Why Medieval Women Sometimes Fought in Bloody Trials by Combat
atlasobscura.com
atlasobscura.com
> For Classen, these judicial duels help illustrate complex medieval gender structures that, in many ways, echo modern ones. Despite centuries separating us from the Middle Ages’s judicial duels, our modern legal system still echoes the past. Rape cases continue to be notoriously difficult to prosecute and the onus of proof still too often falls on victims of sexual violence
I agree that cases of sexual abuse in general tend to be very difficult to prosecute because they typically happen in private.
However, what isn't special is the notion that innocence must be assumed until guilt is proven. That is one of the pillars of any reasonable justice system, and it applies regardless of the alleged crime.
I am all for not putting people into jail based on accusations, but I do not want to live in a society where a women who had this done to her needs to fight windmills to get the case started or even be accused herself of being at fault.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Duel_(2021_film)
Haven't personally read the book:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Duel:_A_True_Story_of...
The article stops short of saying that plaintiffs should not have to prove an assault occured.
Why beat around bush? I wholeheartedly agree and support this notion and I sincerely hope it will be signed into law at once.
Maybe once we've watched the ensuing chaos for a bit we can return to reason and collectively move past tolerating destructive nonsense disguised as thought-terminating high ideals.
Or maybe they want a surveillance state so total, the question of whether something occured isn't a question at all? Sounds good to me as well, let's try it.
That's not it either? So what is it then?
Besides the hapless vaguely activist undertones of this article, it was rather interesting. Could've done without the modern-day commentary though.
The article is indeed talking about historical practices... while making explicit references to, and expressing opinion on, present day practices.
What is it you are trying to say?
The quoted part is not an allusion. Rather it's stating plainly that "rape is hard to prosecute", which is an opinion stated as fact, and it further opines that too many times the "onus of proof" falls on the victim of the alleged assault.
> is an appropriate level of exposition.
It's not exposition either. Rather than conveying information on the stated subject matter (a medieval practice), we are given opinions on something that had no bearing on it at all.
The last two paragraphs are dedicated to circling back to the modern day. It's not exposition, not even just a comparison, it's the lesson the author wanted to teach.
Surely a criminal law expert would be the appropriate person to comment.
Why would you invert innocent until proven guilty for this particular matter but not others? And how exactly would the accused prove themselves innocent? Not having to prove an assault occured means that anyone could accuse anyone without reprimand.
EDIT: I agree that there's a problem in society and sometimes law regarding cases like in the other post, where the jury sees clear evidence and pretends like "it isn't rape because she had a short skirt" etc, this is obviously wrong. But for cases where it's testimony against testimony, the only realistic approach is to pressure the perp until they admit to it. I don't see how the opposite would be viable.
During the trial, every single piece of misinformation regarding rape was echoed by the jury. "She wanted it", "If she hadn't wanted it her body would have rejected it", and "That's not rape, if that's rape then what my husband's been doing to me for 20 years is rape", were all voiced by the jury at one point or another.
Despite copious amounts of evidence, including video evidence, the man went free.
I'm not sure how to fix the problem with the judicial system, but it's very, very clear that there is one. How can a system where criminals go free be called "justice"?
Edit: An additional nice little statistic here is that within the UK, criminal drug possession is overwhelmingly prosecuted at much, much higher rates than robbery, mugging, etc. IIRC it's around 20% for possession and only 5% for theft, violence, arson or house invasion.
If there really was all this evidence and the jury overwhelmingly wanted to acquit...maybe there really wasn't a crime?
The problematic cases are the other ones, the he-said-she-said ones, where even if the guy seems like a scumbag it's impossible to decide beyond reasonable doubt that he's the one lying.
Juries are supposed to be impartial assessors of facts, none of these jurors were impartial, as they all carried various attitudes towards rape that blamed the victim rather than the perpetrator. IMO it speaks to the lack of education of the general populace and the lack of information and knowledge taught in the general school system about consent and rape.
The actual act of rape, as it is described in the law, was committed, on video. The jury was blinded by their own personal beliefs — for the one juror, for example, she would have had to admit to herself that she was raped, that's a pretty terrifying reality to have to acknowledge.
If you have your house broken into, and you are shot in the leg by an intruder, and it is caught on video. Subsequently a jury finds the person innocent because he is rich and well-liked. That person still committed an illegal act.
It's a tall order to ask random strangers on the internet to trust your second (third?) hand account of what happened when, by your own admission, there's a jury (and professional judge!) who disagree.
You've been told something by a dissenting element of that jury, and you may trust their word, but random strangers on the internet have really no reason to trust you or your friend over the conclusion of a court.
To sway any opinions, you'll have to present a more convincing case than "trust me it happened and trust me all the others are morons". To me you're just as reliable - less, given that you're presenting hearsay - as the dozen people who chose not to convict.
I don't see what that has to do with anything, and I don't see what that has to do with productive debate. Either you believe something written on the internet, or not. I really do not believe that anything I say or give evidence of (if that wasn't already incredibly illegal) will convince you.
I'm going to believe that you're a human, and as a consequence I think the only reason why you landed on this specific iteration of incredibly feeble epistemology-based argument is because any other argument you formulate comes out as "rape is good" in some way, and you realise that and want to avoid it.
You can't have a productive debate about this topic with not-verifiable anecdotes and second-hand accounts.
> Either you believe something written on the internet, or not.
People are generally capable of more nuance than that. For clearheaded people there's at least a "don't know" in the middle of that. To move the needle, you weigh the stakes against the likelihood of something being true.
After reading some article about a medieval practice, I'm likely to just proceed as if everything written therein was true. If I repeat what I read there to another person despite the original source being wrong, it's no big deal. The stakes are low. However if we're in a discussion about politics or accusing someone of rape, I'm not going to change my opinions or simply believe rape accusations based on nothing. The stakes are high.
> I think the only reason why you landed on this specific iteration of incredibly feeble epistemology-based argument
It's a bit rich to fluster at that after having made an argument that's really just a not verifiable anecdote, but maybe it's an understandable response given the subject.
Allow me to reiterate: I pointed out that even if your first-hand account of your friend's report is trustworthy, it's reasonable to assign credence to a jury and judge over your friend - as dmurray hinted at. You cannot expect people to act as if the man is guilty of rape after he was cleared of the charges - just because you/your friend claim he is guilty (however convincing you think your argument is). The consequences of being considered guilty of rape are enormous, making the stakes too high to be swayed by so little.
> I think [...] any other argument you formulate comes out as "rape is good" in some way, and you realise that and want to avoid it.
And I'm going to assume you wrote that because you actually believed it and mistakenly thought it would positively add to your comment, rather than it just being a thinly-veiled attack on my person.
Hopefully this comment gave you some perspective on why people who aren't immediately racing to your support may not be caricature villains trying to protect rapists through verbal sleight of hand.
To circle back to the needle analogy: People aren't pointing out issues with your argument because they believe "rape is good", but rather because the argument isn't good to move their needle on "rape is hard to prosecute" in the direction you obviously desire.