Call me a sourpuss; but the "take back the night" types are taking to writing letters to the editors, handing out fliers, already. Blech.
Since the 70s, "rape" has been elevated to a crime worse than MURDER.
It's disgusting. Rape is bad. Murder is final.
And females and psuedo-males are going bananas.. "no one ever believes women"... "we're being thrown back into the gulag of oppression". Sign me, Extremely Disgusted.
Case 1: A prostitute is negotiating with a customer. The prostitute consents to having sex with the customer, provided the customer pays her $300. The customer states that he is only willing to pay $250. The prostitute declines, whereupon the customer forcibly has sex with the prostitute anyway. He leaves $250 on the bed.
Case 2: A woman is jogging near her home. A man hiding in the bushes leaps out and drags her into the woods, where he rapes her.
Should both of these crimes carry the same minimum 16-20 prison sentence? Or should the first case fall somewhere between assault & battery and traditional rape, perhaps carrying a penalty something on the order of 6-8 years in prison?
Before the 70's, rape could be punishable by the death penalty, along with murder. So yes, rape is a big deal. Even before that time, a virgin who was raped was considered to be "soiled" or damaged- unmarriageable because she was no longer a virgin. So the idea that rape wasn't a big deal isn't true.
What has changed is that we recognize today that all women can be raped, not just virtueous white women of high social standing who were attacked by strangers and weren't wearing clothes or making gestures that were "asking for it".