# I hate people joking about rape **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 27, 2006, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913 "2006-11-27T06:04:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Mellivora\_capensis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8797f3/32.png) [@Mellivora\_capensis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mellivora_capensis)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2006, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/41 "2006-11-27T17:23:29Z")
[QUOTE=MrDibble] … BTW, you want to pop into the “Nice South African” thread? I think they need a non-bruin-ou perspective in there. [/QUOTE] Done. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2006, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/42 "2006-11-27T18:18:35Z")
[QUOTE=cactus waltz] I haven’t come across an example yet where it wasn’t tasteless. [/QUOTE] Imagine Elmer Fudd raping Porky Pig. Tasteless, yes, but funny as hell. Also, there’s [this Robot Chicken short](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3n8aQQ4cjw). “This is a no-no!” ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2006, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/43 "2006-11-27T20:19:28Z")
What’s up with all these rape threads? There are four going on right now. Has someone been getting some unexpected action? ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2006, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/44 "2006-11-27T21:18:05Z")
I spent almost two years dating a girl who had been raped some years before. “She’s rape-able” comments and other things that use rape as a way to say “she’s hot” are completely vile, since they imply rape is okay as an expression of desire. I don’t really care that the people using it don’t _mean_ it - that’s what’s implied and it’s repulsive. On the other hand, even after I tried to be sensitive about it, I realized that the girlfriend in question had no hangups about using the word rape as a sarcastic adjective, which is the way all the kids are using it these days. 😉 Things like “That midterm raped me in the ass” didn’t bother her, she said it all the time. That kind of forces you to accept that rape jokes aren’t the worst thing in the world. I still avoid them because all you need to do is run into one rape survivor who doesn’t think it’s funny and you’re a total asshole. “Elmer Fudd raping Porky Pig” is a George Carlinism, by the way. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2006, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/45 "2006-11-27T21:35:06Z")
[QUOTE=cactus waltz] (shaking fist of anger) [/QUOTE] Are we sure we know where that fist has been? ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2006, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/46 "2006-11-27T22:45:11Z")
[QUOTE=yojimbo] What’s 12 inches long, pink and hard in the morning and makes women cry? A cot-death [/QUOTE] 😕 ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/47 "2006-11-28T00:09:54Z")
> [@](#): > > **cactus waltz** said: > I can relate to most humor, even the darkest and blackest humor. But joking about rape is simply not funny, it’s tasteless and it’s ignorant. Tasteless, black and vile it may be, but when it’s funny I laugh like hell. And please don’t tell me that I wouldn’t find it funny if it happened to me. It did happen to me, nearly eight years ago. I am rare in my opinion that rape is no worse than any other physical assault, and certainly not as bad as being burned alive or having my spine broken with a crowbar. That opinion is one I only came to _after_ it happened to me. > [@](#): > > **kambuckta** said: > I don’t think statistical analysis is quite the issue here. There is always going to be someone who has been ‘affected’ by a particular incident, no matter how obscure you might think it is. It is the ‘humour’ value, and just because more people have had some direct or indirect experience of rape does not necessarily mean we should never make jokes about it. Of course, that depends upon the joke…the one quoted by our new guest above does nothing for my funny at all. It’s also not safe to assume that just because someone was ‘affected by’ a particular thing, they will dislike any joking about that thing. I’m not bothered by jokes about rape. They’re either funny, or they’re not, like any other joke. It’s a rare occasion that I don’t have someone knowingly or unknowingly offended on my behalf as a ‘rape victim’ as soon as a joke comes out. > [@](#): > > **Mr. Dibble** said: > I can’t think of a good one offhand (for some reason the only one that comes to mind is a Victorian newspaper headline that read “Woman Murdered But Not Interfered With”), but I don’t find any subject taboo. I _think_ it was George Carlin who said, ‘Picture Donald Duck raping Porky Pig and then tell me rape can’t be funny.’ > [@](#): > > **Lynn Bodoni** said: > And even today, many people feel that rape (of an adult) is really not that serious. I’m glad that the prevailing attitude today is that rape IS a horrible crime. I used to think it was the most horrible thing that could happen to someone. Then it happened to me. And then I thought ‘You know, there are a lot of things worse than that. Like being beaten into a coma..’ > [@](#): > > **Captain Amazing** said: > I can’t think of anyone who doesn’t think that rape is serious. I don’t consider it more serious than other physical assaults. This opinion has gotten me lambasted in a lot of places, but that’s what my experience has instilled in me. I’ve also expressed the opinion that one of the reasons I think rape is so much worse and harder to get over than ‘merely’ being beaten or stabbed or shot is that the message that comes through from all around is ‘You will never get over it. You will always have fear, always feel violated. It is worse than anything else that could happen to you.’ I’ve even heard it called ‘worse than death.’ My response to that, for the last eight years, has been ‘I’ve been raped, but I’ve never been murdered. Given a choice, I’ll take being raped again.’ ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/48 "2006-11-28T00:38:15Z")
Well **gigi** , I think you’ll wish you hadn’t asked, but… It’s a joke about Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (“crib death”, “cot death”). The poor little pink corpse has rigor mortis when mommy finds it in the morning, geddit? Hence the tears. > [@Aangelica](#): > > They just never made the connection between the current random slang verbiage and violent sexual assault, until it was pointed out to them in so many words (and in the case of the slow of thought, punctuated with random whaps). They thought they were sounding edgy and cool. Must be a generational thing; to me, guys talking about “rapable” girls sound like dorky frustrated losers. Aren’t the cool guys supposed to be ones that girls, you know, **consent** to have sex with? Reacting to the sight of a hot chick by wishing you could rape her comes across as just totally pathetic, IMO—like you’ve completely given up on the idea that a girl could have sex with you **willingly** , and the most you can hope for is to fantasize about forcing yourself on her. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/49 "2006-11-28T00:47:53Z")
> [@](#): > > **Kimstu** said: > Must be a generational thing; to me, guys talking about “rapable” girls sound like dorky frustrated losers. Aren’t the cool guys supposed to be ones that girls, you know, consent to have sex with? > > Reacting to the sight of a hot chick by wishing you could rape her comes across as just totally pathetic, IMO—like you’ve completely given up on the idea that a girl could have sex with you willingly, and the most you can hope for is to fantasize about forcing yourself on her. It’s not meant literally as in the girl didn’t give consent. It’s meant in the sense that he’d like a different variety of sex than missionary-with-the-lights-off for ten minutes before going to sleep under separate blankets. What it brings to my mind is the kind of romp-around-the-house-knocking-over-furniture-while-screwing-on-the-coffee-table type sex where various toys, rooms, positions and potentially food items come into play, as well as perhaps role-playing games. The kind where you end up with scratches and bruises not because either of you was forced but because you were buck wild into it. Got another single word for that image? ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/50 "2006-11-28T00:51:43Z")
[QUOTE=catsix] It’s not meant literally as in the girl didn’t give consent. It’s meant in the sense that he’d like a different variety of sex than missionary-with-the-lights-off for ten minutes before going to sleep under separate blankets. What it brings to my mind is the kind of romp-around-the-house-knocking-over-furniture-while-screwing-on-the-coffee-table type sex where various toys, rooms, positions and potentially food items come into play, as well as perhaps role-playing games. The kind where you end up with scratches and bruises not because either of you was forced but because you were buck wild into it. Got another single word for that image? [/QUOTE] Yeah, fuck. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/51 "2006-11-28T00:53:11Z")
Doesn’t really give me the same mental image. ---
**Author:** ![Khadaji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/52 "2006-11-28T01:09:37Z")
[QUOTE=faithfool] **Khadaji** , just one more reason that you are one of my favorite Dopers. I appreciate how hard you try to be a better person. We definitely need more folks like you. 🙂 \ [/QUOTE] Sorry for the hijack - but I appreciated hearing this today. I had a low-energy day and this was a pleasant pick-me-up. Thanks. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/53 "2006-11-28T01:11:06Z")
> [@catsix](#): > > It’s meant in the sense that he’d like a different variety of sex than missionary-with-the-lights-off for ten minutes before going to sleep under separate blankets. > > What it brings to my mind is the kind of romp-around-the-house-knocking-over-furniture-while-screwing-on-the-coffee-table type sex where various toys, rooms, positions and potentially food items come into play, as well as perhaps role-playing games. The kind where you end up with scratches and bruises not because either of you was forced but because you were buck wild into it. Huh. In my 43 years I have heard a lot of guys use a lot of expressions implying longing for sex without using the word “rape”, from “I could do her all night long” to “I’d cheerfully fuck her brains out” to “If I found her in my bed tonight then I’d know there was a God” to “She is pure fuckability”. Never once did any of them give me the impression that what they were hoping for was “missionary-with-the-lights-off for ten minutes before going to sleep under separate blankets”. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/54 "2006-11-28T01:15:22Z")
All of those things really seem kind of bland to me in comparison. Then again, the literal meaning of a word is often not even close to what it means when it’s used in such informal slang. Things are ‘the shit’, or ‘cool as hell’ or maybe I’d like to ‘maul’ that hot guy that I met at the bar. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/55 "2006-11-28T01:25:59Z")
[QUOTE=Aangelica] “I’d rape her in a second!” “Man, she’s totally rapable” [/QUOTE] Just tell them that there are a lot of guys in Pelicun Bay who’d like to rape _them_.I can take a joke about a subject like this if it has a legitimate point. Comments like this, however, are just adolescent, gratuitous and asinine. Adoloescents don’t need to be encouraged to be more adolescent. They need to be encouraged to be more adult. That’s why we have this word in the first place (“adolescent”). Maybe they’ll grow out of it, but if they continue, maybe they’ll become part of that group of (largely men) who believe that no woman is ever “raped” (after all, _they_ never “get to do it”). Words have a way of doing that. ---
**Author:** ![Chotii](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/71e660/32.png) [@Chotii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chotii)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/56 "2006-11-28T01:27:37Z")
[QUOTE=Kimstu] Huh. In my 43 years I have heard a lot of guys use a lot of expressions implying longing for sex without using the word “rape”, from “I could do her all night long” to “I’d cheerfully fuck her brains out” to “If I found her in my bed tonight then I’d know there was a God” to “She is pure fuckability”. Never once did any of them give me the impression that what they were hoping for was “missionary-with-the-lights-off for ten minutes before going to sleep under separate blankets”. [/QUOTE] But were they indicating that they would like to do it whether she agreed or not, including over any protests she might attempt, and with any degree of force necessary? ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/57 "2006-11-28T01:46:10Z")
> [@Chotii](#): > > But were they indicating that they would like to do it whether she agreed or not, including over any protests she might attempt, and with any degree of force necessary? No, but as **catsix** noted, it’s unlikely that the teenage guys that **Aangelica** was talking about really meant their use of “rape” in that way either. As **Aangelica** said, they were probably just trying to sound “cool and edgy”. They just didn’t realize that their slang might unintentionally give a less flattering impression: e.g., that (a) they were actually advocating sexual violence, or (b) they were pathetic losers who had given up all hope of ever scoring any **consensual** sex. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/58 "2006-11-28T01:52:47Z")
Professor asks a student.Wheres your room mate. He hasn’t been in class the last couple days. He replies,a couple blonds grabbed him in the parking lot ,took him in a van and sexually attacked him repeatedly. Prof says sorry to hear about it,is he in therapy or something like that. No he replies we can’t get him out of the parking lot. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/59 "2006-11-28T02:00:15Z")
[QUOTE=catsix] Doesn’t really give me the same mental image. [/QUOTE] Well, the word rape certainly doesn’t give me the “hanging from the lights monkey sex” mental image. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2006, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913/60 "2006-11-28T02:02:47Z")
> [@](#): > > **Dangerosa** said: > Well, the word rape certainly doesn’t give me the “hanging from the lights monkey sex” mental image. It depends on the context. I mean if I hear that my neighbor got mauled by a coyote, I don’t think ‘Lucky bastard. I love a good mauling.’ But if I hear that my neighbor mauled (example, not meant to be taken as statement of fact) Evgeny Malkin, then it brings to mind a whole different image. Context, inflection, environment, these all have an effect on how a word is taken. Consider: That game is the shit. That game is shit. Same word, worlds of difference in meaning. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-people-joking-about-rape/381913.md?page=4)