Talk:Informed consent

What about sex and other stuff?

Informed consent obviously applies to medical ethics, but what about things like sex, sport and other areas where it is a bit dubious how consent works. In Britain, contact sport like rugby (or American football) is one of the situations where consent overrides the assault laws - but there are grey areas. Sports like boxing seem to be one. Also, there are consent problems with sadomasochism and sex generally. What plans are there, if any, to include such issues in this article? Do they fall within the informed consent topic or should they just be in a consent article more generally? –Tom Morris 16:11, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Hmmm. In the interest of a "family friendly" policy that probably is going away -- although we still want to avoid sensationalism -- I had avoided consensual BDSM and the like. Even among devotees, there's a split between those who believe in SSC (safe, sane and consensual) versus RACK (risk aware consensual kink). I've been consulted by friends into some of the more extreme acts, and I've thought long and hard about what to tell them. In some cases, my answer has been "this is something too dangerous for me ever to endorse. If you're going to do it anyway, here are some ways that surgeons, anesthesiologists, etc., reduce the risk with somewhat related procedures." Howard C. Berkowitz 16:28, 27 July 2010 (UTC)