Does this "rape" article seem familiar to anyone else? I seem to recall someone a few years ago using almost the exact same words, if not the EXACT same words, in a "satire" artice some years back. Anyone else remember this?

Could this not only be not simply awful, but plagarism as well?

Since we're all supposed to be super-sensitive to the suffering of others, it's hard to understand why satire of this kind evokes apoplexy among us while jokes about castration in mainstream commercials and movies (not to mention men getting raped in prison) are considered perfectly fine and we'll tell men not to get all worked-up over what is "just a joke"?

I really need someone to explain this to me: Why, exactly, are the latter forms of sexual victimization considered okay but the former is not considered okay? Do we think that men "deserve" it? Is this a moral stance for us to take? Are women more precious and delicate?

I've never understood why castration and prison rape jokes are "okay," let alone "funny."

...how the Nazis did Anne Frank a favor by creating a market for her writing?

I love how men like to 'joke' that ugly women would never have sex unless a guy is drunk or committing an act of violence. Because no man, not even an ugly wildebeest-resembling man, would have sex (much less like) an ugly woman, right? Even ugly men are entitlted to beautiful women. Ugly women are just SOL unless it's mercy sex by a guy with beer goggles, or violence. Some satire.

Humor is very subjective, and I believe this editorial incident has received far more attention than it warrants. We laugh at a lot of things: prison rape jokes, humorous depictions of torture, e.g. "Top Secret" that I'm sure would stir up painful memories for the crimes' real life victims. I confess to finding cartoonish Schwarzenegger-style violence to be hilarious; others find it to be in bad taste Laughing at horrible acts does not mean I condone them. We should think long and hard before declaring any subject to be out of bounds for satirical treatment. When I find something tasteless, such as the rape humor of the editorial, I simply turn the page. There's no need to organize an angry mob.

I'm more inclined to find fault with the direction of this satire. Greater humorists have made rape funny while keeping the jokes far less direct and offensive. George Carlin once said "I can PROVE to you that rape is funny! Picture Porky Pig raping Elmer Fudd!" And in the live recording, it sounds like most of the audience laughed at this. His subjects are Fantasy, so the audience is at a remove from the topic. Similarly the Schwarzenegger-esqu violence cited by other comentators is often more movie magic than real-world.

Would so many be as incensed if Petroski had gone the opposite route and said: "In actuality, rape's advantages can very much be seen today. Take ugly men, for example. If it weren't for rape, how would they ever know the joy of intercourse with a womman who isn't drunk? In a society as plastic-conscious as our own, are we really to believe that a woman would ever sleep with a man resembling a wildebeest if she didn't have a few schnapps [sic] in her? Of course she wouldn't -- at least no self-respecting woman would -- but therein lies the beauty of rape."

Satirize the crime and the criminal, not the victim.

wow. really? hmm. maybe because we live in a patriarchal culture where rape happens on a daily basis. this could potentially be humorous in a world where rape didn't ever occur, but we don't live in that utopia. i've never encountered a man who had be castrated. i can't even count the number of women i know who have been sexually assaulted. that's the difference, you privileged dumbass.

...forced resignation only hurts if you fight it.

The real pain comes from finding out that what you thought was a gift for satire was actually a gift for overestimating one's own cleverness and for underestimating the strength of the ensuing outcry. If Petroski had intended the piece as a satire about the news media, why not point directly at them and write an article about how 99% of rape victims report feelings of having sold more newspapers?

Google will haunt this man forever.

I'm unsurprised that some are already commenting that the reaction to this unfunny "satire" is overblown. What these people fail to notice is that it takes a insensitive lout to even consider writing the article in the first place, and it takes a misogynist newsroom culture to allow the thing to see print.

Petroski's editor Mark Rowan, in the Boston Globe:

"Up until now, I had always seen the world from the narrow vantage point of a 21-year-old white male, but now I see that it needs to be broadened," Rowan said.

Here's a scoop: being 21 years old, male, and white is no excuse for being a complete jackass. I can walk into any college dorm in America and find at least one 21 year-old white male who doesn't think it's a hilarious idea to joke about "raping ugly women," so the problem isn't his race/gender/age, it's his mentality.

Glad you find prison rape funny - it happens everyday too.

As a former small college newspaper editor, I'd always see people wanting to write fluff. "Rape Only Hurts If You Fight It" indicates that the paper's staff would rather write for The Onion (which itself is great, but college newspapers are meant to teach students reporting skills and are funded to provide the campus with information) or they like the idea of being journalists but aren't that interested in giving people useful information. Of all the people I worked with, not one works in journalism today. The staff adviser should have had some common sense. The editors should have realized that such an issue won't get them awards, internships, or good clips for their portfolios.