As someone who wants to make their career as an advocate of victims of rape and other forms of violence against women, words can not begin to describe how angry this makes me.

Dead wrong!

Non-consensual, FORCED sexual intercourse is called rape and it should remain as such. Anything less is purposely lessening the impact of the vile act that occurred.

There are so many things wrong with the "Anonymous" said on the site, and the sad thing is, thats how many people misinterpret rape

This only makes it easier for rapists (yeah, I said it!) to get away with their crimes in court. It makes me sick.

Hell to the naw!!!!!

No, the term “rape” should be used. Sexual intercourse makes it sound as if the act was consensual.

I read a statistic somewhere that only 13% of rape cases brought to trial(?) result in a conviction. It is 6 percent in England.

I can imagine that the rate of conviction for trials where men are the victims of rape is below 1%.

Does the court feel that "rape" is too much of a loaded word?

Ooookkkkaaayyyy, so how about "forced sexual intercourse"?

Much better.

This is foolishness. "Rape" is a recognized legal term. How dare he insensitively suggest that she refer to the crime as "sexual intercourse." The judge needs to be checked.

My first thought was that this is an abomination.
But after ruminating, I realized that the diction does not favor the defendant. This change favors the truth.
If the prosecutors use the word "rape" before the verdict, they are pretending to have already reached a legal conclusion. The jury is easily swayed by this sort of rhetoric. The term "sexual intercourse" does not mean that it was mutual or that it was rape, so the decision is not rigged.
The witnesses should give a factual description of the occurences (For example, "I yelled for help. He held a knife to my neck and said that if I move he will kill me. Then he inserted himself in me."). After both sides give their story, the jury should decide whether there was consent or not.
And if the jury charge the defendant, then the term "rape" should begin to be used.

First off, I think this judge is muddying the water- would he declare a mistrial if someone's testimony included the word "rape"? Granted, "rape" is a loaded word, and the issue at hand has nothing to do with the comfort of the victim or how likely they are to come forward in the first place and everything to do with the due process of law. But does the judge have a viable alternative, and does he think it would be easy to change a society's entire understanding of these cases? I don't like "intercourse" here, because it's simply too vague. Rape isn't an act of "intercourse" on many levels. Maybe "penetration" would be better in court, but not much better.

f-ry

intercourse simply implies that two consenting adults were involved. it trivializes the… um… raping bit.

lol, how about "overly passionate love-making" or "force-fucking"? who comes up with this shit?

As a woman who survived a rape when I was five, I abso-fucking-lutely not OK with the court wanting to euphemize people being sexually violated. Not using the word "rape" erases the violence and, by extension, the lack of consent involved when the perpetrater inflicted him/herself on the other person. As daria concisely stated, "intercouse simply implies that two consenting adults were involved." There is no consent in rape, period.

Judges hear and sentence people who do some heinous crimes that have ugly, uncomfortable terms, too. But they want to get squemish about the word "rape?" Nope, not acceptable.

The charge is rape, just as ohter charged crimes could be robbery, battery, etc. Whether a person is guilty of that charge is for the court to decide

Cosign, lunanoire. They don't call it 'car borrowing' until you're found guilty of grand theft auto.

Only someone who has not experienced rape whether personally or via someone in their life could begin to think this is acceptable. I feel the need to slap the sh@t out of whoever started this movement. When I have sexual intercourse it is MY choice. A rape takes choice out of the equation. Your only choice is how to survive.

Using the word rape to offer a legal conclusion undermines the presumption of innocence for the defendant. The emotionally charged nature of a rape case doesn't take away the standing of this core right.

Change the context to something else, murder for instance, and it's clearly wrong for a witness to testify to a legal conclusion "He murdered that man!" vs. saying "He raised his gun and fired three shots, hitting the man in the chest."

Yet, in a rape trial it's somehow wrong to restrict testimony to a clear recounting of facts?

R Kelly is jumping up and down!