When a sex worker is raped, it’s rape — not “theft of services"

TUESDAY, SEP 15, 2015 04:41 AM +0900
When a sex worker is raped, it’s rape — not “theft of services”
A Chicago Sun-Times column called it a "mockery" to acknowledge when sex workers are sexually assaulted
MARY ELIZABETH WILLIAMS

In an enragingly offensive piece for the Chicago Sun-Times, columnist and editorial board member Mary Mitchell this weekend explored the recent story of Roy Akins, a 29 year-old local man who has been charged with raping a woman in his home at gunpoint. After the alleged assault, the woman called 911 and went to a nearby hospital. Akins, who the Chicago Sun-Times reports “has several other convictions for drugs, burglary and possession of a stolen motor vehicle,” reportedly texted the woman repeatedly to apologize, and “admitted to detectives” what he did to her. He is being held on $750,000 bail for aggravated criminal sexual assault. Sounds pretty open and shut. But wait, the woman was a prostitute, and she’d come to the house because she’s been promised $180 for sex.

As Mitchell puts it, this whole criminal assault thing is “making a mockery of rape victims.” She goes on to write in amazement, “I imagine most prostitutes in this situation would have run straight to a pimp. But after leaving Akins’ home in the 1100 block of North Lawler, the unidentified 24-year-old woman called the police.”


She’s probably correct that what the woman did was unexpected. Though statistics are difficult to obtain, a 2002 report on Chicago area sex workers found between 32 and 38 percent of prostitutes said they’d been sexually assaulted. Mitchell says, “Unfortunately, the way this case is being handled makes it look like sex trafficking is a legitimate business. I’m not one of those women who believe rape victims are at fault because they dressed too provocatively or misled some randy guy into thinking it was his lucky night. But when you agree to meet a strange man in a strange place for the purpose of having strange sex for money, you are putting yourself at risk for harm.”

I don’t even know what “strange sex” means, but I’ll tell you this much — if you pull a gun on a person and force yourself on her, it’s rape. If there’s no consent, it’s rape.

　売春婦が商売で男のところに行ったら、銃を突きつけて性行為を強要された場合、女にも責任があるかのような論調があるが、そうした行為について同意はないのだから、それは、純然たる強姦であり、強姦以外の何もでもない、とアメリカ。