E10: But Enough About You

Posted on October 21, 2015 by davidbdale

Exercise: Remove 2nd person language

Money seems to have a big role in our society; you can’t do much or get far if you don’t have any. Money is valuable in different ways, even when you don’t see it physically. In today’s society you must have faith in the government, in the banking system, that your money is being handled with in the proper manner, if not then you would be hiding all of your money under your mattress, or around your house. I never really have a clue what happens in the banks, and how they take care of your money. I always just thought money was quite simple; you either have some or you don’t, that’s it. However, by being introduced to this assignment and having it compare the Yap Fei with the US and France gold trade in 1933, and the Brazilian cruzeros all seemed somewhat similar. No one actually sees their money being transferred. When you get paid, you don’t get a check or get paid even in cash, it’s all directly transferred to your bank account, and that you just have to trust that you got more money.

The First Sentence can be revised a number of ways.

Original Text
Money seems to have a big role in our society; you can’t do much or get far if you don’t have any.

Replace with First Person
Money seems to have a big role in our society; we can’t do much or get far if we don’t have any.

Convert Active Verbs to Passive Verbs
Money has such a big role in our society that not much gets done without it.

Replace Pronouns with nouns
The rich gets things done in our society while the poor are powerless.

Eliminate People
Money, without which nothing gets done, drives our society.

In-Class Instructions

Open a New Post titled “E10-Username”
Copy and paste the above text into your post.
Edit it to remove all 2nd-person language.
Then make the most elegant additional edits you can.
Publish in two categories: E10 and Username.

Then open any of your own posts that require editing and spend the rest of the period making improvements to your own work.

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A07: Definition (Category) Argument

Posted on October 21, 2015 by davidbdale

Definition (or Categorical) Argument

Your first Short Argument, due at noon on TUE OCT 27, will make a definition or categorical argument essential to your Research Position Paper, which itself will be due before you know it. You’ll write three short papers in preparation for that longer assignment, each one proving something essential about your Research Argument.

This first of these, the Definition or Categorical Argument, will define a term essential to proving your thesis. Understandably, you may still be refining your thesis and gathering valuable sources, still determining the exact parameters of your argument. That is understood. It is also understood that not everything can wait until the end of the semester, and that writing and refining a research paper is shooting at a moving target. What you’ll do in your short arguments may be more or less relevant to your final argument depending on how little or how much your thesis changes between now and the end of November. What you’ll aim at in your short paper is today’s target, however shaped, wherever placed (and since it’s moving, you’ll have to aim a bit ahead of it).

Works Cited
You’ll need to cite two sources for this first formal argument, which you may or may not already have described in your Proposal+5 Sources. You’ll produce a Works Cited for this those named sources. Check the links you provide to be sure they lead back to a page we can all access (even if it’s the page in the databases that “launches” the actual document).

I’ve posted a Model Works Cited and linked it to the A07: Definition Essay category and the Writing Help category.

How Can A Definition Be An Argument?
Good question. Let’s say we’re reading an essay by a columnist who has just had to have her apartment wired for internet service for the first time, after years of casually, almost thoughtlessly, logging on to the non-password-protected networks of subscribers in neighboring apartments. She’s never thought of herself as a thief. She’s never thought much about her actions at all; as long as service was available, and free, and she could access it without paying a service provider, she did so, perhaps with gratitude, perhaps with a sense of entitlement.

When the day came that her neighbors locked her out with passwords or moved or migrated to smart phones and unplugged themselves from their own networks, this columnist reports, she awakened from her mindlessness and faced a new reality: the internet isn’t free in the way she’d grown accustomed to thinking of it. It’s a valuable service that costs billions to the providers who expect to be paid for it. She hadn’t been merely sharing what was offered out of generosity to the world. She’d been stealing. She had to re-define what “theft” meant and what “free internet” meant. The internet is a commercial service that somebody is buying (in this case her neighbors) and sharing with others. If they’re sharing willingly, the service is a gift or an inducement. If they’re sharing unwillingly, or without knowing they’re sharing, it’s theft of service.

A one-sentence definition of “free internet” from the author’s new perspective is a tiny little definition essay all by itself: The internet is free to anybody whose conscience doesn’t prohibit her from stealing service from somebody who’s paying for it.

We could argue about her definition. And that’s the point. Definition is argument. Your definition essay will argue for a particular definition and establish the terms under which the rest of your proof will be conducted.

As you work on your own research projects, stay alert to the terms you think are perfectly understood, but which in fact require your readers’ cooperation. For further clarification, here’s an example of how short arguments must be proved before long arguments can be considered complete.

An Essay Desperately In Need of a Definition
Here’s an example you can examine in detail by reading the actual source. It’s about public sector pensions, a topic being hotly debated all across the country, and which has been particularly contentious in New Jersey since the current Governor took charge of a state scrambling desperately to balance its budget in a time of fiscal crisis.

The story is that former New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman took money from the public employees’ pension fund and used it to lower taxes, then borrowed money and gambled it in the stock market to try to repay what she’d taken. Read the article “But the Pension Fund Was Just Sitting There,” and then come back.

The article makes a persuasive argument that public sector employees are not responsible for current budget shortfalls. What it desperately needs, though, if it wants to make its broader point—that the state of New Jersey owes money back to the pension fund—is a clear definition of the state’s fiduciary responsibility to that fund.

  • Is the state obligated to keep those funds locked in a box, free from deflation or loss of any kind?
  • Or is the state obligated to invest that money in instruments that will grow the money to pay future obligations?
  • If so, is the state allowed to choose the stock market to invest in?
  • In other words, did Governor Whitman play within the rules, or did she steal from the employees?

Notice we’re not defining the term pension fund, although the term might be a good candidate for a Definition Essay for a different research project. We’re not defining state, or fiduciary, or the fund. What requires clarification is the concept people like to toss around when they’re debating the topic: The state’s responsibility. “The Governor thumbed her nose at the state’s fiduciary responsibility to the pension fund,” they say, without ever defining that responsibility. Defining the state’s responsibility (or identifying what sort of responsibilities fall into the category: the state’s fiduciary responsibility to its employee’s pension funds), is a good example of a Definition Essay.

ASSIGNMENT SPECIFICS

  • Write your first Shorter Argument paper.
  • The paper will take the form of a Definition (or Category) Argument, as described above.
  • For example, define a term such as stem cell not just biologically, but also politically, since people use the term for advance particular social agendas.
  • Or, for example, define a concept such as the perfect study to prove that violent game play causes players to act violently, since only when the perfect study is defined can the author test existing studies for compliance.
  • Define your term(s) or concept(s) thoroughly but concisely in 1,000 words. Padding with wasted words is prohibited.
  • Include Works Cited.
  • Title your post Definition Argument—Username.
  • Publish your definition essay in the A07: Definition Argument category.

GRADE DETAILS

  • Due noon Tuesday (11:59 am) TUE OCT 27.
  • Customary late penalties. (0-24 hours 10%) (24-48 hours 20%) (48+ hours, 0 grade)
  • Portfolio Essay
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Model Works Cited

Posted on October 21, 2015 by davidbdale

For your Definition (Category) Argument, your other Shorter Arguments, and of course your Research Paper will have to include a Works Cited. Please understand this is different from a Bibliography, which identifies every source you consulted in your research. The Works Cited identifies only (this will sound so obvious!) works cited in this particular essay.

If you get your sources through the Rowan library databases, you can use Prof Search or RefWorks to produce automated Works Cited citations. A little experience with RefWorks will also accustom you to the mechanics of common citation types. But if you get stuck for a particular style, the Online Writing Lab (OWL) at Purdue offers a free online guide to citation.

Easier still than building your own citations with help from a manual are the automated Bibliography and Works Cited generators such as EasyBib, Citation Machine, and ETurabian.

A sample Works Cited follows.

Works Cited

“Are you Eating Too Much Meat?” Forbes. 24 March 2009. Web. 9 March 2011.

“Teeth Show Fruit Was The Staple; No Exceptions Found.” The New York Times. The New York Times, 15 May 1979. 8-9 March 2011.

“Meat.” WikiInvest. Web. 9 March 2011.

“Study: vegan diets healthier for planet, people than meat diets.” The University of Chicago News Office. The University of Chicago, 13 April 2006. 8 March 2011.

“Humans are Naturally Plant-Eaters (According to the Best Evidence: Our Bodies).” Vegetarian Guide. Michael Bluejay, September 2010. 8 March 2011.

“How Meat Contributes to Global Warming.” Scientific American. Scientific American, 4 February 2009. 9 March 2011.

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The “Heightened Scrutiny” Example

Posted on October 21, 2015 by davidbdale

Before you begin to write your own, you’ll want to review the essential qualities of a good Definition Essay.

1. It’s an argument.
I’ve told you before that all writing is argument, but now is always a good time to remind you. Our intuition might tell us that a Definition Essay is a simple stating of the facts of what a thing is or isn’t. But if that were true, we’d hardly need lawyers at all. Whole libraries have been filled with arguments about whether a particular judicial process is or is not an example of “due process” or “equal protection under the law.” Those categories sound clear enough, but deciding whether individual cases qualify as members of the class is always up for debate.

2. It has real-world relevance.
The dictionary is almost useless in defining what words and concepts mean in society. Because the model essay below is about gay marriage, I looked up the definition of marriage in a 1993 dictionary and found it quite helpless. In several entries, it sometimes refers to unions of husband and wife; sometimes to a special social and legal relationship between men and women for the foundation of a family; sometimes merely to an intimate or close union.

None of these will help us legislate whether same gender marriages should be permitted because, as a society, we get to decide what constitutes a “special social and legal relationship” and who can make one, just as we get to decide what constitutes “the foundation of a family.” After all, we don’t take away the marriage licenses of couples who don’t procreate, even by choice.

3. It often requires defining several terms.
In the above, we need to clarify not just marriage, but social relationship, legal relationship, and family. In the model below, our quest to define the rights of gays seeking to marry sends us in search of good definitions for

  • protected class,
  • insular minorities,
  • laws based on gender,
  • laws based on sex,
  • invidious discrimination,
  • defining characteristics,
  • political vulnerability, and
  • fundamental nature.

After all that, the model below still doesn’t define marriage, let alone gay marriage. It doesn’t try to. It doesn’t say gay marriage should be embraced. It doesn’t say gays are entitled to all the privileges and considerations of marriage. Its narrower argument is that, whatever gay marriage is, gays belong to a class of citizens entitled to special consideration to determine whether depriving them of the right to marry is unconstitutional.

And that’s a worthwhile definition essay!

In red below are the specific claims relevant to a definition of a protected class that deserves heightened scrutiny and the argument that gays seeking to marry belong to that class.

New York Times Editorial
March 23, 2013

Heightened Scrutiny

One of the central questions in the two gay marriage cases to be argued before the Supreme Court this week is whether gays and lesbians are a protected class under the Constitution. Under longstanding principles, government actions that fall heavily on “discrete and insular minorities” historically subject to prejudice and stigma are to be given particular scrutiny.

The 3.4 percent of Americans who identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender clearly qualify as this kind of minority. Laws classifying individuals based on sexual orientation — the anti-gay-marriage initiative in California called Proposition 8 and the federal Defense of Marriage Act — must be given heightened scrutiny.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, then the foremost advocate for gender equality, swayed the court 40 years ago to adopt that standard for gender-based distinctions. The court concluded “that classifications based upon sex” were “inherently suspect.” But it has not yet decided how to treat laws based on sexual orientation. The solicitor general and others argue persuasively that such laws require close review just as those based on gender do.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit struck down the Defense of Marriage Act for defining marriage as between a man and a woman. The appeals court convincingly found that in focusing on sexual orientation, the act warranted heightened scrutiny under the test the Supreme Court established for gender-based laws — and that the statute was unconstitutional when reviewed closely. The test considers whether members of the group have experienced invidious discrimination; whether individuals can leave the group without losing a basic part of their identities; whether the group’s defining characteristic is relevant to its ability to contribute to society; and whether members can protect themselves in the political process.

Gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people share a common “immutable” characteristic because their sexual orientation is fundamental to who they are and they have indisputably been discriminated against. Until a decade ago, the Supreme Court upheld state laws making “private sexual conduct” between people of the same sex a crime. In the five most recent years for which the government has data, through 2011, hate crimes in the United States fell by 19 percent. But hate crimes based on sexual orientation went up by 3 percent. The discrimination has nothing to do with the ability to contribute to society.

Finally, gays and lesbians, as a minority group, cannot protect themselves from discrimination in a political process governed by the majority. If they had power, Proposition 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act would never have passed, nor would the laws currently on the books in 39 states that specifically restrict marriage to opposite-sex couples.

As the brief for the United States said in the Defense of Marriage Act case, “This is the rare circumstance in which a faithful application of the court’s established criteria compels applying heightened scrutiny to an additional classification.” Neither of the laws in the two cases before the court can withstand this serious constitutional examination.

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The Opposite of a Black Sneaker

Posted on October 21, 2015 by davidbdale

In Favor of Outrageous Thinking

The goal of all our arguments is not to join a black-or-white debate, but to create a color, or a set of fancy footwear, not the comfortable shoes that “go with everything,” but a pair of high-heeled neon ankle-killing athletic shoes everyone laughs at until the day she buys a pair. If you start with black, and I start with white, we tend to think we should meet somewhere in the middle, and the middle too often looks gray. BlackWhiteGray Gray satisfies no one. It can’t be what we wanted. Ending up with compromises no more compelling than our starting premises wastes our readers’ time (if we still have readers at the end). Instead we need to realize we’ve misinterpreted our starting points. We haven’t started with opposites. For one thing, we’re both talking about sneakers.

The opposite of a black sneaker

The opposite of a black sneaker isn’t a white sneaker; it’s broccoli, or impressionist art, or the atomic weight of laughter. We’re not obligated to compromise our positions to find something that contains components of both. We should instead be hoping that the tension between the two ends of the spectrum reveals something more interesting than either of the “sides.” First it reveals that we haven’t started on the two extremes. Then we discover there’s something beyond both our positions. BlackWhiteRed

Gray on Gray.

The worst mistake we can make—even worse than settling for gray—is to start with gray, which can only result in more gray. GraySneakers

Gray on Gray, A Model:

The most common misconception with someone who is happy is we think that person has meaning in his life. A person who is happier may even have less meaning in her life than her less-happy counterparts. Happiness doesn’t define meaning; rather, it defines contentment. Having meaning in one’s life runs deeper than the mere sensation that happiness brings. Meaning is about contributing to the world, to something greater than oneself. Happiness is just satisfaction with one’s current standpoint on life, and one’s environment. The world defines happiness as something much greater than it actually is. Happiness is nothing more than the satisfaction of one’s current standpoint.

Color on Color.

Our goal is the colorful conclusion, achieved by beginning with bold and colorful premises, somewhere along a line of reasoning the ends of which are not in sight when we begin. BlackWhiteWings

Color on Color: A Model

Our neighbor Frank seems happy, and would probably define himself as happy, but he’s not. He takes pride in his fine house, where he lives with his presentable family, and he has job security. Let’s call him content. Our neighbor Ernest rents a cramped apartment, lives alone, and scrapes by freelancing. Let’s call him happy. Ernest is tortured by an abiding outrage against injustice. He champions every cause that comes his way if it will better the world or ease the suffering of others. Often hungry himself, he will share his lunch with anyone. We might prefer to be Frank, but Ernest is more likely to be happy.

If you can prove that, I’ll eat my shoe.

The result of our premises will not be as certain as when we try to start with supposed “opposite sides” of a known argument, but the pursuit of an outcome will be more entertaining, vivid, colorful, and compelling. Maybe even nutritious. SneakersBroccoli

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counterintuitive predictions continued

Posted on October 19, 2015 by dancingueen

20.unikely unreasonable bad

21.likely reasonable bad

22.likely reasonable bad

23.likely reasonable bad

24.true reasonable bad

25.likely reasonable bad

26.true reasonable bad

27. likely reasonable good

28.true reasonable bad

29.true reasonable bad

30.likely not crazy good

31.likely reasonable bad

32.true reasonable good

33.false unreasonable bad

33.false unreasonable bad

34.false unreasonable bad

35.likely reasonable good

36. likely reasonable good

37.likely reasonable bad

38.likely reasonable good

39.unlikely unreasonable wrong

40. likely reasonable good

41.likely reasonable bad

42.likely reasonable bad

43. likely reasonable good

44.likely reasonable good

45.true reasonable bad

46.likely reasonable good

47.true reasonable good

48.true reasonable good

49.false reasonable good

50.likely reasonable bad

Posted in Counterintuitive Predictions | 1 Comment

Agenda FRI OCT 16, 2015

Posted on October 16, 2015 by davidbdale
Posted in Agendas, davidbdale, Professor Post | Leave a comment

Advertising Failure Exercise

Posted on October 16, 2015 by davidbdale

The story of Doctor Kim A. Adcock’s approach to solving a problem in the radiology department at Kaiser Permanente in Denver reads like script background for one of those “procedural” TV shows such as CSI. We know who died (far too many) and we know who did it (doctors, sort of) but we’re not sure how to handle the evidence to make sure nobody gets killed next time.

Procedures that seemed reasonable to Kaiser in 1995 because they “had always been done that way,” turned out to be entirely unreasonable, with deadly consequences. And a solution that seemed impossible because of fear, turned out to be the best and most logical of solutions, and has saved countless lives.

Microsoft PowerPoint - EKA.RSNApressimages.2012.10.08.pptxMicrosoft PowerPoint - EKA.RSNApressimages.2012.10.08.pptx

[Caption above and below:Mammography images (from 2010, left; and 2012, right) of a woman in her forties with no family history of breast cancer who missed a year of screening and in the interval developed suspicious right upper out calcifications [ ] and a suspicious mass { }, both of which underwent biopsy, yielding invasive carcinoma.]

Microsoft PowerPoint - EKA.RSNApressimages.2012.10.08.pptxMicrosoft PowerPoint - EKA.RSNApressimages.2012.10.08.pptx

I read this story when it first appeared in 2002 and have cherished its insights ever since. Now 13 years later, I had to go find it to share it with this class. Since reading it, and other stories like it, I cannot look at statistics of any kind without wondering what they really mean. If the crime rate goes down, does that mean there is less crime? Maybe not. It might mean fewer people are reporting crimes.

For example, in New Orleans after Katrina, distrust of the police ran so high most citizens in some neighborhoods preferred to suffer crime in silence than to involve the police. The very first thought that came to my mind listening to that story was, “I’ll bet the crime rate has gone down in those neighborhoods” and not because there’s less crime. The mayor though, and the chief of police, can trumpet those statistics as if they’re doing a better job in those same neighborhoods.

But I digress. Your assignment for today, FRI, OCT 16, was to have read “Mammogram Team Learns From Its Errors” in preparation for today’s exercise in which you’ll contribute a comment to an ongoing discussion of the counterintuitivities (I’m going to keep using this word until the rest of the world adopts it) it contains.

I don’t need an organized essay from any one of you, but I do need a contribution from everyone in the form of a comment to this post you’re reading now. I’m setting up the assignment this way to encourage you to read the entire comment string and reply to your classmates, not repeat what they’ve already said.

You may make your own original observations, of course, when you see an opportunity to point out something new. Or you may reply directly to a classmate’s observation with rebuttal or clarification. And you may contribute as well or as often as you like for a better grade. The minimum for a passing grade is one substantial comment.

Photo Source: Radiologic Society of North America RSNA

ASSIGNMENT SPECIFICS

  • Follow the link from the sidebar or this link here to the article.
  • Read the article looking for evidence of counterintuitivity. At what points in the story do people think or act contrary to what their intuition told them? How do you explain their feelings or thoughts? At what point in human culture does common knowledge change so that we develop different intuitions?
  • Read the comments to this post that precede yours.
  • If you have something new to say, add your new insight to the conversation in a comment of your own.
  • If your insight is not unique, respond instead to someone else’s comment with refutation or additional support. Never repeat. Never merely agree.

GRADE DETAILS

  • DUE FRI OCT 16 during class.
  • Quizzes and Exercises category (10%)
Posted in Advertising Failure, Assignments, davidbdale, Professor Post | 67 Comments

visual rewrite#2-hiralp365

Posted on October 16, 2015 by hiralp365

The advertisement begins with camera focusing on somewhat middle aged blonde woman dancing along to a music. There are few also few people in the background, holding red party cups in dim lit house. The house has nice cushions with lamp and little lights. According to the clothing style, it seems to be filmed in late 1990s or 2000s.

(0:00-0.:01)The blonde woman has happy expression on her face is dancing to the music while talking to young woman on her left who is also dancing along with her. At the same moment, a young woman had spilled a drink over a guy’s shirt in the background.

(0:02-0:03) The blonde woman’s friend replies back with her head bobbling down unable to keep her posture up straight. The blonde woman lifts up big black glass bottle with her right hand similar to alcohol bottle. As soon she drinks it up, her head remains in same position upwards towards the ceiling. Her eyes are wide open and so is her mouth as if she had choked.

(0:04-0:06) The blonde woman puts her hand over her mouth while lowering her head with concern face. Her friend looks at her with goofy smile and is unsteady on her feet as if she is toxicated.

(0:08-0:11)  The blonde woman puts her hand away from her mouth slowly out and spits her tooth out. Her other friend seems to be shocked and laughs with palm her of her hands covering her mouth while looking at it.

0:12-0:13) The blonde woman also starts to laughs while looking at the tooth she lost on palm of her hand. It seems as if they both are not in their consciousness to take it seriously.

(0:14-0:15)  The blonde woman  tries to say something but is unable complete sentence of what she wants to say while looking at her broken tooth. Her friend leans towards her side laughing while looking at the tooth in her hand.

(0:16-0:18) Both of the women fall down losing balance  on to the couch behind them with loud laugher holding each other.

At the end of (0:18) the video says it’s easy to tell if you had too many.

(0:19)  Now the focus goes towards another young couple who are sitting the house wooden stairs indoors. There are two bottles of alcohol and one red cup on a little table next to the staircase where they both are sitting.

(0:20) She holds out her car key smiling at him and the guy nods his head

. (0:21-0:23)  As she gets up smiling, he makes bye gesture with his hand. She gets down on the stairs and makes shush gesture with her finger over her lips. As if it were secret between them that she was drunk.

At this part of video there’s message “what if you just had one too many”

(0:24) She steps down on the steps of the stair smiling at him and crouches down pinking up her jacket to run towards the door out.

(0:28-0:29) The guy’s face doesn’t seem to be happy about her driving drunk and is concerned. It seems he was powerless to stop her.

From (0:25-0:30) till the end of video, a slogan comes up in white letters “Buzz driving is drunk driving”

Posted in You Forgot to Categorize! | 4 Comments

White Paper – crossanlogan

Posted on October 16, 2015 by crossanlogan

The Counterintuitivity of Defining Rape

Practice Opening 1

Rape is perhaps the most heinous of crimes one person can commit against another. Historically, the majority of rape cases have seen a man raping a woman, and yet historically the exact criteria for what constitutes rape has been decided by men. Worse yet, the vast majority of these definitions have focused on not the woman’s loss of autonomy over her body, but the woman’s male owner losing his autonomy over her body. This crime being one of the greatest atrocities a man can visit upon a woman, it seems counterintuitive that men have been the ones to determine what is and isn’t rape.

Practice Opening 2

Throughout history, women have been subject to the whims, desires, and fancy of men. From Biblical times up until the modern day, even countries which pride themselves on being “modern” in their ideologies still are complicit in the patriarchy. For example, the definition of rape has been developed and enforced strictly by men from historic times even until the present day. One of the worst crimes a man can commit against a woman has been defined for thousands of years by men.

“Legitimate Rape” and Todd Akin’s Idiocy

In 2012, Republican Senator Todd Akin said, when asked about rape, “[i]f it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.” This is a statement that not only belies a basic misunderstanding of human biology and physiology, but also indicates a fundamental problem in Senator Akin’s thinking — on some level, the phrase “legitimate rape” implies a hierarchy, wherein some womens’ rapes are on a higher level, more traumatic, or more rapey than those of other women.

Let’s take two women with whom I am close personal friends, whose names we’ll change for the sake of privacy. One woman, who we’ll call Kelly, experienced a rape when she was in high school — her rapist pressured her again and again to perform fellatio on him, and when she said she was uncomfortable he didn’t stop; in fact, he threatened to tell all of her friends that she’d, in fact, done it eagerly, thus labeling her a “slut” among her early high school friend group.

The other woman, Maria, had an experience which we might see as closer to the “traditional” scenario — the struggling, forced kind, perpetrated by her uncle no less. He held her down and removed her clothing, and before he was finished he’d forcibly had his way with her.

As sickening as those scenarios are to imagine,  are we able to conclude under Todd Akin’s idea of “legitimate rape” that Maria’s experience was sufficiently rapey enough to qualify? By extension, then, are we able to write off Kelly’s experience as illegitimate? And more importantly, is it even reasonable and sane to be ranking nonconsentual sexual experiences like that? The answer is a profound no; it is absolutely insane, irresponsible, and reprehensible to attempt to categorize instances of rape as legitimate or illegitimate.

Women as Property

Throughout history, men have viewed women as nothing more than their property; whether we look at the Code of Hammurabi, the early British law text Fleta, the Bible, or 13th century Saxon law, there is one theme that commonly emerges — any wrong done to a woman is in reality done to that woman’s male owner.

Deuteronomy 22:28-29 says the rape of a virgin must be reconciled by a payment of fifty shekles to the woman’s father, as well as taking that pesky daughter of his off his hands by marriage, because what woman wouldn’t want to marry the man that just robbed her of her sexual and bodily autonomy? The Code of Hammurabi has a similar view, though it gets even harsher — not only does it describe the rape as “property damage,” it says that if the woman was married, her nonconsentual sexual experience turns her into an adultress. Regardless of the fact that by definition she was neither initializing the act nor enjoying herself during the act, under ancient Babylonian code she gets thrown into the river along with the rest of the cheating whores of the town.

Posted in Author | 3 Comments