tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post8229964700906592422..comments2024-03-29T08:34:31.322-05:00Comments on Althouse: "We have the abiding conviction that the death penalty... is an excessive penalty for the rapist who, as such, does not take human life."Ann Althousehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01630636239933008807noreply@blogger.comBlogger86125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-118744860097285382008-04-17T10:16:00.000-05:002008-04-17T10:16:00.000-05:00"I imagine it depends on the person, and whether t..."I imagine it depends on the person, and whether they can get more out of being a victim than not.<BR/><BR/>The mood today is pro-victimhood as a life choice.<BR/><BR/>Everyone's an enabler."<BR/><BR/>I know someone who was raped as a child. She would refer to it as being molested, not raped, if you could get her to refer to it, which she won't, except to those closest to her, and even then rarely. Very rarely-- and then just to explain why she wouldn't go to a particular family event (while the guy was still alive). Now, she never mentions it.<BR/><BR/>She has severe sexual hangups to this day. Which she won't address.<BR/><BR/>Which has put strains on her marriage, and deprived her of quite a bit of happiness she would otherwise have had. But she doesn't blame her rape on the way she is. She just says this is the way she is. <BR/><BR/>Maybe she's right. Maybe the rapes had nothing to do with it. I think common sense suggests otherwise. And hers is a counterexample to the idea that the problem with women and post-rape trauma is them wanting to play the victim.EnigmatiCorehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00596092527748619763noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-76446110130683402212008-04-16T10:55:00.000-05:002008-04-16T10:55:00.000-05:00I believe the Amerault guy is still in jail. He w...I believe the Amerault guy is still in jail. He won't confess.<BR/><BR/>Occasionally a WSJ editorial comes up on it still.<BR/><BR/>TM, I recommend you check out ``Thomas Mann and Eighteenth-Century Comic Fiction,'' a tracing of the influence of Laurence Sterne on Thomas Mann by a Tristram Shandy scholar.rhhardinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06901742898653890646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-76727813291860296982008-04-16T09:13:00.000-05:002008-04-16T09:13:00.000-05:00With regard to Rabinowitz, I think you're engaging...With regard to Rabinowitz, I think you're engaging in a bit of apples and oranges. The point of her work was not to minimize the impact of sexual abuse/assault on those who actually experience it, but rather to expose the travesty of the Michaels and Amirault cases and false, mass accusations of abuse, issues of recovered memory, and corrupt questioning methods of investigators. Both extremes are harmful and dishonest--dismissive minimization and wholesale fabrication.<BR/><BR/>Rabinowitz went into journalistic hero status to me with regard her work in this area, and for a very long time hers was a lonely, courageous voice. Further, like <A HREF="http://cathyyoung.blogspot.com/2005/10/mcmartin-postscript.html" REL="nofollow">Cathy Young</A>, I believe "the fact that she never got a Pulitzer for her writings about the Michaels case and the Amirault case is a disgrace" (quote from Cathy in the comments section of her linked post).<BR/><BR/>Does it surprise that it's possible to dislike said minimization of individual experience (and the attempt to rewrite the narrative to suit an agenda) AND to dislike the dishonest hysteria of such cases as McMartin, Amirault and Michaels (an attempt of a different sort to write a narrative to suit an agenda)? That it's possible to find some of the statements that you and others have made as offensive and stupid, AND also to have nothing but contempt for, among other things, perpetrators of false memories, false-rape accusers, and a mindset that can result in 6-year-old boys being suspended for sexual harassment?<BR/><BR/>This is why I get so impatient on this subject--constellation of subjects--and, really, rarely engage in conversations about them anymore, especially online. There are very few dogmatics on either side of the issue with whom I think it's worth bothering to discuss it. It gets too damn annoying, on the one hand, to deal with those who say "oh, it's no biggie, what's your problem" and, on the other hand, those who appear actually to believe that children never lie (or are led to lie or misinterpret) and women never make false accusations on behalf of themselves or others, or that if they do, it's somehow OK. I don't accept either extreme, and I don't think very much of their purveyors.reader_iamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17352836883752091339noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-38412338969449708752008-04-16T08:39:00.000-05:002008-04-16T08:39:00.000-05:00While there certainly is some hysteria regarding a...While there certainly is some hysteria regarding abuse and at times all things psychological, I think I would become hysterical if you actually answered a question.<BR/><BR/>The pattern of your posts, and lack of answers, leads me to believe that it is no use attempting to engage in any type of dialogue with you. <BR/><BR/>If you need help for an improper and dangerous attraction, get it. It will hurt you and perhaps others. Stop looking for justification through minimization. That appears to be your ultimate aim.<BR/><BR/>I hope I am wrong, I fear I am not.<BR/><BR/>TreyTMinkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07221261635305430323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-71426606916809746372008-04-16T08:23:00.000-05:002008-04-16T08:23:00.000-05:00I wonder if you could characterize the hysteria, i...I wonder if you could characterize the hysteria, interestingly, as the defending of soap opera.<BR/><BR/>An angle Dorothy Rabinowitz did not try, in a long series over at the WSJ. To her it was only deplorable and inexplicable.rhhardinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06901742898653890646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-62371219833660833272008-04-16T05:57:00.000-05:002008-04-16T05:57:00.000-05:00You agree?Beats me.Guggenbuhl-Craig seems to be a ...<I>You agree?</I><BR/><BR/>Beats me.<BR/><BR/>Guggenbuhl-Craig seems to be a Jungian, which I haven't read more of, but maybe his archetypes correspond to what I call soap opera ; soap opera being then the marketed form of archetypes.<BR/><BR/>So the question would translate to whether you're selling soap opera.<BR/><BR/>His aim in the chapter (in _From the Wrong Side : a paradoxical approach to psychiatry_) is to explain the hysteria surrounding child sexual abuse.rhhardinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06901742898653890646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-21684431373606186102008-04-15T21:41:00.000-05:002008-04-15T21:41:00.000-05:00RHH, I think that is a very interesting quotation....RHH, I think that is a very interesting quotation. It would be aplicable with older, post sexual children, and is something important to think about. I appreciate your posting it. Thanks.<BR/><BR/>I really hate the psychologists and others in the "helping" professions who support the passivity and victimization of their patients, it is a real problem. I do not see it as any problem for the 4 to 10 year olds that I worked with tonight, but for certain status rapes, the article mentions an possible important consideration.<BR/><BR/>The kids I was working with tonight are a different story. One, she is 6, thought her stepfather raping her was her fault because she was wearing her mother's nightgown. The passage has nothing to do with her. You agree?<BR/><BR/>In general, I hold to a way of working with abuse survivors that goes through three stages. In the first, they are victims and afraid of being re-victimized. In the second, the are survivors and angry as a way of protecting themselves against re-victimization. In the third they are thrivers and wise enough to avoid most situations in which they might be victimized, or shoot the person who is trying to perp them between the eyes with their legally carried handgun. Obviously, not all of the pack heat, but you get the picture!<BR/><BR/>Creating victims is for charlatans. Supporting people growing into responsible adults is what I do.<BR/><BR/>TreyTMinkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07221261635305430323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-91033499958930200592008-04-15T17:38:00.000-05:002008-04-15T17:38:00.000-05:00Not sure where I come down on the issue, if it can...Not sure where I come down on the issue, if it can be put in such terms. I used to think it was a fate worse than death, but watching the Sergio Leone spaghetti Western, Once Upon A Time In The West, with Claudia Cardinale, I thought a little differently. <BR/><BR/>She is raped and threatened with rape at different times during the film, but she says something like (I have no transcript and it's been a while): You can do whatever you want to me, but when you're gone, I'll have a bath and it'll be like you were never here.<BR/><BR/>Now you can jump on this - but I found it a remarkable feminist affirmation of strength. She was certainly not going to let such a thing destroy her. Of course (?) she had been a prostitute in New Orleans before coming west...<BR/><BR/>The fact is it won't destroy you if you don't let it. Of course there are always possible complications but to quote another feminist icon, Anais Nin, "She isn't made out of soap, she won't wear out."<BR/><BR/>...Now like a quadratic equation, there are two right answers. I would absolutely be inclined to kill a rapist or to countenance same. Whereas I might theoretically sit still for a beating, I would almost certainly fight to the death to defend myself against being raped, and if someone were to say that a woman had used disproportionate force by shooting a rapist or attempted rapist, I would a) laugh b) slap his face c) disagree.<BR/><BR/>And then again, of course, any woman can say anything she likes against any man with precious little chance of repercussions. So there's that to consider.Nichevohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12591460407621898458noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-43479920758954786032008-04-15T14:21:00.000-05:002008-04-15T14:21:00.000-05:00Finally, I wish you could sit with me tonight as I...<I>Finally, I wish you could sit with me tonight as I lead a group for children who were sexually abused. I wish you could see their frightened little faces when they first get to group, their growing confidence as they learn that it was not their fault, their growing anger at what happened and their learning how to protect themselves, their realization that they are not ruined. It would do your heart good.</I><BR/><BR/>What do you think of this passage<BR/><BR/><I>The one-sided, unipolar or split-off mythology of the innocent child and victim has the capacity to hinder our therapeutic work with sexually abused children - or adults. The manner and method many therapists use to deal with the guilt feeling of ``abuse'' victims amply demonstrates my point. Children who experience sexual abuse often feel guilty. They have the impression that they, somehow, were at fault. Older children, in particular, have ambivalent feelings about the abuse. They are uncertain whether the experience did not provide them with a certain pleasure. They often wonder if they failed to defend themselves or possible encouraged the perpetrator. Many psychologists reject these guilt feelings out of hand as completely unjustified. They maintain that in no way can there be a question of guilt. They encourage children to forget the guilt, to put it out of their minds. <BR/><BR/>This therapeutic position can be harmful for the psychological developmentof a child. Therapists simply think of and accept the child as a victim.They energetically reject and deny any attempt on the child's part to assumeany responsibility for what happened or at least to recognize his or her ownambivalence. Therapists thereby impose a victim psychology upon the child,a psychology which says that for everything that happens there is alwayssomeone to blame. They nip in the bud the child's growing awareness thathe is at least partially responsible for much that happens to him - or atleast for the back and forth tension between rejection and acceptance. Thistherapeutic position does not take the child seriously as a human being.<BR/></I>rhhardinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06901742898653890646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-71342099029910987462008-04-15T14:13:00.000-05:002008-04-15T14:13:00.000-05:00Perhaps the demographics of the Althouse commentar...<I>Perhaps the demographics of the Althouse commentariat leans more homosexual than I'd assumed.</I><BR/><BR/>Because in your world male homosexuals aren't bothered by male-on-male rape?<BR/><BR/>Perhaps the idea of having something forcible inserted into your anus is the most horrible thing you can possibly imagine, but you're abnormal in that regard.Revenanthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11374515200055384226noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-32587633506159992962008-04-15T09:19:00.000-05:002008-04-15T09:19:00.000-05:00Long ago (as in the 1970s) I accepted as a fact th...Long ago (as in the 1970s) I accepted as a fact that rape is an awful traumatizing and heinous crime that men didn't take with the degree of seriousness and sensitivity they should. As a law student I realized the truth that women who had been raped were raped again by the system when they sought justice against the raper.<BR/><BR/>Then came the push for women to be allowed to serve in combat. It was pointed out that raping women is a common practice for victorious soldiers, and that if taken POW, American women could expect to be raped, indeed gang raped, and subjected to all manner of brutalities of a sexual nature. <BR/><BR/>The response by the feminists to that? "So what? Eh, rape isn't so bad. Rape is no big deal. Many things are worse than rape."<BR/><BR/>So I don't know where it all comes down.Swifty Quickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00748423525653804001noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-73448615189680875072008-04-15T09:02:00.000-05:002008-04-15T09:02:00.000-05:00Zeb's now interested in turning the discussion bac...<I>Zeb's now interested in turning the discussion back to the death penalty issue. No surprise there.<BR/><BR/>What a coward, you are.</I><BR/><BR/>What are you talking about?Swifty Quickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00748423525653804001noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-90231757439930940382008-04-15T08:56:00.000-05:002008-04-15T08:56:00.000-05:00"I daresay you can produce neurological damage wit..."I daresay you can produce neurological damage with any social construct. Something has to be going on inside, after all."<BR/><BR/>If this is so, then dismissing an event as a social construct is meaningless. You are arguing against yourself.<BR/><BR/>"Just plain old language produces changes."<BR/><BR/>These changes are not measurable with the current technology, and they are not trauma.<BR/><BR/>"As far as helping, if you were a woman and raped, would you rather be married to a guy who thinks it's no more than an assault, or a guy who thinks you're irretrievably damaged?"<BR/><BR/>This is a false dichotomy. If my wife were raped I would treat her as someone who was assaulted and would be sensative to her sense of violation. No one can ruin her for me, I love her. I think she would be changed by the experience, but our relationship and my choices would influence the vector of the change.<BR/><BR/>That is what I do as a therapist, I nudge the vector of the change.<BR/><BR/>"Let's compare the neurological damage."<BR/><BR/>Again RHH, this is a false comparison. The research on sexual abuse recovery has shown that the perceived relational stances and behaviors between the survivor, perpetrator, and significant others affect recovery. Someone who sees the survivor as "ruined" negatively affects the recovery process. <BR/><BR/>The modesty and ruination themes seem to be your concern and social construct.<BR/><BR/>But to the question at hand, I am agnostic on the death penalty since I could not carry out the sentence. I do not work against it, as I can understand and appreciate the thoughts of people who support it. So I am firmly, but personally, in the life imprisonment camp.<BR/><BR/>Finally, I wish you could sit with me tonight as I lead a group for children who were sexually abused. I wish you could see their frightened little faces when they first get to group, their growing confidence as they learn that it was not their fault, their growing anger at what happened and their learning how to protect themselves, their realization that they are not ruined. It would do your heart good.<BR/><BR/>It certainly does my heart good.<BR/><BR/>TreyTMinkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07221261635305430323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-53534520193291517992008-04-15T07:48:00.000-05:002008-04-15T07:48:00.000-05:00"Rape is a horrible thing, but it isn't even close..."Rape is a horrible thing, but it isn't even close to the worst thing you can do to a person without killing them."<BR/><BR/>Apparently my attempt to add a little perspective by positing the male posters being on the receiving end of rape hasn't had the impact I thought it would. Perhaps the demographics of the Althouse commentariat leans more homosexual than I'd assumed.John Kindleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13897832130417651667noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-8367073446392955672008-04-15T05:07:00.000-05:002008-04-15T05:07:00.000-05:00I'll bite, though I may not be your target audienc...I'll bite, though I may not be your target audience.<BR/><BR/>Right now I have this vision of a group f men standing around telling women that, you know, rape is nothing to get agitated about.<BR/><BR/>It's, uh, very <I>retro</I>.blakehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05430444326700437630noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-77679208432782833572008-04-15T05:05:00.000-05:002008-04-15T05:05:00.000-05:00It seems bizarre to me to give someone the death p...It seems bizarre to me to give someone the death penalty for rape when so many worse things don't merit it. Say someone gouges out my eyes, blinding me for life. That probably gets them, what, eight years in jail? Who here wouldn't, if given the choice between being raped and being blinded, choose the former?<BR/><BR/>Rape is a horrible thing, but it isn't even close to the worst thing you can do to a person without killing them.Revenanthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11374515200055384226noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-66588713463065690172008-04-15T01:13:00.000-05:002008-04-15T01:13:00.000-05:00I'm prepared to discuss my definitions of rape, an...I'm prepared to discuss my definitions of rape, and of sexual assault. (They might even surprised you.)<BR/><BR/>Are you all?reader_iamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17352836883752091339noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-11390310996480186972008-04-15T00:51:00.000-05:002008-04-15T00:51:00.000-05:00This comment has been removed by the author.reader_iamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17352836883752091339noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-77427257539175919262008-04-15T00:38:00.000-05:002008-04-15T00:38:00.000-05:00Zeb's now interested in turning the discussion bac...Zeb's now interested in turning the discussion back to the death penalty issue. No surprise there.<BR/><BR/>What a coward, you are.reader_iamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17352836883752091339noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-5805288401499486052008-04-15T00:31:00.000-05:002008-04-15T00:31:00.000-05:00Cedarford:Everything you just wrote -- problems of...Cedarford:<BR/><BR/>Everything you just wrote -- problems of proof, false accusations, ambiguous naked necking situations, marital rape etc. -- is entirely valid and entirely beside the point. <BR/><BR/>Earlier, however, you said that "rape is not that big of a deal," and cited all the mass rape that's occurred in wartime as a case in point. No big deal, huh? I've observed before that you seem to be a major apologist for all the "shit [that] happens" in war. It makes me wonder whether you've participated in any wars, and if so what kind of "shit" you made "happen". . .?? <BR/><BR/>You say that "rape is not that big of a deal," and to prove you wrong it's an eminently fair question to ask, would you say the same if it was your ass on the receiving end of the stick? You get all touchy and threatening when your own hairy orifice is in question, which indicates that you think rape is a bigger deal than you say it is.<BR/><BR/>Note I haven't said that I think rape by itself is worthy of the death penalty. (Forcible penetration of a prepubescent child very well might be.) But all those rapes of all those German women by all those Soviet dogs sure as hell was a big deal. What's the real difference between the degradation and humiliation suffered by those women and the degradation and humiliation of my hypothetical of you being ganged up on in a prison cell by a big strapping Jew and a big strapping Negro?<BR/><BR/>Note also that I haven't said that those German rape victims should have languished away the rest of their days bemoaning their fate. But I sure wouldn't hold it against them if quite a few were changed by or found it difficult to overcome that horrible experience, just as I wouldn't hold it against you if you were a changed man after leaving Lev and Leroy's cell.John Kindleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13897832130417651667noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-30254096839223217022008-04-14T23:54:00.000-05:002008-04-14T23:54:00.000-05:00So, anyway if that reason for supporting the death...<I>So, anyway if that reason for supporting the death penalty resonates with you, it's not sophistry at all.</I><BR/><BR/>It starts with the fact that I'm uncomfortable with the state having that power. It bothers me. When you put that together with the inevitability of caprice and mistake, it's enough to tip it to me being opposed to it. I'm not strident about it. I don't persevorate about those who are put to death. I have very little in common with other death penalty opponents, and I disagree with many of their tactics. I just don't like it.Swifty Quickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00748423525653804001noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-59464059885323448882008-04-14T23:19:00.000-05:002008-04-14T23:19:00.000-05:00Elliott A said... We need to rewrite the 8th amend...<I>Elliott A said... <BR/>We need to rewrite the 8th amendment. Punishment is only cruel in the fashion of middle age torture, for the purpose of inflicting pain. If the purpose is just punishment for a horrific crime it is not cruel. The death penalty is not unusual, it has been a mainstay of the British and American legal tradition. Once upon a time, you were hung for stealing a horse in America. The damage caused to an individual by rape is too large to quantify; no penalty is too severe. </I><BR/><BR/>Garbage.<BR/><BR/>Elliot A would have a point if we were back in the 18th century through early 20th when it was a mainstay and 200 offenses, including writing bad checks, could get someone hanged and in America "nigger lynchings" for rape accusations were common.<BR/><BR/>Part of the problem with "daeth for rape!!" is not just the historical record suggesting that it is someone less than the "mind-shattering, spirit-shattering" crime feminists with fragile psyches claim it to be, there are problems with degree, lack of evidence in capital cases, and a huge problem with false accusations being common.<BR/><BR/>1. Unlawfully killing a person ranges from being a misdemeanor to a capital offense. Rape can range from a woman kidnapped, beaten, raped at gunpoint, beaten some more and spending weeks in the hospital - to two folks getting naked hot and heavy and the guy believing she wants intercourse. Who begins penetrating her and withdraws on her objection but who has now met all legal definition of rape - penetration w/o assent on misunderstanding from her being aroused, reponsive and wet up to that point, she was set to go all the way. Within that range, just as with killing someone misreading a doctors prescription up to being a serial mass murderer, there are dramatic variations in law. Add in drunk or drug-impaired couples with different memories, each thinking they know the truth. Or a woman who claims she was date-raped, but then dated the same guy for several more months..."until the awful memories came flooding back and I was a helpless victim!!" And unacceptable variation in states where sex that is legal in one state between a 16 and 18 year old is statutory rape and a 20-year felony if one of 20 cases has parents that want to prosecute because they dislike their willing nympho daughter's BF.<BR/><BR/>(IMO, the guy who penetrates his naked, necking date by mistake and honors her objections shouldn't even be in court. And statutory rape's heavy charges should rest on more than parents being OK or not with their kid's boyfriend and prosecutorial discretion whims..)<BR/><BR/>2. People wanting "Death for rapists!!!" have to confront that jurors weighing a guilty verdict that could kill a man confront a lack of evidence in a majority of rapes. Not just "He said, she said" but non-conclusive forensic evidence. And even with forensic evidence dubious evidence then spun, based on the bias of the feminist rape nurse examiner or DA. Evidence that could arise from a completely innocent source and context having nothing to do with a rape. "A search warrant, ladies of the jury, showed the defendent had porn on his computer of a nature that sexualized and objectified women who were sometimes in the same position as the victim...and there were condoms and KY in the vile man's bathroom that we charge were part of his "rape kit".."<BR/><BR/>3. False accusations of rape, which women rarely get prosecuted for, amount up to 42% of all rape accusations brought to authority's attention in several studies. Accusations of child molestation regularly come up in bitter, contested divorces, so much it has the nickname of the "Woman's thermonuclear bomb" for gaining child custody, because a simple accusation will result in an order she keeps sole control of the kids while the accusation is investigated.<BR/>When people talk death penalty for rape or child molestation, where lies and fabrications are so common - unlike murder -(and combined with feminist bias in the legal system, law failing to assign degrees of rape as they do with homicide) the chances of railroading the innocent goes up geometrically.<BR/>Anyone in favor of death for rape has to also be in favor of death for any jilted or otherwise angry, even conniving woman filing a false accusation.<BR/><BR/>JohnK - <I>I wonder whether Cedarford or rhhardin would rather take it up the ass in a prison gang rape or get their eyeball knocked out from a pistol-whipping.</I><BR/><BR/>The question really is if I beat JohnK until he is brain-damaged or knock out one or both of his eyes in the pistol whipping that drops his IQ down to 50 - if that is a 25-to-life felony or a death penalty-worthy offense like John and others claim a husband forcing a fuck out of his wife, is.Cedarfordhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00602418702398818596noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-52042685456826018542008-04-14T22:28:00.000-05:002008-04-14T22:28:00.000-05:00rhhardin:I'm not sure I fully understand your ques...rhhardin:<BR/><BR/>I'm not sure I fully understand your question, but I'll just answer superficially by saying that Rob Roy is one of my favorite movies of all time. In that movie Rob Roy's arch-enemy Archie (played by Tim Roth) rapes Rob Roy's wife (played by Jessica Lange). She subsequently discovers she's pregnant and is not sure whether the baby is Rob Roy's or Archie's. She doesn't tell Rob Roy (played by Liam Neeson) because she knows that Rob Roy will try to kill him and she's convinced Rob Roy will be bested by Archie's superior swordplay. When she's finally forced to tell him about the rape and the baby, and that she thought about trying to abort but couldn't bring herself to do it, Rob Roy tells her, "It's not the baby that needs killing." Rob Roy goes looking for Archie, but Archie succeeds in capturing him, and mocks him about the rape, saying that it seemed to him that not every part of her objected. At another point in the movie, one of Rob Roy's children asks his mom how the baby was going to get out. Rob Roy quips "I imagine the same way it got in." So he still loves his wife and doesn't view her as defiled. Presumably, he is ready to raise Archie's child. And yes, Rob Roy kills Archie at the end.<BR/><BR/>What a great movie.John Kindleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13897832130417651667noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-62629840627850386772008-04-14T21:44:00.000-05:002008-04-14T21:44:00.000-05:00This comment has been removed by the author.Carolinehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11577584676839171856noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-20098652563375808602008-04-14T21:09:00.000-05:002008-04-14T21:09:00.000-05:00But rated the rapings lower in "traumas of war"Our...<I>But rated the rapings lower in "traumas of war"</I><BR/>Our lives are relatively so easy and safe now.Ralph Lhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07915708905660273961noreply@blogger.com