The careless use of the word ‘rape’
Soccer fans took to social media to voice their amazement at the German thrashing of Brazil in the Soccer World Cup in an inappropriate manner.
THE 2014 FIFA World Cup is done and dusted and I’m sure while most people know by now that Germany were the ultimate victors of the prestigious cup it was their thrashing of Brazil in the semi finals of the major event that was the most talked about not only in social circles but also on social media.
I heard a few Christians, over the weekend, voice their disdain over the image of the Christ the Redeemer statue that shows Jesus Christ’s head tilted in dismay at the loss in which the German team beat the Brazilian team 7 – 1. They said it was “disrespectful”.
And when my fellow journalist mentioned how the word “rape” was bandied in the context of the German’s beating the Brazilians on 8 July an intern at the Northglen News told us of how some students at her university speak about how “that exam paper raped me”. She explained that this meant that the paper was difficult. In the context of the German and Brazilian clash, as it was mainly tweeted around the world, the word “rape” was used to denote that this was major win or that they lost by such a wide margin.
But to choose such a word? As it stands the word rape according the South African Concise Oxford Dictionary is defined as:” (of a man) force (another Person) to have sexual intercourse with him against their will”.
Disrespectful and undermining I would say to anybody who has been raped. Author Jeffrey Rowland sums it up well: “Let’s talk about rape for a moment. Rape is not what George Lucas did to your childhood. Rape is not what happens when a sports team beats another sports team by a wide margin. Rape is not what happens when your electric bill is higher this month than it was last month.
“Rape is when a person violates another person in the most despicable, degrading way imaginable and among the myriad of terrible things humans can do to one another, rape is among the worst. I think the casual misappropriation of the concept of rape extending all the way to its widespread comical usage is disgusting even by Internet standards. Off my chest.”
