Now in this context the word rape doesn't refer to forcing someone to have intercourse against their will. Its synonymous with words like curbstomp, thrashing, etc. I am sure I have seen that term used in the context of vs debates, like the Empire would totally arse rape the Federation etc.Calling a World Cup victory a 'rape' is no joke
By Clementine Ford
When people use the word "rape" to happily describe destroying an opponent in a game, they're wilfully ignoring the fact that women (and growing numbers of men) around the world are subjected to brutal sexual violence. Clementine Ford writes.
It didn't take long before the rape jokes started flooding social media to mock Brazil's 7-1 loss to Germany in the semi-final of the World Cup.
Although the jokes and memes varied slightly, the essential message was this: Germany had raped Brazil, and Germany were legends.
In the aftermath, there have been online debates about the appropriateness of using metaphors of sexual violence to describe a sporting defeat, particularly when the weight of admiration is so clearly aligned with the aggressor. Users of the term have defended it as harmless fun; it doesn't mean "actual rape", so what's the big deal? Doesn't language evolve?
The example for Urban Dictionary's second definition of 'rape' reads: 'Dude, I totally raped your ass during that last game of Age of Empires.'
Leaving aside for a moment the question of whether or not the use of "rape" to gleefully revel in the public humiliation of a sporting team can ever be mistaken for evolution, our culture is sadly not yet at the point where we can divorce ourselves from the ongoing trauma and social implications of sexual violence.
In Australia, one in five women and one in 20 men will experience some form of sexual assault after the age of 15. For women with an intellectual disability, that risk increases by up to 90 per cent. In our prisons, 82 per cent of non-Aboriginal women and 90 per cent of Aboriginal women have been subjected to sexual violence at some point in their lives.
And for the few cases that even reach criminal trial, conviction rates are extremely low. In NSW, data indicates that 74 per cent of alleged sex offenders are acquitted in cases involving adult victims; in cases involving children, that acquittal number drops slightly to a still-high 61 per cent. In schools, universities and communities around our country, children, adolescents and adults - most of them female - are subjected to the kind of sexual violence that is routinely ignored or downplayed by a culture which prefers to think of perpetrators as shadowy monsters who lurk in alleyways waiting to turn girls into cautionary tales.
Language evolves, but it cannot evolve without the culture going along with it.
But this use of "rape" as a metaphor for convincing defeat or destruction in non-sexual contexts isn't new. For years now, it's been co-opted by adolescents to refer to annihilation, most typically through sports or video games. As the example for Urban Dictionary's second definition for "rape" has it, "Dude, I totally raped your ass during that last game of Age of Empires." I have similarly heard it used to describe anything from heavy traffic to a busy day at work. "I got raped by traffic on the way home." "We were raped at work today by the huge crowds."
Let's be clear about something. Unless someone at work forced you to engage in sexual activity against your will - a criminal activity perpetrated against significant numbers of employees around the world - you were not "raped" because you had a busy day. And your rights to freedom of expression are not being violated because people object to your choice to use language which knowingly harms survivors of traumatic sexual assault.
When people use the word "rape" to happily describe destroying an opponent in a video game, they're wilfully ignoring the fact that women (and growing numbers of men) around the world are subjected to brutal sexual violence as a weapon of war, with victims numbering in the millions.
During wartime in the Congo, 48 women are raped every hour. In the 1990s, more than 60,000 women were raped as part of the Bosnian conflict. Between 1-2 million German women were raped by Russian soldiers at the end of World War II. Women serving in the American military are more likely to raped by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire.
These statistics and facts are not jokes. And while they might be theoretical for some people, they are a reality for countless survivors and the people who care about them. For women especially, the fear of rape and sexual violence is our constant companion. We may not always be actively conscious of it, but it takes very little to have that switch triggered to alert our instincts - the appearance of a footstep behind us on a dark street; an unfamiliar noise in the house late at night; and yes, someone who seems to find the idea of rape funny and who, when you ask them not to make thoughtless jokes about it, tells you you're overreacting.
Asking that people be considerate and thoughtful about their language - particularly when it has the potential to cause very real damage to people with traumatic experience of the subject matter - isn't a violation of freedom of speech. It isn't "political correctness gone mad" or any of the similarly jingoistic catchphrases that are bandied around to excuse people's monstrously ignorant behaviour. It's simply asking that we adhere to a socially codified system of kindness in which we consider how our words and deeds might affect other people. For people who have never experienced sexual violence, it is a luxury to be able to redefine those words to get a cheap laugh on social media. It isn't a right.
But perhaps the most important thing is this. When you joke about rape, when you take that word and make it yours to laugh about it, to chide your friends with, to mock one person's defeat while celebrating as victorious those you've cast as the metaphorical rapists, you are telling women that they can't trust you. And when you treat their objections as ridiculous overreactions that are less worthy of respect than the entitlement you feel to treat them as you want regardless of their feelings - you are confirming to them that they shouldn't.
Language evolves. Perhaps it's time society did too.
Clementine Ford is a freelance writer, broadcaster and public speaker based in Melbourne. Follow her on Twitter @clementine_ford. View her full profile here.
The question is, is it appropriate to use it that way. Or is like using the word niggardly.
