Is it ever OK to use the word 'rape' in a light-hearted way?

“He was my boyfriend for like three and a half years. He was fine. I think I raped him.” This is not the confession of a sex offender. Instead it is a joke made by singer LeAnn Rimes, in response to being asked how she lost her virginity.

It's not surprising that viewers, who watched her make her the comment recently on Joan Rivers’ web chat show, responded in shock. Rimes’ ‘joke’ has since been called offensive, tasteless and ignorant. One Twitter user sums it up writing: “Leann Rimes rape joke should be taken seriously! No one should make jokes like that.”

But the reality is that ‘rape jokes’ do exist. So too, does a casual usage of the word ‘rape’ as a catch-all verb to describe something difficult, or a situation where you've been taken advantage of. I've heard people say they have been ‘Facebook raped’ or 'fraped' (had their account hacked by a friend), or even 'raped by a difficult exam’.

‘It’s never OK to normalise rape’

Robin, 30, a male friend, is guilty of the above. He tells me: “[Rape’s] not really a good thing to joke about but then it depends on the context. I will admit that I have said 'I got raped at work today', meaning I had heaps of work. But I know I still shouldn't use it like that.”

And if his girlfriend had made a comment about him, just like Rimes?

“It depends on the tone,” he says. “If she was talking about me in a derogatory manner it would make me feel bad. But if she was talking about it like it was crazy sex and we both had a good time, then I wouldn’t care.”

But while Robin isn’t offended by rape jokes - just knows he 'shouldn't use them - Mark, 29, feels differently. A close female friend of his was violently raped and his knowledge of what happened to her means he hates the thought of the word being used jokily.

“It’s never OK to do anything that takes the sting out of the weight of a word that should make men and women feel physically sick,” he says. "People who talk about rape, or think that they have the right to talk about it endlessly, basically don’t. I think anything that normalises the word is utterly sickening.”

(The Telegraph)

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