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Had I said Ft Worth or Austin or San Antonio, it wouldn't have struck the same meaning.

Exactly. That's the point.

My bet is that every ethnic group that moved to New York (and to every other big city) developed its own criminal gangs. I expect that waving $10,000 on Wall Street or any country club would bring crooks out of the woodwork, too. I expect that the vast majority of us would have known what you meant if you had written Ft Worth or Austin or San Antonio.

There's a phenomenon known as 'implicit bias'. Harvard has an interesting self-test for anyone who is interested.

rothman - your gf didn’t cheat, she was taken advantaged of by someone she thought she could trust. According to her "friends" she was visibly intoxicated. And they let her go off with this guy because the plan was to take her home. Then how the hell did they end up not at her home on someone’s couch? This guy is a creep. She’s known him for 10 years, has never been interested in him romantically, has a bf, and he decided to take his opening when she was inebriated. Guarantee he wouldn’t have tried this had she been sober. It actually says a lot to me that she said "I want to be in my bed" that’s an indication of intent, and her intent was to go home and go to sleep and this guy straight up took advantage of her not having her faculties together.

I was just thinking the other day about the dumb shit I did in college and how blessed I am to have come out of those situations unhurt. Trigger warning: I distinctly remember getting so inebriated at a football party that I ended up passed out in one of the rooms. I’m unclear on their intent when they got me to the room but it was several guys. I remember being in a room with just guys and unable to really move. Thankfully the quarterback (well known) happened to come in the room, saw me passed out, sat next to me, and started giving the other guys directives to help me sober up. To this day I am so grateful he helped me. It may have had nothing to do with me, that it was to keep his school out of a scandal that could effect his pro career but I don’t care the reason. I walked out of that room unscathed. A lot of women don’t. I look back at that night and thank God. But when you’re 18/19/20 you do think you’re indestructible. After walking out the room know what I did? Met up with my "friends" (who didn’t seem to notice I was missing) and kept partying SMGDH. Hindsight is 20/20. I’m so fortunate and grateful to have never come across a bunch of guys who thought since I was stupid enough to get black out drunk, or so high I couldn’t move, that meant my body was —- in the middle of writing this I realized this is not true. It’s crazy what you suppress. I’ve never been raped in these circumstances. I’m grateful for the 90% of guys I’ve come across who didn’t have the POV that since I voluntarily got fucked up, that I was "asking for it."

Bottom line - while there’s the silver lining that your gf seems to have realized her drinking was problematic, and she’s addressed that, it doesn’t mean she was at fault to what happened to her. In fact I’d bet she thought she was safe to drink to this point with her "friends" it’s a cold hard lesson that a lot of girls learn about their so called girlfriends. And a reminder there are men out they who will prey on the fact that you’re drunk or high. That creep knew deep down your gf didn’t want him romantically, it’d been 10 years! He took advantage. And for a long time I didn’t call what happened to me assault because like your gf, no one forced me to drink. No one forced me to hand out with all guys. I "should’ve known better." And I didn’t like looking at myself like a victim or statistic - your gf may be feeling the same which is why she won’t call what happened an assault. But that’s what it was.

If they were both wasted, then who is to blame? The one with lower BAC? Or is it always the guy simply because he’s male?

This right here.

He was smart enough not to text her what had happened. Who's to say he was also smart enough to say he was really drunk as well? Sounds like he might have done this before.

Also..she was so drunk she had very,very vague flashes of memory. He seems rather clear on what happened the entire time he was with her.

Rothman

I have shared this story many times here on SI, and that might indicate how common scenarios like you experienced are:
My wife’s best friend is an alcoholic. Came as a total surprise to us, because we neve noticed that she acted like we envisioned an alcoholic. She shared with us that her problem wasn’t that she had to drink daily or even every week. She could go months without taking a sip. Her problem was that when she drank then more-often-than-not she would drink too much. She would drink to a state where she would black out. She also said that at some point she would KNOW the next drink would be the one that was "too much", but she felt powerless to refuse it or wait or time her drinking better. It was just one drink after another as if she subconsciously wanted to reach total intoxication.
Added to this then often when blacked out she would end up in bed with someone other than her then-husband… Ironically, they divorced due to his affairs.

When non-alcoholic people drink, we usually seek a certain buzz. We might realize we are slurring our words and slow down. Might wait half an hour before getting the next beer or whatever. We might realize that we should skip the shots and just sip our beer and maybe even leave without finishing it. An alcoholic… he’s thinking already about the next one and where he will get it.

This friend told us that one day she decided enough was enough and contacted a friend in AA. That friend took her to a woman’s only AA meeting where it turns out her drinking pattern is quite common. Women that drank occasionally but couldn’t control their drinking once started.
Keep that in mind: Our perception of alcoholism tends to be some wino sleeping in a box, when in fact the next person you meet could be an alcoholic. It’s not frequency or quantity but rather effects and control.
A good (but not failproof) indicator is voluntary sobriety. I would strongly suggest she tries to stay completely sober for a good six months and see how she feels about that. That might discern between if she has a drinking problem or is an alcoholic… If she can’t stay sober for that time or if she goes back to blackout-drinking… It’s AA and a lifetime of happy sobriety.

Look – you are posting in the Reconciliation forum so I’m assuming you want to reconcile. I also assume you care for your GF no matter how this ends. I would irrespective of your relationship status

Frankly I wouldn’t focus too much on if this was rape or not. Purely based on what you share there seems to be a very large part of this consensual – although neither seems to have been fully capable of what we might consider consent. A key-factor to me is that the man quit before gratification. Maybe a medical examination could have indicated otherwise, but too much time has passed and the memories too unclear. I think calling out the guy for rape could be counterproductive and might even divert from the relationship-issues that need to be dealt with.

I really want to stress that IF she was 100% adamant that this was assault and rape… I would be completely 100% on her side. Might not be rape as seen in the eyes of law, but her experience would be the same. However solely based on what you share I’m not so certain.
I do believe this has traumatized her and that she should seek help and guidance. She’s probably feeling vulnerable and guilty and shame. None of those being good emotions to go forwards with. This is probably totally out of character and that worries her. She’s confused, guilty and remorseful.

I think you both need to realize how traumatizing this is and decide on your future based on that. Several things I want to address:

The OM. She has his number; they talk quite easily… He knew of you, yet he didn’t respect the relationship. Irrespective of her possible accountability he needs to be out of your lives. Forever. He isn’t the enemy per se, but he isn’t a friend to this relationship. It does sound like he was the less drunk and it is definitely possible he was abusing her condition, but for me that is not the big issue per se.

I have mentioned her drinking. For me this is a key-issue. As I have stated being drunk doesn’t mean she can expect to be assaulted or raped. But… if her judgement is so heavily impaired she could have done things immensely worse. She could have passed out somewhere and been molested. She could have been in a car-crash. She could have decided to do something even worse than what happened. At this state of inebriation her ability to make rational decisions is too far gone. If she has this pattern of drinking to excess then it’s only a question of time before something worse happens.

You. How are you going to cope next time she goes out with the girls? Or you two have a drink and she has another one and another one? If you remain a couple… you need to feel safe. Not as her warden, but because she changes and shows responsible and safe behaviors.

It’s a hard road ahead. You have no obligation to be together, there is no force demanding you separate. You base your decision on what you want and what you think you need to or can do.

In case anyone reading this is going through a similar experience as I have, here are my final thoughts on the matter.

There are differences between men and women. For a lot of men, it would seem very easy and obvious to stop an advance, all you have to do is say "Fuck off" or give them a push. I'm not sure its the same for all women. If a woman is heavily intoxicated, finds herself alone with a man, how easy is it to get out of that situation? Some women, sure, its easy for them. But some women are hard-wired all their life to feel a (false) sense of obligation to men. And if you're dating a very attractive woman, as in my case, they are constantly being hit on and chased by men... What a world that would be. This is why boundaries are so important for women.

If your girlfriend comes to you with something like this. Give her the benefit of the doubt. Then do your digging, get your re-assurance, and talk to people, because I'm sure there are some women out there who abuse this grey area. That's not OK. That said assault and rape are unfortunately super common (the statistics are shocking), and overwhelming with female victims. We will never be living in that world as men.

I do consider what happened to be sexual assault. I don't believe someone in a blackout can consent to sexual activity. It would be different if they got drunk together, and consent was provided before intoxication. But in this case, this man found my blacked-out GF at the end of the night, and took advantage of her when she was not in a state to make any decisions about anything. She was uncomfortable, she stopped it, and she did not want to be participating in that. This guy knew she was vulnerable, he made sure to get her alone, and then he did something extremely slimy.

Some people will never understand this because not everyone has experienced a blackout. But in this state, you are not picking up on red flags, because you are not making memories (short or long term). If you are in a blackout state and someone grabs your ass, and then 10 minutes later asks you to walk home, you likely don't even have that memory of him grabbing your ass (red flag) and thus can't make an informed or safe decision on whether this is a guy you should walk home with. You are essentially in a state of amnesia. See a great quote by malcolm gladwell below.

"And what is the consequence of being blacked out? It means that women are put in a position of vulnerability. Our memory, in any interaction with a stranger, is our first line of defense. We talk to someone at a party for half an hour and weigh what we learned. We use our memory to make sense of who the other person is. We collect things they’ve told us, and done, and those shape our response. That is not an error-free exercise in the best of times. But it is a necessary exercise, particularly if the issue at hand is whether you are going to go home with the person. Yet if you can’t remember anything you’ve just learned, you are necessarily not making the same-quality decision you would have if your hippocampus were still working. You have ceded control of the situation."

— Malcolm Gladwell, Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don’t Know (2019)

Bottom line, there is a huge difference between just "being drunk" and being "blacked out". And because of this, like so many have said on this thread, nobody should drink to this state. In the case of my GF, this is not an established pattern of behaviour, and she has drastically transformed her life over the past 6 months as a result of what happened. That means a lot to me.

If anyone is going through something similar, I will say this. I think you are within your rights to dump your GF/BF after something like this, but don't do it for the sexual actions, do it for the drinking.

Also, take the advice of strangers on the internet with a huge grain of salt. Nobody knows all the nuances of your situation, and only you can make the decision on what to do. Talk to your friends, family, therapist, and listen to your heart.

Rothman out.

[This message edited by rothman9499 at 3:44 PM, Wednesday, March 1st]

Excellent last post,Rothman.

I do hope she's stopped drinking. And I hope she is no longer friends with the women she was with that night. They allowed her to be in an extremely dangerous situation. They aren't friends.

Excellent last post,Rothman.

I do hope she's stopped drinking. And I hope she is no longer friends with the women she was with that night. They allowed her to be in an extremely dangerous situation. They aren't friends.

Agreed.

If anyone else wishes to understand what consent looks like there is a very good video, if you Google "consent tea analogy" you can find it.

There are differences between men and women. For a lot of men, it would seem very easy and obvious to stop an advance, all you have to do is say "Fuck off" or give them a push. I'm not sure its the same for all women. If a woman is heavily intoxicated, finds herself alone with a man, how easy is it to get out of that situation? Some women, sure, its easy for them. But some women are hard-wired all their life to feel a (false) sense of obligation to men. And if you're dating a very attractive woman, as in my case, they are constantly being hit on and chased by men... What a world that would be. This is why boundaries are so important for women.

I know this is your final post and this is the only thing I touched on very briefly earlier in your thread. Aside from drinking, this boundary setting should be your GF's number one lesson learned. She needs to learn to tell people a strong and definitive "No".

"I have a boyfriend" is simply not a no. It actually implies "... But I'd be interested otherwise". "We can't" "We shouldn't" are also imply desire to continue and are not "no". Often saying something like that just adds to the illicit desire.

"You're a great guy" "if I wasn't dating" etc. Any "soft letdown" can be an indication of interest. The reality is she probably has a lifetime of leading on men without even realizing it if all she does are soft letdowns. She needs to say, "I'm not interested". Even if it isn't a "fuck off".

[This message edited by This0is0Fine at 7:39 PM, Wednesday, March 1st]

This is also my last reply to this topic but…

"I have a boyfriend" is simply not a no.

“I have a boyfriend” is also not a yes. I find it amazing that men still think it is ok to interpret a woman’s answer when it comes to sex. "She said the sky is blue, she didn’t say no therefore I shall proceed". Erm… consent is when a woman says yes. Full stop. Not when she does not say no.

Again, please have a look at consent/tea analogy, Google will bring it up, it appears a lot of men on this forum struggle with the consent concept.

[This message edited by Luna10 at 9:30 PM, Wednesday, March 1st]

I am not struggling with consent. I did not claim this whole interaction implies consent. I'm saying that "no means no" "yes means yes" anything in between means "shake the 8 ball and ask again". Which most men will continue to shake the 8 ball until they get a yes or no.

Edit: tea example is "I already have tea" and the guy makes her tea anyway. She is surrounded by guys making her tea. She might enjoy smelling the tea, or the process of a man making tea for her. Or maybe she thinks it will be worse if she doesn't let a man show her how he makes tea. I don't know. What I do know is she ought to say, "no tea, thanks" instead of "I have tea" or "I really shouldn't drink your tea" or "your tea smells amazing" or "if it was winter I'd really like some of your cinnamon tea, but it's not winter".

[This message edited by This0is0Fine at 8:49 PM, Wednesday, March 1st]

Which most men will continue to shake the 8 ball until they get a yes or no.

And this is part of rape culture.

The reality is she probably has a lifetime of leading on men without even realizing it if all she does are soft letdowns.

A soft letdown isn’t leading someone on WTAF??

Further, do men even pay attention to other men and what they do? A soft letdown is PROTECTION because you never know how a man will react to a flat out no. Have you ever had a glass bottle thrown at your head because you said you’re not interested to some random on the street? I have. Been assaulted for saying "no thank you" I have. Even soft letdowns can be met with a barrage of "bitch" "ho" "fuck you" "didn’t really like your ass anyway I just wanted to fuck" etc etc. The women on this board could probably write a book together of the horror stories for not figuring out the best way to let a guy down without being assaulted or worse. Sometimes it doesn’t matter the origami way a woman tries to let the guy down, unless the answer is "yes" it’s going to end badly. When I was a teen I used to cry & wish I were ugly because I was over the amount of grown ass men trying to fuck a teenager & flipping out when I’d say I had a bf or weren’t interested.

Men MURDER women for saying No. Google: "men are killing thousands women year saying no" this isn’t hyperbole.

Rothman, nice last post.

I have a boyfriend" is simply not a no. It actually implies "... But I'd be interested otherwise". "We can't" "We shouldn't" are also imply desire to continue and are not "no". Often saying something like that just adds to the illicit desire.

All of those are examples of saying no. None of those convey desire on her part.

Adds to the illicit desire? If a man feels illicit desire after hearing any of those things..that's a problem with his thinking, not hers.

A woman shouldn't have to scream No, to mean no. A soft let down is still a no.

And,as mentioned, she's trying to defuse the situation. Any idea how many men become angry when told no? Women know. That's why we try to let them down,without making them angry. Angry results in scary situations.

I have been hit. I've been made to get out of a car,at night,in the middle of the country. I've been abandoned in a town,miles from my home. Screamed at. Threatened.

A soft letdown is a no. Teach your sons that.

[This message edited by HellFire at 9:40 PM, Wednesday, March 1st]

She can do whatever she wants and isn't responsible for the actions of others. I'm not victim blaming. You can come up with whatever the "lowest risk" option is and she could still get raped or killed.

This site is about infidelity and my fWW doesn't say "I'm married" in response to a come on anymore. Because she did say that and he knew it and that was all part of the fun.

Edit to add: I have personally seen, many times, girls say "I have a boyfriend" at the beginning of the night and have *them* lead a man to a secluded area for a quick consensual fuck. Don't act like it doesn't happen. If it didn't happen then "I have a boyfriend" would mean no. Does that contribute to rape culture?

Edit 2: "Adds to the illicit desire?" Of the affair. "We shouldn't be doing this" while doing it is part of the draw. The taboo/forbidden. "We" implies both people are involved here.

[This message edited by This0is0Fine at 10:00 PM, Wednesday, March 1st]

she could still get raped or killed.

And,many times,she does. I've been raped a few times. I'd bet many women here have.

You have had a few women try to explain it to you. Because it's happened to us. If you want to dismiss our experiences,and explanations, because your wife cheated and because of situations you've personally seen, that's fine.

I would hope that you teach your sons that anything other than a resounding "YES!" Means "no." It doesn't mean.."keep trying and see if she gives in."

Society is full of telling young women what they should do in order not to be raped. Yet completely ignore that we should be teaching young men not to rape.

I am through with this subject. I hope some men have read what has been written, and take it to heart. I'm out.

I'll teach my sons to give up if they receive a clear soft letdown. But I'm not going to pretend like persistence doesn't ever pay off in a consensual way or that persistence is anything similar to rape.

[This message edited by This0is0Fine at 11:25 PM, Wednesday, March 1st]

No. It’s not rape, but it is rape culture.

ThisisFine, I normally agree with a lot of what you have to say. I am NOT with you on this one.

HellFire

You have had a few women try to explain it to you. Because it's happened to us. If you want to dismiss our experiences,and explanations, because your wife cheated and because of situations you've personally seen, that's fine.

I don't believe anyone is dismissing anything and comments like this are a bit patronizing. (No offence HellFire. I appreciate all your work and comments on SI.) The various views expressed in this thread aren't mutually exclusive. This0is0Fine made some excellent points with his examples, and it doesn't dismiss anyone else's experiences or explanations.

What we've got in this thread is a very serious subject. Depending on whose statistics you look at, eighteen to twenty-five percent of women experience "date rape" or "acquaintance rape" or whatever you want to call it. One to three percent of men experience it. I had a somewhat bizarre experience with a woman in my younger days that involved aggressive behavior on her part, so I can attest that men do experience it. My wife experienced it during her college days. These events make it easier for me to understand womens perspectives regarding consent.

Let's face it, some people simply will not take no for an answer, no matter how it is presented to them. My wife (then fiancée) told her AP she was engaged...the first few times. Then she apparently said yes. Men have learned that persistence sometimes pays.

I'm not trying to invalidate anyone's experience. I'm not trying to say she absolutely must use "no I'm not interested in you" to reject men. I'm not saying a man should have sex or even physically touch a girl that hasn't said yes. I'm saying that if a woman doesn't make no clear that simply asking again is fine.

Continuing with the tea analogy, you can make her 1000 cups of tea when she gives you 1000 "not no" answers to as long as you don't make her drink any of them. What happened in OPs thread is terrible. I don't have enough facts to say with certainty "it was rape", I think more likely than not it was. I don't think he got "positive consent" but I can't prove that. I don't think she was capable of consent, and I can't prove that either.

Back to this forum and infidelity. Boundaries matter. Don't leave a window open where you ought to build a wall.

From Rothman's initial post:

My GF (27F) of 4 years came to me the morning after a party in tears and told me something "Bad" happened last night. She barely remembered the encounter - she thought it was just a kiss, and she thought she said "stop, I have a boyfriend."

If her memory is correct that she said "I have a boyfriend" then she also said "stop." That's not the least ambiguous.