Mirren angers anti-rape campaigners.

[fretslider]

Helen Mirren has angered anti-rape campaigners by suggesting that women who are date-raped should not expect to take those who have violated them to court. In an interview with the former tabloid editor Piers Morgan, the Oscar-winning actress revealed how she often used cocaine throughout her twenties and had herself been date-raped in her late teens and twenties when she moved to London.

The 63-year-old actress said that she had not reported the incidents to police, but caused controversy by suggesting that those who date-rape should not necessarily be considered rapists in a criminal sense. Referring to the boxer Mike Tyson, who was convicted of raping a Miss Black America contestant in a hotel room in 1992, Dame Helen said: "It's such a tricky area isn't it? Especially if there is no violence. I mean, look at Mike Tyson. I don't think he was a rapist."

The star of The Queen said she believed that if a woman voluntarily ended up in a man's bedroom and engaged in sexual activity, she still had the right to say 'no' and that if a man ignored that request it should be considered rape. But she added: "I don't think she can have that man into court under those circumstances. I guess it is one of the subtle parts of the men/women relationship that has to be negotiated and worked out between them."

Jasvinder Sanghera, who runs the Karma Nirvana charity in Derby helping victims of rape and domestic violence, said yesterday: "Dame Helen's comments ... help reinforce the whole 'She's asking for it' mentality. I'm disappointed by the suggestion that date-rape victims shouldn't bother with the courts. We have such a low prosecution rate for rapes as it is. It's such a harrowing ordeal for rape victims to go through the judicial process that the last thing we need to do is discourage them."

Is Helen right or wrong?

[biglin]

Well, Mirren has been raped herself in her younger days so she's not exactly talking out of a smug superiority that comes out of ignorance.

Basically I think we all have to try and act responsibly.

Why girls think that getting pissed, acting like sluts, dressing like tarts and talking dirty is going to make men LESS likely to rape them amazes me.

Yes, rape is wrong; date rape?

Hm, I'm not so sure.

And yes, I'm the LAST person to defend rapists - but Helen's right on this one.

[Erasmus]

The low prosecution rate for rape might just come about from a very high incidence of false accusations.

I think she is confusing two things though. Date-rape usually means going on a date and finding yourself raped, not going to bed with somebody and then wishing you hadn't. Date rape happens when you were not expecting t oget into a sexual situation, not when you have chosen to put yourself in one showing every bit as willing as the man. Nor should women expect men to have greater control over their sexual reflexes than woman know they have over their own, which is where the extreme of expecting to turn a man on and like a sex toy at any time leads.

Rape is supposed to means sex without consent. How many women would assume that if a man went to bed with them, he had not consented to sex, unless that was agreed explicitly between them? Assuming that women are sexual creatures of intelligence equal with men, then she must expect him to make the same assumptions about her as she does about him. Going to bed together is mutual consent - unless stated otherwise. In the case of a man as violent and contemptuous of any law as Tyson, then as far as I'm concerned, that was a put-up job. Nobody calling round to somebody's room in the small hours following an earlier invitation imagines they are there to play cards!

This regular shrieking of female victimhood whenever a woman says that women are intelligent enough to work out that acting just as sexually as the man together shows that both want the same thing, only does women a disservice by implying that they are morons quite incapable of making their wishes known or of understanding that getting into a heavy sex session together amounts to consent to make love. If you don't want to, don't clamber into bed and give every impression that you do!

Thinking otherwise reverts to times when women were regarded as overgrown children never expected to admit to being sexual at all and not held by gentlemen to be responsible for themselves if they did appear to behave like sluts. She expects that if if she welcomes him into her bed, he is consenting to sex. She should expect equal treatment when he welcomes her into his bed. Anything less implies she is less competent to make her own decisions.

[mouse]

Jul 4, 2011 19:07:19 GMT -5 Erasmus said:

Rape is supposed to means sex without consent. How many women would assume that if a man went to bed with them, he had not consented to sex, unless that was agreed explicitly between them? Assuming that women are sexual creatures of intelligence equal with men, then she must expect him to make the same assumptions about her as she does about him. Going to bed together is mutual consent - unless stated otherwise.

If you don't want to, don't clamber into bed and give every impression that you do.

i happen to agree with Erasmus..dont play the game and then cry rape
used to be called prick teasing and a very apt description it is too .... ..its a dodgy area and a game too many women and girls play...and is imo quite a different scenario than we generally think of as rape
BUT and there is always a but..if the woman says no at the stage of insertion..then no must mean no....
if the male then carries on then its rape...but the courts should look slightly differently at this and consider the circumstances in which the act took place.......its still rape and its still worng but it is more understandable

and women who cry rape where no rape has occured do women in general a great diservice as well as blackening the name of the individual men...

[Erasmus]

I agree on the latter and I've been there. But we are assuming intelligent people, and intelligent people know that things can go wrong, misunderstandings can happen, and if they have any rapport between each other, then once is a mistake you can talk about, twice is vicious. Even once might be vicious but it can be hard to tell. There are plenty of people of both sexes who want their short-term reactions that it is unbearable to be over-ridden for long-term enjoyment, and they are not always simple masochists.

I don't think there is really much chance of misunderstanding between people with confidence in themselves. I misunderstood somebody on an unexpected ending-in-bed where she wanted me to use a sheath and I thought she didn't. Much earlier, I thought a girlfriend I'd been playing with in a chair for ages said Hurt me, when she might actually have said "Don't hurt me". All the same, hurt her I did and rammed my entire hand up there, resulting in a five-minute orgasm but she felt ashamed because she wet herself - but would never have got there otherwise.

The other way round, once Marie got the taste for it, there was nothing she did not want to do (except anything gentle and tender!) and very little that I would, because it was all new to her and (presumably) she wanted to find her limits, but I could see her coming back with taking advantage - which she did anyway, long after she'd walked off because I wouldn't go in for the smacking & stuff she wanted.

Things go wrong, people make mistakes, but normal people with any sort of resilience should be able to accept that, and much more important, to be responsive to each other's body language. If you give somebody their sexual relief, it's only fair that they should do the same for you, but there's more than one way!

I had a girlfriend with a deep inhibition against letting herself lose control with a man through any means. It really started to break through when she came back from a night with the girls full of whiskey and raped me in her bed. However much I wanted to slap her across the face when she told me that she had lost it, or even carry on out of anger, if she couldn't enjoy then I couldn't enjoy. And I couldn't after she felt composed enough to say that she could be there for me - but not for her. Her sadness took precedence because it was not a conscious teasing thing.

That was a case of No at the stage of her orgasm, long after insertion. I don't think it would have been raps as crime to carry on, since women don't think it rape to try to force a man if he climaxes just before they do, and when I was young, I often carried on because her orgasm lasted far longer than mine. Some of these extremists make it out that if she's satisfied, that's it, for a man to carry on is rape. Some of them too make it look like a service that women provide for men with no demand of their own. I'm part of a generation where women were very assertively telling their mothers that they could demand as well as give (and my mother a precursor at war with nice girls only do it for men's sake and if he respects them he'll marry them).

No can only really mean No when it is possible for Yes to mean Yes.

[mouse]

apart from a little too much information..,,,the ."""nice girls only do it for men's sake and if he respects them he'll marry them""" was a biut of a myth usually said by mothers who had no desires for their daughters to become pregnant in an age where having a bastard child was a
the way to social and financial ruin and marriage was the only carreer choice for women if they didnt have an independent income
and this too is a bit of a myth """"regarded as overgrown children never expected to admit to being sexual at all"""as we know from journals and diaries etc etc women have been very sexual throughout the ages...in fact women seem to fall into catagories when it comes to sex
those who throughly enjoy.....
those who use.....
those who put up with
those who really cannot be bothered
those who dislike the sexual act
those who sell..

what is never talked about of course is that for many women their first encounter can play a huge role in their attitude toward sex
a friend of mine always asserts that there is no such thing as a fridgid women or a woman who cannot enjoy sex...and that the problem is the man who hasnt a clue how to treat a woman
the pill has allowed women greater sexual freedom than they have ever had..the freedom to enjoy without the restraints of earlier ages..when pregnacy always loomed....