Barbara Ellen said that “consent should happen before sex, not during or after” (“How to Have Sex broke my heart: it shows that consent is still a hazy concept”, Comment). Yes, consent absolutely should be ascertained between all participating parties before engaging in sex, but consent does not end there.
Consent is an ongoing process, it is not a box to be ticked, or, as Ellen puts it, “banked” as a get-out clause that enables anyone to do anything that they subsequently wish, because “hey, you said ‘yes’, remember?”
It should be absolutely clear to all that anyone participating in any sexual encounter can withdraw consent at any point and feel confident that their choice will be respected. Nor should consent given on one occasion subsequently be considered to be “transferable”, either between different encounters with the same partner or encounters with different partners.
Poor understanding of consent has contributed to defence counsels exploiting individuals’ past sexual histories in rape and sexual assault cases to the detriment of the legal system.
Brody D Ehsem
Ashton-under-Lyne,
Greater Manchester
Barbara Ellen broaches a very important acknowledgement of the still perilous landscape of sexual consent in our culture. To add to her comments, there is a notable silence in our discussions of consent regarding the issue of mental ill health.
I suffered a manic episode a year ago. When I was clearly not acting myself (and also intoxicated), a couple I had known and trusted for many years opportunistically engaged me in sex.
I was admitted to a psychiatric hospital soon after. This rape has been the most traumatic aspect of living with bipolar disorder. One of my assailants was employed at the local rape crisis centre, destroying a lot of my institutional trust or willingness to report. Not many people acknowledge that individuals cannot give consent when they are mentally unwell.
Mental illness makes us vulnerable to exploitation and sexual assault. We need to raise awareness that this is a category of impairment that belongs alongside intoxication, and that the trauma of sexual assaults perpetrated against the mentally ill is often dismissed as being “just something you did while you weren’t yourself”.
Name and address supplied
China’s role in Gaza
Simon Tisdall indicated that China is using the Gaza conflict to try to “isolate” the US and its allies (“How two-faced Xi Jinping is exploiting war in Gaza to beget China’s new order”, World News).
He did not address the problem that the US created this vulnerability with its atrocious, decades-long policies in the Middle East. It has enabled Israel’s impunity with respect to so many international laws and norms.
It was the Biden administration’s efforts to further marginalise the Palestinians by pursuing the normalisation of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia that led Hamas to attack Israel. American (and British) incompetence in the region is the source of many of the Middle East’s problems. Western meddling has not helped resolve the Israel/Palestine conflict. A “new order” might just be what the region needs.
Shaun Narine, Political Science Department, St Thomas University,
Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada
Having read “An experts’ guide to the Israel-Palestine conflict” (New Review) on Remembrance Sunday, I then looked at my late father-in-law’s framed service medals on the kitchen wall – medals awarded for landing at Pegasus Bridge on D-Day in 1945 and later for serving in Palestine in 1948 – I wonder how many others, like me, simultaneously feel both deep pride and deep sorrow about Britain’s role in these two conflicts.
Bill Britnell
Shrewsbury, Shropshire
Self-serve is no service at all
“Machinery is rendering shopping into a soulless, isolating experience, but at last one supermarket is bucking the trend,” says Yvonne Roberts (Comment), but it’s not just loneliness that many of us suffer. At my last visit to a supermarket there was a long queue at the only staffed till while the bank of self-serve checkouts stood empty. We oldies are voting with our feet!
Shopping for many of us is challenging enough with arthritic hands, painful backs and low energy levels, but to then serve yourself and pack it all away is asking too much. Well done to Booths for bucking the trend. Can we have one in Ramsbottom, please?
Bob Dawson
Greenmount, Greater Manchester
Secrets of sourdough
In “Bread of heaven: why we love a loaf (Focus), Rachel Cooke correctly identified sourdough as a long-established (some say timeless) way of making bread, rather than a passing trend.
However, sourdough is portrayed as a type or style of bread, when it’s a process. A sourdough starter culture can be used to create any type of bread that can be made using baker’s yeast. This includes panettone, brioche, naan, bagel, shokupan, croissant – the list continues around the globe. Yes, even a squishy, white sandwich loaf.
We do agree that some products marketed as sourdough are overpriced. Supermarkets (and some other crafty bakers) have a tendency to slap the word on products manufactured by other means – what we call sourfaux.
Chris Young, coordinator,
The Real Bread Campaign, London E2
Why not a white poppy?
If Stewart Lee (“I’m not sure I feel comfortable pinning a poppy to my cagoule this year”, New Review) still has qualms about wearing a British Legion poppy next year, perhaps he might look up the Peace Pledge Union and wear one of its white poppies instead.
Duncan Grimmond
Markington, Harrogate,
North Yorkshire
Stone the Crows
May I take this opportunity of correcting my error in ascribing political protests to the Stone the Crows Morris side (“Hey nonny no, Suella”, Letters). Stone the Crows is an apolitical group, while Brigantii Border Morris is explicitly political, having been formed in response to fracking initiatives. Apologies to Stone the Crows.
Austen Lynch
Garstang, Lancashire
