Given that rape originally meant “kidnap” I think the battle against shifting vernacular is already lost.
It’s only your belief that we’ve “gained nothing.” Maybe we gain an acknowledgement that non-consensual sexual assault can be just as traumatic as penetration, and that non-consensual penetration can be just as harrowing and traumatic and immoral when the instrument happens to be something other than a penis.
If reproductive choice is the fundamental criterion for determining rape, as you suggest, then a rapist wearing a condom is not, in your moral universe, a rapist. Neither is one who rapes a woman taking birth control, or a post-menopausal woman. And in this terminological sphere, male-on-male rape is literally impossible.
Also, as fachverwirrt notes, the definition of rape, outside of the legal sphere, has long encompassed acts well beyond penile penetration.
So if the victim is infertile or post-menopausal, rape is not as serious a crime?
Especially when they are kids. :rolleyes:
I’m especially fond of forced oral sex, 'cause you know…not rape.
It’s rather amusing that you would appeal to history, since, as Fachverwirrt points out, the historical meaning of “rape” is “abduction.” The meaning of “rape” has never been constant, especially in modern times. It has always varied based on context and time.
Wikipedia:
I’m not going to fall into that trap, of seeming to dismiss it as “no big deal”. But I will say that getting a fertile woman pregnant via rape (which is quite possible, no matter what Todd Akin says) is a *more *serious crime. How about that?
I think a *lot *of women would take that trade. Not, again, that both aren’t heinous! Do not put that bullshit in my mouth. But in the same sense as “I’m going to hold you down and cut off one of your fingers. Want me to cut off the index finger on your right hand, or the pinky of your left?” Both are horrendous, violent crimes–but most people would agree on which is worse, and which they’d choose if forced to.
May I ask if you are male or female? Have you ever been raped, or had a female relative who has been raped? I’m curious as to why you think that way.
I speak as a female who was raped while off of the pill, trying to get pregnant by my husband.
And it’s my not so humble opinion that you are completely wrong. What happened to me, or to any person who is raped, is not valued by their age or fertility. It’s always wrong, it’s always awful, and circumstances don’t change that.
Not sure about the legalities of it, but the witch hunt for Brock Turner has gone waaaaay over the top. We GET IT. America is stuck in a “rape culture” but theres other ways to correct that other than stalking this kid for the rest of his life. He paid his debt to society, and his life is ruined. I suppose many of these people wont be satisfied until the kid takes his own life. :rolleyes:
He escaped his debt to society. That’s the point of the thread.
Right. I think some people have forgotten that what might have happened to some extent if the story had not gotten much notice, namely that he would get out in a few months and go attend college somewhere else and still get a good job and take his place in the privileged white male elite, is not really an option any more. He is essentially unemployable, not to mention unmarriageable, so the best case scenario for him is that his parents are really rich and he can go live in Eastern Europe on their dime for the next decade at least.
If they aren’t quite so rich, he will just have to hide out in their house forever (although they may need to find a new place to live themselves and who knows how their employment prospects are looking), and hope that they are able to leave him enough money when they die to buy groceries and pay the bills em dash or maybe he has siblings who can take care of him.
I’m wondering, Slacker, if you’ve been raped? Because I have. And I’ve been sexually assaulted. And there is no worst, there is no choice to be made. Its Sophie’s Choice - there isn’t one.
I do love it when a guy explains how women feel about rape. They have so much more expertise than those of us who have lived through it, attended group therapy, and worked crisis lines. That penis gives them a whole lot of insight.
Yes.
Isn’t it even worse, if a woman is also forced into unwanted pregnancy? It’s everything’s that’s always awful, plus an additional crime and violation.
The whole thing is so horrible that there isn’t a worse. There are simply indignities on top of indignities. AND different women will feel differently about different aspects of it. Some woman might find vaginal rape the most horrible thing imaginable - me - at least vaginal rape turned into some form of “lie back and think of England” you can remove yourself from…oral rape I couldn’t remove myself from in the moment.
For me - what seems to be most humiliating in the Brock Turner case would not be the digital penetration, but that it was done behind a dumpster “in public” and that I ended up with dirt and leaves inside me. I mean, that’s what got him caught, but at the same time, that would probably bug me the most had I been the victim. Its so vulgar, gross, and dirty - which makes no rational sense, but that is the part that I viscerally react to. I think - and its an exercise in who knows really - that I’d rather been raped penis in vagina while passed out in a dorm room than discover that it had happened behind a dumpster and that I had leaves inside me. At least with a dorm room situation, I be able to fool myself that I had consented in a drunken stupor.
The aftermath of a violent attack can be worse in some cases than others, certainly. A woman whose partner turns away from her, who experiences particularly severe PTSD, who gets an STD, who is forced to drop out of a competitive graduate school program she had her heart set on because of her injuries, or who gets pregnant, might have an even worse time afterward than a woman who has a supportive partner, who is fortunate enough to be psychologically resilient against this particular type of assault, who doesn’t catch an STD, who escapes relatively uninjured, and/or who doesn’t get pregnant.
None of these outcomes says a damn thing about the culpability of the rapist or the inherent violence of the act.
It is unimaginable to me that anyone would think that a woman’s fertility levels have ANY bearing on the severity of the crime. Clearly I need a new imagination.
Since precision in language is so important to all of us, I’d suggest that maybe using the term “witch hunt” - a phrase which references the legal murder of women who were factually innocent of the crimes for which they were killed - is inappropriate here. Brock Turner is guilty. There can be no witch hunt for him, unless we start accusing and punishing him of some other crime that he did not commit.
But Brock Turner and his dad think it’s OK so I guess it shouldn’t bother them if someone takes a hankerin’ to Brock. “My object all sublime …”
I feel for his neighbors - they are the ones that did nothing wrong and now have protesters on their sidewalks and are likely to see the house they live next to vandalized.
I said at the time when this first hit and I’ll say it again, in the age of the internet and sex offender registries, the judge did Turner no favors with a light sentence. He will be hounded for the rest of his life. And it wouldn’t surprise me if that life was short - if he’s hounded to his death and kills himself. Which, I think would be a shame, but wouldn’t surprise me.
Absolutely.
Can’t his verdict be challenged in a higher court? I am not American , so i don’t know how the legal system in the US works.