Letters to the Editor

• @AKA Smith

  [Read the article: Post-congressional depression]
  [Read more letters about this article: Here]

  Have you ever had an identifiable hormonal mood swing? Have you ever had PMS?

  Men have hormone cycles too--though obviously not as strong as those of women. If you aren't aware of that, that's not my problem. My point was that hormones and their cycles and low levels of hormones in some cases and excessive levels of hormones in other cases have effects on all people. Some more than others, admittedly. And what does PMS have to do with this discussion? This thread is about PPMD.

  By the way, I am a little angry at you.

  Why am I not surprised? I simply will not agree with you that every single rape accusation that is ever made is 100% true and legitimate. Women are human beings. They sometimes lie. They sometimes do bad things. They sometimes hurt or try to hurt other people. They sometimes manipulate and deceive. But apparently not in your universe.

  In the last thread in which we chatted you implied that my use of the word victim rather than accuser was somehow designed as some sort of rhetorical ploy.

  Because it so clearly was. We were talking about legal proceedings in rape cases, and more specifically he-said/she-said cases of date/acquaintance/gray rape, where the facts of the case are debatable and not black and white. In such cases, it is proper and preferable to refer to the accuser as just that, unless and until a verdict in a fair trial has been reached. Accuser is a broad, inclusive term, and encompasses both victims and false accusers. Your choice of terminology, however, does not even allow for the possibility that a woman might be lying or might have exaggerated an undesirable encounter or might have regretted her choices after the fact or any of the other reasons women have been known to fabricate allegations. By referring to accusers as victims, you automatically presume the utter 100% truth of everything they've said, before a case has been presented and before a jury of citizens has weighed in on the allegation. The analogous verbal trick would be to refer to all defendants as rapists even before verdicts in their trials have been reached. It's the same tactic--refusing to adopt a fair and neutral stance, you presume in all cases the truth (and victimhood) of one side of the equation and the guilt and dishonesty of the other side of the equation. It's an attempt to win your argument and prove your point with a biased and tricky choice of vocabulary.

  I have always used the word victim for people I see as victims of crime.

  As have I, in cases in which I have good evidence to believe the person was indeed a victim, or in cases where it's obvious (murder or sadistic, violent rape for example.) Plenty of "gray rape" or he-said/she-said cases don't fit those criteria while in progress, so I use the broader and more inclusive term accuser instead. If good evidence of guilt is produced and the defendant is convicted, I will happily join you in referring to the woman as a victim. It's that simple. If no good evidence of guilt is produced, and the man is acquitted or the case never reaches trial because charges were dropped, then I cannot in good conscience use the term victim because that presumes the guilt of someone who hasn't been proven guilty. You almost certainly referred to the Duke lacrosse accuser as a "victim" throughout the progress of that case. You might even still refer to her as such today. But that doesn't change the fact that she wasn't a victim of anything more than her own stupidity and bad choices. She wasn't raped. So where was the benefit, let alone fairness, in feminists and the prosecutor constantly referring to her as a victim for an entire year? I referred to her as the accuser from the start of the case, and I still do today. That, and a liar.

  If you think for a minute that you are going reform my word choices based upon your new PC version of how things should be, think again.

  I've explained why I dislike your choice of terminology, both here and in the previous thread. Clearly, you're not going to change your mind, because your terminology is rooted in your rigid ideological views on the subject. That's too bad, but I'm not going to lose sleep over it. I had no illusions about changing your mind on this issue--I knew that was hopeless from the get-go. I was writing more for any others who were reading our little exchange.

  Sorry that you're angry with me. As I've said before, we disagree on some things. I think you're seriously off-base on this issue, but I understand where your thoughts in this matter come from, and I know that you're motivated by good intentions. In spite of it all, I still like much of what you have to say and most points you make, and I think we agree on much more than we disagree on. No hard feelings, hopefully. Well, at least none from my end.

  Permalink Tuesday, October 16, 2007 10:06 PM

• @fetboy

  [Read the article: Quote of the Day]
  [Read more letters about this article: Here]

  You, and Ms. Price, and Mr. Olbermann are all just assuming it was a rape joke or threat, when the simpler and more likely explanation was what I offered--he was responding to the charge that he and his staff had no balls by saying, "Yeah, we still have our balls, do you want us to drop trou and show you?"

  Was it a lame joke? Yes. Was it maladroit and poorly expressed and vague enough to allow for misinterpretation? Clearly. But that doesn't mean that it was a veiled rape threat.

  This is a perfect case of people seeing what they want to see, and automatically assuming the worst in others.

  Permalink Tuesday, October 16, 2007 10:14 PM