Blog 10

This week's class readings about rape really caught my eye. I found the reading the characterized the different categories of rape to be very interesting as well. I was looking at some magazines and came across an article in the September issue of Cosmopolitan. It was titled "His Case vs. Her Case" Court TV anchor Ashleigh Banfiled explained where the law currently stands on rape. She refers to acquaintance rape as "gray rape." She said that most victims of gray rape never report the experience to the police, much less decide to press charges. She also addressed how hard it is even to confront and accurately understand rape, and how hard it is for juries to make judgements about too. The legal system continues to struggle to define exactly where consent ends and rape begins. She went on to give examples of how strong a woman's case (or her assailant's case) might be in several key areas. In the area of consent, consent itself has always been the most basic issue in a rape case. The jury must be convinced that the woman did not give permission, or said and no and meant it, and was clear for the woman to win. On the other hand, the male could win the case by claiming he did not hear the woman say no, or had reason to think she didn't really mean "no." For example, if they were fooling around with rough sex and the male thought "no" was part of the game. When it comes to alcohol, women can win a case if they were too drunk to fully consent. It's illegal to take advantage of someone who is incapactitated. Although, if the woman was wasted, a guy can imply that her story cannot be trusted. But, he can't use being drunk himself as an excuse. The article states many more instances about the deciding factors in rape cases. I highly recommend reading the article to get the full analysis.