Bill Cosby accused of Rape - say it ain't so

Bill Cosby Deposition: What Is Somnophilia?
by Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor
July 15, 2015

Allegations that comedian Bill Cosby drugged and raped multiple women since the 1970s have brought a controversial psychological term to the surface: somnophilia, a fetish for sex with a sleeping person.

The definition is straightforward enough — somnophilia is sometimes known by the nickname Sleeping Beauty syndrome. But use of the term is quite different in psychology and in the legal system. In fact, sexual fetishes, or paraphilias are a hot-button topic in the psychological community.

"Paraphilias and things like sexual sadism are not really used by psychologists and therapists," said Anna Randall, a clinical psychologist and sex therapist who practices in San Francisco and Silicon Valley. "We don't generally diagnose somebody with that."

Fetish versus disorder

In the latest version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM), the
mental health "bible" published by the American Psychiatric Association, unusual sexual fixations are described as paraphilias. This category includes everything from the benign (say, an obsession with shoes) to the dangerous (pedophilia).

If a person is fine with their shoe fetish, it's not a mental disorder. If, on the other hand, the fixation is distressing to a person, or if it harms others, it crosses the line into a paraphilic disorder.

Many mental health professionals see the "harm to others" distinction as muddying the waters, confusing criminality with mental illness. If someone is harming other people in the name of a fetish, the fetish itself is rarely the problem, Randall told Live Science.

"If somebody is doing something that is violating people's personal rights, they're more likely to have antisocial personality disorder, or they're a psychopath or a sociopath — where they don't either know what right or wrong is or they don't care," she said.

Similarly, she said, a "sex addiction" usually reflects an underlying problem like mania, obsessive-compulsive disorder or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

Sex "isn't the problem, it's a symptom," Randall said.

Cosby allegations

Cosby is alleged to have used Quaaludes and Benadryl to drug and rape women. Excerpts from a 2005 deposition in which Cosby admitted acquiring these drugs were released last week in response to an Associated Press request. Cosby maintains that the women consented to the drugs and encounters.

In response to the release of excerpts from the deposition, the lawyer for one of the alleged victims, Andrea Constand, brought up somnophilia. The lawyer, Dolores Troiani, asked for the complete transcripts to be released, saying that they included questions and answers with Cosby about additional sexual interactions, according to Yahoo News.

"Although some of the women engaged in consensual relations with Cosby, their accounts substantiated the defendant's alleged predilection for somnophilia," Troiani wrote.

The rape allegations may have little to do with somnophilia, however. If Cosby is guilty, it's possible that he had fantasies of sex with sleeping women, Randall said. It's also possible that the drugs were just a way to prevent the women from fighting back.

"If we were to say that every college kid who has sex with a drunk girl is a somnophiliac, that would be a pretty big stretch," Randall said. "Or that everybody who drugs somebody in the bar with a roofie is a somnophiliac. We'd have an awful lot of somnophilia around."

In fact, Randall said, somnophilia is rarely seen in clinical practice. "This is not in the top 10 of common fetishes," she said.

Ultimately, somnophilia is a side show in the question of Cosby's guilt or innocence, Randall said.

"At the end of the day," she said, "this is an issue of consent."
http://www.livescience.com/51562-what-is-somnophilia.html

An even longer period of delay was involved in the Grundjambe case, which came before an Alberta court in 1996. This charge concerned events alleged to have taken place more than 40 years earlier. The complainant alleged that in 1954, when she was 11, the defendant, who was then 16, had sexually assaulted her. The defendant contended that it was impossible to defend himself properly against this charge because the destruction of employment records made it impossible for him to establish his alibi. The death of two material witnesses the defendant’s mother and the complainant’s mother denied the defendant evidence in which the complainant’s mother was alleged to have accused another person of the offense. In this case this was sufficient to satisfy the court that it would have been unfair to the defendant to proceed with the trial in the face of these substantial obstacles in the way of his defending himself. The Grandjambe case gives us cause to reflect on the dangers of prosecuting substantially delayed allegations of sexual abuse.

American comedian Bill Cosby admitted trying to pay women to keep quiet after having sex with them, according to testimony obtained by the New York Times.

The newspaper says Mr Cosby made the deposition 10 years ago. A lawsuit was lodged by a former university worker in Philadelphia who claimed he drugged and molested her.

Mr Cosby, now 78, is facing a series of sexual assault accusations.

He has denied the claims.

Court papers unsealed earlier this month showed that he admitted giving drugs to women with the aim of having sex with them.

The New York Times says it has obtained the deposition on which those court papers were based, in which more details are given.

Mr Cosby was questioned for four days in 2005 and 2006 in a Philadelphia hotel, and the deposition of close to 1,000 pages was formed.

The case was brought by Andrea Constand, a former employee of Temple University - the Philadelphia college with which Mr Cosby was once closely associated.

After Mr Cosby intiated what he called a mentoring relationship, Ms Constand says he then gave her a powerful drug and molested her.

Mr Cosby says he gave her only the over-the-counter antihistamine drug Benadryl.

'These romantic sexual things'

After Ms Constand became upset and returned to her native Canada, Mr Cosby offered to pay for her further education.

"My wife would not know it was because Andrea and I had had sex and that Andrea was now very, very upset and that she decided that she would like to go to school," the New York Times quotes Mr Cosby as saying in the deposition.

He is also reported as saying he was skilled in reading women's reactions: "I think I'm a pretty decent reader of people and their emotions in these romantic sexual things, whatever you want to call them."

Mr Cosby also admits paying another woman he met in 1976 and to obtaining sedatives with the aim of giving them to women to have sex with him.
And, still in the deposition, he says he asked a model about the cancer her late father suffered with the purpose of having sex with her.

Best known as Dr Cliff Huxtable on The Cosby Show in 1984-92, the comedian is facing a number of allegations dating back to the 1960s.

Most of the claims of sexual assault are barred by statutes of limitations. They restrict the length of time in which legal actions can be taken after an alleged crime has been committed.

The accusations, which Mr Cosby has described as "fantastical" and "uncorroborated", have led to some of his stand-up shows being called off and the cancellation of some TV projects.

The New York Times

Bill Cosby Deposition Reveals Calculated Pursuit of Young Women, Using Fame, Drugs and Deceit
By GRAHAM BOWLEY and SYDNEY EMBER
JULY 18, 2015

He was not above seducing a young model by showing interest in her father’s cancer. He promised other women his mentorship and career advice before pushing them for sex acts. And he tried to use financial sleight of hand to keep his wife from finding out about his serial philandering.

Bill Cosby admitted to all of this and more over four days of intense questioning 10 years ago at a Philadelphia hotel, where he defended himself in a deposition for a lawsuit filed by a young woman who accused him of drugging and molesting her.

Even as Mr. Cosby denied he was a sexual predator who assaulted many women, he presented himself in the deposition as an unapologetic, cavalier playboy, someone who used a combination of fame, apparent concern and powerful sedatives in a calculated pursuit of young women — a profile at odds with the popular image he so long enjoyed, that of father figure and public moralist.

In the deposition, which Mr. Cosby has for years managed to keep private but was obtained by The New York Times, the entertainer comes across as alternately annoyed, mocking, occasionally charming and sometimes boastful, often blithely describing sexual encounters in graphic detail.

He talked of the 19-year-old aspiring model who sent him her poem and ended up on his sofa, where, Mr. Cosby said, she pleasured him with lotion.

He spoke with casual disregard about ending a relationship with another model so he could pursue other women. “Moving on,” was his phrase.

He suggested he was skilled in picking up the nonverbal cues that signal a woman’s consent.

“I think I’m a pretty decent reader of people and their emotions in these romantic sexual things, whatever you want to call them,” he said.

Through it all, his manner was largely one of casual indifference.

At one point in the first day of questioning, Dolores M. Troiani, the lawyer for the plaintiff in the case, Andrea Constand, a young woman who worked at Temple University as a basketball manager, seemed struck by Mr. Cosby’s jocular manner.

“I think you’re making light of a very serious situation,” she said, to which Mr. Cosby replied: “That may very well be."

Read the rest here...

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/19/arts/bill-cosby-deposition-reveals-calculated-pursuit-of-young-women-using-fame-drugs-and-deceit.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

But I’m starting to think that Cosby’s “crimes’’ were not rapes, but high-pressure seductions.
This may be female heresy.
Still, I wonder if some, if not most (or maybe all?), of the dozens of women who claim Cosby attempted or completed sexual assaults against them, dating back as far as the 1960s, swallowed drugs willingly before the encounters.
It may not matter. Most of Cosby’s illicit activities would be considered sex crimes, according to today’s feminist-written definition of rape. Off with his head, and other body parts!
But not long ago, society looked at rape differently. If a woman, and this was mainly about women, knowingly took drugs or drank alcohol before engaging in sex, and then for whatever reason — shame, guilt or seeing Prince Charming turn into a frog by the light of day — that lady regretted her tacit agreement to engage in sexual activity, she would just have to live with her stupid decision.

“Everyone took Quaaludes in the ’70s. He didn’t shove pills down anyone’s throat,’’ Sandy Kane, a former stripper and comedienne who earns tips from tourists who take her picture in Times Square as the Naked Cowgirl, told me. Kane said she had a consensual quickie with Cos in Los Angeles in the 1970s or early ’80s when she was on a Quaalude, and eagerly swallowed another half-pill he gave her.
“He was a handsome man and a star. He was just a doll,’’ said Kane, who plays guitar wearing a bikini bottom, cowboy hat and boots, plus red-white-and-blue pasties in the shape of marijuana leaves on her nipples. “As far as I’m concerned, he’s the victim here.’

But not long ago, society looked at rape differently. If a woman, and this was mainly about women, knowingly took drugs or drank alcohol before engaging in sex, and then for whatever reason — shame, guilt or seeing Prince Charming turn into a frog by the light of day — that lady regretted her tacit agreement to engage in sexual activity, she would just have to live with her stupid decision.

Except the majority of Cosby's accusers allege they were surreptitiously drugged into an unconscious state-

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former IMF chief, is the second most popular choice from left-wing politicians to run for the 2017 French presidential elections, according to an opinion poll.
Some 37 per cent of those questioned thought Mr Strauss-Kahn would be a good choice for the presidency, well ahead of incumbent François Hollande on 23 per cent.
Mr Strauss-Kahn came second to Manual Valls, the current prime minister, who won 47 per cent of the vote, according to the survey by Viavoice.
Mr Strauss-Kahn was acquitted of pimping charges last month in France, bringing to an end four years of disgrace and three unsuccessful prosecutions for sexual misconduct that began when he was accused of assaulting a maid in a New York hotel room.

"Although some of the women engaged in consensual relations with Cosby, their accounts substantiated the defendant's alleged predilection for somnophilia," Troiani wrote.

But one woman, Dr. Charlotte Laws, claims her friend had a long-running affair with Cosby in the early ‘80s and was drugged by him, too, even though they were already in a consensual sexual relationship. “[My friend] came to me and was distraught and said he had drugged her and had sex with her, and she said ‘it’s not like I would have said no to anything,’” Laws told FOX411. “She was pretty sexually adventuresome. She was perplexed as to why he would have done that, and she felt betrayed and she was confused about it.”

She said looking back on the incident she suspects the famed comedy king drugged her friend because he enjoyed having power over her. Laws, who holds a Ph.D. in social ethics, recalled a strange meeting when she heard him offer her friend a large sum of money to grow her hair longer. Laws claims Cosby even offered her money to convince her friend to grow her hair as he’d asked.

“It could be that he enjoyed having that power over women or that control over someone who was not in control,” she speculated. “I think that he probably… it turns him on somehow to see a woman incapacitated or out or not in control of herself.”

The word “somnophiliac,” meaning someone who is aroused by sex with a person who is asleep or unconscious, has popped up in several articles related to the recent Cosby allegations. Could the man once dubbed “America’s dad” indeed be a somnophiliac who wanted to have sex with unconscious women?

“I would love to have him on the couch to explore how some of his early childhood behavior led to this need to [allegedly] dominate women and the difficulty with intimacy,” she said.

Laws said she suspects based on what she knows of him, Cosby probably has somnophilia.

“People take incredible risks when they have compulsions or obsessions,” she said. “It seems he gambled it all -- his career and legacy --and he lost.”

“[My friend] came to me and was distraught and said he had drugged her and had sex with her, and she said ‘it’s not like I would have said no to anything,’” Laws told FOX411. “She was pretty sexually adventuresome. She was perplexed as to why he would have done that, and she felt betrayed and she was confused about it.”

“My observations are not bread crumbs. They do not dissolve. They are on record, on film printed in books, and found on the Internet. I am happy to share them. For this I was born.”

“When I say I don't care about white people, I mean let them say what they want to say. What can they say to me that’s worse than what their grandfather said?”

“I think I'm similar in my comedy to the way jazz musicians work. After you play a song through once, the solos start. I treat each of my characters as a song, and I start soloing when the character comes into the plot.”

“I want to show the happiness within our people….I'm going to take ['The Cosby Show'] and make it last as long as I can to show black people that they have something to be proud of.”

At the age of 8, Cosby suffered a great loss when his brother James, the second oldest of the boys, died.

A gifted storyteller himself, Cosby learned early on that humor could be a way to make friends and to get what he wanted. Cosby excelled at making things up. As one of his teachers once noted, "William should become either a lawyer or an actor because he lies so well.''

No series in the history of television … has ever been more about education," wrote Dennis A. Williams in Emerge. The Huxtable parents consistently reminded their children of the importance of a college education, and the opening credit that listed "William H. Cosby, Jr., Ed.D." was a powerful reminder of where education could take a person. Both The Cosby Show and its spinoff, A Different World (set in a fictional black college), made higher education a viable option to thousands of young African Americans. During their run, applications to African American colleges went up dramatically. "You've got to figure we made a heck of an impression on people who wanted to go to college," Cosby told the Los Angeles Times.

but if you read between the lines, he also was "strong on power".

Pressuring someone to be drunk for sex is no more ok than pressuring someone to be stone

I think he did pressure them to take drugs