really, they win both ways: they can claim that isn't what they meant, when what they meant is nowhere to be found in the legislation they actually passed. and, they can lay the blame for "misinterpretation" of the law on "activist" liberal judges, who should, by god, be replaced with good, god-fearing, conservative "activist" judges!

when the dust settles, the average constituent just hasn't a clue what their elected representative is really up to, but they know it's good, because their boy/girl tells them so.

writing a law that said exactly what it means is damn hard work, and not nearly as much fun as a 30 second sound bite. don't expect one anytime soon, from any state legislative body, or congress.

out of curiousity, what's it called if, just as the guy is orgasming, the woman says to stop? further, if the guy isn't wearing a condom, wouldn't that be sort of obvious, before penetration? as well, is "btw, i'm HIV positive" a sweet nothing normally whispered into a partner's ear, while in deep coitus?

He is convicted of rape, but the case is on appeal and the appeals court has ruled in his favor, but the state is still fighting.

The article says that during deliberations, the jury asks the judge "if it was rape if a female changed her mind during the sex to which she consented and the man continued until climax. The judge said it was for them to decide."

However, I believe the answer should have been, "Usually, no."  The reason is that most men ejaculate within 90 seconds of insertion and they are not in control of ejaculation and no one responds immediately to any instruction.

I was in a car accident once in which a fellow had made a left turn directly in front of oncoming traffic and it turned out that the oncoming traffic was me.  

How many seconds was it before I hit the brakes?  The issue never came to court.
Was it more than one and less than 10?  Probably.  Was it minimal reaction time?  No.  Was I expecting such an action on his part?  No; I could hardly believe it.

And prosecutors will overcharge the poor and dark, and bargain down (or charge down) the rich and white, and just make a bad situation worse.

The same error which drives the Iraq misadventure, the concentration and torture camps, the capital punishment "must kill more" imperative, and Megan's Laws and their expansions (pick a law with some girl's name - it's almost certainly some "Get Tough on Crime" measure) is driving the banishment of sex offenders and offender lists - the desire for retribution and to put as many people under the whip (of the criminal justice system) as possible.  Were that not the case, how can one explain the "every federal arrestee must now give DNA, regardless of guilt or innocence" law?

The solution is not to accept the frame of having and living with sex offender lists (which inevitably expand), but rather to restore some level of sanity to the whole criminal code, and get off the idea that by making something a crime and locking the perp away we will do anything more than provide lifetime employment for those desperate enough, or cruel enough, to choose prison guard as a profession.

i have a sneaking suspicion, with absolutely no empirical data to support it, that the vast majority of these kinds of cases are going to be between two people who do not regularly have sex with each other. not necessarily strangers mind you, just that they don't have the kind of ongoing sexual relationship that a married couple, or long-term lovers would have.

this is an important, yet completely overlooked factor. people in ongoing sexual relationships are better able to stop when asked to, than those that aren't. why is this, you ask? simply put, it's the "excitement" factor. having sex with a relatively, or totally new partner, is far more exciting, than is sex with a regular partner. not better, just more exciting.

it's likely to be far more difficult to stop on a dime, with a new partner, than one you're used to. yeah, i know it sounds sexist, but it's a fact of life. you can't legislate away facts of life.

It is pretty easy to find the following information, documented by university professors
or academic studies:

1) persons who are hypnotized show an absent or diminished pupil contraction response.  That is, if you have hypnotized a person, you can shine a flashlight into his eye or eyes.  The result when the individual is in normal consciousness is that the pupils contract to reduce the light coming in.  If the person is hypnotized, this response will be entirely absent in some individuals or diminished, in others.  See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypnotism

2) Charles Tart of the UC, Davis wrote

There are enormous individual differences in the particular configuration of our ordinary d-SoC, differences, which are generally not too noticeable because we are trained to behave in similar, socially acceptable ways. Similarly there are probably enormous differences in the particular manifestations of the sexual d-SoC across individuals. Indeed, there might be several discrete sexual states of consciousness possible for a given individual, or depth levels within such d-SoCs (see Tart, 1972a; 1975). For example, the d-ASC experience during orgasm can be extremely different from the d-ASC of high sexual arousal prior to orgasm. Because of these individual differences, we must be careful about generalizations, although lack of knowledge about individual differences forces me to speak generally at this time. . .

As an extreme, a man and woman may be engaged in sexual intercourse, but the physiological sensations each one receives feed almost immediately into ongoing fantasy structures so that each is lost in his or her own internal world . . .
http://www.paradigm-sys.com/ctt_articles2.cfm?id=70

Causes other than religious beliefs, such as illnesses and accidents, can result in altered states of consciousness or mystical experiences.

Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772)

Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772), the Swedish scientist and scholar, also claimed to have experienced mystical experiences in the form of dreams. These episodes began at the age of fifty-six. In these dreams he traveled to spiritual planes such as heaven and hell where he claimed to have spoken with Jesus, and God, and spirits of the dead which he referred to as angels. Also, he claimed to have seen the order of the universe. He continued spending most of the remainder of his life taking these spiritual journeys usually in a light sleep or trance which sometimes lasted as long as three days. As a result of these trips his spiritual views differed greatly from orthodox Christianity. His views were published in several books.

Edgar Cayce (1877-1945)

Edgar Cayce (1877-1945) sometimes called the "sleeping prophet" gave prophetic, healing, and karmic readings in a light-sleep state similar to that of Swedenborg. Cayce put himself into a hypnotic trance while lying down and then gave personal readings. He helped heal many persons this way by describing their ailments and then prescribing what the person should do in the form of treatment. He gave many karmic readings telling about the lost continent of Atlantis and other ancient places. Frequently when giving solitary readings Cayce would have the person taking down his reading tap him to prevent him from going into a deeper sleep.

http://www.hermes-press.com/Perennial_Tradition/altstates.htm

 In 1956, James Olds reported on research in which he had electrically stimulated the brains of rats. Implanting electrodes in rats' pleasure center of the brain, he attached a device that allowed the rats to activate the electrical impulse. He found that the rats would become so obsessed with self-stimulation that they would literally starve to death. . .

various simple studies show that simple distractions such as tuning a radio or talking on a cell phone may increase reaction time by as much as 50% . . .

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11829018/from/RSS/

"This study joins a growing body of research showing that 'freeing up the hands' does not result in faster brake response times," said Jonathan Levy of the University of California, San Diego.

The reason, according to a study last year, is that the human brain struggles to look and listen at the same time. . .

If it starts to hurt, or there's no protection, and he doesn't pull out, it may be unwanted sex at that point but it's not rape.

At what point does it change from unwanted sex back into rape?  According to the Maryland decision, consent, once given, can never be taken back.  So, if a man starts choking his partner, or decides to penetrate her in some place or way she has not consented to, like say, with a broken bottle, or a burning cigarette, she cannot withdraw her consent.  It'll be interesting to see how that plays out.  If a woman has consensual, even willing sex with her partner, and he decides to share her with twelve of his closest friends, would that initial consent render his actions legal?  I would also like to know what you consider the difference is between "unwanted sex" and "rape".  For most people, I would guess that "unwanted sex" is something you don't mind too much whereas "rape" is the sort of thing you go to the ER for.