Aswad
Posts: 9374
Joined: 4/4/2007 Status: offline
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Let's say 10% of the total population practices kink (for some definition thereof). That makes it outside the general norms, but there is, of course, a norm in this subpopulation. But about 10% of the kinky subpopulation practices "hard" kink (again for some definition thereof). That puts those outside the kinky norms, but there's again a norm among them. And 10% of those practice far out kinks (ditto). And so forth. Dealing with this in a court of law seems sort of absurd, because it's so arbitrary. Is the standard what one in ten do? One in a hundred? One in a thousand? One in a million? One in a billion? When discussing what is acceptable and not, we should seek to define it in two ways: (a) in terms of objective criterion, and (b) in terms of to what extent the government is allowed to decide what goes and what doesn't. The jurors, of course, are supposed to safeguard the latter (e.g. jury nullification, when called for, is an important safeguard). Personally, I would also add the question of to what extent our fellow citizens are allowed to decide stuff for us, but for the most part that's subsumed in the second question. I don't see how Jay Wiseman testifying on the norms of the top tenth, top hundredth, or whatever, of the curve will add anything to the trial, save to maybe point out that an objective definition of abuse in terms of consent isn't entirely theoretical, which doesn't strike me as difficult to explain without the need for an "expert". IWYW, — Aswad.
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"If God saw what any of us did that night, he didn't seem to mind. From then on I knew: God doesn't make the world this way. We do." -- Rorschack, Watchmen.
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