Stop pretending this is normal

[BovaryX]

There is a great article in The Telegraph by Louise Perry of We Can't Consent to this. It discusses how a defence of consensual sex is being used by killers to escape a murder conviction. It cites the changes to the domestic violence law designed to protect more victims and the impact of ubiquitous violent porn.

We have seen a rise in the proportion of women reporting such violence at exactly the same time that we have seen the mainstreaming of extreme violence in porn. Sexualised images of strangulation are widely available on social media platforms such as Instagram, Pinterest, and Tumblr, which claim to be suitable for children aged 13 and over, and we have heard from many young women that they feel under pressure to go along with ‘rough sex’ including strangulation, for fear of being labelled prudish

www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/women-strangledchoked-slapped-spat-sex-need-stop-pretending/

From Private Eye

It has also been successful as a defence against a charge of rape
Smith, aged 23, of Hawthorn Grove, Exmouth, denied two counts of rape, sexual assault, and assault by penetration. He was cleared of all charges

There was an absolutely hideous thread on Twitter yesterday, full of charming young men objecting to women objecting to being killed during sex. The sheer naked misogyny made me feel physically sick. These men are in the world, dating our daughters, teaching our kids, deciding who gets shortlisted, writing the algorithms that increasingly rule our lives. Feels like we are in a dark place and as my DD would day, that’s on Pornhub.

Thanks for posting BovaryX. It is a shocking state of affairs.

Some actions you can take against the prevalence of violent porn which normalises this behaviour.
Petition Shut down pornhub
Write to your MP ClickOff has some good resources

Not to mention all the useful idiots grooming our children into believing that extreme porn is normal - like Warwickshire County Council:

metro.co.uk/2019/10/21/council-sex-website-teaches-children-bukakee-caught-masturbating-10955368/

Petition Shut down pornhub
Signed.

Signed

Signed.

I understand a governement review into the rough sex defence has been announced.

Keep talking. Long and loud. I was one of the people arguing with you once (not that it was ok in general, but why it was fine for some, why I 'liked' it) in a relationship with someone I loved, but I'm now able to recognise was groomed in to. I didn't leave the relationship, he died instead. But much as I argued with everyone, I still absorbed what you said.

I explained on here (sex board I think), in response to someone asking what they got out of this, what my boyfriend had told me. I'll not repeat it, because it makes me ill to think of now. But the response to that, someone's sheer horror at that explanation, it stuck with me. It was one of the things that made me see it all for what it was when he was dead.

Someone on here, and their revulsion at enjoyment at strangling someone to passing out, played a big part in my awakening. Not just as an angry feminist, but from my own crippling self esteem issues, from yet another in a line of shit relationships, from continued subservience to my ex husband. My mental health is controlled again now. All because of the women on here (woman in particular, I wish I could remember who) explaining on repeat why none of this is ok.

Well. That was unnecessarily long and all about me! Sorry.

Inspirational post herja. Hope you are doing ok now

Yesterday I read "an erection isn't a compliment" and that was an eye opener for me. Mumsnet can be brilliant

That is a really powerful post, Herja.

So pleased you are feeling in more control of your mental health, and out of such abusive relations.

And it is really good to hear someones posts to you made a difference.
There are some very fantastic posters on here.

Your story makes it all worth while.

I'm fine now! I have never (literally never due to a dodgy childhood too) been in such control of myself. So I'm making use, and sending letters, talking at people, to people, in the hope I can make the same difference to someone else.

The Secret Barrister has linked to a blog post saying this is just hysterical stupid wimmins not understanding how the law works because this technically isn't a 'defence'.barristerblogger.com/2020/03/05/the-harman-amendment-legislation-as-gesture-politics-leads-to-bad-law/ The post then talks about how you can never consent to your own death so the law is pointless. But this, I think, is to miss the deeper concern. There is a worry that the law is not being applied consistently , especially where sex is involved. For example you can't consent to GBH - a poor tattoo artist was just jailed for 3 years for giving consenting clients body modifications like tongue splitting. If the law on consent and harm really is so robust how are we seeing men time and time again claiming their partner consented to being strangled or beaten up and getting away with it?

I sometimes feels barrister bloggers are quite obtuse and miss the point. They point to the law, as if us women are so stupid we can't possibly understand any legal issues. "Look!" they say "look! You can't consent to being harmed anyway!" And they give a long list of past cases where, indeed, consent doesn't allow you to be harmed. But that misses the point. Does anyone else feel like this?

Thank you Herja for sharing your story.

Yes WeeBisom- I do. There's a male poster on here who has a bat signal for these posts and will no doubt pop up shortly to tell us all how legally wrong and incorrect we all are for protesting about this. It seems that these people get over investigated in all the legal intricacies / language while missing (or not giving a toss about) the huge harm that happens to women and girls.

@Herja thank you for sharing that. I was also one of those women who would have said she was into it and, strangely enough, it was my abusive ex who woke me up. He was always putting me down and once said something along the lines of "well I don't know how you can call yourself a feminist when you have sex like that". That was it for me. Suddenly I realised it wasn't empowering. It wasn't sexual liberation. He got off on me being degraded and I was entirely complicit.

No fewer than 59 have been killed in the UK by men who claimed their death was the result of a ‘sex game gone wrong’, according to the campaigning organisation We Can’t Consent To This. In the last five years, the defence has been used successfully in six of 14 cases that went to trial, resulting in a conviction for manslaughter or even an acquittal. In one of the most notorious, a millionaire property developer called John Broadhurst was sentenced to just three years and eight months in prison for the manslaughter of his girlfriend, 26-year-old Natalie Connolly. He left her to bleed to death with more than 40 injuries, including internal trauma and a fracture to her left eye socket, after what he claimed was a session of ‘rough sex’ in December 2016. Earlier this week, and to widespread outrage, Broadhurst launched an appeal against his sentence. It was dismissed.

The point is this is being used successfully to downgrade from murder to manslaughter. This is allowing violent murderers to get derisory sentences by suggesting consent when the dead victim can't challenge that self serving, manipulative narrative.

Any woman currently in a sexual relationship with a man - even/especially a husband - or 'dating' men needs, I think, to record her aversion to violent sex play or humiliating sexual practices and leave it with her will and/or in her computer file named 'In the Event of my Death' If you don't have such a file, or indeed a will, do consider it.

A murderer claiming the 'rough sex gone wrong' defence (most do) could find himself (xerself if suddenly identifying as a 'womxn' ) blindsided if such a document were to turn up in court. It wouldn't take half an hour.

If a woman does enjoy rough sex or aspects of BDSM, the declaration could establish the clear boundaries she invariably establishes with her partner(s) to protect her life.

Such a voice from beyond the grave would be hard for a jury to ignore and would give the lie to the victim-blaming and silencing that routinely goes on in such cases.

I mean it would only take half an hour to write a document like that and have a solicitor lodge it with your will.

The fact that violent, misogynistic killers are using this to swerve a murder charge is an indictment of UK justice and its failure to appropriately punish criminals.

Languishing that Warwickshire council website is shocking. I had to look up what some of the terms meant.

Also, signed to shutdown PornHub.

Well. That was unnecessarily long and all about me!

Apology unnecessary. Thank you for sharing with us.

So glad you are in a better place now

Herja, that was painful but beautiful.