Ace of Spades claims that the woman who was gang-raped by Halliburton employees is lying. Of course she is. Ace himself has played hours and hours of every war video game under the sun, and no matter how much you try, or how many cheats you install, there just is no “Rape that bitch” function in any of them. And since war is just one big video game to him, we can safely assume that it’s a rape-free zone.
I for one am glad that the basement-dwellers have quit being the face of political bloggers now that thinking people are beginning to get some attention.
55 Responses to “Rape in war? Impossible!”
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I guess Acey was just dying for some attention. I know five-year-olds who are more independent.
I only read the quote on Shakes, but Ace has already maxed out my daily quota of stupid. But really, I don’t know, Ace, why would an insanely profitable military contractor chose to cover up atrocities committed by its own staff? It certainly couldn’t be that this incident is in danger of being some sort of straw on an overburdened camel’s back, could it? Like maybe a single gang-raped whistleblower could lead to an unpleasant investigation, which may or may not uncover a blockbuster-movie caliber story of sex, violence, money and power?
Nah, that can’t be it at all. Clearly, she’s lying.
#1: Well, he got it.
#1: Well, he got it.
Hey, the kid hangs upside down on the monkey bars long enough, you start to worry that he’s going to pass out and really hurt himself, so you say, “Yes, I see you, Timmy” and go about your business.
Of course, those naysayers who insist that the woman must be lying are no doubt bellowing for a full, impartial investigation.
(Sound of crickets chirping )
A couple weeks ago, during the section on violence in my Sex and Gender class, I showed this episode of NOW, which deals with sexual assault within the military. It’s a great episode, highlights many of the issues (which would also be quite relevant here), [and served some my pedagogical purposes (discussing how institutionalized practices shape the social phenomenon of sexual assault)]
That’s a real stumper.
One of my pet peeves is the way some people write things off as “conspiracy theories” or “tinfoil hatting” when they make perfect sense and often occur in plain view. I’ve even seen people write off as conspiracy theories things they admit are true!
It’s a lazy way of poisoning the well.
I know that this isn’t at all uncommon, but it really gets me that so many of the people who don’t believe her are saying “if she was telling the truth, she would have come forward right away!” Now, quite aside from the fact that plenty of women delay talking about being raped at until until months or years after the fact (if ever), this woman DID report it when it happened: she told her father, she told the doctors who treated her. What these people are saying is “if she was telling the truth, then she would have told the media about it as soon as it happened”– because someone who has just been gang raped and imprisoned wants nothing more than to subject herself to public scrutiny as soon as humanly possible. But then in the same paragraph they say she must be lying, because she wants to make a movie about what happened, and “real” rape victims don’t publicise what happened to them (particularly not in a way that might make a profit!) because “real” rape victims spend their whole lives in a little hole of shame.
From the first line, I thought he must be joking. Nobody can be this stupid.
This is only damning if you deliberately ignore the fact that her livelihood in Texas was also threatened. The real threat was that her life, ability to support herself and her future would be ruined. But silly me, what’s the big deal?
Now I know he really is this stupid. Gee, ever heard of doctor-patient privilege? What about the gag-rule on discussing a case currently in litigation, especially if you will be called as a witness in that case? Nah, the bitch must be lyin’
Sadly, too many cover-up rape (especially if they aided or participated in the rape), so Ace will have to excuse me if I don’t automatically feel sympathy for the men in this situation. But it is all about the menz isn’t it? We mustn’t consider that this young woman is telling the truth if it paints men in a negative light, right?
But I guess if we ignore the involvement of a Republican Congressman, the State Department, and the Army we can just dismiss this young woman’s allegations and pretend that women don’t get raped in war zones. Heck, they probably don’t get raped that often anywhere. You know, because the Duke case and all.
“Ace himself has played hours and hours of every war video game under the sun, and no matter how much you try, or how many cheats you install, there just is no “Rape that bitch” function in any of them.”
So is this just something the gaming industry has overlooked? Especially in the wake of the Grand Theft Auto series? I’m thinking there’s a whole bunch of military wannabees that would love to kick it up another notch…
Also, I wonder how long it will be before a bogus Clenis connection is proposed - and what it will be?…
Well, Mike, if she’d been really smart, she would have claimed to have been gang raped by Bill Clinton, Barak Obama, and John Edwards in Cloud Cuckoo Land, while a zombie Ron Brown sold tickets and Hillary held everyone’s coats. She’d then be trampled to death in the huge stampede of Starr warriors rushing to believe her every word, represent her every allegation, and book her on every talk show in the western world.
Oh, but history_mom, I’m SURE that all the guys making this argument fully support a welfare system that helps people who lose their jobs.
[/sarcasm]
“She’d then be trampled to death in the huge stampede of Starr warriors rushing to believe her every word, represent her every allegation, and book her on every talk show in the western world.”
Yep, she’d be set for life. Another variation of wingnut welfare.
Instead she foolishly attempts to cling to the truth and hold people responsible for their actions…
Don’t wanna lose your lunch?
I recommend not reading the accompanying comments on Ace’s site.
I should have known better.
Which is a lovely twofer as far as KBR is concerned. First, it means that she has no money to go to court, which channels her into the KBR arbitration process (where KBR wins 80% of the time, according to one post). Second, it allows them to sniff and dismiss her as a Disgruntled Ex-Employee Who Has An Axe To Grind.I love how it is the apologists who scream, “What happened to innocent until proven guilty?!” who assume it is impossible for not only rape victims to tell the truth (with accusation serving as proof) but also for men to exploit physical advantage–ever.
Sadly, I fear our domestic culture is not truly any better. We basically grant immunity to rapists. Seriously, isn’t there a ridiculously high chance that if you commit rape you either won’t even be charged let alone convicted? All a rapist has to say is, “She consented” and it’s virtually impossible for people to believe not that she was raped, but that she didn’t deserve to be raped. I can think of no state crime that would legitimize the torturing of civilians by self-appointed vigilantes who serve as judge, jury, and executioner. And yet there is a widespread cult-like belief that not being born a boy qualifies as such an act of treason that endangers the state.
I keep waiting for a rape trial that focuses heavily on the attitudes of the alleged rapist on trial, specifically regarding women (and girls) and rape. I fear if that were ever to happen, there’d be a huge national uproar b/c of a “But all men think that!” mentality that would be said w/o irony.
I bet none of the Halliburton guys have an honorable discharge amongst them. Imagine some chickenhawk with military training and a gun; that’s what they’re like.
In the very wildest of my fantasies, Ace has been outfitted with a head-mounted device which, whenever he begins a sentence with “It feels all un-PC to…”, raises an artificial palm to his forehead, thus shaking the contents of his skull and perhaps causing some sorely-needed sense to surface. Were he a less reprehensible human being, he’d do this himself, but I think that machinery is indicated in this instance.
Jessica Lynch, Pat Tillman, Abu Ghraib…
The answer to his question is obviously no. What would the interest in that be exactly? I’ll note he doesn’t say anywhere.
God, just when I think Ace can’t be more of an asshole, he puckers up and proves me wrong.
Hey, give this Ace of Spades credit. He managed to get through an entire post without mentioning the Duke case (although the guy he linked to didn’t).
Anorak: Sadly, I waded in. Truly vile crap. Apparently, a 20-year old woman with an IT degree should never, ever think that she could be hired for anything other than her pussy, especially if she has breast implants. Really, it’s the implants that did it– obviously, any woman who gets them wants to be fucked. [/sarcasm]
The scary thing is that there are people that think exactly that. And then there are people who think radfems think that. Either way, it’s impossible to be too sarcastic about it. How many rapes have these guys gotten away with? How many murders? You know that Ace and his buds are just living vicariously through these rapists. They get off on abusing the victim in the one way that’s open to them.
What I am waiting for, and not in a ‘I hope this happens’ way but in a ‘This is inevitable way’, is how soon they will find a way to make all of the problems with sexual assault in the military the women’s fault, because after all, women have no place in the military and will ruin unit morale and unity.
Maybe that’s why they really are afraid of having gays in the military; since everyone just sees the people they want to fuck as prey, they think that means that having someone who wants to fuck them makes THEM prey.
If we just let our military just be the nice white men we meant it to be, none of this would happen…
The deniers have a wee problem this time. It isn’t just she said/KBR said.
She called her father, ostensibly from the container. Her father contacted his senator. The senator, Ted Poe, wrote a letter on her behalf while she was ostensibly being held. In response, the State Department dispatched agents to rescue her from said container. She was rescued (so I can drop “ostensibly” now).
If her version of the events is a fabrication, I await the rationalization of just why they had felt a need to imprison her in the container. Without food or water.
Kinda makes you wonder about the fatal work accident that might have happened had she not been able to telephone out, no?
The deniers have a wee problem this time. It isn’t just she said/KBR said.
Not to mention the documented upper body trauma. She had corrective surgery only after an independent medical review. In other words, it was determined that the torn muscle wasn’t a result of vigorous self-fondling (you know, the typical thing women with breast implants do to themselves) after all.
“Kinda makes you wonder about the fatal work accident that might have happened had she not been able to telephone out, no?”
I was wondering the same thing. Something along the lines of “she accidentally got locked in a shipping container for 2-weeks before anybody noticed, and she was already dead when they opened it up…” or some such bullshit.
People who have no morals, don’t have any morals (surprisingly)…
I find it fascinating that people like Ace, who don’t really think of or treat women like fully human, act like it’s so obvious that gang rape is bad. I don’t actually buy for a moment that someone who puts all his energy into cover-up and denial after gang rapes thinks they’re bad for any other reason than they make the bitch-creatures whiny.
Seriously? I don’t know about Ace in particular, but I wouldn’t think most guys like that would care what the “bitch-creatures” whine about. I’d probably err on the side of they think it’s bad because other GUYS have told them that it’s bad - like their pastor, or their father, or some other authority figure.
One of the reasons that religion is still useful - we still have jackasses who can’t figure out that hurting other people is wrong on their own, but they’ll go along with it if someone in authority tells them it’s wrong.
“Maybe that’s why they really are afraid of having gays in the military; since everyone just sees the people they want to fuck as prey, they think that means that having someone who wants to fuck them makes THEM prey.”
And only women deserve that!
Got it in one. It’s why the same people who are so proud of the courage they have facing bullets and stuff go absolutely batshit that someone might be looking at them in the shower. Because the whole morale thing is never about “might be fondling me when I don’t want it” — it is ALWAYS about “might be looking at me when I don’t know it.”
Which would be absolutely insane, because the only possible actual issue would be in the case of rape, and everyone knows that soldiers would never stand by while one of their own got raped by another soldier.
Oh, wait.
This story really saddened me and makes me angry at the administration, their enablers, and the bloated plutocrats who seek to profit from human misery. I swear they have some kind of PowerPoint presentation with dollar signs on one axis and skulls on the other.
All the dead and damaged human beings caused by this completely unnecessary war… are the sociopaths in charge?* Why is that behavior rewarded ? Why aren’t the honest doing something about it ?
I don’t know what else to say.
*(of course they are)
(PowerPoint Presentation Graph)
Nony, I also have trouble imagining that any man has sat down Ace and told him not to rape. Hell, I’ve never heard a liberal guy say they’ve had another man talk to them about rape, and I’m sure as hell guessing that men suffering from 10th level anxious masculinity don’t want to talk about it.
I wonder if the men who are rape-denial defenders have themselves committed acts that were coersive or sexually abusive to women in some way and stick up for the accused perpetrator because they identify with him. If they haven’t and their misogyny is just so deep-seated that they instinctively defend men from any charge of rape because many victims don’t respond the same way as they would if someone stole their cell phone, I wish they’d walk around with fluorescent orange armbands so I could identify them.
“…are the sociopaths in charge?*”
Abso-damn-lutely.
In fact, I can’t tell whether Bush is the HSIC (Head Sociopath In Charge) or Cheney is. Not that it really matters…
…oh wait - you weren’t talking about the federal government. Sorry…
“I wonder if the men who are rape-denial defenders have themselves committed acts that were coersive or sexually abusive to women in some way and stick up for the accused perpetrator because they identify with him.”
I’d say that’s exactly it. Except they wouldn’t admit to themselves that it was coersive - or rape. They worry that other people might think that’s what they did, so they do backflips trying to distance the skeletons in their closets from any sort of responsiblity for them.
“I find it fascinating that people like Ace, who don’t really think of or treat women like fully human, act like it’s so obvious that gang rape is bad.”
My guess would be that run-of-the-mill rape is extremely easy for someone who is so inclined to justify, minimize, and dismiss, but when it graduates to gang-rape, it makes it very difficult to use any of the standard arguments. Far fewer people are going to believe that all men involved took her out for dinner or paid for her movie ticket on the same night, or that she led all men involved on at the same time, or that she totally agreed to a gang-bang that just got out of hand, or that she’s just upset because the men all failed to call her the next morning. You have to start coming up with new reasons why it’s totally okay, or it didn’t really happen, or it wasn’t really rape; when someone who doesn’t want to admit that rape is much uglier than they like to think of it has to actually start really thinking about it, it gets uncomfortable.
I imagine there’s also at least some sense of gang-rape not being “fair play” in the same way that fist-fights are “fair” even if the loser is beaten quite badly, but a bunch of people beating on one person isn’t.
I’m sure that Ace would say gang rape is bad if it happened to a woman whose pussy he felt he owned, particularly if the rapists weren’t white.
Hey, the kid hangs upside down on the monkey bars long enough, you start to worry that he’s going to pass out and really hurt himself, so you say, “Yes, I see you, Timmy” and go about your business.
Except that Timmy is an ostensible adult who gets a thrill out of being told “You’re gonna pass out if you hang upside down like that!”, so why not let the little fucker hurt himself?
“I wonder if the men who are rape-denial defenders have themselves committed acts that were coersive or sexually abusive to women in some way and stick up for the accused perpetrator because they identify with him.”
I don’t wonder. It’s the only thing that makes sense.
I find it fascinating that people like Ace, who don’t really think of or treat women like fully human, act like it’s so obvious that gang rape is bad. I don’t actually buy for a moment that someone who puts all his energy into cover-up and denial after gang rapes thinks they’re bad for any other reason than they make the bitch-creatures whiny.
Ace is horrified by the accusation. It’s tarnishing the image of KBR and, by extension, Bushco. It’s such a terrible thing to accuse someone of, gang rape; those men are in danger of having their lives ruined. I mean, how can she do this to them?
Except that Timmy is an ostensible adult who gets a thrill out of being told “You’re gonna pass out if you hang upside down like that!”, so why not let the little fucker hurt himself?
Because otherwise we’re gonna turn on the teevee one of these days and see that little fucker wearing a tie as one of the smirking “commentators” on Fox News. Better to expose his idiocy now to try and prevent that from happening than waiting until he’s already there. It took years, but at least Malkin finally got herself banned after too much bloggy idiocy.
I don’t think Ace is very much interested in the facts of this case. I think he’s motivated here by the principle that guys ought to be loyal to other guys. It’s Ace’s bad luck that according to the dicta of GuyWorld—dicta Ace supports—it’s the worst guys who are deemed to be the most representatlvely masculine. If the dicta of GuyWorld were to change overnight—if, for example, it were suddenly to be decided that the most dudical guys are the ones who wear striped instead of white shirts—you can bet you’d find Ace panting with eagerness (no pun intended) to set forth the very next morning the dangers to virility posed by bleach. Bleach would become the new soy.
Hey, the kid hangs upside down on the monkey bars long enough, you start to worry that he’s going to pass out and really hurt himself, so you say, “Yes, I see you, Timmy” and go about your business.
Well, and the “she’s lying” charge is part of a larger denialist tapestry that encompasses the people claiming that waterboarding isn’t torture.
“I don’t wonder. It’s the only thing that makes sense. ”
Agreed. In my experience it’s always the most racist person who gets the most defensive about race issues. (To quote an ex-friend of mine: I can’t be racist, Bette, I’m friend with *you*.)
I see no reason to think rape deniers are any different. If they haven’t actually done it themselves, they get off on the idea of it.
Interesting angle. Rape = KBR = Halliburton = Cheney = Bush = …Ace of Spades, Bush supporter?
Nowhere in there do we find the woman.
I wasn’t of the impression that he was somehow subconsiously identifying with guilt for *this* rape, though now that I’ve built on Sour Kraut’s idea it’s something I’m going to have to think about. I’m more of the mind he identifies with sexual abuse of women in general and that this wasn’t an issue of political defense.
Though, yeah, there’s nothing Republican monsters won’t defend about their party’s “values” by tearing other people down. In that case this rape victim would be getting the Richard Clarke/Paul O’Neill/Joe Wilson treatment?
I’m more of the mind he identifies with sexual abuse of women in general and that this wasn’t an issue of political defense.
I have no doubt, deep6. But it’s a confusing situation for Ace: on the one hand–despite his misogyny–he’s able to sense that there’s something horribly wrong with gang rape; but the idea that said crime was committed by employees of KBR, a firm entrusted by the great and infalliable King George to carry out His will, is inherently ludicrous to him. Therefore, the woman must be a BDS-afflicted, leftist affiliated thing which is attacking KBR(and Bushco by proxy) out of spite.
I can see why they’d want to deny it happened. They are all enablers of this horrible situation and they have blood on their hands.
In that case this rape victim would be getting the Richard Clarke/Paul O’Neill/Joe Wilson treatment?
Remember that the treatment in Wilson’s case was to ruin his wife’s career.
Why haven’t the names of the Halliburton guys been published? If there is some supposed legal reason, at least their nationalities and past experience could be mentioned. Many of these mercenaries come from military and security forces in places like Pinochet Chile, Apartheid South Africa, Serbia, etc. where they were involved in torture, murder, war crimes, and general human rights abuses.
(Sighs.) I remember the good old days when it was just us and the blacks and asians in the country club, and the only boondoggles allowed in were as waitresses. Great days, gone forever.I very much doubt that Ace, or most of them, have the actual nerve to go through with it, in normal circumstances - so living vicariously is even more precious to them.
Well, how do I put this - various US governments have been caught perpetrating and covering up things that make a gang rape almost look harmless in comparison. And as for Halliburton - at the end of the day, this is about money, isn’t it? They would do anything not to lose their Irak contracts. Covering up a gang rape, say by arranging for a tragical accident on the job, would be peanuts to them.
But when Ace finds it hard to believe, we must be wrong, and Jones must be lying, no question.