Hello, How can you know if someone truly wants sex or not? I know that the person; - needs to be sober - isn't allowed to be pressured - 'yes' doesn't mean 'yes' But what if merely asking 'would you like to have sex?' is pressuring for them, or they've truly meant saying 'yes' but claim months later it wasn't. Thank-you.
You cannot. That's why you have to rely what they say. If they say "yes", they are able to consent (ie an adult who are not "feeble minded" and awake), are not under the influence of mind altering drugs such as alcohol, are not being coerced or manipulated and there are no other compelling reasons to believe they don't mean it then the yes alone is consent good enough for me. Naturally they are free to withdraw the consent at any time.
But what if they decide to withdraw the consent six months later, even though the consentual sex act had already taken place? I'm not sure why this is classed as rape, you're not going to know if someone is going to withdraw consent six months in the future over something that's happening at that moment. I'm not sure what to do in this situation? Is filming of the consent allowed [not the sex]? Or is that considered manipulation? What if I don't have reason to believe they don't want it, and are saying 'yes' merely to get me in trouble for rape later? Sorry for all these questions, it seems confusing.
If they consented to having sex and decide six months later they withdraw that consent, it wouldn't be allowed in a court of law. You can't withdraw previous consent for an action that's already taken place and if for some reason someone wants to place a rape charge on you, which is not all that common, it's not going to be easy to prove that you didn't have their consent. In a court of law you have - and I'm certain it's the same in England - you have to show evidence that the victim was pressured, under the influence of drugs or alcohol, given no choice but to comply by verbal or phsyical threats, or otherwise harmed and forced to perform. I'm not sure about England but in the US rape cases have a statue of limitations and after five years, no one an press charges. The reason for this is because after so much time has passed, it's nearly impossible to have evidence. It's even difficult to prove real victims of rape were raped unless they went to the police directly afterwards, but some don't because they feel scared or ashamed or don't want to go through court, and if one is a female or perceived as a female, a lot of people say you were asking for it if you said this, or you dress provacatively, and so on. Which is still wrong because sex is required to have consent no matter how one acts or dresses. So in other words, you should be safe and I don't know why you would be concerned that someone would want to get you in trouble. However, some people are unfortunately like that. But if someone you know you think might do this maybe you have a trust issue with them or maybe you should just avoid sex completely until you find a reliable partner/relationship.
Even if they withdrew the consent right after sex it's still not a rape. BTW, one cannot withdraw consent after the act has taking place. That's called having regrets. The thing is that if you are concerned that your sex partner might pull something like that and cause you trouble perhaps you should not have sex with them in the first place.
