Read on Twitter
The problems of adults who lack mental capacity to make decisions about their sexual lives is a vitally important aspect of the work of the Court of Protection, and this comes from of one of its most reflective and sensitive judges on the subject https://twitter.com/joshuarozenberg/status/1387749672429801474
As @TorButlerCole, who acted in the case, points out here, this case does not concern a person who lacks capacity to decide to engage in sex or with whom to have contact, and I should have been more clear about that https://twitter.com/TorButlerCole/status/1387863979310075913
I’ve read a lot of critical, heartfelt and anguished comment on this case and what it is said to reflect of the attitude of a male legal system towards women and commoditised, commercialised sex. I think it’s important to read the judge’s own words on this, in his conclusions
I think this, from @LevinsLaw is a fair and accurate analysis of the question of legal principle which the judge did have to decide, and generally agree with their other tweets and replies in various conversations about this case https://twitter.com/levinslaw/status/1387876309225836546
It’s understandable that references to a “right to sex” rile people, as if condoning a Neanderthal view of (predominantly male) sexual entitlement and behaviour. But that wrenches it out of its proper context as a universal right, exercisable within boundaries of law on consent
The judge himself refers to the “misinformed commentary” (an understatement) on this in a previous case he decided, which was about whether a long-married wife had lost capacity to consent to sex with her husband. I wrote a blog about that case in 2019 https://link.medium.com/z684F73uSfb
Link to @bindelj commentary on the judgment which strongly articulates the case against a court facilitating commercial sex for an individual man https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/disabled-men-don-t-have-a-right-to-use-prostitutes
Judges in cases which have raised a lot of public interest sometimes produce a summary for the media of the issues and their decision, and it would have been helpful to have one here.
@OpenJusticeCoP is the account to follow for informed insight into the decisions of this court
@OpenJusticeCoP is the account to follow for informed insight into the decisions of this court
@AstiHeaven is an Approved Mental Health Professional under the Mental Health Act who attended the hearing of this case last December as an observer, and wrote about it for @OpenJusticeCoP in a blog very well worth reading https://openjusticecourtofprotection.org/2020/12/14/is-it-lawful-for-zs-carers-to-support-him-in-accessing-a-sex-worker/
This article by @KatharineQ is wide-ranging and well-informed on the subject of disabled adults and sex, essential reading, I suggest, for anyone with an interest in or strong views about the Court of Protection judgment linked in this thread https://mosaicscience.com/story/sex-disability
