<p>@3mom "I think videotaping is good for sons and daughters. A dropcam that overwrites every few days would protect both parties if limited to proper uses.</p>
<p>I do not see any reason that student should be prevented from using a video as a defense or to prove that a crime occurred.</p>
<p>It may be a fact of modern life.</p>
<p>Wow. Well, maybe. But, I would think a girl would have to consent to being videotaped, too. I don’t know. I’ll have to think about this more but even without the whole rape thing I’m not sure everyone wants videotapes of their sexual trysts floating around, either.</p>
<p>I’m with you on that…alittle too creepy for my taste but I can understand where it’s coming from. </p>
<p>I think that they need something that says that security cameras can only be used related to defense from or prosecution of a case, unless you have permission. Yes, if it is posted on social media, you should be in trouble.</p>
<p>I do not think that accusing someone of rape and then trying to block video evidence to the contrary should be allowed. Or saying you didn’t do it and then trying to block video evidence. </p>
<p>In today’s world, I think that we should all assume that whatever we do or say is probably being recorded by someone.</p>
<p>Whatever we do or say is likely being recorded by someone! But, luckily the supreme court finally said they need a warrant! Yay us.</p>
<p>There are two things going on on this thread: one group is afraid there won’t be due process for accused rapists and one group is afraid the schools will continue to bury and hide and harrass rape victims. Either way, the schools need new policy. </p>
<p>Carry on.</p>
<p>This is far too creepy for me. If people are having sexual encounters where the issue of consent is so borderline that they feel compelled to videotape it for evidence, I think they need to rethink who they are having sex with, and when. This goes for both males and females.</p>
<p>Right? A college tribunal is going to watch videos and decide if participation met the appropriate standards of enthusiasm. Ick. I’m leaning strongly towards no on this one.</p>
<p>Mandatory reporting would take care of colleges “hiding” criminal sexual assaults and rapes and make the colleges and universities have clear definitions of what constitutes poor conduct on students parts from criminal behavior and would probably lead to clearer and more “universal” guidelines across the country for punitive damages. It’s a bit of a free for all right now. I know, I know I’m pushing my agenda…sorry. We have mandatory reporting for the young, the elderly, the mentally infirm and expanding it to university and college students doesn’t bother me at all.</p>
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Good. Now women won’t be the only ones who have to worry about there actions being misinterpreted. </p>
<p><a href=“8 Important Questions About California's New Sexual Assault Bill”>8 Important Questions About California's New Sexual Assault Bill;
<p>Is this bill a cure all? I’m unsure, but the criticisms bring to light why we need a solution to out problem. </p>
<p>The concept of affirmative consent is fine with me. The law does nothing to inform how to adjudicate either in the courts or by honor code tribunals. It does give teeth to requiring men to obtain consent before the occurrence and hopefully it gives teeth to women to make up their minds at the time of occurrence.</p>
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<p>Thanks for clarifying.</p>
<p>According to this logic, since typically the female causes the penetration when she performs oral sex on a male, she would require his consent. Therefore, if they are both legally drunk and the female performs oral sex on the male (not an unlikely occurence), she has by definition raped him.</p>
<p>Taking this together with the earlier discussion, if two legally drunk people ‘agree’ to participate in sex:
<p>Frankly, I do not see why the mechanics of how two partners engage in sex should determine who is the perpetrator in a rape, particularly in the case where there neither can consent due to intoxication. Only in the case where the man is sober do some positions imply the man’s consent (e.g., missionary). </p>
<p>@ collegealum314 “According to this logic, since typically the female causes the penetration when she performs oral sex on a male, she would require his consent. Therefore, if they are both legally drunk and the female performs oral sex on the male (not an unlikely occurence), she has by definition raped him.”</p>
<p>You are conflating drunk and incapacitated, which we have been over about 50 times. </p>
<p>The penetrating party is responsible to get the other parties consent which can be verbal or indicated through participation. Therefore, if they are both dunk but not incapacitated, and they are both participating, then how things happen does not matter. However, if one party is too drunk to fully understand what is happening or is lying passively while the other party takes advantage of the situation without consent, then these details could matter. </p>
<p>Also, once they decide anything together, it would seem to me that they both are sober enough to understand what is happening and actively participate, so all of your scenarios do not matter. </p>
<p>Perhaps it is your experience that when a guy is so drunk that he can only lie there and vomit from time to time that more sober women take find this to be a big turn on and take advantage of him by ripping his pants off and performing various acts on his penis while he continues puking and is too drunk to resist. However, in my more mundane experience, I have never seen this happen. </p>
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<p>No, I am not. I was only talking about the drunk but not incapacitated case, and it was my understanding that you were talking about legal intoxication (BAC = 0.08), not incapacitation, in your last few posts. Your last post referred to the case where “a man is not consenting or participating”. Before you said a person cannot consent if legally intoxicated, which is a blood alcohol concentration of 0.08. Then you seemed to qualify it by saying that it matters who is causing the penetration, and that in some cases, this may be the female. However, you said this would be quite rare, which I contested by saying oral sex is ‘caused’ by the giver, not the receiver.</p>
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<p>The definition of drunk but not incapacitated that we have been discussing was established as legally drunk. At this level, certainly people are aware of what is going on, not laying their passively or intermittently vomiting. My interpretation of your posts was that you feel if both parties are legally drunk but not anywhere near incapacitated, then the male has committed rape. </p>
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<p>Yet, you think at this level of intoxication a man would be initiating sex with a female? The scenario we are discussing is <em>equal</em> levels of intoxication, and you have repeatedly said that at equal levels of intoxication, it is the man’s fault. </p>
<p>And, yet, at this level of intoxication, or less, men DO rape women. </p>
<p>All you’all who keep saying “We are discussing equal levels of intoxication” don’t understand that you don’t get to set the discussion terms. Most of us talking about rape are NOT talking about equal levels of intoxication, and while, I recognize this odd preoccupation, which has taken up most of the thread, IS your primary concern, it’s not everyone’s main concern regarding rape on college campuses. In fact, given that women make up about 64% of the college population, I can very confidently say it is not the primary concern of the majority of college students, either.</p>
<p><a href=“http://thedartmouth.com/2014/05/16/featured/dear-dartmouth-thank-you-3”>http://thedartmouth.com/2014/05/16/featured/dear-dartmouth-thank-you-3</a></p>
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<p>You brought the discussion to this topic when you defined sex between two legally drunk but incapacitated people as rape, and further when you and others insisted that only the female needs to give consent. If consent is impossible at this level, then it is not possible for either party. </p>
<p>You’re right. These cases of equal intoxication are not the primary focus The focus is to make sure that men who take advantage of women when they are intoxicated do not get away with it by hiding behind some loophole. However, enforcing that is tricky, so they have sought to criminalize a blameless scenario when both people are equally intoxicated so it’s easier to throw the male in jail in the case of unequal intoxication. In fact, it’s just easier to throw all the males in jail if there was alcohol involved in a sexual encounter. (If this scenario of equal intoxication is not blameless, then there is equal blame by both parties.) It’s not even clear where the level of intoxication needs to be either. If it is set at legal intoxication, people are fairly lucid and you can’t always tell. This means that every couple that has a glass of wine or two at an anniversary dinner and then has sex, a rape has occurred. </p>
<p>The numbers you put for rape are 1 in 5 women. If you want to use the definition above, it is a lot higher than that and in fact most of the cases are probably the scenarios I have described. And so, it does make sense for the discussion to revolve around this scenario, whether or not you feel it’s appropriate to throw all the males in jail. </p>
<p>Bottom line if you are going to use a definition of consent to engage in sexual activity, it needs to be consistent for both genders. Sorry if that is inconvenient for you. </p>
<p>@ collegealum314 “you have repeatedly said that at equal levels of intoxication, it is the man’s fault.”</p>
<p>No, I have never said that. I think that this is another theoretical distraction, but okay. If they are both consenting and participating and drunk but are clear headed enough to know what they are doing and participate actively, then it is not a crime to me. I have been consistent with this. They may regret it the next day, but the were sober enough to understand what they were doing and actively participate. </p>
<p>@collegealum314 “The definition of drunk but not incapacitated that we have been discussing was established as legally drunk.” </p>
<p>I have never agreed to that. In fact, I have said at least 2 times, that I do not believe that 0.08% blood alcohol is adequate to incapacitate most people. Feel free to go back and check. </p>
<p>My practical point is that in my experience, when the guy is saying that they were “both drunk”, they are rarely equally drunk and usually the women is more drunk because they had a similar amount and she is smaller. </p>
<p>@ collegealum314 “Yet, you think at this level of intoxication a man would be initiating sex with a female? The scenario we are discussing is <em>equal</em> levels of intoxication, and you have repeatedly said that at equal levels of intoxication, it is the man’s fault.”</p>
<p>No. That is my point. If he is initiating in that situation he is not as drunk. Saying “we were both drunk” is just some bs that he says later to deflect responsibility by implying that somehow “both drunk” means “equally drunk.”</p>
<p>Basically, I just do not accept your premise that the level of intoxication is always equal. That is never really the case. </p>
<p>Maybe you have me confused with someone else?</p>
<p>^OK M2L, I understand your position better and it seems reasonable.</p>
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<p>I’m not personally putting that number forward. That is the number from the most recent government study on this issue. In 2007, the year of the last study, the number was one in four. It’s getting better.</p>
<p>I think what you need to understand is that the reason it’s at one in five is because young women don’t feel raped when they have consensual sex while drinking. Understand that women feel raped when they are raped. </p>
<p>Studies have found there are no more false reports of rapes than there are of any other crime.</p>
<p>I’m happy to discuss solutions, but I’m uninterested in this both parties are drunk scenario. Both parties go into that situation informed at this point…Girls have to be careful of certain things in this situation and so do the guys. On the balance, the guys have to be careful of far, far less.</p>
<p>Actually, I think that the sturm und drang on this is mostly about the fact that according to the Title IX procedures and standards, guys now DO have to worry that they might be accused, suspended, or expelled. Whereas previously they didn’t have to worry one tiny bit. Scored with a drunk female? Just put another notch on the bedpost, stud! It’s the liminality thing: people agree 98% or more on rape, it’s the 2% where they don’t agree that they will fight over endlessly.</p>
<p>Now, this doesn’t address the justice or injustice of the preponderance of the evidence standard, or the actions of individual committees. In the few cases we’ve discussed here, many of us apparently agree that the committees refused to interview witnesses and ignored evidence of female intent and male innocence, including that produced by their own investigators. Others ignored rape kits and examinations that showed vaginal tearing. Clearly, some of these committees have members who are politically motivated one way or the other to the detriment of the students involved. </p>
<p>But something MUST be done. Personally, I would like to see the Title IX standards and procedures revised to more effectively render justice. I think that’s likely to happen, given the push back. I’d like to see committees composed of people who were not in thrall to a athletic department, the school administration, or an activist group, people who do not have a vested interest in a particular verdict. I’d like to see people who are fair and open-minded, and willing and able to educate themselves on such subjects as the behavior of victims after sexual assault. I’d like to see a built-in appellate group, with at each school or among consortia of schools. I think that preponderance of the evidence is too ow a standard, at least if 50.5% is going to be considered enough.</p>
<p>New article Re the recent Brown case mentioned here previously—an interview with the accused (and suspended) man:</p>
<p><a href=“Exclusive: Brown University Student Speaks Out on What It’s Like to Be Accused of Rape”>http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/06/08/exclusive-brown-university-student-speaks-out-on-what-it-s-like-to-be-accused-of-rape.html</a></p>
<p>Some quotes:</p>
<p>To say that nobody knows what really happened that night on August 2 except for the two people involved is a cliché; but it also fairly sums up what can be gleaned about this case from the available evidence. The discrepancies between Sclove’s and Kopin’s accounts seem too great to be explained by differences in subjective perception. Is it possible that Sclove felt pressured or intimidated in ways Kopin did not notice or understand? Perhaps. Is it possible that her bad experience with her adult student fatefully colored her perceptions of her interaction with Kopin? …</p>
<p>One can certainly argue that even if Kopin’s account is entirely true, he should have been more sensitive to Sclove’s fragile state—especially in view of his earnest protestations that their interaction that night took place “within the context of our friendship”—and should not have pursued what he describes as “a passionate hookup” under the circumstances, even if she mostly initiated it herself. But if Kopin’s account is right, and he acted like a bit of a dolt, that doesn’t add up to “non-consensual sex” for which Kopin was found responsible by the Brown disciplinary panel, let alone to the brutal rape of which he stands convicted in the court of public opinion…</p>
<p>In many ways, the current system of campus trials—in which claims of sexual assault are investigated by gender equity bureaucrats with no background in criminal justice and judged by professors, students, deans, and campus activists, with no clear rules of evidence or protections for the participants—does a grave disservice to both the wrongly accused and to victims who are misleadingly promised a friendlier alternative to law enforcement channels. On at least one point, Sen. Gillibrand is right: if Daniel Kopin is a violent rapist and near-strangler, he should be doing time in prison, not getting suspended or even expelled (the toughest disciplinary sanctions still leave a rapist free to find other victims off-campus). If he is innocent, he has been effectively branded a criminal without any of the safeguards normally accorded to criminal defendants. In the end, nobody wins.</p>
<p>Comments below are also an interesting read.</p>