Close the voluntary intoxication loophole

To the editor:

With the spotlight on the alleged gang rape of a Cornell student and the voluntary intoxication loophole that hindered the prosecution of those accused of attacking her, more attention is now being given to why the New York State Assembly won't pass legislation that would eliminate this problem.

     We are told that this bill is blocked because Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie won't allow it to be brought to a vote. But it is sponsored by 96 Assemblymembers. That is a clear majority that would pass it.

     Likewise, if Assemblymembers really want to enact it so badly, they have enough votes to replace Heastie with a speaker who would bring it to a vote. Do many of these lawmakers really not want to pass it and simply want Heastie to take the blame?

     The voluntary intoxication loophole never made moral sense. The whole idea that it's alright to rape a woman if she's not sober should boggle the mind of any decent person.

     Another issue arises when the woman's response to someone describing what happened as gang rape was "That's the first time I had heard the narrative change that I wasn't a whore and that I was assaulted." That raises the whole sexist double standard.

     Any man who had consensual sex with seven women would be called lucky. But if a woman has consensual sex with seven men, she's called a whore. Nobody, regardless of their sex, should be disrespected for having consensual sex with multiple partners.

Richard Warren