When the number of totally innocent men accused and punished of sexual assault/harassment comes anywhere near the number of victims who receive no justice, I’ll become concerned.

I think it’s rooted in insecurity and fear. The guy you were emailing has probably had an encounter that he’s now realizing might be considered assault so he want’s to push away from that by micromanaging the definition.

Your idea of “romance” is not more important than our idea of rape.

The fact that they were only able to get him to plea to statutory rape, despite the fact that “rape rape” was what was being alleged, has allowed people to brush this off if they were so inclined. People here he was convicted of statutory rape, and somehow are able to ignore the rest.

Yeah, and in Polanski’s case he was guilty of both so there’s no splitting of hairs, there.

You’re not wrong, but also Stern is like a secret agent sometimes. Stern can get dirtbags to tell him things they would NEVER talk about with anyone else. Hence the audio above. Thank you, Howard Stern.

I am tired of men defining real rape as “the level which I haven’t done to a woman”. The rape definition changes and doesn’t get believed because these men feel guilty as fuck because they knew in their hearts they’ve crossed lines and boundaries. Tarantino sits at home at night and lies to himself he’s not a rapist…

Unfortunately I feel this is an all too accurate take for a lot of men

Fascinating. I never thought women thought so (speaking honestly, I’m always interested in who women find attractive).

You know it won’t be the Drs and Nurses who use this. It’ll be Mr Rogers or Mrs Jenkins on the front desk who refuses to deal with you.

If your religious or “moral” views prevent you from providing service to a patient who doesn’t fit within your moral framework, you (1) have really shitty religious/“moral” beliefs and (2) should find a line of work that doesn’t require you to come into contact with people you find morally objectionable.

Right? It’s amazing how men are allegedly SO terrified of false rape accusations - but somehow they defend ignoring it when a woman says “I don’t want to feel forced because then I’ll hate you, and I’d rather not hate you.” They defend a man repeatedly moving her hand to his dick after she keeps moving it away. Or…

I have done a considerable amount of research on Pick Up Artists and the techniques they use. Everything about this story ticked the boxes of a Pick Up Artist “Escalation”.

“And it definitely seems that no one teaches men how to be considerate that you are in this confusing and stressful position.”

I don’t have it in me to reread the piece right now, but my recollection is that she asked him to slow down several times and his response each time was to change things slightly and then go right back to full speed ahead. If she’s accurate that her body language was also uncomfortable, he should have taken the hint…

And adding onto that, men are taught to always, always, always push and ignore your boundaries! Also, not only are we not taught how to set boundaries, we’re actually actively socialized to be accommodating and polite, which directly contradicts the ability to do so.

No. This is a dangerous statement.

Every time she expressed hesitation or said she wasn’t comfortable with something, he stopped. She doesn’t try to leave until the end and he doesn’t stop her. Instead he calls her an Uber. Also, she’s a grown adult too and doesn’t seem like she was forced into anything. Being inconsiderate is not the same thing as…

I agree. There’s a difference between a bad sexual encounter and sexual assault.

I think that reinforces the point though — the conversation here should be a lot more nuanced and handled more deftly. I’m in my 30s now and I know how to say no, but pretty much throughout my 20s as I explored my sexuality I consistently ran into situations that I didn’t know how to handle. There’s a lot of pressure…