Can a drunk woman give consent?

"Sexual activity is dependent on signals" now there's an interesting idea. Presumably then a man can claim he just misread the signals and it wasn't rape at all. Sexual attraction may be dependent on signals. sexual activity requires consensual agreement.
Anybody can criticise my posts. Sometimes when I find attitudes a bit ridiculous I like to extend the ideas behind those attitudes to the furthest extent hoping that the poster will recognise or at least acknowledge the flaws in their argument. Of course it doesn't work with people who don't understand irony
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thatbags you may not consider the "hysterical" comment to be anti-women I would certainly differ. And so would a lot of others.

From Stop telling women they are crazy

"“Hysteria” became popular in the mid 19th century, suspiciously around the same time that women’s rights began gaining momentum. The first national women’s rights convention took place in 1850. By 1859, physicians were claiming that a quarter of all women suffered from hysteria — as defined by a 75-page list of possible manifestations. Women demanding equality was a pesky problem, and hysteria was a brilliant answer. Hysteria asked, "Don’t those high-maintenance females see they’re too irrational to do things like own property, control finances, get a college degree, or cast a vote?" It framed female emotional instability as biological “fact.” "

Alcohol certainly is behind a range of crimes - no question about that - and drugs too. We could I suppose ban them, or simply make sure that people are aware of the potential risks of getting "wasted" - and that the risks are not just to your liver, but could involve traffic accidents, falls, and waking up in the morning not knowing who with or if you have had sex and whether you gave consent or not.

That is not a statement in defence of rapists.

Banning alcohol wouldn't solve the problem, although it might ensure that women are 'safer' in that they would have their wits about them at all times.

But banning things doesn't usually work anyway - look at the history of prohibition.

trisher - thanks for your post summarising the issues around calling women in general and you in particular 'hysterical'. Imo, spooky's comments add nothing positive to this discussion and in fact can be read as offensive to women in general.

I suggested banning alcohol as it seemed to be one of the sticks being used to beat and woman who is raped whilst drunk.

If avoiding alcohol would make women safer than they'd be safer still if men couldn't drink either as neither could be said to have alcohol clouded judgement.

But let's be honest it's nothing to do with alcohol or clothes. We could be a totally dry country with exceedingly conservative clothing and women would still be raped. Even then some people would still say they'd brought it on themselves because they'd shown an ankle or a wrist or worn makeup. walked alone in a dark/quiet street, talked to a man, left the house....whatever is frowned upon.

vampirequeen,

'The discussion isn't about a drunk person breaking the law though. It's about whether a scantily clad, drunk woman is in some way responsible if she is raped.'

'Some people on the thread seem to be judging the women as culpable based on their own prejudices and beliefs about appropriate behaviour.'

Actually, it was about whether a drunk woman can give consent. It hasn't been about a drunk women being responsible for being raped and I don't know why you keep on with this when it has already been roundly rejected ad nauseum.

vampirequeen, if it's got nothing to do with alcohol (I agree) then why would you suggest banning alcohol?

Have you actually said whether or not you think a woman can consent to sex if she is drunk?

lam64, that is just utterly ridiculous. I'll bite though - what have I actually written (not what trisher has said about me) that is 'offensive to women in general'.

If a woman has taken such offence to something I have written then I would suggest the problem is hers and not mine.

Excellent post luckygirl.

Trisher is digging back to 1859 to justify her belief that using the word 'hysterical' is somehow intended by me to be offensive to all women. 1859!

Be offended if you want trisher - it's your problem and not mine.

luckygirl, you said:

'Sexual activity is dependent on signals - some subtle, of which we may not even be aware. Alcohol disrupts that communication.'

Wouldn't that make drunk people less likely to have sexual activity? ;-)

Alcohol lowers pretty much everyone's inhibitions. People might willingly do things that they wouldn't imagine they would normally do.

It suddenly occurred to me this morning when gazing vaguely at the sunrise over the hills and sipping my coffee in my comfortable life that I think, without exception, we have all regarded this question (drunken woman/sexual consent) as involving a single man who may or may not be a rapist. However, there have certainly been high-profile accusations from young women about multiple rapes when they were too drunk to consent – some of them involving celebrities and some of them involving well-known gangs of young men. I would make a guess that multiple rapes – whether the victim is drunk or not – are reported evenly less frequently than rape by a single man because the event has to be that much more humiliating, horrible, embarrassing and frightening to make public.

I think that's why Chrissie Hynde is publishing her account of gang rape. People may not like what she says or how she says it but she is getting it talked about by confronting the demon, which should be a good thing.

Are you serious, Spooky, or are you playing devil's advocate?

You may notice, if you read other threads, that conversations and debates have a tendency to move on from the OP and open into a wider discussion. However if you'd like to bring the discussion back to the OP I'm happy to oblige.

If a woman is so drunk she cannot recall anything , it is assumed she cannot give consent to sex and a man can be charged with rape.

If a woman is drunk she cannot make a considered decision to give informed consent.

* What if the man was drunk as well and assumed she had consented?Can there be one law for one and not for another?*

Consent cannot be assumed.

Obviously if it was a taxi driver or someone who took advantage I can understand this is rape, but what if she just seemingly willingly went off with some guy she has only just met in a nightclub and then later discovers she must have had sex and regrets it?

Being alone with a man isn't an invitation to have sex. If she only later discovers she had sex then she must have been so drunk she couldn't give informed consent.

Should we be warning young girls to watch what they drink/ wear etc on an evening out or is that just limiting their freedom?

All young people should be warned about drinking too much however you cannot force them to stay sober. I drank to excess as a teenager. I don't drink at all now. Most of us grow out of it. As to clothing, at the moment scanty clothing is in fashion. This will pass and new fashions will come in. Unfortunately women will still get raped.

Would anyone be using this sort of language about male rape?

In the case where a man was found dead in a swimming pool after attending a party hosted by a celebrity, the man was found to have sustained serious injuries arising from a vicious sexual assault.

He was found to have been three times over the legal alcohol limited and to have taken ecstasy. Would people be so quick to say that he should have thought about the risk of being raped before drinking so much?

I gave you one example spooky if you fail to understand the history,meaning and significance of a word you use that is up to you. However as I have already said it reveals a significant lack of understanding and empathy with women and what I can only describe as an unwillingness to learn from your mistakes. It shows your age I am afraid. Thank goodness most of us are not stuck with outdated values.
Thanks for continuing the argument vampirequeen I am going to regard spooky as a boring old fart and bow out. I am just pleased the younger men and women of my acquaintance are more enlightened.

The original post asks "Can a drunk woman give consent?" If she is too drunk to be judge whether she wants to give consent or not, then no, she can't give consent, and it should be assumed that she would have said no. But being in the right won't keep her from being raped if someone ignores that, any more than being in the right will protect you from being knocked down and killed on a pedestrian crossing if someone jumps a red light. You'd be just as dead. The driver can be convicted, so can the rapist, but the damage is done.

Thatbags Thank you for differentiating between rape in a "stable" relationship where a woman thinks she has a consensual agreement with a man to treat one another with consideration, and the rape of women who have gone out to enjoy themselves, perhaps in a group and become separated from their friends somehow, while too drunk to look after themselves.

Some of the comments on here (the ones fallen on and condemned as condoning all rape) concentrate on the latter, which are the ones that are reported enthusiastically in the papers.

It is not surprising that the comments on here by those who have NOT experienced rape should be about this situation - which is where it would seem from the media that excessive drink is more likely than in a domestic situation.

The other ones that receive a lot of publicity are where a rapist breaks into a house secretly, containing a lone or elderly woman, and rapes and beats her sadistically. an obvious demonstration of how rape is used for power over a weaker individual.

Rapes within marriage, or by regular and trusted partners, receive less poublicity. The result may be the same, but in a private home in a relationship with a man who is thought to be committed and caring a woman's guard may be down. I don't know why that is, perhaps it is not sensational enough for the media, or it is reported even less than the low report rate of date or night-out rape. It is the part of the iceberg invisible under water.

ALL rape is abhorrent, and I don't read any posts that don't agree with that, or that "condemn" the victim and excuse the perpetrator (and if anyone thinks they have read such posts, they were too angry to read the small print)

The supposed "falling on and condoning rape" posts that you refer to, elegran, or rather the posts in response to those supposed to be condoning rape of any kind, of which there are none on this thread, are the posts that can be referred to as hysterical. It doesn't matter whether a female or a male posted those 'hysterical' comments. That they are regarded by at least one person as hysterical is what matters, not the gender of the poster.

I happen to think the word hysterical in the context it is used to be too strong for the purpose but I sympathise with anyone using it. There is a great deal of what looks like deliberate misinterpretation on this thread. It's enough to drive anyone to a slight excess of impatience.

I have been following this thread with interest and all I can say is I will stick with my view in my post 2ndSept. 11.17. Which concentrated on the OP question of 'consent' if a male/female is blind drunk.

In part.

"The fact is rape is a heinous crime, rape is sometimes a very difficult crime to prove. Rape claims are sometimes false and that has to be factored into the equation to.

As for women having to take responsibility for their own safety and care, to me that is self evident .Chrissy Hind from the Proclaimers has just been castigated for her views but I understand what she was saying, if you dress provocatively and get blind drunk or so doped up, ' you have lost the ability to protect yourself from harm'. Now she has a valid point.She got it in the neck for saying so, why?

Some will say it doesn't matter how the woman behaved rape is rape and there is no excuse. That is also true to say. There for it is a waste of time falling to one side of the argument because THEY ARE BOTH RIGHT. Women should take 'some' responsibility. No man has the right to rape, Nada, zilch, zero tollerence."

Not one single person on this thread has said rape is acceptable/excusable yet there is a determination by some to make it their goal to twist what a poster has said to argue they have.

The question of taking 'responsibility' for ones safety surely is up to the individual , it doesn't matter under what circumstance and there have been some excellent ananologies posted. Those who say it does not matter how a women is dressed or how blind drunk or doped up she may be, rape is rape. You are correct, 100% but being correct is only good as a sound bite or on paper .

The rape of the nuns is a classic for making the case about dress. It is clarifying the fact attire, sobriety can still mean a male/female could suffer rape. No argument I am sure from any poster.

The flip side of saying practically wearing nothing, being drunk or doped up and having loss of all control of your faculties to the point of being almost comotosed is also stating a male/female could suffer rape. It is an unpalatable truth but none the less it is a reality.

The point is both scenarios are what happens, 'nobody' in their right mind agrees with either of them being a cause for rape but it is a pointless exercise to simply not admit it is what happens and has bugger all to do with theory.

Good post Elegran.

'I gave you one example spooky if you fail to understand the history,meaning and significance of a word you use that is up to you. However as I have already said it reveals a significant lack of understanding and empathy with women and what I can only describe as an unwillingness to learn from your mistakes. It shows your age I am afraid. Thank goodness most of us are not stuck with outdated values.
Thanks for continuing the argument vampirequeen I am going to regard spooky as a boring old fart and bow out. I am just pleased the younger men and women of my acquaintance are more enlightened.

There it is again trisher, you just cannot help yourself. I will not allow my use of the English language to be dictated by your narrow and prejudiced view of the meaning of the word I use.

Out of morbid curiosity, exactly how old am I, now that I have betrayed my age?

What mistakes have I made that I am unwilling to learn from?

Are you my Mother?!

Personal comments? A classic response to a failing argument.

absent, whilst that is true, the reason we have considered the single man who is also drunk scenario is because that is the one the OP posted. In every area of law you can find exceptions and situations that do not fit into the neat little boxes we try to create.

What about this scenario? A young man (Bob) goes out for the evening wearing shorts and a tight tee shirt which shows off his well-honed muscles. He works hard to keep his body looking good and likes to show it off. He meets another young man (Fred). They’ve never met before but they get on like a house on fire. Have a drink and laugh. When the pubs/clubs close they want to continue drinking and chatting. Fred suggests they go back to his flat and Bob agrees. They get in a taxi and the driver notices that Bob is very drunk but he and Fred (who is not so drunk) are chatting and laughing. In fact Bob seems very happy to be with Fred.

When they get to Fred’s they carry on drinking but soon Bob starts to feel woozy. Fred suggests he lay down which he does. He remembers falling asleep but then doesn’t remember anything until the next morning when he awakes with a stonking hangover.

Was Bob giving out ‘up for sex’ signals by going to Fred’s flat whilst very drunk and scantily clad?

That is it. There are no neat little boxes. It is down to human variation and combinations of circumstances, to men who want to dominate, men who listen to women and men who don't, men who believe all that crap about women really being all for it but just protesting for the sake of apperarances, men who drink until they reveal their inner selfish nature, men who think that they married partly to have sex whenever they feel like it, women who want to enjoy an evening out, women who drink a lot, women who don't drink a lot and believe that they are therefore safe, women for whom an evening in means a nice meal and watching a video or two while snuggling up on the sofa with a drink, not rampant sex on a scratchy carpet, women who don't fancy it tonight but go along with a demanding man. Add to that women who are all for it, do fancy it tonight, but not with the particular man they seem to have been lumbered with, or in the uncomfortable circumstances where he has chosen to make his move, and you are in - it has been said before - a minefield.

To go back to the OP - no, a drunk woman is not capable of saying "yes" and meaning it. Having a few drinks, enough to make her cheerful, may not cloud her judgment, or affect her memory of what she said, but being stocious certainly will.

With respect vampirequeen, I wouldn't say that many of the women that I have seen rolling around drunk in the streets wearing next to nothing look like they spend any time in the gym. They presumably have a different reason for wearing revealing clothes than your friend Fred. :p

In your scenario, by the way, nobody had sex... It would seem that Bob may well have assumed there was a chance of having sex but that would have gone out of the window when he, rather gallantly, made sure Fred had somewhere safe to sleep.