We all know what sodomy is, I trust. Some of us have sodomized other people, or had it done to us. It’s a crime in some states.
We also know the name of this behavior comes from the Biblical city of Sodom, whose neighbor and rival in depravity was Gomorrah.
My question – has anybody ever been Gomorrafied? What ever happened to this place that it’s been wiped from the lexicon?
Somebody out there, please let us know what Gomorrism is, or some other linguistic remainder of this place. And NO, the Gamorrean guards from Return of the Jedi don’t count. Neither does Godzilla’s enemy Gamera.
Da Cap’n
Looking for another way to spend his weekends
Really though, do the american authorities prosecute this kind of thing?
Does someone have to be forcibly sodomized to be a crime?
Can they charge two consenting adults for sodomy?
If that is the case, couldnt they use stuff from here to charge people with ( I know its far fetched, but Hypothetically speaking could they?)
Prosecution is rare, but several states instituted or revamped laws against sodomy (even between consenting adults) back in the mid-1980s as a knee-jerk reaction to the HIV/AIDS crisis. Most were Southern or Midwestern states, I believe.
“Thou shalt not commit buggery.” Proof that you can’t legislate a disease out of existence.
I wonder if somebody could have avoided conviction if they simply pled to the judge, “I was Gomorrifying her – I’ve never heard of this sodomy thing!!”
I was under the impression that anti-sodomy laws have been around for a lot longer than the AIDS crisis. The law in New York State was supposedly enacted in 1800-something, as a thinly-veiled attempt to criminalize homosexuality.
As for enforcement, the police and the courts are busy enough without trying to crack down on anal sex. The law is still used on occasion, however; a prosecutor will often tack a charge of sodomy onto an arrested sex offender, to increase his sentence by some amount. IIRC, when Amy Fisher (“The Long Island Lolita”) was in the news a few years back, her beau Joey Buttafuoco was charged with sodomy as well as statutory rape.
Of course I don’t fit in; I’m part of a better puzzle.
Kellibelli said, “1) Really though, do the american authorities prosecute this kind of thing?
2) Does someone have to be forcibly sodomized to be a crime?
3) Can they charge two consenting adults for sodomy?”
Well, since Sodom and Gomorrah (as well as Admah, Tzevoyim and Tzoar) were pretty much destroyed for the same crimes, I doubt that there’s anything unique about Gomorrah that would make anyone choose it for a name rather than Sodom, which was always at the top of the Biblical list.
“Sherlock Holmes once said that once you have eliminated the
impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be
the answer. I, however, do not like to eliminate the impossible.
The impossible often has a kind of integrity to it that the merely improbable lacks.”
– Douglas Adams’s Dirk Gently, Holistic Detective
“Sodomy” also is applied to oral sex. It’s a sure-fire way to get a john and/or prostitute convicted of a crime if the actual financial transaction can’t be proven.
Another way the sodomy law is (mis)used [not an urban legend; I just can’t remember all the details from about 10 years ago]: In Georgia, a man and his estranged wife seemed to be making up. She invited him over for dinner, and ended up seducing him. In the midst of their lovemaking, she asked him to go down on her. Being all worked up, he did.
After that night, their reconciliation didn’t go any further, and their divorce continued. In court, her lawyer asked if he had every performed cunnilingus on her. His lawyer objected, but it was overruled. He admitted it, and he was arrested for sodomy. On this charge, he was sentenced to 5 years in prison. Plus, since he was now a convicted sex offender, he lost all visitation rights to his kids.
In the sodomy trial, the wife’s sister testified that the wife had planned the whole seduction to get his character assassinated for custody purposes. The wife admitted it, but she still got sole custody.
