Chapters 167-169: Fractal Therapy
Aella on trauma narratives. Also, Aella’s survey regarding your opinions as to what counts as rape
For next week — 170-173
170. On Treating With Dragons
171. Blood is Thicker Than Water
172. Respec
173. Passions
Cakoluchiam’s stellar Character Sheet
Steven’s Predictions – Everything is a Clue
Worth the Candle can be read at AO3 or RoyalRoad.
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“Your mouth’s telling me no~
“But your body!~ Your body is telling me yes~!”
-R. Kelly, Bump N’ Grind, somewhat adapted
Disclaimer: Not a lawyer.
I believe the legal concept you’re describing is mens rea, the mental intent to commit a crime. And yes, because of that, ignorance of the law is totally an excuse, unless you are in a situation where knowledge of the law would reasonably be expected. Wikipedia has a good summary.
But I think the more striking example is childhood. For instance, in my country of Germany, people under the age of 14 are just fundamentally incapable of being culpable of a crime, I believe largely because it’s their parents’ fault, who have a duty of oversight, but also because they are not yet socialized and educated to an extent that they can be expected to have a sufficiently adult understanding of social norms.
“No means no” is a great example of that. I would argue that in fact no *doesn’t* mean no, but rather it means “no means no.” For instance, if a child runs inside with their shoes on and I yell “nooo, now I have to clean up”, this has a totally different meaning of “no” than Joon’s “no” in that chapter. The meaning of “no” in sex in particular, is a product of centuries of cultural evolution and discussion around consent.
But Bethel is not socialized into human society. So in our world there’s a huge amount of cultural work and shared understanding around the idea of saying no in sex, that seems to be at least somewhat mirrored in Aerb, that Bethel has had zero exposure to. In that sense, I would consider her infantile rather than negligent.
Actually specifically in Germany Ignorance is NOT an excuse. Feeping Creature hasn’t read the Constitution it seems.