The Cornell 7 rape accusations, like most everything in our country these days, has divided the country into two camps. One camp thinks the woman willingly went into the man’s room with the promise of a menage a trois she should have known what she was letting herself in for. The other camp thinks that a bunch of sex starved frat boys gang raped a drunken woman who couldn’t make a decision to consent and, worse still, other people knew she was being raped and failed to rescue her.
We, as a civilization, have had problems dealing with sexual issues since well forever. In the good old days, just a little less than 100 years ago, women bore the brunt of responsibility when accusations of rape were made. The woman should fight and say no and if she didn’t then she was going to have difficult time proving it or getting any justice for it. Things have changed and, I think, for the better. There are still problems.
Big problems which is why I seriously doubt that when all the facts are in that any jury will punish the Cornell 7.
The problem with rape is that it involves sex which is one of the more decidedly irrational and primal human experience. The idea that we have two rational and sober human beings sitting down to discuss how the sexual act is going to go is wildly off base. There is a lot of irrational and emotional feelings going on here.
Simple horniness is a good place to start. Horny people make bad decisions. Things like foregoing birth control or sleeping with someone, anyone, just to get laid can easily happen during these horny patches. The itch needs to be scratched and poof goes rational thinking.
Then there is a good chance, as is the problem in this case, that alcohol or drugs are involved. Either both or one of the parties involved is not making decisions in full possession of their decision making faculties. It is interesting that some critics of the Cornell 7 investigation are saying that the men involved in this case were just as incapacitated as the woman. If she was incapable of making a decision but then so were they.
Sex carries a different emotional weight for different people. A good deal of our thinking about sex is fantasy. Some people view it as just fun one night stand and that is all they want from the night while others might see a big romantic future for the same experience. So the woman in this case started out wanting to please a guy and agreed to a menage a trois and, as the night proceeded, ended up with a parade of men wanting to use her. This wasn’t what she agree to.
If she was capable of agreeing to anything at all.
Then there is the problem of how drunk a woman has to be before she is incapable of making a decision. I don’t know about you but alcohol and drugs figures prominently in my sexual escapades. I can’t say it helped me make good decisions about my partners but it certainly helped me to get laid. When in the alcohol and drug addled space is someone responsible for their actions and when are they not? I am curious to see how this is resolved.
Cornell 7 is a mess and it won’t be easy for anyone involved but messes need addressing and hopefully we will come to an agreement on how people should behave when faced with these messes. Of course, this might work for a short time until the next mess comes along.
