Venus' Touch

[Neighbor]

Breathless immersion. Envy of the energy it took to properly texture this story-segment in such fine detail.
Millions of years of evolution have provided so many ways to get a woman pregnant.
And from a male perspective, "A bunch of women sat around and discussed whether they had REALLY WANTED these children that now belong to them"...
I been. The until 30-some years of her life, she said how embarrassed she was to have me and my brother, we made her "feel old".
When I was 17, and my sister was born, her attitude changed dramatically toward the 3 of us.

... So, "Regret, reluctance, makes it non-con"? I'd be the last person to agree with you.
... and yeah, I fully understand the closer I skate to the line, the more thrilling it is, and the more legal danger I risk.

True story, I was on an assignment for a couple days at a distant town, on a dancefloor with a beautiful woman. I started whispering into her ear, I physically felt her melt.
I told her what I was going to do, she made me promise I'd bring her back so she could leave with friends, after we had finished.
As we dressed, I asked her if she wanted to get together again, and she said "No", but THIS had been the most excited she been in her life so far, but it had to be a 'once in a lifetime thing'.
I never saw her again, yeah I might have gone to jail if there had been accusations, if she'd claimed to be drunk or something.
She had whispered about being "Helpless to Svengali", about not really having a choice, I had simply intuited "her rhythm", and whispered it into compliance.

I really enjoyed Claire's above story, because it blurred in MY mind the line between 'what is story', and 'what is resonance of a memory'.
A man can say, "I got excited, and felt it impossible to stop". We want HIM to go to jail.
A woman can say, "I got excited, and felt it impossible to stop". We still want HIM to go to jail.
... but some contrarians (raises hand) will disagree.

(PS, I'm a huge fan of Jennifer Love Hewitt and where she played the part of working in a massage parlor, and "sold it" for $50,000 and HE made her be 'her real self', not allowing her to escape to a 'fantasy role'.)

[Claire]

@chloevee Thanks for the detailed feedback, I love it! Maybe that is a good moment to share my own thoughts on the story.

So the one option from the poll that can easily be discarded in my view is option A. The sex is definitely problematic. It starts with Ryan being the massage therapist and the setting that they are meeting in. But even if you disregard that completely, the lack of clear communication before the moment of penetration is definitely an issue during sex with a stranger that you have known for an hour or two maybe.

If you asked me what this situation feels like, then my gut reaction would be B or C. This certainly is not what I imagine when I think of rape, but that is also kind of the point.

I think there are two moments in the story that are critical. First, when Ryan starts fingering her and, second, when he penetrates her.

When it comes to the first moment, I would give Ryan a pass. Amelia herself does not view her spreading her legs as a concious choice, but unless we want to disregard non-verbal cues entirely, then her spreading her legs in that moment is as clear of a sign as it gets.

The second moment is the difficult one. Rape is, from what I understand, usually defined as penetration without consent. Does Amelia do anything that that could be interpreted as consent in that moment? I think looking at the scene closely, the answer is no. Amelia was on the brink of orgasm with her eyes closed. When Ryan climbs unto the table to her, she doesn't even see him. She only notices him again when she starts to feel his penis. There is no eye contact, no nod, no inviting gesture, and obviously no words. He just assumes that she wants this. Maybe rightly so, but that doesn't matter.

Everything that comes after is irrelevant. You can't make a moment of nonconsensual penetration retroactively okay by the fact that she might have enjoyed it or even consented to it later. You can only judge what happens in the moment by the information that was available during the moment. Otherwise, you could have two people in the exact same situation do the exact same thing but assess what they did differently based on the outcome. No consistent moral or legal assessment can work like that. That would be like saying that drunk driving is okay for as long as you cause no accident. The critical moment is the moment you start driving while drunk, not what happens after.

So this is how reasoned my B or C feeling ultimately into a D vote.

[trio]

First of all I want to complement you on your writing. It is a wonderful story and it is well written.

Second, this opens up a much broader and extremely complex discussion. We live in an analog world, full of emotion, nuance, and interpretation. But society keeps trying to make it digital. Everything must be clearly defined, categorised, and controlled, even something as human and layered as sex.

This mindset leads us to believe that a single word or moment can define an entire situation. But real human interaction does not work that way. You cannot understand what is happening between two people by isolating one sentence or gesture. A phrase like “I don’t” matters, absolutely. But its meaning depends on everything around it. The tone, the setting, the emotion, the buildup. Context gives weight. Without it, we risk judging moments out of proportion.

Science tells us that complex systems become unpredictable when we try to over-regulate them. More rules do not always create clarity. They often lead to confusion, contradiction, and detachment.

Even a pizza box now comes with instructions: “Do not eat the box. Eat the pizza inside.” That should not be necessary. But we are no longer trusted to think. We rely on rules and labels instead of judgment and personal responsibility.

This is the real issue. We shift responsibility to the system. But no system can replace personal awareness. If you do not want something, say it. If you are afraid they will ignore you, then that is already a red flag. Silence will not stop what is coming. It only removes your voice from the outcome.

We need less rule-following and more responsibility. Less fear of saying the wrong thing and more courage to do the right one. Accountability does not begin with the label. It begins with the person.

Unfortunately, crimes like rape will never disappear completely from society. That is a hard truth. But we should be careful not to replace one tragedy with something even worse. Over-regulating expectations, emotions, and human behaviour creates a false sense of control. It is unnatural and it does not work. Trying to script human connection through rigid systems does not eliminate harm. It just creates a new kind of failure, where no one thinks for themselves and everyone waits for the system to decide what is right.

I am not a legal scholar so I cannot say it was rape or not, but this was just wrong, and it was his responsibility. Even if this was consensual at some level, he decided to enter her without any protection against STDs and he came inside an unknown woman not knowing what the consequences would be. He could have grabbed a condom and that would have given her the time to clearly say she did not want this.

[chloevee]

A phrase like “I don’t” matters, absolutely. But its meaning depends on everything around it. The tone, the setting, the emotion, the buildup. Context gives weight. Without it, we risk judging moments out of proportion.

Right, but we do have context for this specific story, and I thought the idea was to make an assessment based on that context. At least that was the intention with my comment. With the exception of my first point (in my list of reasons why I chose as I did), I was referring to this specific situation, not making blanket statements about what is or is not rape.

But we should be careful not to replace one tragedy with something even worse. Over-regulating expectations, emotions, and human behaviour creates a false sense of control. It is unnatural and it does not work. Trying to script human connection through rigid systems does not eliminate harm. It just creates a new kind of failure, where no one thinks for themselves and everyone waits for the system to decide what is right.

I interpreted the question posed by @Claire as referring to the moral or societal determination of consent/nonconsent/rape, not a question of the legal definition. Regardless, I don't think anyone has proposed making legislation based on this discussion.

[trio]

I understand, my remark was not a reaction on your comment specifically, as I understood it, and mostly agreed with it.

We indeed get some context here, but I took my arguments in a more general direction. I love moral discussions, but they will never have a clear cut answer that everybody can agree upon. Like I stated, a society is a very complex system and ours is getting more complex by the day.

I think we are going in the wrong direction, even with the expected morality we tend to push onto others. I need to be very careful here, as believe me I am against any form of coercion. But we, as humans are never going to become mind readers, we are natural born interpreters of context, our brains are build that way. Men have dominated women, also sexually, across the ages and it has always been wrong on any level. But you can't solve this by just defining what consent means and expect everybody to interpret it the way you expect them to do.

In this story she could have stopped it at so many places and probably had him being very embarrassed. Not that I want to excuse what he eventually did, or make her responsible for the outcome. But interpretation without clear communication is a dangerous thing.

Personally I had a reprimand from a lady when I opened the door for her on our first date. She called me a typical man, that pushes women into a certain role. She told me she is an independent woman and that she could open the door herself. I know that she is and can do it on her own, but I was raised to be gentleman and I did it out of respect.

Right, but we do have context for this specific story, and I thought the idea was to make an assessment based on that context. At least that was the intention with my comment. With the exception of my first point (in my list of reasons why I chose as I did), I was referring to this specific situation, not making blanket statements about what is or is not rape.

I interpreted the question posed by @Claire as referring to the moral or societal determination of consent/nonconsent/rape, not a question of the legal definition. Regardless, I don't think anyone has proposed making legislation based on this discussion.