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Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!harpo!eagle!mhuxl!ulysses!princeton!eosp1!fischer
From: fischer@eosp1.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.women,net.legal,net.singles
Subject: Re: Rape (anywhere, not just Ontario)
Message-ID: <421@eosp1.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 6-Dec-83 17:01:56 EST
Article-I.D.: eosp1.421
Posted: Tue Dec  6 17:01:56 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 9-Dec-83 02:47:48 EST
References: <1509@utcsstat.UUCP>
Organization: Exxon Office Systems, Princeton, NJ
Lines: 35


     Laura, I'm really having a hard time believing you mean the things you
said about rape.  If you do, it reminds me of a famous rape case in England
a century or more ago where the defense attorney handed the victim a pen,
and challenged her to put it into an open ink bottle he was holding.  He,
of course, moved the bottle every time she attempted to place the pen in
the bottle.  He thereby "proved" that it was impossible to rape an unwilling
woman.
     Very recently, in the town I live in, a woman was raped.  She was walking
to her car when a man came up behind her, grabbed her by the throat, and
placed a large knife in her mouth.  Would you like to tell me how much
resistance you would be willing to put up in a situation like this?  Perhaps
she should have been more cautious about walking alone in dark parking lots,
but, given you were there, with the knife in YOUR mouth, would you struggle?
Or, imagine the knife replaced with a gun.  More simply still, if you had a
choice between just being raped, and being raped and also having the s**t
beat out of you, which one would you choose?  Getting beat up isn't very
pleasant, especially if you have reason to believe that your attacker might
get a little carried away and injure you permanently, or perhaps kill you.
If a rape victim perceives her life as being in danger, why does she HAVE to 
struggle?  Demanding bruises and rope marks to verify a charge of rape is 
equivalent to saying that no one should be allowed to charge anyone else of 
a crime unless they can prove that they exhausted every conceivable means of 
preventing that crime.  All the rapist would have to say is, "Well, she 
didn't fight too hard, so I guess I figured she didn't really mind.  I wouldn't
REALLY have killed her."
     The average rape victim is weak and vulnerable.  Women as old as 80 or 90
and children as young as 2 and 3 are raped.  Just because YOU feel secure in
your ability to defend yourself does not give you the right to cast doubt on 
all rapes where the victim did not.

				    Elizabeth Fischer
				    Exxon Office Systems
				    decvax!ittvax!eosp1!fischer
				or  allegra!eosp1!fischer