Transgender woman jailed for deception sex assault

Someone has been sexual assaulted because they did not have informed consent. They were led to believe something that would have fundamentally changed their views on sexual contact with that person.

And people in here are acting like its not a big deal.

I’m not sure if that is because Male sexual assault is treated as a joke, people wanting to defend a trans person no matter what, or a bit of both.

Either way it is pretty disgusting to read.

Anyone trying to defend this woman is living in a fantasy land.

Changing gender is massively significant and if you’re entering into a relationship with somebody that is heterosexual, you should 100% tell them before proceeding with the relationship. It’s not something to drop half way through a date, or just before you sleep with them. Certainly not afterwards either.

It’s hard not to feel like this is being trivialised because its a male that was sexually assaulted.

The amount of comments saying words to the effect of ‘What harm was caused’ like mental harm suddenly doesn’t apply because it’s a bloke on the receiving end.

Just because he didn’t go home with physical harm it doesn’t mean there was no harm. The concept of being sexually assaulted causing mental harm isn’t a new one…so why does it suddenly seem not to apply here?

This sounds like it’s going to pretty significantly shift the landscape around cases featuring “gender deception” in law.

Prior cases have involved a really significant element of deception – non-transgender people who have created a new fictional identity that doesn’t align with their day-to-day lives and misrepresented the actual sex acts that took place. The McNally case is a good example, where the female defendant pretended to be a man and would do things like blindfold the victim during sex and lie about what she was penetrating the victim with.

The facts here are pretty different, and without reading the judgement it’s difficult to tell what the precedent hinges on. She is genuinely transgender and appears to genuinely live as “Ciara Watkin”, as opposed to it being a fake identity. It doesn’t seem like she misrepresented the sex acts that took place; by the sounds of it she gave him a handjob or blowjob, which is different to claiming the dildo you’re penetrating someone with is a penis or, as in non-gendered deception cases, that it is actually a medical procedure or something.

There are a few possible outcomes to this.

1. Deception as to gender can apply to basically every sexual action with a trans person. “Oral sex by someone born male” is a different sex act to “oral sex by someone born female”, as penetrating someone with a dildo is different to with a penis or with/without a condom.

2. The lack of any sort of medical transition was the key the case turned on. The above instead becomes “oral sex by a man/woman”, and some set ‘amount’ of transition can shift you from one camp to another in terms of the nature of the sex act.

3. The lying about being on her period is the element that indicated an intention to deceive – it was less the fact that she was transgender and more that she deliberately obscured it. If she had said she didn’t want to receive any sort of sex act instead, and her trans/cis status simply went unremarked upon, she wouldn’t have been found guilty.

4. Some combo of the above.

I have the sinking feeling that 1 is going to be the takeaway going forwards, which is not ideal. If any sort of sex act involving a transgender person is deceptive and thus sexual assault/rape, this criminalises a lot of common romantic/sexual interactions. If I spark up a chat with someone at the bar, flirt a bit, and kiss them, have I been sexually assaulted if it turns out they’re transgender and I wasn’t aware, regardless of how far into their transition they are? What if I go to a club, drink a bit, and receive oral sex in the bathroom from someone I believe to be a woman who is actually a feminine-looking man?

That doesn’t seem right, but if “oral sex by someone born male” and “oral sex by someone born female” are so different that one can vitiate my consent, then surely that applies to any sort of sexual act, from penetrative sex to a kiss or a touch, and it applies whether someone is transgender or not. This seems to require that trans people out themselves effectively immediately in any romantic/sexual context, whether they believe the other person is aware or not.

Also, as an aside, the fact that the defendant was diagnosed with gender dysphoria in school and has still yet to be able to receive any sort of medical transition support is nothing short of incredible. Maybe she just doesn’t want it, but this sounds like a massive failure on the part of our healthcare system if someone can go so long without care.

I think a big context point that a lot of commenters are missing on this is the age of when the assault took place. They were both 18.

The reason why I say that is, I imagine that where this came from for Watkins was very much ‘fake it until you make it’ style of social transitioning.

Does this make it ok? Ofc not. I am very pro-trans, but you have to be clear and communicate to your sexual partners. Even if its “just a blow job”; I would still count this as assault.

Is this an excellent case for a wider sexual education and its importance than just hetreo-sex in highschools – yes. I dont know about Watkins but I know I learned about gay sex from porn and that f*fcked me up, I can only imagine how confusing it is for an unguided trans person. (Before I get jumped on, I’m not excusing it, I’m speaking about having empathy for her, and looking how we can stop it from happening it again).

Good.

There are some grey areas about when it becomes necessary to out yourself. But this isn’t in the grey area, it’s straight up pretending to be a biological woman while being physically a man, to have sexual contact with a hetero man. This is clearly and obviously wrong and I’m glad that is the outcome reached.