No means wait ’til I’m asleep
Via Feministe, this bizarre and disturbing summary of US marital rape law:
On July 5, 1993, marital rape became a crime in all 50 states, under at least one section of the sexual offenses code. In 17 states and the District of Columbia, there are no exemptions from rape prosecution granted to husbands. However, in 33 states, there are still some exemptions given to husbands from rape prosecution. When his wife is most vulnerable (e.g., she is mentally or physically impaired, unconscious, asleep, etc.) and is legally unable to consent, a husband is exempt from prosecution in many of these 33 states.
I’m dumbstruck. How does this make sense? Who lobbied for the exemptions? What the fuck?
Rob, you can bet that those exemptions were pursued by men who think that it’s impossible to rape one’s own wife. Women are chattels, property, of course.
If you run the list of states with exemptions, I will cast a blind $1000 bet right now that every one will have recently “voted” for Shrub.
I say “voted” because the fat lady is still disquietingly unresponsive over in the land of the ‘free’:
http://www.blackboxvoting.org
http://cannonfire.blogspot.com
-weez
SA under Dunstan was the first state to outlaw marital rape. At the time conservative Christians opposed this: putting the family first.
Maybe Clinton had something to do with giving out legislative passes.
Thanks to ‘Shrub’, Udai Hussein for one doesn’t lift chicks off the streets to rape with his buddies any more.
Wow, a Currency Lad post that attempts desperately to change the subject? Who would’ve thought?
Btw, I had a look at the red state/blue state divide, and there’s no pattern. For example, Texas doesn’t allow any exemptions.
Geoff,
Dunstan’s just one generation ago. How far we’ve come and how close we are.
Hey CL, there are lots of girls Udai would have to pick up off the streets with a spatchelor these days thanks to Shrub – keep that in mind.
(PS – If you oppose rape, you must support the invasion of Iraq.)
woah, that is bizarre. just wondering weezil, what links you got about conservative Christians opposing anti-marital rape laws?
can the people who vote these things in really sleep at night?
“(PS – If you oppose rape, you must support the invasion of Iraq.)”
And if you oppose abortion, you must also oppose the invasion of Iraq.
(Unless, of course, you believe that there was not a single pregnant woman among the tens of thousands killed by the invasion/occupation forces.)
Vaara, in the context of my line about Udai, the fact that the Post Script was tongue in cheek should be apparent.
Unless you did notice and your comment is directed at readers in general…
Women in Afghanistan who were raped had the right to be stobned to death for adultery. Gays had the right to be executed under Taliban rule.
George Bush took those rights away.
pity those aren’t the only rights GWB has taken from people. Guantanamo Bay, etc…why is it that morals and rights figure so big when it comes to ‘deposing tyrants’ and matter so little when it comes to what goes on back home?
Not to mention that at the moment it seems like for many Afghans and Iraqis life isn’t exactly brimming with rights and democracy yet. Seems to me, from my meagre news reading, that turmoil still reigns supreme in the region.
Why is it that some people think that imprisoning armed enemy combatants is on the same level as executing rape victims?
Your moral compass needs adfjustment.
first of all, America isn’t just imprisoning those combatants and second of all your right executing rape victims is a lot worse then what is going on in Camp X-Ray. That doesn’t however excuse the way America is treating the “unlawful combatants” or the way our government doesn’t really seem to care. Two wrongs do not make a right. I wasn’t saying that stopping those awful practices is wrong, I was saying that America hasn’t done a very good job of stopping those practices and that at the same time have engaged in some horrible things themselves.
You can guarantee that even though they were asleep, it’d be their fault, too – ‘her flannelette pj’s and hair curlers were just too alluring – & here she is crying rape’! Evil tormenter of weakminded men!
The 2003 women’s policing conference papers cover a severely taboo topic[duh-I wonder why] called ‘victim blaming’
which is a syndrome affecting people who work with victims, which prevents them from being able to separate their own personal prejudices[for whatever reasons] in order to provide a fair and equitable service to people who report being raped.
It looks like it is a very common syndrome.
But lets face it, reality is, in a lot of places women have the same or less value than livestock and it is really just only so many years since women were allowed to show their legs/hands/hair or vote, in this country.
If a government is going to represent the people of a country with balance and equity, women need to be represented equally and proportionally to men in parliament, and they still are not.
There are too many old men in parliament.
rofl-that’s meant to be ‘proportionately’ – that’s rather an unfortunate mistake… head shaking…
Thursday November 25th is the U.N. International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.
I think a really good initiative, given the AIC stats on sexual assault and domestic violence against women, would be to stop teaching little girls at school how to cook, knit and sew and start teaching them self defence.
Or even do karate in phys ed instead of some of the useless things they make kids do during phys ed classes like long distance running in summer for example.