-reported. In this rare instance it would be easier for women to report this type of sexual crime.

There have been 7 publicised cases of 'sex by deception' in the last decade, all of them biological women who pretended to be men in order to have sex with heterosexual female partners. I think one or two identified themselves (loosely) as trans men. All but one pleaded guilty.

Rather interesting that only females have been prosecuted, isn't it?
I suspect we may live in a patriarchy. It's a bit like transmen only ever being mentioned when it furthers the transwomen agenda. Funny that. 'Almost' as if birth sex is the thing that everyone knows matters, but pretends that it does not.

My suggestion to clarify 'sex by deception' is to add:
Possession of an unexpected penis.

A bit like rape being 'penetration by penis', the rest being sexual assault.

My apologies LauraMipsum I think we maybe agreeing on some things! I hastily read your post before I posted and think I read it a bit wrong.

I agree that the law as it stands benefits men and men's interests eg wealth and having the freedom to shag around undisdained.

"In reality, some deceptions (such as, for example, in relation to wealth) will obviously not be sufficient to vitiate consent."

But why is that obvious?

I do not think it should vitiate consent. I don't think consent can be bought so this applies equally here.

I also don't think lying about being married vitiate consent. These are getting in the realms of absurdity.

lass consent can be conditional in law. In my case I would not sleep with a man unless they were legally and morally free to pursue a monogamous relationship with me (and I with them). My right to consent to imtimate sexual acts is based on that conditional and expressed consent (amongst other consents). I value that intimacy and control over my body and intimacy and would feel violated if deceived. I place value on that.

Just like in ye olden days when men placed value on women's virginity and fidelity for reasons of feelings/pride/ paternity of children.

Can my intimacy only have worth if men deem it so? Or am I allowed to pursue justice for myself?

It's worth noting that if someone who was infertile kept that fact knowingly hidden from a spouse, it is grounds for an annulment in the Catholic church. I know that's not exactly the same as sexual consent, but I just bring it up because it is an issue that has had bearing on similar things wrt deception in relationships.

Obviously the virginity thing is frigging batshit. Comparing someone who is wedded to notions of 'purity' and feels the previous undisclosed sexual encounters of a partner are a violation against them to someone discovering at an intimate moment that a sexual partner has the genitals of the opposite sex and feeling violated because they are not of the corresponding sexuality is comparing a value judgement with a innate sexuality.

I take the point of the legal mind on the thread that the law does need careful consideration, but I think it's wise to not stretch definitions as wide as possible so that they include personal preferences and value judgements. Sexuality is not a personal preference. It is pretty fundamental.

lass consent can be conditional in law. In my case I would not sleep with a man unless they were legally and morally free to pursue a monogamous relationship with me (and I with them)

The English courts have considered 3 cases recently involving conditional consent - the Assange sex without a condom ; another involving some one who promised not to ejaculate inside the woman but did so; and the McNally one.In these there was held to be no consent.

In McNally the court said

Demonstrating that the circumstances in which consent may be vitiated are not limitless, the Court explained:

"In reality, some deceptions (such as, for example, in relation to wealth) will obviously not be sufficient to vitiate consent."

I am not aware of a case in the UK being argued on the basis of what you suggest.

It's worth noting that if someone who was infertile kept that fact knowingly hidden from a spouse, it is grounds for an annulment in the Catholic church. I know that's not exactly the same as sexual consent, but I just bring it up because it is an issue that has had bearing on similar things wrt deception in relationships

It is a very good point and it demonstrates the problem if the criminal definitions are stretched to breaking point.

Well the trouble is judges don't always get everything right and are prone to upholding the interests of white males. And not everyone has the resources to take their grievance to court; mental/ emotional or financial. Few barristers are real risk takers or motivated soley by principle.

And women are often denigrated as stupidly emotional, weak and just asking for it if seen to have been taken in by a cad. Or their pain is seen as as trivial. I think it would be very much in the public interest to try to put people off deliberately acting so badly in personal relationships.

In a parallel universe I would pursue cases as above and compare to cases where money was obtained by deception and expect parity in terms of method of deception. If you can deceive to obtain money in a variety of ways and it be wrong ie false promises etc, it must be wrong to commit the same varieties of deception to obtain sex/ intimacy. If not, why not?

Many people think that sexual offences are under-punished in comparision to other crimes.

Am too tired to think now but info here www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/fraud-act-2006

Fraud by false representation (Section 2)

The defendant: 

made a false representation 
dishonestly 
knowing that the representation was or might be untrue or misleading 
with intent to make a gain for himself or another, to cause loss to another or to expose another to risk of loss.

The offence is entirely focused on the conduct of the defendant.

The scope to prosecute seems wide there. There is precedent that consent is conditional, and perhaps the only thing that stops juries convicting is that they think they might also behave in deceptive ways WRT sex/ relationships and so they might be disinclined to convict having sympathy for the offender thinking there for the grace of god etc. Doesn't make it right though.

And I really wasn't talking about virginty in anything other than a true democracy - not in situations/ societies that are generally coercive and abusive to women, or that include rape. Clearly the odds are stacked against women in that situation and they are not free to choose or consent, nor to tell the truth. Not at all the same as wilful deception. Poor Tess :(

Nite all.

What stil way back before the inevitable derailing - plus I think MRAs in different guises are wanting to erase women altogether, apart from as virgins, mothers & whores - as Pope Gregory did from the Bible - did you know that the word Bible had been sequestered from women and perverted - The word, "bible," came from BABYLOS, the City of the Great Mother, the oldest continuously occupied temple in the world. The Goddess (called Astarte, Baalat, Hathor, etc.) patronized learning and her Priestess collected a library of paypyrus scrolls. So it came to be that the Greeks called any papyrus, "byblos," which came to mean any HOLY BOOK.

Some of the miracles attributed to mythical heroes were appropriated from Goddess myths. For example, Joshua's arrest of the sun was formerly credited to priestess of ISIS, Hecate, and the Thessalian Great Mother, who were said to stop heavenly bodies in their courses, thus lengthening the day or night at will. Moses' flowering rod, river of blood, and tablets of the law were all Symbols of the ancient Goddess

Moses' miracle of drawing water from a rock was first performed by Mother Rhea after she gave birth of Zeus, and by Atalanta with the help of Artemis. Moses' miracle of drying up waters to travel dry-shod was earlier performed by Isis, or Hathor, on her way to BYBLOS !

I just listened to Whittle where they justify withholding information or lying outright as consent.

So presumably Lab LGBT are trying to appropriate that version of misogyny into law. Really the law needs to embody respect - if you respect someone, you tell the truth because you want their informed consent.

Anything else is objectifying someone else to get your way- justifying deception and withholding as ok and not abuse

How much money you have, whether you are married, if you are a virgin, how many sexual partners you have had - all apply to whether you want to enter a relationship with someone. Not sex. You don't stop wanting to have sex with someone because they have less money in the bank or because they are married. You might make a conscious decision not to enter a sexual relationship with a married man based on your own moral compass, but it doesn't change the fact that you fancy them and want to have sex with them.

If some one had or did not have a penis - that is going to be a deal breaker for a lot of people in regards to sex. Along with infectious disease.

Alot of people feel very strongly about their sexuality and for whatever reason don't want to have sex with either males or females. They have the right to make that decision. Saying I don't want to have sex with someone that has or has ever had a penis is not the same as - I only want to date virgin because I don't believe in sex before marriage.

Getting sucked of by a biological man who has a penis when your are firmly hetro, is not the same as shagging someone who turns out to work in tesco when you thought he was a millionare playboy.

Incedetially, when I was 16 and at school I met a man in a nightclub, I told him I was 19 and at university. We went out a few time and had sex a number of times. Does this make me a rapist? No. Would he have still got involved knowing I was 16, maybe not. But you consent to sex with the body. That's why "she told me she was 16" when she is clearly 12 doesnt work as a defence for pedos.

@Snappity
If the principle is that there needs to be informed consent before sex then absolutely it must include virginity. For many Christians and Muslims that's still very important

^^
So in your world I would need to tell my Christian partner that my father raped me, thus robbing me of my virginity, or we would be having non consensual sex?

UglyCath - correct.

You must divulge, or go to prison for rape.

... sarcasm?

It should be remembered that we have plenty of ultra religious sects in operation in the UK, where the virgin issue would be material

• families / communities which have different ideas around this (we have seen plenty in the news about so called honour crime)

This is a non trivial pronouncement from snappity.

Girls (only girls) in these communities have the option of rock or hard place - punishment / excommunication / etc or prison.

Only an MRA would say that an 18yo who has grown up as part of an ultra religious sect, who has been raped as a child and is having an arranged marriage, must tell what has happened and accept the punishment, or must be imprisoned for rape.

They only see things from a male perspecitve. Some men want virgins. This is understandable and important, so women and girls who lie are comitting a crime and must be punished.

This is how it already works in lots of places in the world where women are beaten, raped, imprisoned, stoned, executed for not being virgins when they are not married.

I think snappity's posts are awesome TBH.

I think snappity's posts are awesome TBH.

Awesome in a peak transing sort of way. Yes, awesome in that regard for sure.

Yes quite.

Absolutely they should stand.

Over the last couple of weeks they have been becoming more and more extreme and random.

Over the last couple of weeks they have been becoming more and more extreme and random.

Presumably because people aren't turning round and frothing a whole load of vitriol at trans people in general, which is what Snappity is hoping they'll do.

Snappity jumped the shark over the infertile woman nonsense. Now they've got nowhere to go other than more shark jumping.

It's characteristic of this kind of thing that the more extreme they become the less offended people are. Because it evolves into desperate nonsense that can't be taken seriously.

Because it evolves into desperate nonsense that can't be taken seriously.

I hope so! Quite a bit of nonsense seems to have been taken seriously by a lot of well-meaning people so far!

I'm not actually referring to the idea of sex by deception. I absolutely think someone should disclose their sex, before having sex. If there is any reason to doubt it.

It's often very dangerous for women to deny a man sex at the point at which it is expected it will commence.

Lots of women don't say no at that point as subconsciously they are afraid, or don't want to be rude / hurt feelings (heavy socialisation) + there is the dynamic esp for women who have been assaulted in the past that saying yes when they don't want to is better than saying no and being forced.

This may come into play less with lesbians as they dont' interact sexually with men out of choice, are less likely to have been in situations where physical force / strong coercion / physical threat etc are brought into play. Women generally being less violent and sexually entitled than men. And looking at the stats.

How much money you have, whether you are married, if you are a virgin, how many sexual partners you have had - all apply to whether you want to enter a relationship with someone. Not sex. You don't stop wanting to have sex with someone because they have less money in the bank or because they are married. You might make a conscious decision not to enter a sexual relationship with a married man based on your own moral compass, but it doesn't change the fact that you fancy them and want to have sex with the

Getting sucked of by a biological man who has a penis when your are firmly hetro, is not the same as shagging someone who turns out to work in tesco when you thought he was a millionare playboy.

Indeed, quite right.

Surely the rationale behind needing to disclose if you are trans is that it us not OK to expose someone to you penis/vagina without them consenting to it and them consenting in the expectation that you will have a different organ doesn't count?