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[–]Alienhunter糞大名 13 insightful - 1 fun13 insightful - 0 fun14 insightful - 1 fun -  (5 children)

Sexual assault is sexual assault regardless of the "identities" of anyone involved.

If you use false pretenses to lure someone you are no better than a pedophile rapist luring children with promises of puppies.

[–]ClassroomPast6178[S] 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

I took it to mean that they’re considering making it an offence not to declare your trans-status before sexual activity, and making disclosure part of consent.

I expect there to be considerable wailing and gnashing of teeth as the fetishists who dream of tricking men or women have their fetish criminalised.

This seems to be a good thing.

[–]Alienhunter糞大名 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I think that various things should be disclosed, veneral disease is another one.

The problem however is you do eventually end up opening a can of worms over what is and is not criminal for disclosure. Should it be criminal for someone to not disclose martial status before sex? There's a fairly strong argument for that. Should it be criminal for someone to disclose their race or religious beliefs before sex? It can get into the weeds rather quickly and we need to be careful when we create laws that we don't inadvertently create new vehicles by which sociopaths can terrorize others through baseless and unprovable accusations. In this case it would very much be a he said she said situation and unenforceable. He said he disclosed his trans status, she said he didn't. Bit of a legal quagmire can form.

Now naturally if it's a question of whether or not you should be honest with your date obviously the answer is yes you should. After all it's stupid and dangerous for trans people to play around like that and it's why many of them get killed, and I have little sympathy for them in that situation. Play stupid games win stupid prizes. It's still murder though, and I do think the trans panic defense isn't really a tenable excuse for murder when you could simply leave. Self defense from sexual assault is a good excuse for deadly self defense however. But it's still a bit legal quagmire of what does and does not constitute a justifiable homicide.

[–]LyingSpirit472 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

I just took it to be a better thing and them finally getting around to closing the loophole of "under UK law, it only counts as rape if a man uses his penis to penetrate a woman", and catching on to "well, what if a woman/trans man uses a toy on an unwilling partner, or a trans woman uses her penis to penetrate an unwilling woman?"

[–]ClassroomPast6178[S] 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

A transwoman using their penis IS rape. The pronoun HE in the law is not a loophole for transwomen to escape being charged with rape.

The act of penetration with a penis, whether traditional or “feminine” without the reasonable belief that the person being penetrated has consented, is rape under the law in England & Wales.

You’re right about toys, using them to penetrate without consent would fall under the most serious level of sexual assault not rape.

[–]LyingSpirit472 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

While that is the case, the fact laws change is in large part because there's lawyers who are willing to play fast and loose with technicalities. The fact that we're seeing rape cases by transwomen in England and Wales get thrown out of court because the victim refused to use "she" pronouns for their attacker means that we're closer and closer to some asshole lawyer deciding to test that loophole by waiting until the victim referred to their attacker as "she" and then saying "she called my client she! She admits my client is a woman! That means that this is merely sexual assault, and since you didn't charge her with sexual assault and only charged her with rape, you have to throw the whole case out!"- and it's likelier and likelier that would WORK right now.

So, better to formally close it up and say "don't even think about it. They have a penis, even a feminine penis, they raped them"- and while you're at it close up a bunch of other backwards parts of the law as well.