> I didn’t follow the story. Was Stallman taken out of context?
Yes. This statement of Stallman's:
> We can imagine many scenarios, but the most plausible scenario is that
she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was
being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to tell her
to conceal that from most of his associates.
has been reported in several places as Stallman saying Epstein's girls were "entirely willing", completely ignoring that he was not saying they were willing--he was saying that Epstein would have required them to say they were willing.
If you have sufficient power over someone to force them to have sex with whomever you want them to, you almost certainly also have sufficient power over them to tell them to pretend to be doing it of the own free will. Epstein was massively evil, but he wasn't massively stupid, so almost certainly would have exercised such power.
Stallman was talking about Marvin Minsky's sex with a girl at Epstein's island retreat in 2001, which was a few years before Epstein's sexual atrocities became known. Stallman was arguing that from Minsky's point of view, he probably had no reason to suspect that he was not dealing with a consenting girl.
Except for the part where he got taken to a remote island by a billionaire and was presented with a very young woman who immediately wanted to have sex with him.
You mean the island that Epstein regularly invited numerous people to in order to discuss assorted legitimate things, like supporting their charities or their research?
Epstein's island wasn't some stereotypical villain lair where anyone who steps foot on it must be up to no good. It was a place that he conducted the normal business that any entirely legitimate billionaire would conduct, in addition to the villain stuff.
Based on the girl's deposition, it looks like she was there on the record to provide massages to guests, and off the record was forced to make those erotic massages including sex. It is not clear which, if any, recipients of those massages plus sex knew that the sex was something she was forced into. There are no details given on her sex with Minsky other than it happened.
Minsky was included in a list of people that Epstein's assistant asked one of his victims to have sex with (the deposition didn't ask if sex actually occurred). In the deposition the victim couldn't remember the date they received that request, but a third party reported that they saw the victim approach Minsky in 2002 and that he turned her down and complained about it ( https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/339725/ ).
It may be the case that the witnessed event and the content of the deposition were unrelated and at different times, but if not-- the victim was also 18 at the time...
But no one really cares about the facts, this is almost entirely a ceremonial battle over who has the sickest imagination. Because there are essentially no clear details, not even a concrete allegation, everyone is essentially making things up in order to fight over them.
> Epstein’s former neighbor, the psychologist and computer scientist Roger Schank, describes another such event that he attended: a meeting of artificial-intelligence experts, organized by Marvin Minsky and held on Epstein’s island in April 2002. “Epstein walks into the conference with two girls on his arm,” said Schank. The scientists were holding their discussions in a small room, and as they talked, “[Epstein] was in the back, on a couch, hugging and kissing these girls.”
Hindsight is 20/20, scrutinizing our understanding of past events instead of making grandios assumptions is the key to realising justice. Misinterpretting the words of a man because you don't like the way they think is an injustice.
> Stallman was arguing that from Minsky's point of view, he probably had no reason to suspect that he was not dealing with a consenting girl.
"Consenting girl" is a contradiction. A child cannot legally give consent for sex. If he knew she was underage and if he had sex with her anyway, that was criminal.
She wasn't underage. The age of consent was 16 at the time there. It was raised to 18 later, in the Child Protection Act of 2002.
If you are traveling, and there is any possibility you will engage in any sexual activities outside your home area, it is a good idea to check the destination's laws. If you forget this and just assume they are the same, you can get screwed (no pun intended), regardless of if the age of consent is higher or lower at your destination.
If it is higher, you might inadvertently commit statutory rape with someone who is clearly old enough back home and so doesn't trigger your "do an age check" alarm.
If it is lower, you might run afoul of laws back home against against sex tourism.
(Pay attention to recreational drug laws, too. Sex and drugs are both things that are taken vary seriously. Most other things tourists might do aren't nearly as risky--nobody except maybe Singapore is going to make a big deal of it if you, say, improperly dispose of a food wrapper or something like that. Oh, and also be careful with religion).
The age of consent is 16 in 31 US states and the DC (including Massachusetts). It s 17 in 8 states. It is 18 in the remaining 11 states.
It's 18 in Mexico, 16 in Canada, ranges all over the place from 14 to 18 in South America, 13 to 21 in Asia, 14 to 18 in Europe, and 11 to 18 in Africa.
It also varies widely whether or not places have close-in-age exceptions (also known as Romeo and Juliet laws). Such an exception might, for example, might say that in a place with an age of consent of 18, a 16 or 17 year old can consent to sex if the other participants are under 21. Don't assume that because you are young that you don't have to worry about other young people's age.
Finally, it also varies widely by what kind of sex. There are places where they have close-in-age exceptions, but only for heterosexual acts, and so a 17 year old girl with a 17 year old boy is fine, given an age of consent of 18, but a 17 year old boy with another 17 year old boy is statutory rape by both of them because the close-in-age exception doesn't apply.
Yes. This statement of Stallman's:
> We can imagine many scenarios, but the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to tell her to conceal that from most of his associates.
has been reported in several places as Stallman saying Epstein's girls were "entirely willing", completely ignoring that he was not saying they were willing--he was saying that Epstein would have required them to say they were willing.
If you have sufficient power over someone to force them to have sex with whomever you want them to, you almost certainly also have sufficient power over them to tell them to pretend to be doing it of the own free will. Epstein was massively evil, but he wasn't massively stupid, so almost certainly would have exercised such power.
Stallman was talking about Marvin Minsky's sex with a girl at Epstein's island retreat in 2001, which was a few years before Epstein's sexual atrocities became known. Stallman was arguing that from Minsky's point of view, he probably had no reason to suspect that he was not dealing with a consenting girl.