LGBT Rights and Gender Equality Thread - Page 138

On August 08 2013 11:37 KwarK wrote:

There are not. It just amounts to "try not to fuck people who don't want to fuck you, even if you can come up with an excuse". It's not a special rule, you just believe it shouldn't apply to you because "wah, wah, trans oppression, wah".

On August 08 2013 11:42 RaspberrySC2 wrote:


Do you disclose to your partners before you put your dick in them how emotionally invested you are in them?

Do you even have partners?

Maybe they don't want someone as clingy as you sound.

On August 08 2013 11:49 Plansix wrote:

Always. And I have one partner and she is great. We live together and disclose things to each other. We are not obsessed with ourselves.

On August 08 2013 11:47 ComaDose wrote:
im trying really hard to help out raspberry but calling kwark irrelevant for representing the consent argument is a bit far TT

On August 08 2013 11:52 RaspberrySC2 wrote:


Glad it worked out for you. I have many partners and it works out for me.

On August 08 2013 11:55 Plansix wrote:

It's not like you would give a shit if it didn't for them, so of course it works out for you. If you don't care, it goes great.

On August 08 2013 11:50 RaspberrySC2 wrote:
The basis of Kwark's consent argument is that it is a "reasonable assumption" that most people would not be ok having sex with a trans person,

I do not agree that this is a reasonable assumption on the basis that it is not my experience and that the invocation of "reasonable assumption" has the same flaws as the invocation of "common sense" in that it is highly subjective.

The demand is that I accept a different experience that is not my own as my basis of "reasonable assumption."

That is not reasonable.

On August 08 2013 11:56 RaspberrySC2 wrote:


That's because I believe in people telling me what they want and not making assumptions for them.

On August 08 2013 11:16 RaspberrySC2 wrote:


No, I identified myself as female.

You're using male pronouns.

You are denying my identity that I disclosed.

Why should I take any of this seriously when you say that i should disclose and when I do, you say that I'm not who I say I am and I am only what you say I am.

I don't know of any other appropriate time that someone deserves to be told to fuck off than when they strip someone else of their identity.

Hopefully, you'll just come to understand how horrible you are being.

On August 08 2013 11:50 RaspberrySC2 wrote:
The basis of Kwark's consent argument is that it is a "reasonable assumption" that most people would not be ok having sex with a trans person,

I do not agree that this is a reasonable assumption on the basis that it is not my experience and that the invocation of "reasonable assumption" has the same flaws as the invocation of "common sense" in that it is highly subjective.

The demand is that I accept a different experience that is not my own as my basis of "reasonable assumption."

That is not reasonable.

On August 08 2013 12:10 killa_robot wrote:


You're wrong actually.

The basis of his argument is that it's a reasonable assumption that most people would consider having sex with a trans person something different from having sex with a cis one, and so they should have the right to choose if they wish to or not.
The other part is that everyone is under the assumption they are having sex with a cis individual by default, your case is different, and due to it being different you have the responsibility to make them aware that it is in fact different.

You reject this because it's inconvenient for you, you feel it's irrelevant, and you think it could endanger you. The middle point is false, but the other two have merit(if you really think you convenience outweighs their right to know who they're doing).

However then you (and whoever the other transwoman was that posted a lot was), eventually degrade your own argument to "Fuck everyone, I'm gonna sleep with whoever I feel like and I don't need to tell them a damn thing".

Kwark, being a hardcore feminist, who very much likes the idea of real consent, thinks this is a very bad thing.

On August 08 2013 11:53 Plansix wrote:

I wouldn't bother. She is totally self absorbed and refuses to respect the wishes of someone who wouldn't want to sleep with her. She can't stand the idea that someone might not want her because she is transgender, so much so that she is unwilling to give them the option. It's almost sad if she wasn't so horrible about it.

Sorry for taking so long to reply, it's been a busy weekend.

In case you are interested I thought I'd summarize my view point one more time, because it may have gotten lost in thread. Or maybe you just think it's bad, in which case I would appreciate it if you could point out where you think the flaws are : )

First off, I think I have a very clear idea of what your standard for disclosure is: In order for consent to be valid when Person A is considering a sexual encounter with Person B, Person A must disclose all information about Person A that Person A has reason to believe would affect Person B's decision to have sex with Person A.

As I mentioned before, I believe this is an internally consistent and coherent standard, that provides relatively clear guidelines for behavior. Also, I am quite sure that it is in no way transphobic because it applies to everyone equally.

I have two problems with it however.

Problem 1 - Asymmetric Disclosure Obligations

One of the implications of your standard is that when two people are considering a sexual encounter, and neither of them would want to sleep with the other if the other disclosed certain information, only the one with reason to believe the information would have this effect has a moral obligation to disclose. I tend to highly (over?) value fairness, and this seems grossly unfair to me.

Problem 2 - Effect of Consent

I think many people who were posting in the thread had an unrealistic and impractical view of consent, where they believed that consent has to be 100% fully informed in order to be valid, and this is simply not the case. For example, say a person just bought some new software, and when he gets to the EULA he doesn't read it but just clicks on "I consent to be bound by the terms of this EULA." He then goes merrily on his way, making copies of the software and selling them to all his friends and family. If the software company sues him for IP infringement based on his acceptance of the EULA, he can't say "but I didn't know there was a provision in there about IP infringement, so I didn't really consent to be bound by the license!"

Similarly, if a person consents to a one night stand, he is accepting the risk that there might be something about his partner that had he known about it, would have prevented him from consenting. He can't go back after the fact and say "I didn't know you were a trans person when I consented, therefore there is no consent and you're a rapist!"

I guess you could argue that this would be a case of ineffective consent, or misinformed consent, or consent by deception or something like that (to be clear I wouldn't argue this), but it would be wrong to say that there was no consent.

In sum, I think individuals should be responsible for making informed consent, and if they consent without bothering to become informed, they can't say consent was invalid after the fact, just because they didn't get exactly what they were expecting.

My Standard for When there is a Moral Obligation to Disclose

As a result of the problems outlined above, I think the following standard works better, at least for a person like me who highly values personal responsibility and fairness.

In order for consent to be valid when Person A is considering a sexual encounter with Person B, Person A must disclose all information about Person A that Person A *knows* would affect Person B's decision to have sex with Person A.

I believe that this standard addresses the two problems outlined above, as well as being internally consistent. It also puts the onus on Person B to protect himself by either making his preferences known, or by getting to know Person A before consenting to sex.

People seemed to think that the First Cousins Analogy and the Twins Analogy brought to light internal inconsistencies in this standard, but I disagree.

First Cousins Analogy - I do not believe that this analogy was directly applicable, because it included an additional variable: the male cousin was aware of personal information about the female cousin that she was not aware of, which could possibly effect her decision to sleep with him. I would say that in this unusual situation, there is a moral obligation separate from the one addressed by my standard to disclose the personal information before engaging in sex.

Twins Analogy - In this case, the husband's twin wouldn't just have reason to know that the wife wasn't consenting to sex with him, he would have actual knowledge. Knowledge doesn't just have to come from explicit statements, it can also come from context. When he knows that he is identical to his twin, and that he is entering the wife's room in the same manner that his twin might, and he knows that the wife would have no reason to suspect that he was any other person besides his twin, I think it is pretty clear that he had "knowledge" that she was consenting to sex with his twin, and not with him.

I appreciate it if you bothered to read through all this, and I would appreciate it even more if you could tell me whether you think that my standard is internally consistent, even if you still think yours is better for whatever reason. Also, on the slight chance that you do think my standard is internally consistent, I would appreciate it if you could acknowledge in the thread (if the topic comes up again) that reasonable minds can differ about what circumstances give rise to a moral obligation to disclose.

On August 04 2013 16:35 Iyerbeth wrote:


In your examples the person is never attracted to them. What is being discussed is being attracted to someone and then not when you are told they're trans. That change is based on nothing but attitudes towards and beliefs about trans people (typically for trans women - 'she's a man' or concerns about being 'gay'), and is therefore likely based in some form of transphobia.

As I've said a few times though, and to repeat so no one thinks I'm trying to insult anyone, that doesn't make the individual transphobic, but the nature of that change is what was being discussed.

On August 08 2013 14:01 Velocirapture wrote:
I think the extreme elements of this particular scenario, that transgenders are an extremely small and controversial community, are keeping people from exploring the thought process. Correct me if I am wrong but the standard template for establishing context for consent in sexual matters is as follows.

1) Person one asks a question.
2) Person two is either tacit or honest in reply.
3) Person one determines whether the response is satisfactory
4a) Yes - repeat step one.
4b) No - Move on.

With this system we retain the right to filter out potential sexual partners for any rational OR irrational reason (this is relevant to this discussion) but we are obligated to vet each person according to our own standards. Many people call this the "open book" standard and is the most widely used method in my experience.

What Kwark has tried to assert in this thread is that transgenders are so rare that straight people are reasonable in assuming nobody is one and that it is well known, at least in his community, that the vast majority of people would not sleep with a transgendered person. He feels that the extreme nature of this situation somehow shifts the responsibility to transgenders.

I guess at this point it is clear that I do not entirely agree. I see a clear line in this instance between "good idea" and "moral imperative". If we are going to start setting these moral standards of disclosure based on cultural acceptance and minority status it simply feels like too dangerous of a road. At what point exactly is a minority so small that you can discount them? At what point does an idea, good or bad, become so widespread that I become morally obligated to attribute it to every individual? I am not convinced these thresholds exist.

On August 08 2013 12:54 RaspberrySC2 wrote:


KwarK likes to call himself a hardcore feminist, but if he actually were, he'd know not to try to place morality on people's sexuality. He'd be aware of the imbalance in sexual power and negotiation and he'd be aware of things like survival sex work.

If he is indeed aware of these things and still chooses to pass judgment, then he truly is an awful person.

I've given him a pass based off of assumed ignorance.

Just in case any of you needed any more reason to dislike me, get this: I don't let wedding rings stop me either.

Why? Because I have had a culmination of experiences ranging from women wearing them just so they can have an easy go-to to get men to leave them alone while they prowl around to people being in open relationships to people just flat out cheating on their spouse. I'm still not responsible for them.

I reject the basis of his argument because it's not my problem and not my hangup. I reject it because I do not make myself responsible for another person's hangups. I reject it because I stand up for my right to not *have* to be responsible for someone else's feelings - a responsibility that is demanded of no other group of people.

You all strike me as pretty sheltered in your sexual experiences. My first four sexual partners came from a leather fetish background and stressed to me the importance of personal responsibility and how to navigate human sexuality. How to stay safe with my physical body and how to protect my mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being.

What it boiled down to is this: The radical notion that only you are responsible for your own life. Nobody owes you anything and don't let anyone else demand that you owe them anything. Only you are responsible for constructing your reality and if you fail to maintain it, that is your own fault. Learn, and move on.