re: #7 goddamnedfrank

I’m sure there are situations where the condom breaks, the woman notices, tells the man to stop, he doesn’t and that’s a form of rape. Yet the risk of bodily fluid transmission is always present in consensual intercourse, condoms do break, in rare occasions because the woman has sabotaged them. If a person didn’t sign on for that risk, and aren’t willing to deal with attendant consequences, perhaps they shouldn’t be having sex.

Speaking solely as someone with experience in forensic analysis, I like cases that can actually be proved, that don’t hinge entirely upon competing raw assertion. Especially when my only two witnesses know each other and have been colluding with each other prior to coming forward.

Going back to the original subject, my opinion is pretty much the same as Frank’s if you change the word “colluding” to a word without the negative connotations.

Once consent is withdrawn I would also consider it a form of rape. In my mind it would be the same as if I allowed a friend to borrow my car for 3 days, then on the 2nd day I decided I wanted it back—because an emergency came up, because the friend was driving dangerously, etc.—and my friend refused to return it. At that point I would consider it a form of theft. In both cases the absence of forensic evidence or a confession would make it very difficult to prove in court.

When I was a teen my (much) older brother told me that I should never have sex with someone with whom I didn’t want to have a child. His point was that there’s a always an inherent risk in the form of the possibility of unforeseen and/or undesired consequences, therefore if I wasn’t prepared to acknowledge & accept the risk, I shouldn’t do it.

This is NOT to say that a woman (or man) deserves whatever happens to them once they give consent, it simply means that people need to think twice and be aware that things can get out of control and go very, very wrong. I think this is especially true for anyone whose chosen partner has greater physical strength, regardless of gender, because this makes one even more vulnerable. (The last scene of Looking for Mr. Goodbar comes to mind, a movie I only saw for the first time a few months ago. *shudder*)