gattsuru
5hr ago
Because the scoring is arbitrary and the score-keepers are readily politically captured. A transman who wins a sprint either has the time or doesn't. A transwoman who beats wins the Miss America pageant could have impressed judges with interviews, swimsuit, and evening dress... or have had judges feeling they could Prove The Chuds Wrong. Hell, even if she genuinely does win with the judges, it's quite possible or even likely, that none of the things that won the race will appeal to a social conservative audience, even if you could somehow force them to be honest with a magical spell.
((uh, most sports. A transman might have a biological advantage over cis guys in some gunnie-related sports, though the data is controversial.))
Meanwhile, the philosophy that this is just some distraction that doesn't matter runs headfirst into the 'fine, then let me win' problem. It probably does have some strategic value, and I'd argue that social conservatives should actually try to investigate what (though I don't like them on this topic well enough to do their work for them), but social conservatives can tell it does from progressive actions, without having to delve into whether it's the scholarships, ability to claim what's attractive to men at young women, ammo for the 'this is how things really are' arguments in courts and to regulatory agencies, or just a new avenue to claim anti-trans people aren't 'really' straight.
I don't think it matters, but if you want to persuade people who do, you need to at least attempt the basics of understanding what motivates them.
gattsuru
12hr ago
Yeah, there's similar drives behind surrogacy debates, and toward the gay mentor/'uncle' stuff comes from similar sources for men who can't have kids by blood.
It's... not a great situation. Even the best-case scenario for a 'down low' gay guy in a het marriage -- a wife that's aware and accepting, the guy being able to hit her needs, and a limited number of external partners that aren't Catching Feelings -- there's a tendency for them to kinda detonate as often as they work out. And most don't really achieve that level of openness, either out of fear or cowardice about coming clean to the wife, or inability to think with their bigger head if they try to button it up.
gattsuru
12hr ago
I will caution that what's tasty to humans and what's tasty to dogs (or, worse, cats) are very separate fields. There's an ongoing joke/bet/trial thing in the furry fandom where people will try to eat dog treats, there's some that are 'just not great' and there's others that are 'I hope you have a barf bag nearby'. No idea where this would fall.
gattsuru
13hr ago
It's definitely not a job title, but I'm reminded of ACLU Legal Observers, where the point is to observe and document the legal interactions at a protest, either between protesters and police, or protesters and counter-protesters. In theory, they're supposed to specifically be separate from the protest even if they're associated with the protestors, though sometimes they get very hands-on.
That said, I can't find good or trustworthy information on the status here.
gattsuru
16hr ago
They'll probably have a better idea than I do, given what it sounds like they're up for from the last talk, but from my understanding:
It varies from person to person, and some people just can't manage to plan a more discreet approach, without the ability to set up something like a hourly motel room (eg, if a wife can access his credit card statements) or bath house (eg, if you don't want to be seen in a bath house). There's a lot of drama around 'can host' as a result, here, in grindr sphere spaces. Possibly including this guy, given the whole 'I'm Tots Straight In Monogamous Het Relationship' bit.
... but for those with it as a kink, it seems pretty overtly about the risk of potentially getting caught, the violation of norms, and the degradation. So the stuff that's a problem for you (or me!) is part of the point in the fantasy.
direct link to the MTPS report. On one hand:
In his police statement Mr A said that when he had received a message from Dr Stefan asking him to meet in the woods and a photo of an erect penis, he had replied that he did not randomly meet with strangers and liked to get to know people first, nor did he do things in public. When Dr Stefan suggested meeting places, Mr A said that he had replied that they could have a chat and get to know each other. Mr A said to Dr Stefan that it was a good thing that they were not looking to do anything private as he was quite loud. Mr A said that this had been a joke.
Mr A's claims might just be a 'the lady doth protest too much' and the board had to pretend to believe it. My gut check is that Mr A probably wanted to actually get a name and more conversation than is typically allowed in men's restrooms, rather than being entirely against screwing in toilets, and that's a kinda arbitrary dividing line, but the direct summary is a lot more candid than I'd expect from a group trying to paper over anonymous sex between professionals. The 'just bros washing hands' defense is hilariously threadbare, but someone being down for action and yet not wanting to have a fully-stripped man trying to get them into a stall with nothing more than a handwave, even if just because they would have rathered move to a supply closet or something.
If so, it's a weird rule, but honestly, I've seen weirder.
That said, I'd point to something else:
When Mr A entered the toilets that day, he said that one of the three cubicles was occupied. Therefore, he waited a couple of minutes, and no one emerged. Mr A stated that he approached the door and opened the door to see a man who was quite tanned and around the age of 36 to 38. In his interview with the Trust Mr A had stated that Dr Stefan had opened the door and his statement to the police, he maintained that he had heard a toilet door unlock, he waited around 2-3 minutes, the toilet door had then opened, and Mr A had seen a hand come and gesture towards him. Mr A had maintained this in his statement to the GMC, in that he had seen a hand come around the cubicle door. In his oral evidence, Mr A further clarified that after he had been in the toilet for a minute or two, Dr Stefan had put his hand out of the cubicle and gestured for him to enter the occupied cubicle. Mr A said that when he went over to the cubicle and peered inside, he could see that Dr Stefan was naked and playing with his penis in an attempt to make it erect. Mr A said that he could see Dr Stefan’s scrubs hanging on the cubicle door.
Ms H recalled that Mr A said that the incident had taken place in the toilets near the north entrance of C Level of the Hospital, which is the second floor of the Hospital. She said that Mr A told her that while in the toilets, the man had walked out of the toilet cubicle and was naked. Ms H said that she and her colleague were shell shocked at this.
[Mrs J] said that Mr A had told her that he had arranged to meet this doctor in the toilets in the Hospital, and although Mr A may have told her which toilets, she could not recall. Ms J said that when they met, Mr A and the doctor may have spoken, and then the doctor acted inappropriately, however she could not recall the details. She said it may have been that the doctor dropped his trousers and told Mr A to get on his knees. Ms J recalled that Mr A had said that he was frightened and ran out of the toilets.
Ms K said that Mr A told her and her colleague that a doctor dragged him into a toilet and assaulted him. She said that Mr A did not explain what he meant by being dragged or assaulted and thought that he felt embarrassed that it happened, ashamed, and scared that he could not say anything because no one would believe him because he was young
There's some discrepancies, here. I'd expect as much of them are Mr. A giving more palatable explanations for the sequence of events to his interlocutors or reinterpretations by the listeners (especially given the gender he was reporting to!), as are the more conventional hearsay problem where recollections change over translation and time. In particular, the bits where Mr. A can't seem to remember who opened the stall door... well, I'm gonna guess that Mr. A did, and he wasn't doing it to ask if anyone wanted to hear the good word.
But even the scenario that looks best for Dr. Stefan, he's coming across as... more than porn-level aggressive, even by the low standards of cottaging. I mean that quite literally; even in pornography (or drawn porn) where the pragmatic concerns can be left fully ignored, you're pretty likely to see people pretty deep in coitus with more clothes on than that. I'm sure there's people who sign up for it, don't get me wrong! But I don't think it's even necessarily what someone who gave a thumbs-up to "want sum fuk" grindr message would involve.
This seems common to one of the other allegations: Mr B's allegations seem to be reported as just 'groping', but the full summary has what started out as some consensual kisses and turning into:
Mr B confirmed that no words were used but it was inferred in the form of eye contact and holding out his penis. Mr B said that he tried to ignore Dr Stefan and at that point, he was encouraged further to do so with the words ‘go on’. Mr B said that Dr Stefan tried to persuade him to suck his penis. Mr B said these were the only words used. Mr B said that Dr Stefan pulled down his trousers slightly and began moaning whilst masturbating himself next to Mr B.
That's not in a restroom, but in what looks to be some sort of examination or procedure room. So basically what we're proposing that the MTPS doesn't want to admit happens.
It's the action scene from a porn flick, but without the setup or reciprocity of Lemon-Stealing Whores. I can't tell from the report where the review board was using a very loose definition of consensual for the earlier kisses, if Dr. Stefan was just cranking his hog at random guys and only the gay ones were willing to testify or complain, or if there was more backstory behind the kiss, but optimistically it's a guy pushing a relationship as hard as he can.
Which is probably the bigger driver. I dunno exactly what the UK's exact rules are, but in the United States, the rules-as-written are usually some variants of prohibiting on-the-clock sex period and off-the-clock relationships within a chain of command, and the rules-as-practiced are "don't make me go over there" and "the squeaky wheel gets the grease". That's not necessarily an unreasonable thing for an organization to do: as annoying (and potentially gross) as employees shagging might get, the actual meat-and-potatoes of enforcing a ban on such things is just impractical if they aren't actually interfering with work or leaving suspicious stains.
But then there's a problem, and both the assailant and the victims are in violation of the rules-as-written, if you ask too hard or too loud. One answer is to let justice ride, and to hell with the consequences, and that's died with modern social media if it survived the 90s; another is to just bask in the inconsistency, and sometimes that works if it's convenient enough.
The easier answer is to not ask stupid questions, and not hear stupid answers, at least in any way that requires writing them down. Any question about how many times Mr A has used the mysterious XXX App while on the clock would be off-topic, and slut-shaming besides. The inquiry isn't about him, and had it not been necessary to support Mr A's written documentation I doubt we'd have seen even the few references here.
It's... not a good compromise, like anywhere else where the contradiction between the rules and the policies are in high tension, not least of all because no one, probably not even the MTPS board here, can really spell out what the actual rules-as-practiced are. But it's a compromise that beats most BATNA, and takes no real negotiation itself.
gattsuru
18hr ago
Eh... in the sense that if a sizable minority of a population does something, you probably will end up with a (recognized) word for it, maybe? But then it's 'standard' for men to get fucked by other men, because we have the word 'gay'. Even for definitions of standard where that's not wrong, it's not really clear.
((And there's a lot of things we have words for that are pretty uncommon, but I don't think we need to dive down the vore hole now.))
gattsuru
19hr ago
That's fair, and why I put it as a quibble more than any real disagreement. I have had people who assumed it was so common as to be a rite of passage, so it's something I prefer to have more specifics about.
gattsuru
19hr ago
I'd quibble a bit about 'perfectly normal'. Even for Grindrites, cottaging isn't a standard behavior, and I'd bet a sizable amount of money that >50% of gay guys haven't cottaged ever, and a smaller bet that around 80% either haven't or have only done so rarely and in non-central examples (eg, screwing in the restrooms of a gay club after you've danced with the guy for ten minutes). In addition to the safety and privacy concerns, or the various problems of preparation, it's also just a hilariously uncomfortable kink, and there's ways to execute on the kink side without busting your knees to hell and back.
But I could believe it's a 10-20% thing, and it's a slang that most gay guys either know or know under a different name, so it is a quibble. And there's a lot of other less-immediately-squicky stuff that's still definitely very far from the Hallmark-style "love is love" gay life-as-greeting card. I think there's ways to make these things compatible -- there's more than a few self-identified 'sluts' with lower body counts than the average straight guy and saccharine-level relationships with their husband, who enjoys orgies or partner swaps a couple times a year with the same close friends -- but that's not all of the sluts, and not even interesting to many of them.
Mr. B doing some administrative task while in the same room as a Dr codes as young intern to me (and his included writing, like 'not very slay' codes as very young), but you'd know far better than I how the UK medical norms on that go. Doesn't necessarily mean Dr. Stefan was looking especially young as chickenhawks go, but could be part of it.
Agreed that it's a hilariously bad as an excuse, even assuming Mr. A was genuinely derpy enough to have bought Grindr's 'it's a social meeting app' spiel.
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