[UtahDan]

the felony murder rule. The law (I think everywhere) is to the effect that if you choose to commit a felony, you chose responsibility for the foreseeable consequences including the death of an innocent person.

For example, if I rob a bank and someone tries to run away and manages instead to fall and hit his head klling him, I can be charged with his murder. Or if the convenience store owner I hold up fires his shotgun at me trying to defend himself and hits an innocent bystander, I can be charged with that person's murder too.

The idea is that once you choose to put the chain of events in motion, you bear the risk of unintended, but nevertheless foreseeable, consequences.

I personally think that the choice to get drunk is similar, and while it does not give anyone the right to rape you, I don't think the the loss of your judgment or the loss of the ability to defend yourself or escape are unforeseeable consequences. Quite to the contrary, I think you are choosing them. Now that doesn't relieve the person who may do something bad to you from his responsibilty, but it certainly makes me far less sympathetic to the victim.

Is that too harsh?