Quote: (10-20-2012 12:44 PM)basilransom Wrote:
The idea that a man can rape a woman with whom he has a sexual relationship is something of a feminist innovation. Feminists considered a woman's right to refuse more important than suffrage:
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Stanton: "'Woman's degradation is in man's idea of his sexual rights,' Stanton wrote to Anthony. 'How this marriage question grows on me. It lies at the very foundation of all progress.'" Stone: "It is clear to me, that [the marriage] question underlies, this whole movement and all our little skirmishing for better laws, and the right to vote, will yet be swallowed up, in the real question, viz, has woman, as wife, a right to herself? It is very little to me to have the right to vote, to own property &c. if I may not keep my body, and its uses, in my absolute right. Not one wife in a thousand can do that now, & so long as she suffers this bondage, all other rights will not help her to her true position." Hasday, Jill Elaine (2000). "Contest and Consent: A Legal History of Marital Rape". California Law Review 88: 1425.
If a man is reduced to the use of non-consensual sex with a girlfriend or wife, the relationship is already dysfunctional, and they should separate. Whether an instance of non-consensual sex with a long-term partner constitutes 'rape' is up for debate. And there's definitely a spectrum to it - eg, deciding to penetrate your wife while she's sleeping, when you had sex four hours before, would be hard to consider as 'rape.' There's a certain assumption of consent, given by the continued presence of each party in the relationship, unless someone otherwise states they don't want to bang.
Just putting this out there to show that prior to feminism, this was not a clear cut issue. Feminism and progressives have been successful in making people believe that any beliefs that predate Women's Liberation are automatically evil and wrong.
In this instance, the anal sex sounds like genuine rape, given the nature of anal sex, its potential for injury and that she told him to stop.
It goes well beyond feminism. It's a basic enlightenment principle: the idea that every adult human being is a fully formed moral agent with the ability to make his or her own decisions. You simply cannot have a free society in which half the population is reduced to the legal status of children. The only way that such a situation can be maintained is if there is some overarching authoritarian structure that keeps everyone in line, like religion. This is why the Muslim theocracies are the only places that can maintain this sort of system. And as much as I dislike feminism, I'm in no hurry to trade it for theocracy.
I also have an issue with the notion of a relationship constituting implied consent. Let's say your friend Joe comes over every weekend to watch football and drink beer at your house. One Sunday you decide that you're not up for company and would rather just be alone. If Joe walks in and grabs a beer, it would be a bit much to call him a burglar and a thief, but once you tell Joe that you're not up for it this week, Joe should leave. It doesn't mean that you're not friends anymore. It just means that at this particular moment, you don't want Joe in your house drinking your beer. The ongoing relationship doesn't give Joe any special rights to your property.
My problem with the feminist conception of rape is that it tries to turn it into a political act, something that "men" commit against "women." Bullshit. Rape is what a criminal does to a victim. And just like any other crime, guilt is established by looking at the particular facts and weighing them against some objective measure. In rape, the objective measure is consent. If the alleged rapist has consent, he didn't rape. If he doesn't have consent, he's guilty. You're doing something very similar to the feminists, except from the opposite direction.
When you use the phrase "reduced to the use of non-consensual sex," that sounds very contrived to me. Criminals aren't "reduced" to anything. They make a conscious choice to commit an act. If some destitute guy mugged you, would you say that he was reduced to robbing you? Probably not. If you're girlfriend doesn't want you to bang her, tough luck. Dump her and find one who will.