"Date rape" is one of those unfortunate consequences of the schizophrenic worldview that at once demands that women are fully capable of being adult citizens equal to any other, but still deserving the special protection of society. Ultimately, these concepts are at odds with one another and one must eventually give way.

In a conventional sexual assault, there is physical evidence that an actual assault occurred. The he said/she said situation is simply one where one party is lying.

In a "date rape", all of the evidence is in the women's mind. And, frankly, this goes against our entire concept of rule of law. If a woman can turn a consensual sexual encounter into rape merely by her unilateral decision, then there is no way for a man to reasonably obey the law beyond simply abstaining from all sex.

Maybe men should back off a little too in such situation. If you don't want to wind up tagged a date rapist by a woman who has "morning after" regrets, then don't have sex with her. Your genitals won't explode if you abstain . . .

You're missing the point. No matter where you put your fuzzy line, you're still dealing with a situation where the 'crime' only exists in the victim's mind and the perpetrator has no way of knowing whether they're breaking the law or not. This sort of arbitrary definition of crime is directly contrary to the principle of having written law.

In a "date rape", all of the evidence is in the women's mind.

This is just nonsense. If the woman says "no" and you use force to do it anyway, that is rape. That is not "mental" evidence. The decision procedure is straightforward for figuring out whether it is a case of rape or not.

The respective credibility of the parties is a different issue, of course.

Date rape does not mean that a woman had consensual sex with her date and then regretted it later. That is not rape at all.

Date rape simply means that you were forced to have sex against your will by someone you knew and agreed to associate with them socially. The force can either be a threat or physical action. Like all rape, the physical evidence is not necessarily any different than the evidence of consensual sex.

As far as abstaining from sex goes.....well? Should you really be having sex with someone who would accuse you of rape in the first place? If that is an issue with you - that women so regret having sex with you that they call the cops, perhaps you should abstain from sex.

Think of it as nature's contraceptive. A thinning out of the herd....

i agree with trebuchet, for a change, no is no is no is no. and just because something is hard to prove doesn't mean it didn't happen.

an additional thought...this first occured to me when those duke people were accused of rape by the stripper. here is a lesson for the young men of the world: women who take their clothes off for money are not notoriously stable people...if you get tangled up with such a person it may not end well. girls who participate in gang bangs are also not often the world's most stable women either, you have no idea how they will react...proceed with caution. the craziness that allows a woman to behave in the above ways could turn on you in a heartbeat.

is this blaming the victim? no more so than telling young women not to go to a party alone and get wasted...it is common sense and protecting one's self.

No does not always mean no, and I have been in at least one relationship where no meant yes and yes meant no but I knew that when I played those games, I was putting myself in harms way. It may have been the Fez for that particular individual to have the ability to feign innocence, but by satisfying their fantasies I was setting myself up for legal ramifications.

Maybe I was a good judge of character and read this person right, or maybe I was just stupid and got lucky, but either way, I think I would be hard pressed to say I was an innocent victim when I knew I was doing something that was potentially a criminal act with a crazy woman. Like you said - sex with unstable personalities is never a good idea, and it goes both ways. While it is perfectly legal for an 18 yo girl to hop on the back of a Harley Davidson whose owner she doesn't know and it is still rape if he rapes her, the one thing it shouldn't be is a surprise.

i have no idea what the fez is.

but, nevertheless, i agree. if i leave my purse on a park bench, the person who takes it is still a thief, but i shouldn't be surprised that there are such people on the planet, and i should probably keep better track of my things.

i hope to instill that in my daughters: how to recognize a threat and act accordingly. i'd rather have them be safe than have them find out the hard way that being right, or within one's rights, isn't some magical sheild of invincibility...there are lots of raped and/or dead women who can attest to that.