Deborah Orr's inews article worth reading (linked previously)
'Carl Benjamin and Jess Phillips: What it means to joke about raping (or not raping) a woman
He imagines he is saying something vile about the woman. Of course, in reality, he is saying something vile about himself'
(extract)
Of course, in reality, he is saying something vile about himself. A number of vile things, actually.
He is effectively saying that he hasn’t understood the physical advantage that men, generally, have over women. He is saying that he has never considered what the fact of greater male strength might mean for women, even though women are raped, beaten and killed every single day by men.
The reality he hasn’t considered is that men rape women because they can. He is saying that he has never thought about what it might be like to be physically overwhelmed, to have it made clear to you that this physical overwhelming is sexually exciting to your attacker, and that that attacker intends to physically overwhelm you as much as they can, by thrusting a part of their own body into your body.
He is saying that he hasn’t thought about how abhorrent this is, the idea of using a woman’s body as a chunk of meat. He is saying that he has not thought about how sex is something that can result in pregnancy for women, that it can change their life and make a new one.
He is saying that he hasn’t realised that this violent, violating crime is such a big deal.
He is saying that he hasn’t considered that for some men, women are ultimately objects, to be used for something they think is sex, but is actually a gruesome, disgusting form of masturbation, with the bonus that it hurts and defiles a woman.
He might even tell people that he wouldn’t even rape this woman. This, he says, is a joke. If people disagree with him, he may truly believe that this proves that he is right – that along with their many other uselessnesses, women can’t even take a joke.
Carl Benjamin, who has been accepted as a Ukip candidate for this month’s European elections, has been joking about whether or not he would rape Jess Phillips, the Labour MP for Birmingham Yardley, for years. He has been banned from a social media site because of it. But he has not been banned from membership of his political party. On the contrary, his colleagues think that this man is fit to stand for election." (continues)
inews.co.uk/opinion/carl-benjamin-rape-joke-jess-phillips-ukip-european-elections/