tag:theconversation.com,2011:/fr/topics/legitimate-rape-3638/articles'Legitimate rape' – The Conversation2012-11-08T00:45:57Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/105992012-11-08T00:45:57Z2012-11-08T00:45:57ZIt’s the women wot won it: Democrat victory was no Fluke<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/17380/original/6rck6w7k-1352335363.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President Barack Obama hugs Sandra Fluke, who was vilified by the right for her views on contraception.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Rick Giase</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A president’s first act in office carries considerable symbolic weight. After President Obama was sworn in in 2009, the <a href="http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2009/01/29/obama_signs_lilly_ledbetter_ac.html">first piece of legislation</a> he signed was the Lilly Ledbetter Act, allowing women greater ability to sue for pay discrimination. Whether by coincidence or design, with a stroke of a pen Obama positioned himself perfectly for the 2012 election.</p>
<p>Women became a focus of the 2012 campaign when the “war on women” narrative emerged during fights over contraceptive coverage mandates. Though a potent rhetorical tool for Democrats, the “war on women” narrative obscured women’s centrality to this year’s race.</p>
<p>Initially, the Obama administration was losing the debate over contraceptive coverage. Conservatives had successfully framed the issues as one of <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/17/us/politics/birth-control-coverage-rule-debated-at-house-hearing.html">religious liberty</a>, not women’s rights. But then something happened: conservative men started talking. And it turned out they couldn’t talk about policies aimed at women without saying something remarkably retrograde.</p>
<p>Rush Limbaugh <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-buzz/post/rush-limbaugh-calls-georgetown-student-sandra-fluke-a-slut-for-advocating-contraception/2012/03/02/gIQAvjfSmR_blog.html">called</a> a Georgetown student a “slut” for advocating for birth control. Rick Santorum, runner-up for the Republican nomination, <a href="http://swampland.time.com/2012/02/14/rick-santorum-wants-to-fight-the-dangers-of-contraception/">warned against</a> “the dangers of contraception”. “You know, back in my days,” <a href="http://www.politico.com/blogs/burns-haberman/2012/02/foster-friess-in-my-day-gals-put-aspirin-between-their-114730.html">said</a> conservative mega-donor Foster Friess, “they used Bayer aspirin for contraception. The gals put it between their knees, and it wasn’t that costly.”</p>
<p>In the wake of these comments, women began flocking to the Democratic Party. Democrats saw opportunity in the growing gender gap: They could win over voters by focusing on issues that elicited these kinds of responses from Republicans.</p>
<p>The strategy succeeded. Keeping the focus on so-called “women’s issues”, Democrats forced Republicans to defend their increasingly rigid stance on reproductive rights. Since the 1980s, the Republican platform has <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2012/aug/31/opinion/la-oe-0831-kinsley-abortion-gop-platform-20120831">called for</a> federal bans on abortion procedures, without specifying any exemptions for rape or the health of the mother. It was a remarkable development for a party that until the late 1960s was the party of feminism, contraception, and abortion rights.</p>
<p>Practiced Republicans have found ways to discuss this stance without sounding radical and regressive, though Mitt Romney did blunder in the second debate with his now infamous “binders full of women” comment. But when novices find themselves obliged to do the same, they end up inadvertently saying what they think. Todd Akin babbled on about <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2012/08/19/todd-akin-gop-senate-candidate-legitimate-rape-rarely-causes-pregnancy/">legitimate rape</a> and Richard Mourdock <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/10/indiana-senate-candidate-richard-mourdock-pregnancy-from-rape-something-god-intended/">asserted</a> pregnancies from rape were what “God intended.”</p>
<p>When they made these claims, voters fled - and not just women voters. Akin and Mourdock’s <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/decision2012/gops-akin-mourdock-lose-senate-elections/2012/11/07/2b48954c-27b3-11e2-b2a0-ae18d6159439_story.html">drubbings</a> last night help illustrate what the “war on women” narrative often obscured: that voters concerned about so-called “women’s issues” aren’t just women. Men too were repelled by the idea of “legitimate rape”, and men too voiced support for the ability to control reproductive choices.</p>
<p>The “war on women” framework also distorted women’s role in the election. By focusing on women as voters, it diverted attention from the historic nature of women’s candidacies in 2012.</p>
<p>Women have long been underrepresented in America’s national politics. They make up only 17% of the current House and Senate – and those are historic highs. In terms of women in government, the U.S. <a href="http://www.catalyst.org/publication/244/women-in-government">lags behind</a> nearly seventy other countries. While last night’s election results won’t suddenly make the Congress a gender-equal institution, the upper chamber will add four, possibly five, new women senators. This includes Elizabeth Warren, the popular Harvard law professor, and Tammy Baldwin, the first openly gay senator.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/17374/original/9rr58y2w-1352334106.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/17374/original/9rr58y2w-1352334106.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/17374/original/9rr58y2w-1352334106.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/17374/original/9rr58y2w-1352334106.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/17374/original/9rr58y2w-1352334106.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1133&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/17374/original/9rr58y2w-1352334106.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1133&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/17374/original/9rr58y2w-1352334106.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1133&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Elizabeth Warren at a campaign rally in Massachusetts.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Tim Pierce</span></span>
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<p>And where does the newly re-elected president fit into all this? It is easy to interpret Obama’s decision to lead off with the Ledbetter Act as a play for women’s votes. And to some extent it was. But it was also a signal that the economy Obama planned to rebuild from the rubble of the global financial collapse would be a more equitable one, one in which women would command the same economic value as men.</p>
<p>Tuesday night’s results suggest the political system could become more equitable as well. One could imagine as the results came in that future debates over policies affecting women’s choices might actually include women as policymakers rather than bodies to be legislated.</p>
<p>The phrase “war on women” has real limitations. But to the extent the 2012 election was a battle over what role women would play as America moves forward, the results are clear. Americans rejected Akin and Mourdock, returned to office the man who signed the Ledbetter Act, and increased the number of women senators by at least 25%.</p>
<p>A war on women? If so, it wrapped up last night. And women won.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/10599/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicole Hemmer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A president’s first act in office carries considerable symbolic weight. After President Obama was sworn in in 2009, the first piece of legislation he signed was the Lilly Ledbetter Act, allowing women…Nicole Hemmer, Visiting Assistant Professor at University of Miami & Research Associate, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/89882012-08-22T02:54:19Z2012-08-22T02:54:19ZWhy ‘legitimate’ rape and other myths are alive and dangerous<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/14511/original/7d8kdxgm-1345597177.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Comments from male politicians such as George Galloway have revealed cultural assumptions about rape that originate from some powerful myths about this sex crime.</span> </figcaption></figure><p>When US Republican Todd Akin declared earlier this week that it is impossible or “really rare” for a woman to become pregnant as a result of a “legitimate rape” because “the female body has ways to try and shut the whole thing down” it wasn’t just the feminist blogosphere that went on high alert. </p>
<p>Republican Presidential nominee Mitt Romney was quick to condemn the Missouri Congressman’s claims as “insulting, inexcusable, and, frankly, wrong,” while President Barack Obama described Akin’s endorsement of such a view as “offensive”. </p>
<p>He continued: “[Rape] is rape, and the idea that we should be parsing, qualifying and slicing what types of rape we’re talking about doesn’t make sense.” </p>
<p>Various Republicans <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2012/08/21/politics/akin-controversy/index.html">demanded his resignation</a> or at the least an apology (which he has since issued, qualifying “rape is never legitimate”), though not yet vice-presidential nominee Paul Ryan who with Akin last year co-sponsored a proposed bill that used the term “forcible rape” in an effort to narrow access to abortion (the term was later dropped).</p>
<p>It’s encouraging that even Akin’s fellow travellers have swiftly distanced themselves from his purportedly “scientific” claims; it also seems likely that Akin’s political career may not recover from his “misspoken” assertions. </p>
<p>From an Australian vantage point – where despite Tony Abbott’s past efforts, abortion rarely features as an election issue – the whole furore may strike us as peculiarly American. </p>
<p>Yet the related border dispute about what constitutes rape is hardly exclusive to the United States. Also this week, Independent British MP George Galloway <a href="http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/cristinaodone/100177389/george-galloway-todd-akin-why-must-politicians-trot-out-their-ugly-prejudice-about-women-and-rape/">dismissed the rape allegations</a> made by two Swedish women against Julian Assange by rehashing the familiar argument that if a woman had already had dinner with the accused, already invited him back to her house, and already had consensual sex with him, only to wake and find him having sex with her (and without a condom), well, “This is something that can happen … not everybody needs to be asked prior to each insertion”. </p>
<p>And further, even if the allegations made by the two women against Assange were “One hundred percent true, even if a camera captured them, they don’t constitute rape…at least not rape as anyone with any common sense can recognise it”.</p>
<p>Suspect definitions of rape do not only flow from the mouths of men – it was Whoopi Goldberg who defended director Roman Polanski against charges of “<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NX_D0Bv9M0">rape rape</a>”, to cite one of many possible examples – but the default definitions of Akin and Galloway with their appeals to “science” and “common sense” have their origins in at least two centuries of what anti-rape campaigners have branded “rape myths”. </p>
<p>These myths are powerful because historically they have been espoused by medical and legal authorities, and they’re dangerous because they continue to be pervasive enough for the great majority of rape victims to never report the crimes committed against them. It is this enduring reluctance that should give us pause before we consign Akin and Galloway to the lunatic fringe.</p>
<p>Rape myths are amendable to revision, but the basic assumptions endure, as historian Joanna Bourke traced in her 2007 book <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/oct/20/featuresreviews.guardianreview8">Rape: A History from 1860 to the Present</a>. Here we discover that Akin’s “legitimate rape” concept is an updated version of the once medically-supported notion that it was virtually impossible to rape a resisting woman, whose thigh and pelvic muscles were presumed powerful enough to fend off unwanted penetration. </p>
<p>To quote directly from medical textbooks, “it is impossible to sheath a sword into a vibrating scabbard”. Under the terms of this myth, one assailant did not have a chance against a woman determined not to be violated. In Akin’s contemporary reworking of this logic, where the female body is assigned the ability to “shut down” its reproductive capacities during a “legitimate rape”, he also draws on another since medically discredited notion that nonetheless enjoyed long-time popular support: that female orgasm is necessary for conception. </p>
<p>In Galloway’s protracted dismissal of Assange’s accusers, he merged two myths into one rant: women lie and rape is not serious. </p>
<p>Central to each of these myths is the notion that everyday heterosexual acts – where men might get a little “carried away” – are vulnerable to wilful or histrionic misinterpretation by women. </p>
<p>The question of consent is sidelined or repackaged as another myth, “no means yes”, and the burden of proof is placed on the victim to prove otherwise. Under this constellation of assumptions, the only “true” rapist is a stranger, despite evidence that rape by close acquaintances has been on the increase since the mid-twentieth century – that is, since the rise of dating culture and the invention of the contraceptive pill.</p>
<p>Akin and Galloway have hardly gone unchallenged this week – note that the satirists at <a href="http://www.theonion.com/articles/pregnant-woman-relieved-to-learn-her-rape-was-ille,29258/">The Onion</a> cleverly led with a story titled “Pregnant Woman Relieved to Learn Her Rape was Illegitimate” – but as Joanna Bourke reminds us, rape myths circulate daily and widely and have real-life effects. </p>
<p>The general public, or at least those called for jury service, continue to apply a definition of what constitutes rape that is “much narrower than that decreed by law”.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/8988/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Zora Simic does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>When US Republican Todd Akin declared earlier this week that it is impossible or “really rare” for a woman to become pregnant as a result of a “legitimate rape” because “the female body has ways to try…Zora Simic, Lecturer, School of Humanities, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/89722012-08-21T05:34:12Z2012-08-21T05:34:12ZAkin, Obama and how the ‘legitimate rape’ disaster could cost Romney the election<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/14478/original/4cpyv4z8-1345526241.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President Obama's intervention into the "legitimate rape" controversy may spell danger for the Republicans.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Jim Lo Scalzo</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It’s not often a little-known candidate for the U.S. Senate changes the dynamics of a presidential race. But in <a href="http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/08/todd-akin-legitimate-rape.php">an interview</a> released on Sunday morning, Missouri Representative Todd Akin did just that.</p>
<p>Akin was attempting to explain his opposition to abortion in cases of rape. He made his case in the most offensive way imaginable. A woman getting pregnant from rape? “From what I understand from doctors”, he claimed, “that’s really rare. If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down”.</p>
<p>In other words: if a woman gets pregnant, she couldn’t have been raped.</p>
<p>Condemnation, swift and without reservation, came from across the political spectrum. Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/314452/romney-akins-inexcusable-comment-robert-costa">denounced</a> the comments as “inexcusable” and “entirely without merit”. “Flat-out astonishing”, <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/story/2012-08-19/todd-akin-rape/57146944/1">remarked</a> the president of the National Organization for Women. But the most game-changing response of all came during a surprise press conference by Barack Obama.</p>
<p>Over the past few weeks, President Obama has faced <a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0812/79840.html">mounting criticism</a> over his refusal to take questions from the press. But after his performance Monday, his opponents may start wishing he’d stuck to that vow of silence.</p>
<p>Asked about Akin, Obama hit all the right notes. “Rape is rape”, he <a href="http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2012/08/obama_at_press_conference_rebu.html">declared</a>, a simple statement one wishes was unnecessary but clearly needs saying. He excluded other members of the GOP from his condemnation. “I don’t think they would agree with [him]”, Obama said.</p>
<p>Yet the president didn’t give his Republican rivals a complete pass. He used the incident to highlight what he called “a significant difference in approach between me and the other party”. For Obama, that difference boiled down to this: “We shouldn’t have a bunch of politicians, a majority of whom are men, making health care decisions on behalf of women”.</p>
<p>The language harkens back to what, five months ago, appeared to be a pivotal issue in the campaign: the “war on women”. In March and April, debates over contraception access devolved into slurs against sexually-active women. A yawning gender gap appeared, with women <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/OTUS/women-boost-obama-romney-abc-poll/story?id=16109262#.T4e6CpqokyA">favouring Obama</a> over Mitt Romney by 19 per cent. Across the country, women protested in numbers that seemed to presage high turnout in the November election.</p>
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<span class="caption">Controversial Republican Congressman Todd Akin has ignited a political firestorm with his comments about ‘legitimate rape’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">US Congress</span></span>
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<p>But Americans soon moved on to other things. A slow summer with mediocre economic news and little to focus on other than occasional gaffes took the air out of the activism.</p>
<p>In pivoting from Akin’s indefensible remarks to the broader image of a Republican Party insensitive to women’s concerns, Obama reopened this front in his campaign.</p>
<p>This fall’s “war on women” won’t just be a retread of the spring’s talking points, however. Obama slipped a phrase into his comments that, if they’re smart, should keep Republicans up nights.</p>
<p>In pointing to “broader issues” that separate the Obama and Romney campaigns, the president first repeated his contention that lawmakers shouldn’t be making women’s health care decisions. He then added, “…or qualifying forcible versus non-forcible rape”.</p>
<p>Here’s the thing: Akin didn’t say anything about “forcible rape” in his interview. He said “legitimate rape”. Yet Obama didn’t misspeak. In 2011, Akin co-sponsored a bill limiting the rape-exemption for federally-funded abortions to “forcible rape”.</p>
<p>Opposition and outrage quickly mounted. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Florida representative and head of the Democratic National Committee, <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/02/01/141757/dws-rape-language/">recoiled</a> at the implication “that there is some kind of rape that would be okay to force a woman to carry the resulting pregnancy to term”. The Daily Show <a href="http://www.mediaite.com/tv/kristen-schaal-explains-rape-rape-to-jon-stewart/">savagely mocked</a> the bill in a segment outlining the differences between “rape” and “rape rape”. Public pressure eventually caused Republicans to strip the language from the bill.</p>
<p>And who co-sponsored the bill with Akin? Wisconsin representative – and newly-minted Republican vice-presidential candidate – Paul Ryan.</p>
<p>It is unlikely that Obama will personally go after Ryan on this issue. Obama has, in recent weeks, been working to restore the above-the-fray aura that served him so well in 2008. But his surrogates and SuperPACs no doubt got the message: Ryan on rape is fair game. The same groups that responded to Ryan’s Medicare cuts with <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGnE83A1Z4U">an ad</a> showing a Ryan-like figure dumping a senior citizen off a cliff will have a field day tying Ryan to Akin.</p>
<p>So the big question: Will all this matter on Election Day?</p>
<p>It will, in three ways. First, if Akin stays in the race he will almost certainly lose a seat he was predicted to win. Incumbent Democrat Claire McCaskill will stay in the Senate, and whatever slim chance the GOP had of gaining control of the upper chamber will vanish.</p>
<p>Second, Akin’s comments allow Obama to again shift the debate from a referendum on his less-than-brilliant first term to a choice between two competing visions. Using Akin’s medieval comments, Obama can portray the GOP vision as something out of a Margaret Atwood novel. If nothing else, that should reenergise the female vote.</p>
<p>And finally, by putting Ryan and Akin side-by-side, the Democrats reinforce their overarching message about the Republican ticket. They want to portray Romney and Ryan as out of touch, unable to relate to the real problems of real people. Romney feeds that narrative every time he speaks off the cuff, which is why he chose the wholesome Midwestern representative as his running mate. Ryan’s ties to Akin and the “forcible rape” bill, however, gives Democrats a chance to transform his earnest persona into a far more sinister one.</p>
<p>Akin’s original comment on rape lasted no more than thirty seconds. Obama’s response was only ninety. Yet given the narrow margins separating Obama and Romney, those two minutes could change the dynamics of the campaign – and possibly even the outcome of the November election.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/8972/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicole Hemmer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>It’s not often a little-known candidate for the U.S. Senate changes the dynamics of a presidential race. But in an interview released on Sunday morning, Missouri Representative Todd Akin did just that…Nicole Hemmer, Visiting Assistant Professor at University of Miami & Research Associate, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.