Remarkl
2 min readAug 30, 2022

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There's an important difference between failure to disclose and outright lying.

Try telling that to your local securities lawyer. The problem with your approach is that it relies on deception as a basis for non-consent rape. If you can argue that non-consent is non-consent however it arises, then you must allow that deception is deception however it is effected. Structurally, your argument proves too much. Right now the law stops at compulsion and drugging. If it does not stop there, but goes on to deception, why should it stop at positive lies?

Even if we stick to lies, problems arise. Does the footballer know that you wouldn't have sex with him if he weren't a footballer? What if he insincerely compliments your shoes, or tactfully says you don't look fat in that dress? Maybe the truth about those things would have cooled your jets. How is he to know what truth would break the deal? Do you really want to make such niceties too dangerous to utter?

The law generally operates on the "reasonable person" theory. Unless it is reasonable to assume that a woman would not have sex with a guy who claims to be a footballer but isn't one, even though he's big and strong and nice and a good dancer with real money to pay for a real meal, then it doesn't really matter that some particular woman wouldn't do so.

The real problem is that rape is not a monolithic event. Stranger rape and spousal rape and date rape and seduction by deception are different misdeeds, both in terms of the woman's experience and the danger each act poses to society. Any attempt to treat them as a single category with similar legal consequences just doesn't do what the criminal law is designed to do. If there is an important difference between lying and not disclosing, isn't there also a difference between rape by force and "rape" by deception?

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Remarkl
Remarkl

Written by Remarkl

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