mjg59 | Ted Ts'o is a rape apologist and why this matters

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Ted Ts'o is a rape apologist and why this matters

(This post contains some discussion of rape and sexual assault but does not go into any specifics)

There was a brief controversy at Linux.conf.au back in 2011. The final keynote speaker gave a compelling presentation on online privacy, including some slides containing sexualised imagery. This was against the terms of the conference policies, and resulted in an apology from the conference organisers and the speaker. The situation was unfortunate but well handled, and that should have been the end of it.

Afterwards, there was some pushback on the conference mailing list. Concerns were raised about the policy being overly restrictive and the potential for it to be used to stifle speech that influential groups disagreed with. I don't agree with these arguments, but discussion of why policies have been implemented is completely natural and provides an opportunity for a community to determine what its expected standards are.

And then Ted Ts'o effectively called rape victims liars[1]. At first I assumed that this was just some sort of horrific failure to understand the implications of what he was saying, so I emailed him to check. The reply I got drew a pretty clear distinction between the case of a drunk college student raping another drunk college student in their room and the case of knifepoint rape in a dark park. You know, the difference between accidental rape and rape rape. The difference between the one any of us might have done and the one that only bad people do. Legitimate rape and the "rape" that those feminists talk about. The distinction that lets rapists convince themselves that they didn't really rape anyone because they weren't holding a knife at the time.

Ted Ts'o argues that only a small percentage of rape really counts as what people think of as rape. Ted Ts'o is a rape apologist.

There's an ongoing scandal in the UK at the moment. A well known DJ, Jimmy Savile, died last year. He grew up in a working class family, but through hard work and natural talent was one of the most significant figures in promoting pop music in the UK in the 50s and 60s, and worked in various parts of the BBC for the best part of 30 years. He spent significant amounts of time raising money for charity, and it's estimated that he raised over £40 million for various causes. Since his death, around 300 people have accused him of sexually abusing them. The BBC is desperately trying to explain why it cancelled an expose shortly before it aired. Multiple people who worked there at the time claim that everyone knew he was involved in indecent activities, but saying anything would risk both their career and the charities that depended on his fundraising. Nobody said anything, and he was allegedly free to continue his abuse.

Ted Ts'o is a significant figure in the Linux kernel community. He has expressed abhorrent beliefs that damage that community. Condemnation was limited to a mailing list with limited readership, meaning, effectively, that nobody said anything. Last week the Ada Initiative published a blog post pointing out the damage that did, and I realised that my effective silence was not only helping to alienate 50% of the population from involving themselves with Linux, it was also implicitly supporting my community leadership. I was giving the impression that I was basically fine with our community leaders telling people that it wasn't really rape if you were both drunk enough. I was increasing the chances of members of our community being sexually assaulted. Silence is endorsement. Saying nothing is not ok.

In the absence of an apology and explanation from Ted, I'll be interacting with him to the bare minimum that I'm compelled to as a result of my job. I won't be attending any Linux Foundation events he's involved in organising. If I'm running any events, I won't be inviting him. At a time when we're finally making progress in making our community more open and supportive, we don't need leaders who undermine that work. Support organisations who encourage that progress, not the people who help drag us back.

Footnotes

[1]The original archive has vanished. I've put up a copy of the relevant thread here. Throughout, Ted states that he's actually arguing against the idea that women need to be frightened of sexual assault, and not against the definition of rape. Except saying things like This one does a pretty good job of taking apart the Koss / Ms. Magazine study, which is the source for the "1 in 4" number. For example, it points out that over half of those cases were ones where undergraduates were plied with alcohol, and did not otherwise involve using physical force or other forms of coercion is difficult to read in any way other than "Half of the people you're counting as having been raped haven't really been raped", and favourably referring to an article that asserts that the rate of false rape reports is probably close to 50% is pretty strong support for the idea that many rape victims are liars.

(Update 2012/10/30: Adam Williamson suggests in this comment that this mail is a better example of Ted's behaviour - there's some explicit victim blaming and a lot of "Is that rape" questioning with the obvious implication that the answer should be "no". Ted Ts'o is a victim blaming rape apologist.)

(Update 2012/11/05: It's been suggested that I haven't been sufficiently clear about which of Ted's statements justify my claims. So, here we go.

In this mail, Ted links to and endorses this article. He explicitly links to it because of its treatment of rape statistics. Quoting directly from that article:
the rate of false reports is at least 9 percent and probably closer to 50 percent
Ted explicitly endorses an article that claims that a significant percentage of reported rapes are false. The study that generated that figure is held in poor regard by other researchers in the field - Australian police figures indicate that 2.1% of rape accusations were classified as false. Ted asserts that he was trying to argue against poor use of statistics, so it's a fair assumption that he agrees with the alternative statistics that he's citing. Ted believes that many rape victims are making false accusations. Ted believes that many rape victims are liars.

Again in this mail, Ted argues against a claimed figure that 1 in 4 women have been sexually assaulted. One of his arguments is that Also found in the Koss study, although not widely reported, was the statistic that of the women whom she classified as being raped (although 73% refused to self-classify the event as rape), 46% of them had subsequent sex with the reported assailant. Ted disagrees with a statistic because some rape victims subsequently have sex with the reported assailant. This means that Ted believes that this indicates that they were not really raped. Ted is a rape apologist.)

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"If you believe that the number of false rape claims is larger than the actual number of false rape claims then you are saying that some of those actual victims are lying."

By this logic, if you believe that the number of false claims is smaller than the actual number of false rape claims then you are saying that some innocent people are lying and calling them rapists. So unless you get the number exactly correct you're being horribly offensive. This logic is obviously bullshit. And all the other reasons from my earlier post why your statement was dishonest still apply.

"He says that if you're too drunk to know that the other party can't provide consent, it can't be rape"

In the part you're referring to now, he's saying that's how the real law resolves the "two equally drunk people having sex, while too drunk to give informed consent" issue. In other words, that's answering the question "why does real law not define both as rapists, like the proposed flawed definition of rape would?". If you take the "rapist has to know" part out of context and apply it to other cases, you could interpret it as saying that you can do whatever you want without legal consequences as long as you're drunk enough, but it should be obvious that's not what he meant (especially given his attitude towards alcohol elsewhere in the mail). Nor does that interpretation match what Valerie Aurora claimed.

"ie, yes, Ted places blame on the victim"

Yes, in the sense that Ted is willing to criticize someone even if that someone is a victim. If you think fact alone is hugely significant I think it's your attitude that is ridiculous.

By this logic, if you believe that the number of false claims is smaller than the actual number of false rape claims then you are saying that some innocent people are lying and calling them rapists.

Yes, if you believe that the actual number of false rape claims is smaller than the number that are classified as false, you clearly believe that some people who are considered innocent are actually rapists. How is that obviously bullshit?

he's saying that's how the real law resolves

Note his lack of citations. However, you don't actually seem to be disagreeing that Ted said that it's not rape if both people are drunk enough that they are unable to know that the other party is too drunk to give consent.

Yes, in the sense that Ted is willing to criticize someone even if that someone is a victim.

Great. You agree that Ted is a victim blamer. You just don't think there's anything wrong with that. That's a logically consistent position for you to take, but it's not what you said originally.

"if you believe that the actual number of false rape claims is smaller than the number that are classified as false"

No, smaller than the ACTUAL number of false rape claims. The exact SAME reference number you used (I used the exact same phrasing to describe the number...), not some different "classified as false" by some non-omniscient classifier. So you accuse INNOCENT people of being rapists, not people who were (possibly incorrectly) categorized as innocent by some imperfect agent.

"How is that obviously bullshit?"

What's bullshit is the claim that if you mention any estimate of a percentage, you're personally attacking someone unless your estimate is exactly correct.

"Note his lack of citations"

I don't know US law well enough to comment on whether his interpretation of it is correct. Either way it's not something morally objectionable.

"you don't actually seem to be disagreeing that Ted said that it's not rape if both people are drunk enough that they are unable to know that the other party is too drunk to give consent.

In his symmetrical example case where both are equally drunk and without anything else creating asymmetry, he believes that neither is a rapist (rather than the other logically possible alternative, saying that both are guilty of rape). I don't believe he'd extend that to all cases with both people drunk beyond a certain level; you could introduce asymmetries that would change the situation. For an extreme example, suppose that one side was completely passed out in his/her own room, and a stranger walked in. I'm quite sure he'd consider sex in that situation to be rape no matter how drunk the stranger was.

Great. You agree that Ted is a victim blamer.

I consider the use of this magical "victim blamer" label to be ridiculous. On one hand, the criteria to apply it are very lax; it can be applied to anyone who does not consider everyone qualifying as a "victim" to be totally immune from any criticism whatsoever. On the other hand, the label is considered damning - once you've labeled someone, that's enough to show they must be a horrible person.

"it's not what you said originally

I stand by what I said in the first post in this subthread, and I can't see why you'd think my position has changed (or how).

What's bullshit is the claim that if you mention any estimate of a percentage, you're personally attacking someone unless your estimate is exactly correct.

He's supporting a claim that close to 50% of rape accusations are false. The most rigorous numbers suggest that the actual number is 2%, and with fuzzier definitions you get to 8%. Are you entirely unable to see why this is objectionable?

I don't believe he'd extend that to all cases with both people drunk beyond a certain level

"the rapist has to know that the the other person was not able to give
legal consent" - so sure, if there's a level of drunkenness that prevents you from knowing that an unconscious individual is failing to provide informed consent, Ted doesn't think that it's rape.

I stand by what I said in the first post in this subthread, and I can't see why you'd think my position has changed (or how).

My apologies - you're right. You were disagreeing with something that nobody had actually said.

"Are you entirely unable to see why this is objectionable?"

If you can show that the numbers are likely false, then you do of course have a valid reason to object to their use. But that's not the same as justifying your "calls rape victims liars" claims.

"if there's a level of drunkenness that prevents you from knowing that an unconscious individual is failing to provide informed consent, Ted doesn't think that it's rape"

His explanation of how the law would treat the symmetric case looks incomplete (or inaccurate), as it leaves open the question why the answer to that case would not then generalize into a more general "drunk people are not responsible for their actions" principle. As I wrote in an earlier post: 'If you take the "rapist has to know" part out of context and apply it to other cases, you could interpret it as saying that you can do whatever you want without legal consequences as long as you're drunk enough, but it should be obvious that's not what he meant (especially given his attitude towards alcohol elsewhere in the mail).'.

So there's a sentence in his post that in isolation could be interpreted to mean that if a person is drunk enough then he's not responsible for his actions. But overall it's not plausible to consider this an accurate interpretation of his real views, because the sentence occurs within the explanation of the more limited symmetric case, and because it would be inconsistent with the negative view toward alcohol use that he clearly expressed elsewhere in the mail. Note that even if taken in isolation, the sentence would not match Valerie Aurora's claims ("rape was impossible if both people were drunk enough").

If you can show that the numbers are likely false, then you do of course have a valid reason to object to their use. But that's not the same as justifying your "calls rape victims liars" claims.

There are studies that claim to clearly demonstrate that the number of people murdered in the holocaust was significantly smaller than the consensus figures. We call people who cite those numbers holocaust deniers. If you cite numbers that say that the proportion of false rape accusations could be up to 50%, despite there not being a single well-supported figure that puts the number above 8% (and many which put it well below that), you're denying reality. You're explicitly saying that many people who report rape are lying about it. And since all the worthwhile evidence says that the majority of those people have actually been raped, you're saying that some people who have actually been raped are lying about it.

Note that even if taken in isolation, the sentence would not match Valerie Aurora's claims ("rape was impossible if both people were drunk enough").

If both people are drunk enough that they are simultaneously able to give consent and unable to determine that the other person is unable to give consent, Ted's example says that it's not rape. That's another way of saying "rape is impossible if both people are drunk enough".

"you're saying that some people who have actually been raped are lying about it"

I already explained the problem with this argument: it'd always apply (either you're calling victims liars, or you're calling innocent people rapists) unless your estimate of the percentage was exactly correct.

I'd consider any global false-report numbers a lot less certain than evidence for holocaust. Also, "holocaust denial" is normally used to mean more than just a significantly different estimate of how efficiently the Nazis managed to carry out their extermination campaign; it means questioning the existence of such an intentional campaign. A comparison to "holocaust deniers" is silly (I guess Godwin's law applies by this point).

"If both people are drunk enough that they are simultaneously able to give consent and unable to determine that the other person is unable to give consent, Ted's example says that it's not rape."

No, he did NOT make any such claims about all possible cases which match "both are drunk". He was talking about an example case where the situation is symmetric. I have already addressed that point before. You seem to arguing something along the lines of "but I can add things to his example that he didn't explicitly rule out, and then it no longer works". He didn't add disclaimers like "... and there is nothing else making the situation asymmetric", but his example was clear enough without those.

I already explained the problem with this argument: it'd always apply (either you're calling victims liars, or you're calling innocent people rapists) unless your estimate of the percentage was exactly correct.

Yes, and so if I make assertions about the rate then I should have good confidence that the figures I'm quoting are accurate representations of reality. Basically nobody with any experience of the topic has confidence that probably closer to 50% of rape reports are false. Except, it seems, Ted.

No, he did NOT make any such claims about all possible cases which match "both are drunk"

I don't think the evidence agrees with you:

Now, actually, the way the law works is that not only does the being raped be not able to give consent, but that the rapist has to know that the the other person was not able to give legal consent.

He clearly states that someone must know that the other person is unable to give legal consent before it's rape.

So if both Alice and Bob were drunk, there's no rape that has taken place

He then proceeds to give an example of where both parties are drunk enough to be unable to know that consent hasn't been given, and claims that it's therefore not rape. His argument isn't based on symmetry. His argument is based entirely on the claim that the law says you have to be aware that consent hasn't been granted. You're reading things into Ted's writing that aren't actually present or implied.

Edited (Fix tag) 2012-11-08 21:47 (UTC)

You have the order, and thus logical structure, of things wrong in your quotes. You start from "Now, actually, the way the law works" as if that was the general issue he was discussing, and then give "So if both Alice and Bob were drunk" as if that was a general statement about the consequences of law. But that's wrong. "So if both Alice and Bob were drunk" is not where that case is introduced; the sentences before mentioning law are clearly already about the symmetric case ("Or did Alice and Bob rape each other?").

The correct order is
1) the symmetric case with Alice and Bob is brought up FIRST
2) talk about how he thinks real law would handle this case ("Now, actually, the way the law works", in contrast to the alternatives like "rape each other" mentioned just before).
3) the "So if both Alice and Bob were drunk" you quoted is just a reference back to 1, not a general statement about every possible case where both partners are drunk.

The rest has already been addressed in my previous comments.

So you're asserting that when Ted explicitly said Now, actually, the way the law works is that not only does the being raped be not able to give consent, but that the rapist has to know that the the other person was not able to give legal consent, he believes that the law says that in order for it to be rape the rapist must know that the other person was not able to give legal consent - but only if the situation is symmetrical?

See my earlier comment about "His explanation of how the law would treat the symmetric case looks incomplete (or inaccurate)".

This post (http://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/18505.html?thread=735817#cmt735817)

Right. You're saying that Ted meant something other than what he wrote, and you're justifying this via various suppositions that don't obviously follow from what he did write.

"You're saying that Ted meant something other than what he wrote"

I'm saying that specifically his "the rapist has to know that the the other person was not able to give legal consent" is too vague, and it's very unlikely he meant that the inability to understand consent would automatically exclude someone from all responsibility. Note that the literal interpretation would not justify Valerie Aurora's description either.

"and you're justifying this via various suppositions that don't obviously follow from what he did write"

My view is justified by a lot more than just "various suppositions", including:
- That a drunk enough person could freely rape anyone without legal consequences is ridiculous enough that it's unlikely he'd really mean to say that.
- Interpreting it that way would make the logical structure of his post inconsistent. If he meant such a general principle, why would he only apply it to a case with both drunk? And other similar issues.
- Interpreting it that way would conflict with his other views on alcohol use. Given his other views, it does not look plausible he'd say something like "you were drunk at the time, so it's not your fault".

I'm saying that specifically his "the rapist has to know that the the other person was not able to give legal consent" is too vague, and it's very unlikely he meant that the inability to understand consent would automatically exclude someone from all responsibility

That's what he said. Despite having had ample opportunity, he hasn't claimed that he's been misinterpreted on that point.

Note that the literal interpretation would not justify Valerie Aurora's description either.

Going back to Ted:

Now, actually, the way the law works is that not only does the being raped be not able to give consent, but that the rapist has to know that the the other person was not able to give legal consent

and Valerie:

Theodore Y. Ts’o wrote that rape was impossible if both people were drunk enough

If both parties are sufficiently drunk that they are unable to know that the other person was not able to give legal consent, a straightforward reading of Ted's claim is that it's not rape. The literal interpretation precisely matches Valerie's description.

That a drunk enough person could freely rape anyone without legal consequences is ridiculous enough that it's unlikely he'd really mean to say that.

It's exactly as ridiculous to claim that it's not rape purely because both parties were too drunk to realise that neither could grant consent.

Interpreting it that way would make the logical structure of his post inconsistent. If he meant such a general principle, why would he only apply it to a case with both drunk? And other similar issues.

Where is he only applying it to a case where both parties are drunk? He uses various examples to lead to his conclusion, which is that if you're drunk enough that you can't tell whether someone's given consent, you can't commit rape. It's a single thought experiment, not a series of them. The symmetrical case merely informs the asymmetrical one.

Interpreting it that way would conflict with his other views on alcohol use. Given his other views, it does not look plausible he'd say something like "you were drunk at the time, so it's not your fault".

He doesn't say it's ok. He just says it's not rape. There's no conflict with his other views on alcohol consumption.

"The literal interpretation precisely matches Valerie's description."

Her description matches it like "he supports voting rights for men of Aryan race" matches "I support universal suffrage". It's a consequence of the literal interpretation, but not an accurate description of it. An accurate description would be something like "one of his comments could be interpreted to mean that he believes drunk enough people are free of all legal responsibility related to rape". Even if you omit the "could be interpreted" part, this description would still make it a lot more obvious that it's unlikely to be his real view.

"It's exactly as ridiculous to claim that it's not rape purely because both parties were too drunk to realise that neither could grant consent."

I don't think the thought experiment case is ridiculous at all; due to the symmetry the only logical alternatives are that both are rapists of neither is.

Are you again trying to mix this up with other, asymmetric, cases?

Where is he only applying it to a case where both parties are drunk?

Immediately afterward he only applies it to the thought experiment with both drunk. His later questions about the study again mentioned "numbers might be skewed by cases where both parties were drunk". No mention of anything like "numbers might be skewed by cases where the 'rapist' was drunk", even though that would be an obvious consequence. Generally no discussion of the full consequences, even though they would be remarkable.

"He doesn't say it's ok. He just says it's not rape."

I doubt alcohol would make him stop considering it rape from non-legal terminology perspective, and I'd expect him to say something about it if he thought there was a difference in this case.

Ok, so you don't object to one of his comments means that he believes drunk enough people are free of all legal responsibility related to rape. Rephrasing that as Theodore Y. Ts’o wrote that he believes drunk enough people are free of all legal responsibility related to rape still seems to match the meaning. That seems equivalent to Theodore Y. Ts’o wrote that he believes drunk enough people are innocent of rape, which seems to be Theodore Y. Ts’o wrote that if both people were drunk enough they were both innocent of rape and I honestly can't find a meaningful difference between that and Theodore Y. Ts’o wrote that rape was impossible if both people were drunk enough.

Are you again trying to mix this up with other, asymmetric, cases?

You're basing this asymmetry argument entirely on the belief that Ted meant something other than what he said. Get Ted to say that and I'll pay attention to it.

Immediately afterward he only applies it to the thought experiment with both drunk. His later questions about the study again mentioned "numbers might be skewed by cases where both parties were drunk". No mention of anything like "numbers might be skewed by cases where the 'rapist' was drunk", even though that would be an obvious consequence

Of course - he's questioning it in the context of women not themselves classifying the attacks as rape.

I doubt alcohol would make him stop considering it rape from non-legal terminology perspective, and I'd expect him to say something about it if he thought there was a difference in this case.

Ted says there's no rape that has taken place. He doesn't say "Legally, no rape has taken place". He doesn't say "Many people would not regard this as rape". He doesn't draw a distinction between legal and non-legal terminology. He clearly and explicitly says that if both parties are drunk, it's not rape.

About your rephrasing of his comments, I think the exact phrasing matters as I consider the comment at least vague, and something he'd likely clarify if questioned about it specifically. "Clarifying" his sentence to something you consider equal makes its original likely inaccuracy less obvious. Compare with someone writing "I'm a nazi" when he meant "I'm not a nazi"; if you expand this to an explanation about how he denies holocaust, wants to preserve racial purity and so on, then the possibility of a typo becomes a lot less obvious.

The essential difference between what his sentence could literally be taken to mean and what Valerie Aurora said is whether it depends on one person only. The first would say that it's legally OK to rape anyone on the street you can catch in your drunken state; the latter wouldn't. Another difference is that the first was clearly about interpretation of (US?) law only, while the latter wasn't.

"You're basing this asymmetry argument entirely on the belief that Ted meant something other than what he said."

Where did you get that idea? I'm not. His thought experiment was a symmetrical case. The "meant something other" question is whether his legal analysis of that case would imply a drunk can never be a rapist in any other case either.

Your line I was responding to was "exactly as ridiculous to claim that it's not rape purely because both parties were too drunk". Maybe that's just nonsense? I thought you were saying he implied (before the legal analysis, in addition to it) that in the symmetric case there would be no rape, and this would be the "other claim" compared to. If not, that I don't see what your "exactly as" would mean.

"He clearly and explicitly says that if both parties are drunk, it's not rape."

He clearly and explicitly says his symmetric thought experiment case with both Alice and Bob drunk is not rape. He does not say that any case where both parties are drunk would not be rape. That's exactly what you got wrong originally, so you shouldn't confuse those. (The questionable sentence about law could be taken to imply that ONE party being drunk would be enough to say that party can't legally be a rapist.)

The literal interpretation of what Ted says is that if you're too drunk to know that someone hasn't granted consent, it's not rape. Maybe that's not what Ted meant. He's had the opportunity to say so and hasn't. But until he does, you're reading something into his claims that isn't actually written, and everything you're then saying follows from that. I don't think Ted limited that claim to the symmetrical case. I don't see any reason for that to be the natural reading of what he wrote. You clearly disagree, and neither of us is going to change the other's mind. If Ted wants to clarify that point, he's free to.

Your interpretation is based on a single sentence out of Ted's mail, "Now, actually, the way the law works is that not only does the being raped be not able to give consent, but that the rapist has to know that the the other person was not able to give legal consent.". While this could be interpreted to imply absurd consequences, nowhere in the mail does Ted himself actually make such claims based on it. And the sentence occurs within the explanation of the symmetric "thought experiment" with Alice and Bob, so there's every reason to believe he did not mean the consequences such interpretation would have for other cases.

Your "everything you're then saying follows from that" is false. Obviously I've said a lot not related to this particular claim at all. And about this particular sentence, even if it was considered plausible to interpret it literally, that still would not justify Valerie Aurora's "rape was impossible if both people were drunk enough"; that's not an accurate representation of the sentence.

Oh, right. I see what the problem is. You're interpreting what Ted said as "Both these things need to occur", whereas what Ted's saying is "If this occurs, this other thing is a defence against it". He's asserting that inability to know that the other party is unable to give consent is a statutory defence, not that both conditions are required to satisfy the scenario he's describing.

Yes, there is a single sentence in his mail, "Now, actually, the way the law works is that not only does the being raped be not able to give consent, but that the rapist has to know that the the other person was not able to give legal consent.", that can be interpreted as a general statutory defence leading to absurd interpretations. But there is nothing else in his mail to suggest he actually meant such absurd results. This sentence occurs in the discussion of the symmetric case, and the only thing he himself uses it for is to argue that in that symmetric case neither is a rapist.

So, yes, there is a single sentence in Ted's mail that can be taken out of context to imply absurd consequences. But there's nothing in his mail to suggest he actually meant such consequences.

Also, I have already explicitly addressed this exact point multiple times, starting at least from this post (http://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/18505.html?thread=734025#cmt734025). NOW you suddenly "see what the problem is"? If this is the level of your reading comprehension, no wonder you have problems interpreting Ted's mail.

No, the problem is your interpretation of it. You're right, it's absurd to think that drunkenness is a defence against an accusation of rape. It's absurd if you attack someone in the street, and it's absurd if you're alone in a room with an equally drunk person. It's even absurd to believe that a situation could arise where people are sufficiently drunk that they can't give informed consent but are still able to initiate sex. Ted believes absurd things.

Yes, most of those things would be absurd. But as I've explained, there's little reason to think Ted would believe them. And one thing that is NOT absurd is to say that being equally drunk should rule out rape, if the only reason to make rape accusations in the first place was the drunkenness of one party (claiming this would mean there was no informed consent). And this is what Ted was talking about.

You say it's "absurd to believe that a situation could arise where people are sufficiently drunk that they can't give informed consent but are still able to initiate sex". So apparently you believe it's informed consent pretty much all the way until totally passing out. But the mail is talking about a study classifying sex as "rape" due to drunkenness. Did the study use this same high "practically passed out" standard for its classification? If it did not, or if was not clear to the participants in the discussion that it did, then talking about this problem case in the classification is not absurd at all.

Ted's hypothetical scenario is one where one party takes advantage of another party's drunkenness by repeatedly requesting sex until the other party gives in. He then asks what happens if both parties are equally drunk. The answer's pretty straightforward - the one repeatedly requesting sex clearly wanted sex, and so it's ridiculous to claim that they were unaware of what they were doing. For it to be symmetrical, both parties would need to be asking the other party for sex even though they didn't want it themselves. That's absurd. The situation isn't symmetrical, and Ted's defence doesn't rely on symmetry.

You keep searching for ways to read the mail in absurd ways. You've decided in advance that he must be wrong, and will always find a way to interpret his writing to support your preconceptions.

I don't believe Ted would be totally insane or demented. The parts of his mail under discussion can be read in a way that's totally sensible, except for one inaccurate sentence about the technical workings of law, which he could have plausibly missed himself. That interpretation is a lot more plausible than your absurd suggestions.

Also, basing your character assassination attemps on claims about his view on law makes them even less believable. It's one thing to claim someone has questionable attitudes, but even more ridiculous to claim that someone non-ignorant would actually have the most absurd beliefs about practical law that you've attributed to him.

Re: My overall take on the discussion

mjg59 - 2012-11-13 05:35 (UTC) - Expand

Re: My overall take on the discussion

(Anonymous) - 2012-11-13 19:38 (UTC) - Expand

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