Is it rape?

After last night's drama and cries of rape, I began to think. Was she raped or was she regretful?

Now, I wasn't there and I don't know the whole situation. All I know is the girl's character and tendency to get extremely inebriated and uninhibited. I realized that this gave me an extremely biased opinion of the situation and I began to wonder "What is rape? If a woman causes her own inebriation, is the man who takes advantage of her committing a crime?"

There is a term for situations like this. It is called ambiguous rape. There are many other types of ambiguous rape and to try to consider them all together would be too much for this one blog post.

There is a concise article written by a JMU professor who took a poll on women’s perceptions of rape. Only 18% of the women polled believed it was rape if "woman was severely impaired by alcohol and/or drugs and did not have the ability to resist." That's a pretty harsh judgment they made on fellow women.

Another site had some sad, but interesting statistics on the subject:

-One in four women surveyed was victim of rape or attempted rape.
-An additional one in four women surveyed was touched sexually against her will or was victim of sexual coercion.
-84 percent of those raped knew their attacker.
-57 percent of those rapes happened while on dates.
-One in twelve male students surveyed had committed acts that met the legal definitions of rape or attempted rape.
-84 percent of those men who committed rape said that what they did was definitely not rape.
-Sixteen percent of the male students who committed rape and ten percent of those who attempted a rape took part in episodes involving more than one attacker.

An article written in Time mentions that most people perceive rape as a crime of power, acted out by a stranger in a dark alley. It goes on to mention that a possible reason for this perception is that women don't want to face the fact that rape could be perpetrated by someone familiar. With that reality, how is a woman supposed to let her guard down and be comfortable around friends? I'm not sure if I agree with this sentiment, but I digress.

The question is- if a woman is drunk on her on volition, is the man she has sex with a rapist? After reading some articles online today and using knowledge and opinion I already possess, here is how I feel about the situation.

1. If she says 'No' in a direct and unambiguous manner, it is rape. It is an assertion of power over a woman against her will, whether or not there is violence. Rape is such an awful crime and we need to be careful not to stereo-type it into the 'back alley stranger' crime that it is often portrayed as.

2. If she never says the word 'No,' it may be a reprehensible action, but it is not rape. The man, I believe, is taking advantage of the woman's lack of good judgment, but she is consenting. However, this does not take into account the man’s motive for his actions. How do you judge whether or not a man believes he is partaking in consensual sex or if he is exerting power over someone he knows is powerless to resist his advances due to her intoxicated state? I believe that if there was a way to accurately determine motive, legal judgment in cases of rape would be simple and straightforward. However, it is very difficult to determine a man’s motives and the stakes at hand are too high for error. It becomes a dangerous game of ‘he said, she said.’

3. If she says 'No' but is coy, misleading and ambiguous, it is a miscommunication on the woman’s part. I think that in this case, with the woman (and possibly man) being intoxicated, there is a lack of moral responsibility to one’s self and to one’s neighbor that is taking place. I’m just not so sure I could call it rape and have the man punished legally, socially, and psychologically.

Even as I write all of this, I have doubts about every stance I have taken. I don’t believe that anything I have said is an inaccurate portrayal of my opinion; but every situation is different and it is impossible to come up with a standard for judgment, even within the specific parameters I have explored.

If there is anyone reading this that has been raped, know that my heart goes out to you. Even though my definitions may not call your experience rape, I understand that each woman knows the truth about her own experience even if that experience cannot be accurately defined by law.

How do you feel on the matter? Do you agree with me? Think I'm dead-wrong? Let me know.