Speaking of Rape & Deconstruction

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Tue Feb 1 10:17:48 PST 2000


[sent to me rather than the list]

To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com cc: (bcc: DANIEL DAVIES) bcc: DANIEL DAVIES Subject: Speaking of Rape & Deconstruction

I'd be the last person to claim any feminist credentials, but I thought that the idea that not every "yes" constitutes consent was pretty-well established, and certainly predates deconstruction. Surely the whole idea that the defining difference between rape and nonrape is a single, definitive act of the woman's will is intrinsically questionable, and not by deconstructionists? I seem to remember Germaine Greer giving a lot of interviews which suggested something like "putting the category of rape under erasure") Or am I missing something? (specifically, am I missing some sort of rhetorical trap)?

dd


>I wonder if devotees of deconstruction are comfortale "deconstructing" the
>"binary" between consent and lack of consent and putting the category of
>rape under erasure? No is supplemented by Yes, and vice versa? When a
>woman says, "what part of No don't you understand?" a deconstructive (or
>Freudian) man might say, "well, there is no such thing as a No that is not
>always already deconstructed," and proceed to do the same old work of
>sexism.


>Pop deconstructors often make, without any evidence, a totalizing truth
>claim that all "binary" thinking -- true/false, reality/fantasy, etc. --
is
>"metaphysical" and therefore oppressive, predicated upon "violent
>exclusion," but I wonder if they ever think through the consequence of
>their own claim.


>Yoshie

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