Leave it to ol K-S-U to take a hard stance on what is and isn't "real rape"
It is a real problem the way the we are watering down terms to where they don't mean anything anymore. If Harvey Weinstein and George HW Bush both have "sexual assault victims", then the term "sexual assault" doesn't mean anything anymore. When two drunk people having sex together is called "rape", it minimizes the term to nothingness.
The left has done the same with racism and bigotry of all sorts in recent years. It's horribly counterproductive to a movement that is well-intentioned.
I don't know that being drunk should be considered a valid defense for someone's actions.
It isn't. But it's also not so simple when
both people are drunk.
The problem arises when schools impose bright line, zero tolerance standards because they don't have the training, experience, or wherewithal to fully and fairly investigate sexual assault claims. So instead, they simply say: (1) no consent = rape, and (2) drinking alcohol = no consent. Put those two things together, and having sex with a drunk person is always rape (or at least "sexual misconduct" under most school policies). But if both people are drunk, it logically follows under this zero-tolerance standard that they both raped each other.
This is what Mrs. Gooch literally said above. Which, of course, is stupid. I think even Mrs. G realizes how stupid that sounds. Every thinking person would readily acknowledge that there is no such thing as mutual rape. But that's the absurdity you reach based upon these bright line tests.
To avoid this absurdity, universities just discriminate against men, assuming that they are always the perpetrator in drunk sex situations. This discrimination is even worse than the mutual rape absurdity. It leads to situations like what happened here:
http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2015/02/drunk_sex_on_campus_universities_are_struggling_to_determine_when_intoxicated.html That article will make you cringe.
In reality, we all know that there's no such thing as mutual rape, and we all know that a guy isn't always a rapist in drunk sex situations. This isn't some game or a matter of, "well, we have to protect women at all costs thing." Rape is a horrible crime. A false rape charge is likewise horrible. Both have to receive serious consideration.
So how do you disentangle the messy situation of "drunk sex?" Where is the line between regrettable judgment and rape? Well, for starters, divide the facts from the law. The facts are often going to be murky, but very important, so let's set that aside for a moment.
The law actually isn't that hard. Some states define having sex with someone who is incapacitated as rape (and drunk generally means incapacitated), but also qualify that this situation isn't rape if the accused likewise lacked the ability to understand that the person was incapacitated. Take Ohio's law, for example:
[No person shall engage in sexual activity when] the other person's ability to resist or consent is substantially impaired because of a mental or physical condition or because of advanced age, and the offender knows or has reasonable cause to believe that the other person's ability to resist or consent is substantially impaired because of a mental or physical condition or because of advanced age.
Basically, this provides an out for "mutual drunk sex" that one party later comes to regret. And that's just common sense. But then it comes down to the facts.
Obviously, a guy being a little bit drunk is not going to be a defense to having sex with a girl who is passed out in the back room. That's rape. And a guy being so black-out drunk that he can't even realize his "partner" is passed out is likewise not reasonable. You have to look at the actions of both parties. The guy, even if drunk, knew or should have known full damn well the girl was passed out. She took no steps to initiate or have sex. He "did all the work." But if both parties were conscious and took steps to having sex (getting into a room together, getting into bed together, taking off clothes, kissing, etc.), that's probably not rape just because both were drunk. So police look at the facts. They talk to witnesses. They read text messages (helpfully, millennials keep a running audit log of their behavior via text and tweet). They perform an investigation that schools are not competent to do.
What schools can and should do is take steps to avoid these situations!! For starters, ban alcohol on campus, and no more co-ed campus housing. It is ironic that the feminist movement pushed for co-ed dorms, and they have become a cesspool of drunk sex situations.
