Accused rapist Ched Evans to be released from prison

[Orang Utan]

I love him very much for it. I think he's a bit exceptional and maybe a bit extreme though. Also I don't think I want to live in a world where drunk women who want to have sex are necessarily always victims.

i don't think, or at least I hope, it's not that exceptional for a sober man to feel he doesn't have the right to have sex with a drunk woman.
A woman certainly shouldn't feel grateful to their partner for refusing to have sex with them if they're smashed. It's the right thing to do. It's not something to be congratulated on.

 

[bimble]

i don't think, or at least I hope it's not that exceptional for a sober man to feel he doesn't have the right to have sex with a drunk woman.

Agreed. I hope so too. But now you're bringing in a whole nother thing:
If one person is pissed and the other one is sober, that sober person has a sort of advantage. It happens to be true that my boyfriend doesn't really drink, the very occasional glass of wine, whilst I sometimes do. Is it the case that M & E were totally sober and clean that night ? So they had a 'reasonable' person's judgement in the law but she didn't? I have no clue.

 

[bemused]

Tbh the blackout ime after the event, at the time you can appear lucid and even charming

My experience with alcohol abuse tells me it is very possible for someone to be drunk but appear very aware of their situation; even in the morning if they can't remember any of the events of the previous night.

 

[bimble]

My experience with alcohol abuse tells me it is very possible for someone to be drunk but appear very aware of their situation; even in the morning if they can't remember any of the events of the previous night.

Yep. My friend who I've mentioned here before, who knows blackouts, I had a sunday roast with her yesterday and discussed this.
She has woken up with men and asked them what has happened several times, sometimes it involved sexual stuff and sometimes the answer was that they watched some boxset or ate kebabs and cuddled and then she fell asleep. She said that she has never once felt like a victim of a crime.

 

[bluescreen]

But has she woken up naked and alone, having vomited and wet the bed and not knowing where she was and how she got there?

 

[bimble]

But has she woken up naked and alone, having vomited and wet the bed and not knowing where she was and how she got there?

She once called me in distress and confusion in the morning, from a houseboat, alone. But no. Not like that. I am not saying that I think her behaviour is cool by the way, or safe, or 'liberating'. I have been trying for ages to get her to text me where she is going and with whom etc if she's pissed, because I am concerned.

 

[Treacle Toes]

But has she woken up naked and alone, having vomited and wet the bed and not knowing where she was and how she got there?

Apparently that is similar to being in a relationship with someone you know and love when you got drunk but they didn't...and we have gone from over-moralising anti-feminists expect too much from strangers to moralising that strangers should and do treat us in the same way that our BF's or partners do and should. Confused? Aha!

 

[Pickman's model]

My experience with alcohol abuse tells me it is very possible for someone to be drunk but appear very aware of their situation; even in the morning if they can't remember any of the events of the previous night.

Drunk people can be lucid and even charming

 

[bimble]

Drunk people can be lucid and even charming

Yes, and drunk lucid charming people can sometimes be very up for sexual encounters, even with people they haven't met before that evening. Even women! What a shocking thing to say, in this day and age. If it was not for this eternal truth though, I wonder what the UK birthrate would look like.

 

[Orang Utan]

Yes, and drunk lucid charming people can sometimes be very up for sexual encounters, even with people they haven't met before that evening. Even women! What a shocking thing to say, in this day and age. If it was not for this eternal truth though, I wonder what the UK birthrate would look like.

very different situation to the case in question though

 

[bimble]

very different situation to the case in question though

How so? Because she was too drunk to consent in your opinion, too drunk to have agency as an adult person in the law. Based on the CCTV . Is that right? So you'd have found McDonald guilty too.

 

[Orang Utan]

How so? You would have found McDonald guilty too, yes?

the victim wasn't described by witnesses as lucid, but as very very drunk and unsteady.

 

[bimble]

the victim wasn't described by witnesses as lucid, but as very very drunk and unsteady.

We're never going to agree about this but I think we understand and maybe even respect each others point of view, and we've have managed that without either of us shouting abuse at the other one so that's a real achievement, on this thread.

 

[bimble]

My experience with alcohol abuse tells me it is very possible for someone to be drunk but appear very aware of their situation; even in the morning if they can't remember any of the events of the previous night.

Why does a post like this, a vulnerable honest personal testimony, which matches that of several other people (Pickman, RubyBlue, LBJ, etc) get ignored, whilst the ones saying 'yeah but she couldn't have seemed ok she must have been obviously out of it, they totally must have known that she was incapable of making her own decisions and just didn't care ' get loads of likes?

 

[bluescreen]

Why does a post like this, a vulnerable honest personal testimony, which matches that of several other people (Pickman, RubyBlue, LBJ, etc) get ignored, whilst the ones saying 'yeah but she couldn't have seemed ok she must have been obviously out of it' get loads of likes?

Maybe because it's not as relevant to the night in question as the evidence from the CCTV and the night porter?

 

[bimble]

Maybe because it's not as relevant to the night in question as the evidence from the CCTV and the night porter?

I think it is relevant. And obviously so do they, the people who have come here to say this exact thing and have been resolutely ignored or worse.

 

[Orang Utan]

I think it is relevant. And obviously so do they, the people who have come here to say this exact thing and have been resolutely ignored or worse.

how is it relevant when the victim was by all accounts visibly drunk?

 

[Treacle Toes]

Good grief.

Stop being anti-feminist moralisers and agree with me. Like what I tell you has value, see things as I do...who cares what your own experiences are and why you think as you do. Do not notice the inconsistencies in my own moralising about what is expected behaviour from those we are close to and complete strangers. All fucking hail.

That's all. We have been told. But great we didn't descend into abusive names yeah, that counts. Thread closed.

 

[bimble]

Good grief.

Stop being anti-feminist moralisers and agree with me. Like what I tell you has value, see things as I do...who cares what your own experiences are and why you think as you do. Do not notice the inconsistencies in my own moralising about what is expected behaviour from those we are close to and complete strangers. All fucking hail.

That's all. We have been told. Thread closed.

I know you don't like me but maybe try to engage with what I'm saying instead of calling me names or accusing me of trying to be some sort of, you know, 'princess'. I think it's quite weird actually what you're doing.
Just argue with me, explain where I'm being wrong, why my posts are silly, what I am not getting, why I am mistaken, but don't give me that shit, pretending that I'm setting myself up as something special, I'm not.

 

[DrRingDing]

Oh youre special bimbleclot x

 

[bimble]

Oh youre special bimbleclot x

x

 

[hegley]

I think it is relevant. And obviously so do they, the people who have come here to say this exact thing and have been resolutely ignored or worse.

People aren't being ignored but quite frankly someone saying "oh, I don't come across as very drunk when I've had blackouts" or "some people can be very lucid and charming when they're drunk" isn't at all relevant in this case when there are witnesses saying she DID seem very drunk, and she was staggering about and falling over. Even one of the defendants asked for her to be kept an eye on because she was sick.

 

[bemused]

how is it relevant when the victim was by all accounts visibly drunk?

You can't tell how drunk someone is by looking at them, I can't speak to her competence, but from the video she was not only able to walk unaided but also remember she'd left her food behind and go back to get it. I have no doubt she can't remember the previous evening, but I don't think that it is an unquestionable fact that people could tell she was consciously incompetent.

 

[bluescreen]

I think it is relevant. And obviously so do they, the people who have come here to say this exact thing and have been resolutely ignored or worse.

thing is, the circumstances you describe of being companionably pissed and then forgetting what happened next, are completely different from the circumstances in this case. For a start, the police didn't and wouldn't get involved in that sort of amiable aftermath. Why do you suppose the police got involved here? Because the woman (who has never accused anyone of raping her) presented as someone who'd suffered some kind of traumatic experience at the hands of strangers. Some people on here reckon the police overstepped their authority in probing the circumstances once the issue of the missing handbag had been resolved. I don't. I don't reckon it denies women agency or anything like that. It seems to me more like an attempt to look out for someone who appeared to have been taken advantage of.

 

[Athos]

Spymaster, I apologise for calling you rape apologist.

Whilst I know that I demonstrated that your arguments were deeply flawed (and don't believe that you believe your protestations to the contrary), and whilst I feel that your keenness to defend Evans and cast aspersions about X betray some (perhaps unconscious) misogyny, it's not fair to characterise them as highly as rape apology. I said that out of frustration, because you seemed to be making fatuous points to defend a dodgy position on an important issue, but, whilst I believed it at the time, on sober reflection, it was unfair.

Essentially (and without prejudice to my feminist credentials), whilst I think you've been an absolute twat about this, I don't think you're a total cunt.

And apologies to everyone else for my part in tying up the thread with what became little more than dick waving (albeit initially well-intentioned). The issue is too important to have allowed that to happen.

 

[bimble]

thing is, the circumstances you describe of being companionably pissed and then forgetting what happened next, are completely different from the circumstances in this case. For a start, the police didn't and wouldn't get involved in that sort of amiable aftermath. Why do you suppose the police got involved here? Because the woman (who has never accused anyone of raping her) presented as someone who'd suffered some kind of traumatic experience at the hands of strangers. Some people on here reckon the police overstepped their authority in probing the circumstances once the issue of the missing handbag had been resolved. I don't. I don't reckon it denies women agency or anything like that. It seems to me more like an attempt to look out for someone who appeared to have been taken advantage of.

Who described anything as 'amiable'?
The police are great aren't they, always looking out for anyone who might have been 'taken advantage of', and doing everything they can to make the lives of vulnerable people so much better . So great that she's apparently hoping to move to Australia, to try to get away from all this.

 

[Casually Red]

Just rereading the thread and i'm livid about this.
It seems that you are introducing evidence on here about x's sexual history which was not aired at either trial or in the appeal papers (the three witnesses in the appeal papers are a man who'd known her for 13 years (ie since she was at primary school), his mum, and a man who 'd initially met her on facebook). The part of x's statement when she says she wouldn't consent to sex with a stranger is mentioned briefly in the appeal papers but was not used in either trial. Its irrelevant anyway.
Where are you getting this info from? - from misogynists on twitter who are continuing to harrass and threaten this woman? - from the ched evans website? or from your own fevered imagination?.
Its disgusting enough that a woman had her sexual history interrogated in a rape trial. And shit that people on here are still analysing it and discussing it still. But trying to talk about aspects of her supposed sexual history which were not introduced at trial is absolutely fucking out of order.

It seems I'm not you massive twat

https://www.crimeline.info/uploads/cases/2016/chedevansappealx.pdf

 

[Spymaster]

Spymaster, I apologise for calling you rape apologist.

Whilst I know that I demonstrated that your arguments were deeply flawed (and don't believe that you believe your protestations to the contrary), and whilst I feel that your keenness to defend Evans and cast aspersions about X betray some (perhaps unconscious) misogyny, it's not fair to characterise them as highly as rape apology. I said that out of frustration, because you seemed to be making fatuous points to defend a dodgy position on an important issue, but, whilst I believed it at the time, on sober reflection, it was unfair.

Essentially (and without prejudice to my feminist credentials), whilst I think you've been an absolute twat about this, I don't think you're a total cunt.

And apologies to everyone else for my part in tying up the thread with what became little more than dick waving (albeit initially well-intentioned). The issue is too important to have allowed that to happen.

Lol! Phwoar, you're well sore aren't you?

You're full of shit and you know it.

You blatantly used this thread to try to showboat your super-dooper lawyer skills to argue legal details regarding the introduction of s.41. It was all about you.

The wheels came off, but at least now you've gone for the fully ad hominem approach and aren't pretending otherwise! It's all you're left with.

Apology accepted. As for the rest, fuck off.

 

[BigTom]

Agreed. I hope so too. But now you're bringing in a whole nother thing:
If one person is pissed and the other one is sober, that sober person has a sort of advantage. It happens to be true that my boyfriend doesn't really drink, the very occasional glass of wine, whilst I sometimes do. Is it the case that M & E were totally sober and clean that night ? So they had a 'reasonable' person's judgement in the law but she didn't? I have no clue.

Again, you don't need to be totally sober to recognise someone else is in a state, just not too drunk.

Being also very drunk would be a legal defence I should think. M was acquitted, most likely because how he met x was fairly usual way of meeting someone on a night out, not obviously predatory behaviour, though we can see it was from the text message and him leaving the hotel afterwards. CE very different circumstances. I don't remember their own levels of sobriety being mentioned tbh, for that they would need to accept she was too drunk to consent and I think they've always argued she was able to consent (and did so).

 

[Athos]

Lol! Phwoar, you're well sore aren't you?

You're full of shit and you know it.

You blatantly used this thread to try to showboat your super-dooper lawyer skills to argue legal details regarding the introduction of s.41. It was all about you.

The wheels came off, but at least now you've gone for the fully ad hominem approach and aren't pretending otherwise! It's all you're left with.

Apology accepted. As for the rest, fuck off.

Not sore, no. But I was irritated, so said something I shouldn't.

I'm genuinely baffled that you think you had the best of our exchanges, given you were forced to abmit you had things wrong a number of times, though. I just don't get what part of my argument you think you've effectively counted.

Yes, the main thrusts of what I was saying were legal points, and I make no apology for that. But, no, not to show off; rather, because it's crucial to this case.

I don't see the issue with a legal analysis. That's got to better than your vague position, which seems to be that, whatever the process that led to it, the acquittal was proper because you would have found him not guilty at the first trial. That is to overestimate the importance of your opinion, particularly since you didn't hear the evidence, and heard a lot more, some of which was undoubtedly inadmissible.

I made the points about both the circumstances and timing of the new evidence coming to light, and it's probative value.

You still haven't offered any argument for the latter i.e. what you believe the new evidence has the capacity to demonstrate (once you'd conceded that it doesn't show the pattern you originally claimed), and how that outweighs the arguments against allowing a victim's sexual history to be admitted in evidence; or how s.41 should apply to it (including the issue of coincidence).

Want to go again on those points? Genuine discussion of the issue, not bickering or ad hominems.

Maybe start with:

1) Do you accept that, but for the decision that the new evidence was admissible, the original verdict would have stood?

2) Do you think that the acquittal (including the process leading to it i.e. the decision to admit the new evidence) was good in law? And/or in justice? If in justice, do you think the procees an/or the outcome were just?

3) What you think the new evidence could be properly adduced to show?