I say your brother is winning, she wasn't forced to live there.
From a criminal and judicial standpoint you are wrong, if she is under duress for any reason i.e. money troubles,taking care of her brother, landlord soliciting her for sex due to her financial situation this is a crime. Before consummating the arrangement this is considered psychological and/or emotional abuse and therefore solicitation of her for sex is indeed a form criminal activity. It moved from sexual harassment and abuse to rape the moment he had sex with her. Considering that the worst offense is the one that would be prosecuted the; rape hold priority over anything else he has done.
You act as if peoples financial situations can't change at the drop of a hat, maybe she could afford rent at first, and then money became an issue. If for any reason she felt she had no other option than to unwillingly accept an offer from the person who has control over her place of residence then he committed sexual assault. Yes, she could have found somewhere else to live, but that in and of itself can be a lengthy and time consuming process, especially if she is in a financial situation in which she would be unable to drop the money for a deposit AND pay her current landlord.
At the end of the day I've treated this as a thought experiment because I figure that is what it is. In the case that this whole thing is true it is a sad situation and should be reported to the authorities.
Words can't explain this fuckery. Is your brother human?
So you think he was wrong to give her the option? Would it have been better if he gave her no option, and said "this is the rent, these are the rules. You have to pay them or be evicted"?
Clearly, that would have been a worse thing to do, because if he had done that, she would be evicted. Which is what she chose to avoid. How is it better to have given her no choice than to have given her a choice, even if the choice is very unsavory?
How is a choice of A vs. B worse than a no choice, and forcing them to take A, no matter how bad choice B is? A is always there in both cases.
She clearly would rather have sex than be evicted. This much is evident because she made that choice. So people are demonizing him because he gave her a choice (that she opted to pick) rather than give her no choice (which is actually WORSE for her, since she didn't choose that option)?
The difference is evicting a tenet for not paying rent isn't a crime, coercing them into having sex is. All this does is make the argument she had no choice otherwise but to agree to having sex with him, which is illegal. She may have a roof over her head but she is still being abused.
In Canada prostitution is not a crime, so she isn't a criminal. It is however illegal to solicit a prostitute, and I would think this situation would qualify.
I would not go as far as to call it rape like some of the other posters, but what he is doing is illegal.
EDIT: I was mistaken, both buying and selling sexual services are legal in Canada. It's just surrounding activities, such as public communication for the purpose of prostitution, brothels and procuring that are offences under the criminal law. I don't think any of these laws were broken so it is more a moral issue. Unless anyone knows of a court case where sex was paid as rent in Canada, which would clarify whether this a criminal offense.
Last edited by Jotaux; 2012-12-29 at 07:28 AM.
I realize why he did it is pretty disgusting, but bear with me. His motivation is kind of irrelevant. I'm trying to ask why what he did was worse than simply kicking her out. I'm running under the assumption that she was unable to pay the rent anymore. So we have:
A) He offers no alternate solution, and she gets evicted, nothing she can do about it.
B) He offers a pretty awful alternate solution, or she gets evicted.
He chose B, but it seems most people would prefer he chose A. However, being that the girl chose that alternate solution, she must also be in favor of him choosing B. She didn't want to be evicted for not paying her rent. It was a better choice.
Is a choice (even if the option is bad) better or worse than having no choice at all?
How on earth does it make me more wrong? That's basically what's happening. He's abusing his position as landlord against a young girl who already has enough trouble to live with. Clearly she is not feeling well with this "arrangement" but barely has a good alternative, again he's just making use of this.
If you find that normal moral behavior, then I'm pretty sure your morals are quite low themselves.
Yes, because of the nature of this arrangement. There is no true choice for the woman because free will is not an equitable option here; a 60% reduction in rent is huge, and in her situation she can't afford to refuse it.Is a choice (even if the option is bad) better or worse than having no choice at all?
Arguably, he did her a service by reducing her rent.
Possibly. I mean, if he hadn't given her the choice, she would have been forced to make the same decision as if she had refused his choice, which is clearly not the decision she wanted to make.
This is almost objective:
He gives her a choice of A or B. She chooses B.
He gives her a (non)choice of A. She must pick A.
A is available in both scenarios, but given that she avoided A when given the choice means that giving her a choice of something other than A is actually better than just giving her a (non)choice of A. Objectively, he did do her a service by offering her a choice that she (even if slightly) preferred. Subjectively, he's a perverted pig.
The only way I can make this sound good is by substituting letters for the actual choices he gave. But it's also the only way to be really objective about it.
Last edited by Seegtease; 2012-12-29 at 05:46 PM.