California Supreme Court says rape begins when woman says stop

Associated Press / SFGate

[TheBattman]

bump for later reading.

[Kozak]

I have no doubt that the girl was also trying to push the boy off of her while she told him she needed to go home. There's your context...

So let me get this straight.
A woman consents to sex, voluntarily goes to a private place where only the participants are present, they begin to have intercourse, and THEN changes her mind.
The man continues for another minute and that constitutes RAPE?
And just HOW is the court to evaluate that set of circumstances? No other witnesses, no physical evidence of force, all just on the "state of mind" of the women?
O sure that makes for wonderful law...

[Kozak]

"NO" is "no". "No" is always "no". If they say "no" it means a thousand times "no." "No" plus "no", equals "no", all "no's" lead to "no","no","no."

But YES doesn't always equal yes? And now we are just supposed to take a womens word that in the privacy of the bedroom Yes became NO?
Bottom line. Women if you want to avoid this situation don't put yourself in the position for it to happen. It's YOUR responsibility. Don't be in the back seat, don't be in his house, don't go to his hotel room or dorm room, don't be in the bedroom at a party because that implies YES in any rational world.

[Kozak]

Glad I'm a married Californian

Don't be too happy. California recognizes "marital rape" as a felony.......

[Kozak]

Yes.

Does that apply to all the teenage girls who do it too?

Congradulations on winning the coveted "Ayatollah" award.

[william clark]

Thanks for the details. Unless the defense can produce a credible witness to indicate that the girl's lying, sounds like a pretty clear case of date rape to me.

[Boot Hill]

TerribleThunderLizard says:   "I stand by my previous assertation that there is a point that consent can not be changed."

I agree. Unfortunately though, this case sets the opposite standard, that even where consent is freely given, a retraction (of consent) during intercourse is controlling as to whether a rape occurred.

Regards,

Boot Hill

[FreeTally]

So let me get this straight. A woman consents to sex, voluntarily goes to a private place where only the participants are present, they begin to have intercourse, and THEN changes her mind.

Confusing to all people except those who wish to remove any responsibility from women in sexual activities.

But YES doesn't always equal yes? And now we are just supposed to take a womens word that in the privacy of the bedroom Yes became NO?

And she went in their more than once, even after at least one of them admitted he wanted to have sex with her and two guys said "why wont you do stuff?". Like I posted before, I bet she was the type that wanted to be seen as "cool" and thus wouldn't just leave and not give the time of day to those types of guys.

Bottom line. Women if you want to avoid this situation don't put yourself in the position for it to happen. It's YOUR responsibility. Don't be in the back seat, don't be in his house, don't go to his hotel room or dorm room, don't be in the bedroom at a party because that implies YES in any rational world.

I wish everyone could understand this and stop playing sexual games.

[Boot Hill]

harpseal says:   "What was presented in the news story was completely different than what was presented by these facts"

It sure was different, but, as they say, bad cases make for bad case law. And this case sets the standard that, even where consent was freely given, that a retraction of that consent during intercourse is controlling as to whether the crime of rape occurred. Any man that wouldn't stop when asked to do so (during intercourse) may be a jerk, but he is not a rapist, imo.

Regards,

Boot Hill

[dfwgator]

I have a question. What if the guy is deaf?

[NELSON111]

Are you kidding? If I was 17 (again)...and having consentual sex...and the girl said "I should be going now" and "I need to go home." ...I would take it to mean "hurry up and finish"! Not Stop it you jerk!

It is not semantics to say such. When the words STOP and GET OFF ME (or some derivative therefor) are not used...and there is no act of trying to get him off (of the girl)...then those words can mean several things...1) I don't want to do this anymore or 2) Hurry up and finish I have to go. Considering the girl consented...any 17 year old boy would think the latter. To think otherwise is denying reality.

[GretchenEE]

Court defined rape Monday as continued sexual intercourse by a man after his female partner demands that it stop

And how long till the first court case arises over the definition of "demands"? I doubt this will remain a non-issue.

For underage citizens, the conviction-proof barrier could be returned to, hello, their age.

[freepatriot32]

sorry that wont work either therir was a case in california (where else) where a college student had all of his sexual partners sign consent letters before sex because there wasa rash of feminist on campus preaching about date rape that semester and one of them cryed rape afterwords and the guy was convicted of rape and sentenced to i think 5 years in prison even though she never denied signing the consent paper

[SarahW]

Its a woman's prerogative to change her mind.

(and yes, the subtext of the above has always had to do with sex)

"Yes" changes to no when she says no.

Women should avoid situations where they aren't in control. But its NEVER her fault if she says no, and the guy refuses to let her go. That's rape.

[bankwalker]

"Don't...Stop!"

Means the same as "Keep...Going!"

[Kozak]

Its a woman's prerogative to change her mind

Oh okay. So a woman exercises her "perogative" and a guy gets slapped with a felony charge, goes to jail for months or years, loses a lot of his citizenship rights (vote, right to bear arms, work in lots of jobs ). ALL based on her unverifiable, completely subjective and personal "perogative". No Commisar in the Soviet Union ever had more power. Do you not recognize how destructive and poisonous this kind of "rape" charge is going to be? Believe me I think rapists should be executed, I have no truck with violence against women, but this is insane.

[A.J.Armitage]

Did you actually read the post? If the facts are as presented, it was clearly a case of rape.

[SarahW]

NO means No.

[gridlock]

My favorite track on the Phil Rizzuto's Greatest Hits album.

[Dianna]

Bottom line. Women if you want to avoid this situation don't put yourself in the position for it to happen. It's YOUR responsibility. Don't be in the back seat, don't be in his house, don't go to his hotel room or dorm room, don't be in the bedroom at a party because that implies YES in any rational world.

With the new information I do agree that this was rape. The boys certainly knew she wasn't enthusiastic, and she did make at least a half-hearted protest.

But honestly, all concerned acted stupidly. Any girl who cannot be firm and know to immediately extricate herself from this place shouldn't be going anywhere unsupervised.

Unfortunately the only ones who can be punished are the boys and that punishment is fairly harsh. I'm not sure I could vote to convict in a case such as this. That could depend upon the attitude of those involved while in court (for example if the boys were acting cocky and arrogant, or if she was acting virginal and outraged, I might think that the lessons which ought to have been learned by this incident haven't been learned). If they were all just a bunch of upset, seemingly sincere kids I'd probably vote no and just let them learn from what happened.