{"id":107669,"date":"2025-02-24T19:16:38","date_gmt":"2025-02-24T19:16:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/american-history\/the-word-rape-has-been-disappeared-from-the-english-language\/"},"modified":"2025-02-24T19:16:38","modified_gmt":"2025-02-24T19:16:38","slug":"the-word-rape-has-been-disappeared-from-the-english-language","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=107669","title":{"rendered":"The word “rape” has been disappeared from the English\u00a0language"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

UPDATED BELOW<\/strong><\/p>\n

At least in the coverage of Roman Polanski\u2019s arrest it has!\u00a0 I keep hearing about how he was arrested in Switzerland this weekend on a 32-year old charge of \u201chaving sex with\u201d a then-13 year old girl.\u00a0 (This New York Times<\/em> story will stand as representative of the chicken$hit coverage.)\u00a0 Funny\u2013he was actually charged with rape in 1977 (aggravated with the use of drugs and alcohol to incapacitate the girl), but pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of statutory rape.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s something even more inexcusable:\u00a0 the Denver Post<\/em> ran a Los Angeles Times<\/em> story that featured a photo with a caption of the victim in which she is described as the girl who \u201caccused Polanski when\u00a0she was 13.\u201d\u00a0 (The Denver Post\u2019s<\/em> headline in their print and online editions this morning is \u201cPolanski held in 1977 rape case,\u201d however, so \u201crape\u201d is OK in a headline presumably because it\u2019s shorter than saying \u201csex case\u201d or \u201chaving sex with 13-year old accuser.\u201d)\u00a0<\/p>\n

Thank you, Kobe\u00a0Bryant, and your very capable but total dirtbag\u00a0of an attorney, Pamela Mackey!\u00a0\u00a0Ever since Bryant was charged with raping a 19-year old college student from the University of Northern Colorado in 2003,\u00a0the news media has refused to label\u00a0rape victims as rape victims,\u00a0even when\u00a0a District Attorney has charged\u00a0a man with rape,\u00a0<\/em>at which\u00a0point the alleged crime is acknowledged to\u00a0be in fact a crime.\u00a0 (The presumption of innocence of the alleged criminal still holds, but at this point victims should be acknowledged as victims, not jeered at and patronized as \u201caccusers.\u201d)\u00a0 Check out the linked story above\u2013Bryant\u2019s victim is described as the woman who \u201caccused\u201d him, although of course he had been arrested and charged with the crime.\u00a0 By the way, the charges were dropped because the victim refused to testify against Bryant, not because the D.A. came to the conclusion that the charge was unwarranted.<\/p>\n

What a proud legacy Colorado has given the nation with respect to our understanding of crime, consent, and rape.\u00a0 Now, we can\u2019t even describe drunk and drugged 13-year old girls as rape victims\u2013they\u2019re just \u201caccusers.\u201d\u00a0 I\u2019ve talked with my women\u2019s history students about this for the past few years, when thinking about patriarchal equilibrium and the fact that I\u2019m old enough now to see a good span of my life historically and to note the changes, and I think the language we use to describe rape has been shaped to the advantage of rapists everywhere.\u00a0 Unless and until all crime victims are going to be referred to as \u201caccusers\u201d in media accounts, I\u2019ll stand by my analysis here.<\/p>\n

UPDATE, <\/strong>Monday afternoon:\u00a0 In catching up on my blog reading, I find that others have written some good posts on the Polanski arrest.\u00a0 First, Dr. Isis got there yesterday with her post, \u201cAfter Years of Stealth Evasion, Elusive Criminal Roman Polanski Arrested,\u201d and Salon\u2019s Kate Harding wrote today, \u201cReminder:\u00a0 Roman Polanski raped a child,\u201d which is a much longer and more thorough\u00a0treatment of the case than I offered here.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UPDATED BELOW At least in the coverage of Roman Polanski\u2019s arrest it has!\u00a0 I keep hearing about how he was arrested in Switzerland this weekend on a 32-year old charge of \u201chaving sex with\u201d a then-13 year old girl.\u00a0 (This New York Times story will stand as representative of the chicken$hit coverage.)\u00a0 Funny\u2013he was actually […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12032],"tags":[37554,48970,45098,3644],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-107669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-american-history","tag-disappeared","tag-englishlanguage","tag-rape","tag-word"],"yoast_head":"\nThe word "rape" has been disappeared from the English\u00a0language - Som2ny Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=107669\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The word "rape" has been disappeared from the English\u00a0language - 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