Petition to make it illegal for police to rape sex workers

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Continuing the discussion from Petition to make it illegal for police to have sex with sex workers before arresting them:

“The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their proper name.”

― Confucius

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Yes, we all get where you land on this topic. Message received already.

“Language is a living thing. We can feel it changing. Parts of it become old: they drop off and are forgotten. New pieces bud out, spread into leaves, and become big branches, proliferating.”
―Gilbert Highet

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In conversational English, yes. But when it comes to the law, we still use some very archaic terms, because precise meaning is important, and that meaning has been well established.

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[quote=“jyoti, post:136, topic:92278, full:true”]A couple of things to keep in mind (which seem to have been used the longer this thread goes on, but still):
• the preferred term is sex worker
• men are sex workers too[/quote]

Downthread…

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Uh, congrats on your quoting skills, I guess?

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The law evolves as well. Some people are saying the law should evolve to protect sex workers more than it does today. If I understand right you have said that you don’t think sex work should be illegal but while it is illegal, you seem (to me) to care more about semantics than people. If not, what is your end game in this argument? What are you really arguing for in the real world? To me it seems you are arguing it is ok for cops to have sex with sex workers and then arrest them because the definition of the word rape can never evolve or change in your mind.

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You quote Confucius, and say that “The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their proper name,” but you’re not willing to use the proper terminology for sex workers yourself. It makes me doubt your commitment to using “proper names” when it doesn’t pertain to limiting the definition of “rape.”

As for the “when it comes to the law” argument, the exact crime for which rape is the “proper name” varies wildly in different jurisdictions. For instance, in England and Wales:

“According to the law, a rape can only be committed by a male as the penetration can only be done by his penis.”

I don’t know about you, but my definition of what constitutes “rape” goes quite a bit beyond this.

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I find that law is named more aptly when the complement is an indefinite singular, rather than a plural.

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Wrong. I used “sex worker” when appropriate, and “prostitute” when appropriate. While prostitutes are sex workers, not all sex workers are prostitutes.

And congrats on figuring out that laws may be different in different countries.

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This thread needed to be continued like I need a whole in the hedge.

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Do ya think we ought to borrow someones club?

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This thread needs to

REST

IN

#

PEACE

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I think the message that @jyoti was trying to get across was that the latter term has become corrupted by religious sensibilities to take on negative implications, and is, thus, never appropriate (unless you’re deliberately trying to be insulting, in which case, keep on keeping on).

Thank you. Now, since you insist that the meaning of “rape” has been well-established by the law, and everyone should be using exactly the same definition for the word, which law are you referring to? And, for those countries with a different legal definition of the word (or no such legal definition at all), why should we have to conform to that legal definition?

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I don’t know, How about the law that would be affected by the petition that this thread is about? Will that work for ya? Good lord. You’re completely out of arguments, aren’t you?

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I sure am. An argument with someone completely unwilling to even consider that their position might be wrong is not much of an argument at all. The fact that everyone here is done with this discussion is pretty clear evidence that yes, we are “completely out of energy to argue with you.”

This thread is the opposite of constructive and holds no purpose other than to further show how entrenched you are in your position. No one is changing their mind, no new ideas are being presented, and you are stretching out a discussion that was clearly painful for many people. Have you considered closing the thread?

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Let’s drop this and move on

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In Alaska? The word isn’t legally defined there at a state level. There is no federal statute.

I’m not the one who reopened a thread to tell everyone that they were defining “rape” incorrectly with no other proof besides a dusty old quote from Confucius about using the right words.

If you want to prove your definition of “rape” is absolute, prove it. Otherwise, go pester someone else.

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In fact, this whole thing started with a proposed evolution of the law: to classify having sex for the “purposes” of investigation as rape, or at least illegal.

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So can this fucking thread die already because reasons? Here, I’ll number some that seem to apply.

  1. Be cool. Don’t post insulting, bullying, victim-blaming, racist, sexist or homophobic remarks.

  2. Stay on topic. Don’t hijack threads, repeat yourself or post generic talking points.

  3. Constructive criticism is welcome.Hostile, whining hand-wringers will be eaten.

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