[claudiawerner]

Ah, I did think he used it somewhere but I must have missed it, you're right. But in this case he is not referring to a moral principle as much as a terminological point. "Absolutely wrong" here refers to rhetoric and writing, it's not clear to me that he thinks people who use the term "sexual assault" in an accusation are morally bankrupt.

[eesmith]

Nor did I claim it was in reference to a moral principle. I wrote specifically about his terminological point, which is clearly incorrect, saying:

> The thing is, the current law backs their interpretation that this is sexual assault, or at the very least would be some some jurisdictions.

> Hence, his personal view that it's absolutely unreasonable is bogus.

You misread Stallman, and misread me, which makes it hard to have any sort of discussion.

[claudiawerner]

I said:

>Why? He is making direct reference to the fact he thinks the law is problematic. He thinks it's morally absurd. It is very likely that you, too, have issues with the way certain laws are defined.

The context of this is that he thinks there is a moral problem with someone being able to provide sex without it being classified as assault at 18 but not at 17. We are talking about a moral principle here. You responded to this point (by quoting me asking "Why?") with:

>Hence, his personal view that it's absolutely unreasonable is bogus.

I believe we're still talking about a moral principle when you introduce the word "absolutely". My response to that, in turn, was:

>Firstly, it is not as "absolute" as you make it sound. Nowhere does he actually use that word or imply that his moral judgements are handed down from heaven. He explicitly says "I think" - and as a moral claim, it only requires as much justification as our other moral claims, which all reduce to "ought", which cannot be gained from an "is".

The whole time the usage of the word "absolute" in the way I referred to it in my last quote has been in reference to what Stallman thinks of morality, and my claim is that he does not consider it "absolutely immoral" or anything else "absolute". This is because he prefaces it with "I think", but also because he just doesn't use that word when speaking about morality. The fact he uses the word in another context, namely the notion of accusation inflation, has nothing to do with his metaethics.

[eesmith]

I don't care about his personal morality, or metaethics, and I'm certainly not talking about his moral position.

His email had:

> The term “sexual assault” is so vague and slippery that it facilitates accusation inflation: taking claims that someone did X and leading people to think of it as Y, which is much worse than X.

The term "sexual assault" is no more vague and slippery than "copyright infringement." Sure, there are edge cases, but "sexual assault" in general means "any nonconsensual sexual act proscribed by Federal, tribal, or State law, including when the victim lacks capacity to consent". https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/34/12291#a_27 (34 U.S. Code § 12291 (29)).

Is that so hard to understand?

This isn't a moral question, this is a legal definition.

Why it is not reasonable, under the generally understood US legal definition, to use the phrase "sexual assault" with sex between a 73-year old man and a woman under the age of consent?

Why is it not reasonable, under the generally understood US legal definition, to use the phrase "sexual assault" when describing sex with a sex slave who is not meaningfully able to give consent?

He may not consider the age-of-consent laws to be morally justifiable. That's all well and good. I'm not arguing that point, which is the one you bring up.

But it doesn't change the fact that "sexual assault" is the correct legal term here, so his personal beliefs don't matter.

He then goes on to write:

> The word “assaulting” presumes that he applied force or violence, in some unspecified way, but the article itself says no such thing.

There are two points here. Stallman could have criticized the original email for using the term 'assaulting' (which can mean physical assault), instead of the correct legal term "sexual assault". He did not.

Instead, he coupled the physical aspect of "assaulting" with "sexual assault" and used that to construct his own definition of what sexual assault means - one which is different from the generally understood US legal definition.

That he may not like the term - great. He doesn't like "intellectual property" because he doesn't think copyright, patents, and trademark should be thought of the same as physical "property". I can understand that argument. But here he's not arguing like he even knows what the current widely-accepted legal term means, before wanting to tear it down.

I've even (elsewhere in these comments) pointed to the US military law, at https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/920 as an example of a place in US law which distinguishes between 'rape' and 'sexual assault (not all jurisdictions do that). Go to it and see that it's rape which has the association with force or violence:

  (a)Rape.—Any person subject to this chapter who commits a sexual act 
     upon another person by—
    (1) using unlawful force against that other person;
    (2) using force causing or likely to cause death or grievous bodily
      harm to any person;
    (3) threatening or placing that other person in fear that any person
      will be subjected to death, grievous bodily harm, or kidnapping,
      and *sexual assault* which does not.
     ..

while

  (b)Sexual Assault.—Any person subject to this chapter who— 
    ...
    (2) commits a sexual act upon another person—
      (A) without the consent of the other person; or

He sounds like a kook making up his own naive definitions and forcing them on everyone else, when the question of what "sexual assault" means was worked out long ago, and at least for this case is not vague and slippery. Just because he's ignorant of the law doesn't mean that he's worth listening to.

He knows a bunch of lawyers - why didn't he do his homework first, and talk with them?

You point to his moral views on rape, which indeed is prefaced with "I think". But none of my argument has anything to do with his views on rape.

Instead, I'm criticizing:

> I’ve concluded from various examples of accusation inflation that it is absolutely wrong to use the term “sexual assault” in an accusation.

Quoting the Big Libowski - 'That's just like, your opinion, man'.

It's such a low grade opinion, farcically wrong given the people who are literally accused, in the legal system, of sexual assault, that it reveals something deeply wrong with Stallman's understanding of the entire topic. Here's one lawsuit accusing sexual assault - https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.flsd.557135... .

If it really wants to tear down and replace the legal framework concerning sexual assault, he shot himself in both feet with his effort.