[NSFW] What would you consider this as?

If I don’t consent to a sexual act then yes it’s rape or sexual assault. It’s my body. Nobody, husband or otherwise, has the right to impose a sexual act on my person without my consent.

If it happened, I’d be very unhappy with my husband. What I did would depend on what happened. I would treat it as a very serious abuse of my trust.

Yes, definitely. Unless it was something along the lines of waking the other one up with something fun (etc.) that we’d previously discussed.

Like @Earthbound_Misfit said, your body is yours alone. You do with it only what you consent to do. No one else has the right to force you to do anything, no matter who they are. You’re not owned property.

@DrasticDreamer, I agree with the distinction for something fun. I was just discussing this with my husband. If he woke me up by fondling me, and I made it clear I wasn’t interested, he would stop what he was doing. If he continued, that would be sexual assault. Similarly, if I wasn’t able to give consent, say I was drunk, then he has no right to engage in sexual activity with me.

@Earthbound_Misfit Agreed 100%.

no consent = rape
No if and buts.

hehe, “buts”

I agree with all of the above. You are allowed to safe-word out at any time.

I agree with all of the above, but with a caveat. Tak @Earthbound_Misfit example. It is technically rape. However, with if she chose to prosecute it in a court of law, she would have one hell of a time winning the case.

So while the action itself might very well be rape, could there/would there be legal consequences?

Leave it to a man to bring up legal practices when the ladies are talking about moral theory.

@imrainmaker How broadly are we construing “sexual act” here? Is a kiss a sexual act? Does it matter where the kiss is placed? If my partner wakes me up by slowly stroking my body, is that a sexual act? Or are you using “sexual act” as a euphemism for some sort of penetrative action?

And what sort of consent are you asking about? Active, verbal consent? Do I have to verbally acknowledge and say yes to every testing of the waters every time? “Excuse me darling, may I move my finger to the entrance of your vagina and press a little to see if you are prepared for penetration?” In a long-term relationship, there is a certain degree of implicit consent at least for the sake of making one’s interest known. As long as no one goes to far and everyone is allowed to stop an act from continuing, it seems a bit extreme to call anything unwanted “rape.”

By sexual act I mean penetration only…not as broad as kissing someone / other acts.

When I have some mutual trust with someone, not every act requires a “Is this ok if I do this?” and then me responding “Yes,” or “no.” I think some things are implied by lack of resistance, other verbal cues other than words, etc.

If I was asleep or under the influence of alcohol and my partner was molesting me without consent, yep, I’d consider it highly inappropriate and be very pissed.

Any act? No. I don’t think you know what rape means.

Of course. It doesn’t matter who’s doing the raping, it’s still rape.

Granted, I don’t expect my boyfriend to look me in the eye and say “do you consent to this?” before each session. But if I’m clearly not into it, or I say no, he’d be expected to back off.

@imrainmaker Sometimes my girlfriend sticks her finger into me before I’m ready. I say “not yet,” and she pulls out and we move on. I don’t think that’s rape, but it’s definitely unwanted penetration. So I still think it takes more.

I don’t want to say that rape can only come after an explicit “no.” That’s obviously not true (someone who is passed out can’t say anything, but it’s still rape). But I don’t think we can say “any unwanted penetration” is rape either.

I think it has to be more about having disregard for consent. If the strap-on slips and goes into the wrong hole, that’s an accident. But if I go for it on purpose and don’t even care what she wants, now we’re getting into shady territory.

Ultimately, I think it’s bad to have a reductive definition of rape. If we want something that can be applied in the real world, we’re going to have to take account of how relationships actually work and the differences between different types of relationships (long-term relationships, fuck buddies, one night stands).

Implicit consent is a real tripwire, and I get why it riles people up. The whole “she wanted it” thing has been horribly abused. But one reason it works is because we all know there really is such a thing as implicit consent, and an argument that operates on the premise that there is no such thing is never going to make progress. Even if we take male fear out of the equation, there are too many women who know they have had consensual sex without ever uttering a word.