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comment by WorLord
WorLord  ·  4045 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Rape Is Caused by Rapists, Not by Underage Drinking

Ah, I see. I was confused, and I apologize: I did think cases A and B were the same case, that's my mistake.

Case Z would be what I've been talking about (more like railing against).

That said, I see now why A and B are interesting to you.

If B is as you present it, then I disagree with the groupthink there, as in every other criminal avenue we view inebriated people as responsible for the horrible acts they commit under the influence. In fact, we often ratchet the severity up if one does something horrible in an altered state, and criminalize otherwise legal acts if they attempt to be done drunk (like driving). That should be the case in B, and that it isn't displays a double-standard regarding responsibility and inebriation that I can only describe as "breathtaking".

On the other hand, I find it is common to have less sympathy for inebriated people who hurt themselves or otherwise get themselves into bad situations then would normally be felt if those people were sober. I often view this as reasonable, and share the sentiment, so I can't say that I disagree with A at all. I disagree that it is somehow sexist to point out that she had a hand in her own undoing, or to suggest that the situation may well not have come to pass were she sober.

On your last sentence, I think we've actually come to some sort of agreement, as my entire gripe against zero-sum responsibility is that it reduces things to a numbers game whereas percentages of responsibility don't make any real (or even mathematical) sense otherwise. I mean yeah, you can try to do it, but if you did you'd very realistically have situations wherein the sum total of all blame to go 'round could very well be something like 487%, and that's just a silly and useless way of looking at it.