‘Rape as most people understand it’

George Galloway got a spade out today and made a statement in which he attempted to clarify his comments about the allegations against Julian Assange. He dug himself a little deeper, saying that ‘what occurred is not rape as most people understand it’. Assange is wanted in Sweden – but not yet charged – on allegations of rape, unlawful coercion and sexual molestation. Rod Liddle blogs that he thinks Galloway has a point. The law says he does not. There is a lesson to be learned from Galloway’s comments, though, which is that rape is not well understood at all. When he says something is ‘not rape as most people understand it’, this is because society still largely imagines rape as an unexpected attack on a woman walking down a dark alley late at night. By describing what Assange is alleged to have done as ‘bad sexual etiquette’, Galloway demonstrates that he does not understand the legal definition of rape, or of sexual assault for that matter.