Peikoff on date rape


9thdoctor

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Would the Norwegian Blue be nailed to its perch by any chance?

If you look really closely I think you can see the nails.

So far his new statement doesn't have any defenders. It's really good until the last couple minutes. None of the previous defenders has offered a mea culpa, either.

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Would the Norwegian Blue be nailed to its perch by any chance?

If you look really closely I think you can see the nails.

In the off-chance that some poor deprived OLer doesn't know what we're talking about:

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From Peikoff’s “correction”. . .

I was concerned to defend Bryant against people that I loathe who go after people in the public eye who are successful because they are successful.. I saw this as another example of that—so right away I went out to try to find a basis to justify this—but I went by feeling. I hated these people. I wanted to defend the victim, so I simply jumped at it. ‘Well, she was there, what would you expect’--without thinking what that implied. I simply went with—ah, confused a feeling of justice with a knowledge of what is really proper. That’s an example of going by emotion, and not clearly understanding what the issue is—not attempting to understand, because you just go by the emotion and think: ‘well, that’s self-evident.’

Peikoff repeats the words “moral” and “immoral” over and over throughout his retraction, ad nauseum. Every conceivable sexual movement and gesture is analyzed as “moral” or “immoral.” But oddly he does not say anything about the immorality of being guided by emotions instead of clear thinking in a public statement. His act of poor judgment was an “error,” apparently, not anything immoral. And here I thought that letting your emotions take precedence over thinking was the most basic act of immorality, according to the Objectivist Ethics.

Papal infallibility, I suppose.

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Here's my latest from over yonder.

The premise that I think is what bothers me and most here, is the gender-centric one: that the male has the right to perform and conclude the act of sex, regardless of the female's late (even extremely late) objections.

Reverse this. To any man who has not experienced it - it will happen, sometime.

I’ve had the experience of a woman forcibly (or let’s say ‘vigorously’) locking my head between her legs while demanding oral sex. I think that’s a better parallel, but still not quite right. BTW I don’t look back on it in a positive way, but no charges were filed and the relationship even carried on for some time after.

Fact is, women can just lie there and "submit", even when they’re not enjoying it. I don’t think there’s a male equivalent for that, unless you want to bring up something weird like pegging. Here’s something I know has happened to me: GF has something on her mind, something’s bothering her, a problem at work, whatever. With a little consoling caress, a smooch on the back of the neck, she says yeah, let’s do it, thinking that’ll take her mind off the problem. She might even initiate it. A minute (or ten) into the proceedings, the problem has reemerged in her mind, and now she’s not into the sex. This being what Peikoff might call a “loving relationship”, she doesn’t say ‘stop’, but signals that she wants you to finish up. Otherwise, in addition to her work problem, she knows she’s going to have a grumpy partner sleeping next to her. Before long her experience is going to go from ‘not really enjoying it’ to ‘this is starting to hurt, time for him to get the hell off me’, so hopefully you’re done within a couple minutes, before she finally does say ‘stop’. To complicate matters, I’ve had the experience of the GF’s desire soon reigniting, a second wind in the category five hurricane eye-wall gust class, requiring a rematch delayed only by that inconvenient refractory period my fellow males should know all about. Sex can get damn complicated. Unpredictable. When Peikoff talked about the woman being “skittish then falling into it”, that resonated well enough with my experience.

A point I’ve been trying to formulate since the new podcast came out is an ‘altered state of consciousness’ defense. I’ve already established that I disagree with Peikoff’s new formulation, and hold that a woman (or man) can withdraw consent at any time and expect that to be respected. So, now I’m testing out an opposing argument, and maybe someone else can put it on firmer footing. The main point is that passionate sex puts one into what amounts to an altered state of consciousness, kind of like when you’re drifting awake in the morning, and can’t yet will yourself to full consciousness. Or, being very drunk, or high on say, marijuana. Earlier I wrote about how it takes some number of seconds for a ‘stop’ to reach the rational faculty, well, can the sex get so passionate that no stimulus is going to put reason back on her throne? That is, besides ejaculation, followed by a few minutes of refractory period bliss? I’m open to that argument, but it still doesn’t completely line up with my experience. It’s just that you need the equivalent of a blaring alarm clock that snaps you awake. So, imagine the male is going at it full throttle, and the woman, out of the blue, calmly whispers ‘stop’. That’s just not going to register. Did she say something a minute ago? But the same calm whisper would be sufficient to end foreplay, that’s the difference. I’m trying to come up with the best case for what Peikoff’s talking about when he says sometimes a ‘no’ is not valid, and that’s all I’ve got so far. And it's never happened to me. What has happened is she cooed 'I love you', it didn't register so I gave no reply, then I got a talking-to about it later.

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The OO thread has taken a turn in the direction of a flame war, and there's some really entertaining stuff flying back and forth. I'm afraid it'll all get deleted, apparently the opening salvo was originally put under moderation, then restored, so go see it while you can.

http://forum.objecti...ndpost&p=290019

"Well, I am a pontiff, and I did say something to the effect that those who defended LP's first date-rape podcast ought either to recant or to disagree with Peikoff's reversal. I am now hereby threatening any such person who does not take one of those two actions with excommunication from the Church of Either/Or.

Pope John Peter LIII

(fallen-away Catholic)"

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