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DonViejo

(60,536 posts) Tue Feb 11, 2014, 02:01 PM Feb 2014

Wall Street Journal Columnist: Victims Of Sexual Assault Need To Take Their Share Of Blame, Too

TOM KLUDT – FEBRUARY 11, 2014, 9:46 AM EST

Hold on to your seats, people. James Taranto has some more thoughts on sexual assault.

The Wall Street Journal columnist's latest effort on Monday focused on what he sees as a double standard of sex offenses on college campuses.

Working off a piece in the New York Times, Taranto highlighted an incident last year at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, where a young man named Matt Martel prevented his intoxicated male friend from sleeping with a drunk female student. The young woman thanked Martel the next day, which apparently left Taranto baffled.

The question arises here: Whom exactly did Martel save from danger? The answer is quite possibly both the young woman and his friend. Had she awakened the next day feeling regretful and violated, she could have brought him up on charges and severely disrupted his life. Both of them were taking foolish risks, and it seems likely that he as well as she had impaired judgment owing to excessive drinking.

Taranto just doesn't think men and women — physical disparities, be damned — should be treated differently in such cases if both parties are drunk.

more
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/james-taranto-sexual-assault-college-campus-males-females

3 replies

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Highlight:

Wall Street Journal Columnist: Victims Of Sexual Assault Need To Take Their Share Of Blame, Too (Original Post) DonViejo Feb 2014 OP

This will end well.....not. MADem Feb 2014 #1

As I said in another thread, the WSJ is a male conservatives wet dream of what Rex Feb 2014 #2

Responsibility and liability Vox Moi Feb 2014 #3

MADem

(135,425 posts)

1. This will end well.....not.

Reply to DonViejo (Original post)

Tue Feb 11, 2014, 02:18 PM

Feb 2014

This guy is a nut:

Taranto is a reliable soldier in what he's called the "war on men." He wrote last June that Democrats such as Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) were trying to "criminalize male sexuality" in their efforts to eliminate sexual assault from the military. McCaskill promptly shot back at Taranto's "bizarre and deeply out of touch understanding of sexual assault."

Best part of that link? The comments under the piece!

Rex

(65,616 posts)

2. As I said in another thread, the WSJ is a male conservatives wet dream of what

Reply to DonViejo (Original post)

Tue Feb 11, 2014, 02:19 PM

Feb 2014

the world should be like.

Vox Moi

(546 posts)

3. Responsibility and liability

Reply to DonViejo (Original post)

Tue Feb 11, 2014, 02:22 PM

Feb 2014

Since sexual issues are so inflammatory, I'd like to address this point via another example.

I know a guy who insisted on driving on the thruway at exactly the speed limit in the left-hand lane.
I rode with him one time and watched as traffic pressed us from behind and cars passed us on the right.
I told him that he was creating a hazardous situation.
He replied with great indignation that he was entirely within the law, that other people were speeding. Fuck them, he was right.
A few months later, he was read-ended and he and his passenger ended up in the hospital.
The other driver was at fault and was found to be liable.

However, this accident was waiting to happen and I saw this as a case of relying on the letter of the law as an excuse to exercise bad judgement.

I think that this is the point Taranto was making.

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