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Small-Scale Question Sunday for December 11, 2022

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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The consent framework in the west precludes those in positions of power from being able to engage in intercourse with someone under their control. Teachers and students, police and suspects, prison guards and prisoners, etc. Those are typically outright illegal. Many professions don't allow it, like professors and students, doctors and patients. Some are iffy, like a boss and employee.

There seems to also be a push, at least culturally, to label other power dynamics as invalidating consent. Like a celebrity and a fan, an older guy and a younger (but legal age) woman.

Anyways, many people who are very 'progressive' on power dynamics and consent seem to also subscribe to the idea that only white people can be racist, because racism = prejudice + power. If we accept both positions, that unequal power structures undermines consent, and that there's an unequal power structure between whites and minorities (predominantly blacks), then this should mean that all interracial sex between a black person and a white person is rape.

This sort of popped into my head over the story about some folks in California being concerned that white people may qualify for reparations, because they may have been a descendant of a rape baby. It got my thinking about how interracial relationships are typically portrayed in the media; a white male slave owner sleeping with a slave is a rapist, since the female slave obviously cannot consent due to the power dynamics. Whereas a white female slave owner (or someone adjacent to the slave owner, who still holds power over the slave, like a wife or daughter) and her male slave are portrayed as having equal ability to consent.

If we accept both positions, that unequal power structures undermines consent, and that there's an unequal power structure between whites and minorities (predominantly blacks), then this should mean that all interracial sex between a black person and a white person is rape.

There's definitely been back and forth in progressive circles about some views circling back to 1950's American Conservatism and this is absolutely one of them. Haven't seen it as much recently (could just be due to traveling in different circles, though I hope the "you've just reinvented anti-miscegenation" argument won out), but I definitely remember this coming up in progressive circles some years back, with people arguing such relationships were "problematic", but not rape (similar tone of discussion to say a 28 year old woman with a 62 year old guy- not quite willing to call it rape but people casting aspersions nonetheless). Though I'm sure someone somewhere went ahead and made the final push to the rape label.

I will say, when it came up it was almost always white guy x non-white girl and much less often white girl x non-white guy.

Whereas a white female slave owner (or someone adjacent to the slave owner, who still holds power over the slave, like a wife or daughter) and her male slave are portrayed as having equal ability to consent.

This specific scenario being the exception, I've absolutely seen this called out as the male slave being raped.