A few months ago I found myself at lunch with a couple of women my age who kept insisting that (a) rape is purely a crime of violence, not sex, and (b) since I write for Penthouse sometimes, I’m part of the problem, because pornography contributes to a rape culture by sexually objectifying women. (Uh, I feel I should point out here that I’ve never written porn for Penthouse, just pristine articles about Hollywood topics that could run in any PG-rated publication.) The logical retort — that if rape is only a crime of violence, not sex, then what does sexually objectifying women have to do with rape? — only occurred to me once I was driving home.
This is part of an interesting discussion over at The Volokh Conspiracy, where Cathy is guest-blogging.