andrewducker | Well that was interesting

Well that was interesting

It seems to me that part of the reason why discussions of sexual assault, get very heated very quickly is that some people view "assault" as a great big thing. If someone was assaulted then _something very bad happened_. This means that when something happens that they don't see as being that awful, then they object to the word "assault", because it doesn't emotionally resonate with them as feeling similar to the act that occurred. What happened wasn't assault because it wasn't that bad (someone got kissed when they didn't want to be, it was just a hug, etc.).

At the extreme end you end up with things like Whoopi Goldberg's defence of Roman Polanski because what he did wasn't "rape rape" - because that would make Roman Polanski evil, which would make her a bad person for liking him. At the milder end you have people arguing that kissing someone against their will isn't assault, because if it is then it means that people can be charged for drunkenly snogging someone they fancied in the pub without checking first.

In any case it means I end up with 70-odd comments while I'm away at a meeting on the other side of town, which I wasn't really expecting.

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I think you may have a very valid point here and wonder if it might justify the idea of different "degrees" of assault. When one, unqualified, phrase can cover everything from a drunken inappropriate snog up to everything bar actual rape we tar an awful lot of people, who've done a lot of very different things, with the same brush.

"Sexual assault" is a black-and-white phrase and it's not a black-and-white world.

Isn't the problem that different people have different definitions of both "assault" and "sexual assault". There may be a single legal definition, but what is considered acceptable varies from person to person.

Had the genders been reversed in that scene from Dr Who, I suspect we would have a very different response about the acceptability (or not) of what was depicted.

Really? You didn't expect that to happen? I read the blog post you linked to and expected there to be volcanos of reaction from both sides (well, the various sides).

If the word assault doesn't seem to work very well for something in the opinion of the majority of people then maybe assault isn't the right word. Words only really have a meaning in as much as they represent what the majority of people understand them to mean afterall.

"rape rape"

Now i'm trying to work out what metarape is.

Wow. I hadn't actually bothered to absorb the polanski thing, and assumed it was americans doing their puritanical shtick (sex offender for pissing against a tree, etc) and conflating rape and "statutory rape", but if wikipedia's to be believed...

What's wrong with liking bad people? Everyone's grey. Mind you, given how much trouble I have remembering that, I imagine most people *really* struggle.

You try floating that next time round. I'll pay close attention to how it goes for you :->

There's a link to her actual deposition somewhere. It's not pleasant.

From what I read of the conversation, it looks like people agree on everything except whether it should be called 'assault' or not.

Sorry, I don't follow.

To clarify:
Next time the "assault" discussion comes up, try telling the people who say that it is assault that they need a new word, because some people say it isn't actually assault. I shall watch and see what happens.

Err, ok.

What does that have to do with the validity of my argument?

My argument is: The meaning of words are defined by the majority usage. If in the view of the majority a word is being used in a way which jarringly does not fit then it suggests that the word is being misused.

What Goldberg was trying to do with the language, I think.

Somehow, I'm reminded of the Level/L-E-V-E-L/Level edition of OOTS.

My main point is about the meaning of words being determined by the majority usage, I don't want to shift attention away from that with this comment, but given that there seems to be a disagreement about what the word means I thought I'd look at the OED. Of course the OED doesn't dictate what words mean, it just records common usages, but it might be helpful.

Perhaps there is a clue here in the OED to how the terms are being used differently, one definition is "To make a violent hostile attack by physical means", which I think is how the majority of people normally use the term for situations like the one being discussed.

Another definition is the far broader legal definition, where as stated by other commenters, touching someone lightly on the arm in a conversation may be assault (as may a harsh word according to the OED).

So Amy definitely did assault the doctor according to the second definition, but did she according to the first? Probably not. The response that people have to the use of the word assault will depend on what they understand the term to mean. I suspect that in general usage by laymen the primary usage is the former rather than the latter.

Rather than defend her choice to still care about a flawed human being who had done a bad thing but may well have had redeeming features, (which is defensible) she chose to deny his faults (which is both idiotic and dishonest).
Too many people do that over all sorts of issues and it's a huge problem because it isolates the victims.

Hiya.

I tend to think it's a very privileged sort of viewpoint that can term what happened in F&S "not serious" and say "I don't see why people are using this word, that word should be saved for something terrible." There are many people who have gone through a type of assault like what happened in the scene, and maybe they should be the ones to say "this is serious" or "this is not serious," or "this is violent" or "this is not violent." I was trying to say in the post that yes, the word "sexual assault" should only apply to very bad things, and what Amy did was very bad! The fact is that what happened is all there is to sexual assault. I'm repeating myself by now, hah. But a lot of people all over the interbutts seem to have missed it!

Anyway, thanks for the linklove.

Indeed; I've been thinking about how differently we'd be reacting if the roles were reversed.

You're wrong. Using the first definition means that if someone slips someone rohypnol and then rapes them, that wasn't sexual assault because it wasn't a "violent hostile attack". Which is very apparently completely wrong.

I believe Whoopi Goldberg said that because she believed Polanski was guilty of statutory but not forcible rape (which of course is mistaken, according to the uncontradicted testimony of the complainant).

I have experienced unwanted sexual advances / physical contact much as the Doctor did in the episode in question. It was annoying. I did not consider it serious or violent.

I have had someone grab me by the throat in a pub and try to throttle me. I considered that somewhat more serious, and certainly violent.

You may not have considered it serious or violent, but another person in the same situation might, and their opinion is just as valid as yours.

Well of course it is, and they are free to give their own accounts. As the OP said, it is people who have been in these situations who should make these assessments. That is what I have done. If you have similar experiences, you are welcome to share your expressions if you so choose. If you have not, then your contribution is neither relevant nor helpful.

In fairness, there are different degrees of assault...

As usual I find your application here problematic, but in principle I actually agree.

I hate the fact that that conversation got turned into a semantic argument over the definition of sexual assault when I felt that totally missed the whole point: The point being that it seems as though an awful lot of people saw the thing that happened in that episode as not a big deal, or not uncomfortable, or not at least a bit not okay and uncategorically just funny or even worse, a positive sign of female sexual independence or what-the-hell-ever.

When I watched that scene I thought it was uncomfortable, and my opinion of Amy went down - not irrevocably, not permanently, not without hope of redemption - but I decided that I just didn't like her quite as much because of what she did. And I thought that was the way it was meant to be read.

If a person watched that scene and didn't feel that way, I have a problem with that, and with them, and with the culture/society/portrayal (although I actually think the issue in this instance is with the viewer and not the writer/director but that's subjective) that allowed that scene to seem 'okay' or even 'funny' (without reservation) to a significant proportion of people.

Now, I'm making an assumption here, from the fact that that article was written, that this is the case. I don't actually know what the overall on-balance reaction was to the scene - everyone I know and respect so far almost without exception has agreed that the scene made them uncomfortable.

That was what I wanted to say. Unfortunately, what happened by use of the hot-button word 'assault' was that some people said 'that wasn't assault because blah blah blah'. Now, in actuality, I don't care what your (not you personally) personal definition of assault is. I care that your reason for saying 'that's not assault' is because it didn't make you uncomfortable. Call it whatever you like. It should have made you uncomfortable.

I don't think words are determined by majority usage. They're determined by the understanding that individuals have of them, and the interlinked understandings between groups of people. Sure, you want to make sure that the people you're talking to have a generally agreed understanding, but that's what discussions like this are there for - to argue over meaning and attempt to share your meaning with others so that common understanding can be found.

Yes, slapping someone across the face and punching them repeatedly in the face until they pass out are both forms of physical assault, but the first is much less serious.

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Well that was interesting

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Definitionof "metarape"

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