Subject: RE:rape, etc.

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 15 Sep 2000 10:27:40 EDT

A Central American joke I have heard from time to time says that the way to 
talk like a Mexican is to make every other word "chingando" ("fuckin'") -- a 
trait picked up from the Northern Neighbor in translation. I see that the 
corresponding rule here is: to get work on a word, have it be one that 
involves {gletu}. There is more (whatever replaces ink in this medium) 
spilled on "rape" than any word since "homosexual" (which -- with a number of 
related words -- we have not yet decided on either, but note that they too 
were all {gletu}), more even than on names for programs and computer parts. 
As mark has insisted since the beginning, the crucial thing about rape is 
consent. Statuatory rape is rape because a juvenile cannot give consent in 
the legal sense -- ditto mentally challenged people of a certain degree and 
domestic animals (though other charges may apply). Force is not the issue 
("date rape drugs" make that irrelevant) nor is violence, etc. 
Interestingly, it is not always the consent of the raped that is needed 
(statuatory again -- if the guardian consents -- provided the guardian is not 
also the raper -- it is not rape, regardless of the wishes of the minor. 
There have been some contrary cases lately, happily.) So, assuming that 
consent is the same as permission (something I, as a profesional philosopher, 
am loth to do), I think that we are back at {curmi}. However, we do not need 
a denial of permission, "not permitted" = "forbidden", but only an absence of 
permission, the lack of a positive act of consent (or, indeed, a positive 
withdrawal of such consent at a later time). So 
{curmi claxu gletu}.