Not Fair in Love and War

There is a phrase I have heard men say with a little smirk:

“You can’t rape the willing.”

Another favourite is:

“All’s fair in love and war.”

I don’t believe either statement is funny.

There is nothing fair about deceiving another human being and then using their participation as evidence that they consented to whatever you secretly intended to do to them.

A person can walk willingly into a room without willingly surrendering their body.

A woman can willingly go on a date without willingly having sex.

A person can willingly answer the telephone without willingly handing a stranger their life savings.

A person can willingly love you without willingly consenting to be lied to, cheated on, manipulated, exploited, robbed or psychologically dismantled.

Participation is not blanket consent.

And consent without meaningful knowledge is not the same thing as informed consent.

This is where the logic of the predator becomes particularly grotesque.

The victim trusted you.

Therefore, you say, the victim was willing?

The victim entered the relationship.

Therefore, she accepted everything that happened inside it?

She gave you an agreed-upon loan.

Therefore, you claim, she consented to being robbed?

She married you.

Therefore, she consented to whatever you decided marriage meant?

She came home with you.

Therefore, she consented to sex?

She had sex with you because she believed you loved her.

Therefore, you claim, she consented to being raped?

She didn’t leave immediately.

Therefore, she wasn’t harmed?

No.

You don’t get to conceal the terms of the game and then declare victory because the other person agreed to play.

Imagine a thief telling an elderly person, “You gave me your wallet voluntarily.”

Imagine a scammer saying, “You willingly gave me your banking information.”

Imagine a rapist saying, “You willingly entered a relationship with me.”

The deception is precisely what matters.

The victim was making a decision based on one reality while the perpetrator was operating from another.

That isn’t fairness.

That is a sneak attack.

And “all’s fair in love and war” is not a magic spell that transforms dishonesty into righteousness.

If you’re going to invoke the rules of war, then at least admit what you’re doing.

Tell the person across from you who you are.

Tell them what you want.

Tell them what you’re willing to do.

Tell them what you are not willing to do.

Let them see the battlefield.

Then let them choose.

But deceiving someone into trusting you, manipulating their boundaries, exploiting their vulnerability and then congratulating yourself because they participated?

That’s not winning. It’s pathetic.

It’s cowardice wearing a victory hat.

And this applies far beyond sexual violence.

We teach ourselves to protect against scams. Check the number. Don’t give out your password. Watch your bank account. Cover your drink. Don’t walk alone. Don’t trust strangers.

Good advice.

But vigilance does not transfer moral responsibility from the perpetrator to the victim.

You can be careful and still be deceived.

You can be intelligent and still be manipulated.

You can be experienced and still be betrayed.

You can love someone and still discover that they were never playing by the same rules.

That is not a failure of your humanity.

It is evidence that trust has been exploited.

And perhaps this is the real problem with “all’s fair in love and war.”

Love isn’t war.

Your partner isn’t the enemy.

Another human being is not an opponent whose defenses you are entitled to circumvent simply because you want something from them.

There are no loopholes in another person’s humanity.

If you have to deceive someone into saying yes, you haven’t earned a yes.

If you have to manipulate their boundaries, you haven’t respected them.

If you have to hide your intentions until they are vulnerable enough to exploit, you aren’t playing fair.

And if your only defence afterward is “But they were willing,” perhaps the question isn’t whether they were willing.

Perhaps the question is:

What did you make them believe?

Because there is another layer to this kind of deception that people don’t talk about enough.

Sometimes the person doing the deceiving knows they have the advantage.

They know the rules.

They know the loopholes.

They know where the consequences are weak, where the processes are slow, where the burden of proof falls, where retaliation is restricted, where the victim will have to navigate systems they have never encountered before.

The person being deceived doesn’t know any of that.

They are walking into the game believing they are in a relationship, a friendship, a business arrangement, a conversation, a transaction.

The other person may already be thinking three moves ahead.

And when the victim finally realizes what happened, the person who caused the harm can retreat behind contracts, procedures, laws, authorities, technicalities, delays and systems designed to contain conflict.

The victim is expected to behave perfectly while carrying the consequences of someone else’s deception.

And then people wonder why vulnerable people are targeted.

The innocent are easier to deceive because they still trust.

The generous are easier to exploit because they give.

The inexperienced are easier to manipulate because they haven’t yet learned every trick.

The open-hearted are easier to betray because they aren’t standing there expecting an ambush.

That doesn’t make them stupid.

It makes the exploitation of their innocence particularly contemptible.

“Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” is sometimes tossed around as though the injured person is the dangerous one.

But perhaps that’s another convenient little joke.

Perhaps the real fear is not the woman who was scorned.

Perhaps it is the woman who has finally understood what was done to her.

Because once trust has been violated, innocence is replaced by discernment.

The person who once opened the door without suspicion now checks the lock.

The person who once trusted words now watches behaviour.

The person who once assumed good faith now looks for the hidden terms.

The person who once gave freely now knows that generosity can be exploited.

And that is precisely why deception is so cowardly.

You didn’t outsmart someone because you fooled them.

You found someone who trusted you and used that trust against them.

That’s not a victory. That’s fucking weak.

“Lying lips are abomination to the LORD: but they that deal truly are his delight.”

— Proverbs 12:22

“Judge me, O God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation: O deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man.”

— Psalm 43:1

“And he shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the noonday.”

— Psalm 37:6