Talk:Marital rape

problem with lists citing countries which have criminalised rape

China appears on both lists. There are also other inaccuracies. Please check. Unable to edit. Thanks.

Copyright Violation

The entire header of this page is a word-for-word copy of Solano County's page on spousal rape. Jacie Cady (talk) 21:31, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

So is the entire Psychological Damage section, although I'm not going to tag it at this time because it seems silly to put two section-specific copyvio tags on the same page. The section cites http://www.hiddenhurt.co.uk/Articles/maritalrape.htm as a source, but it is in fact a copy-paste of http://www.co.solano.ca.us/depts/fvp/sexual_assault/rape.asp. Jacie Cady (talk) 21:35, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Copyright investigation

The header of this page seems to have evolved naturally on Wikipedia. I cannot locate an archive of http://www.co.solano.ca.us/depts/fvp/sexual_assault/rape.asp, so I cannot verify definitively, but note a few significant points:

• The opening sentence of the external source is "Spousal rape is non-consensual sexual assault in which the perpetrator is the victim's spouse." In August of 2004, we have the first germ of the opening sentence added here, when the sentence "Spousal rape or marital rape is a generally uncommon type of rape that involves spouses." was altered to read "Spousal rape or marital rape is a phrase used to describe an instance of non-consensual sexual activity, when the perpetrator is the spouse or ex-spouse of the victim." A look at the article at that time shows the rest of it is very different from the suspected source. In August of 2004, "ex-spouse" was removed from the equation, here. In January of 2005, the sentence evolved again, with "is the spouse of the victim" becoming "is the victim's spouse." Here it became "Spousal rape or marital rape is non-consensual penetrative sexual activity in which the perpetrator is the victim's spouse." That evolved into the same form used at the external source in July of 2007: here.
• Looking at the paragraphs beginning with "Spousal rape is also called marital rape....", this was introduced to the article in June of 2006, in a split from the article rape. Note the significant differences:
  • In our article, it says, "Spousal rape is also called marital rape, wife rape, partner rape or intimate partner sexual assault (IPSA)." The external source says, "Spousal rape is also called marital rape and often wrongly mixed with partner rape or intimate partner sexual assault (IPSA)." Our article was altered a year later in June 2007, here, to read "Spousal rape is also called marital rape and often conflated with partner rape or intimate partner sexual assault (IPSA)." It's unlikely that it would have been pasted into our article in June of 2006 in an altered form and modified a year later again to break it closer to that external source. It's more likely that another source copied us.
  • In the external source, it says, "One reason for this is thought to be the lack of social validation that prevents a victim from getting access to support. Domestic violence services have made inroads in addressing this problem. Another reason is the betrayal of trust." Our article is identical, except that it stops with the words "addressing this problem." The phrase "Another reason is the betrayal of trust" was not added to our article until March of 2008, here. Again, it's more plausible that the external source copied us, at some point after that second sentence was added, than that copyvio was introduced twice.
  • Speaking of that second sentence, it is part of another illuminating series of edits. This all from March 2008 by User:Barbara Shack. When adding that sentence, "Another reason is the betrayal of trust", she adds down to the first footnote, which is present at the external source. Here she sections the article, as it is sectioned at the external source. Hours later, she adds through the second reference, here.

Given the evidence, I don't believe that we can conclude that http://www.co.solano.ca.us/depts/fvp/sexual_assault/rape.asp published the material first. It seems likely to me that they simply copied the first several paragraphs from the Wikipedia article at some point in March, before this change, and altered a few words ("wrongly conflated" in our article becomes "wrongly mixed"). --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 02:54, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

The Solano County website is an official government page which clearly identifies the author of the article. It is ludicrous to suggest that a government source is plagiarizing Wikipedia as opposed to the other way around, especially given Wikipedia's history of plagiarism. Jacie Cady (talk) 02:29, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

The Solano County website clearly identifies the author of the article "A Crime Aganist [sic] Woman [sic], A Crime Aganist [sic] Wives". That article (actually titled "Real Rape Real Pain: Help for Women Sexually Assaulted by Male Partners”) begins with the words "In 1987...." It seems to have been originally published here. (What that website is offering as a title is a bit of a badly formatted stab at the subtitle: "A crime against women, a crime against wives. When the one you love commits an act of sexual violence against you, the scars lie deep and buried.") I don't find it quite so ludicrous to believe that the Solano County employee who pasted that article, under the wrong title, might have copied material from Wikipedia as well. It happens more often than you might think. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 19:51, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

I find it funny, that you (User:JacieCady) had more trust into the authenticity of "an official government page" than the evidence lain so plainly in front of your own eyes :)

What you're saying here is that either lots of different Wikipedia users made lots of little changes over months, each of them one little step to the final goal of plagiarizing this webpage or that in a bout of "parallel evolution" the government official who "wrote" the page miraculously arrived at the same result as this article... Now I have quite a lot of problems believing this and so should you 79.234.77.116 (talk) 12:08, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

New Map, Fixing the country lists

Map of countries which criminalize marital rape

I've recreated the criminalization map as an SVG file, which is editable with any text editor. All sources cited are commented inside the SVG file itself, but I will add them to the file description soon as well. I'm posting the image here for one week in order to solicit comments before adding it to the page itself. All sourced countries described on the Wiki page are included, along with those from a variety of other sources. I've done google searches on the top 10 largest countries as well, but clearly additions are welcome.

While we're at it, it would be really useful for someone to extract the country lists in this image and add them as sourced portions of the article itself. Maybe that will be me someday. --Carwil (talk) 23:58, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm going to create a subpage of the discussion Talk:Spousal rape/Country lists for cleaning up and fully documenting the lists of countries. Arbitrarily (really, because several sources are region-specific), I'm arranging the list by continent. Also, can someone make the US State Department citation more clear, because unless someone did a long country-by-country search, I don't see where it comes from on that site. --Carwil (talk) 00:39, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Formatting the country list

I've done some updating in the past couple days (happy International Women's Day!), but ultimately this page should look a lot more like Use of capital punishment by nation or Same-sex marriage legislation around the world. Tables and notes are far more readable and informative than our current lists. I'll continue to use Talk:Spousal rape/Country lists as a storage bin for references and possibly a design experiment for the table, but extra hands would be appreciated.--Carwil (talk) 16:24, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Misleading

Spousal rape is still legal in many states in the United States, requires a significantly higher standard of proof, requires additional criminal activity, or is otherwise de facto legal in many circumstances. You do no one any favors by presenting the untrue whitewash that spousal rape was eradicated in the US. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.247.234.225 (talk) 04:44, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Interesting. Do you have a source? Gabbe (talk) 06:47, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Spousal rapists get exceptions other rapists do not in 33 states for example. A higher standard of evidence is often needed for convictions [1]. High evidence burdens are only one of many marital exemptions from sex crimes. I am not really sure how to cite things in articles or what is a good enough source. Are these good sources for Wikipedia? Can you explain why or why not for me? 67.247.234.225 (talk) 05:12, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

incorrect color code

In the image in the section "Countries that have made spousal rape a criminal offence", the lit countries are a colour (a violet-purple) not like the key (red). I can't think how to change it. Someone fix it.--Auric (talk) 06:44, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Resolved

Done! Lova Falk talk 11:59, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Two different maps about the same subject??!

How come the article has two maps, one showing in which countries "Marital rape is criminalized" and the other showing "Countries where marital rape is criminalized" - with considerable differences, especially in South-America. Which one of these maps is correct?? Lova Falk talk 12:03, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Resolved

There should only be the newer SVG one, which is being updated as information is added to the page and Talk:Spousal rape/Country lists.--Carwil (talk) 16:17, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:14, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

---

Spousal rape → Marital rape — Marital rape is the more common name (on the web: 625k vs. 143k and in books: 27,100 vs. 3,970 by Google hits) and the one used in prominent international legal and human rights discussions on the subject. This includes the United Nations, the Council of Europe, and human rights groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. Marital rape (and its longstanding legality, and recent widespread criminalization) is legally an issue relating to marriage as such, rather than primarily the relationship of spouses.--Carwil (talk) 12:31, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Sounds reasonable. Kaldari (talk) 23:23, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

I'd oppose this move. While I have no doubt that marital rape is the more historically used term, this is really talking about spouses, marriage is irrelevant. Language can be slow to change but that's no reason to misrepresent a topic on wikipedia. Kuguar03 (talk) 09:18, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Kuguar03, while I think I disagree (and will explain that below), I also just don't understand. Is there some substantial segment of spouses-not-in-marriage whose abuse is best covered here? Are there married couples that don't qualify as/consider themselves spouses?

I also want to be clear that this page has developed on the assumption that it is not covering all forms of partner rape, which unfortunately redirects here. Partner rape and other forms of intimate partner violence are important, and spousal rape/marital rape are a significant portion of them. However, spousal rape/marital rape has the distinct condition of being religiously, socially, and legally authorized for much of recent history, as well as an historically important trajectory of criminalization in the last century.

And to clarify one more thing: I have no interest in prescribing away spousal rape as a term, or in prescribing away marital rape as the preferred term (once I hear whatever arguments there are for doing so). Marital rape and spousal rape would remain in bold in the lead. However, per WP:COMMONNAME, we should use the more common term if it is not POV or misleading (and some times even then, but that's an argument for a different page).--Carwil (talk) 11:52, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

• Support: I don't see a logical argument either way so we might as well go with the one with more hits. –CWenger (talk) 03:21, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

People's Republic of China

Has marital rape legal or illegal in China? Because it is listed under both countries that have made marital rape illegal and countries that have not made marital rape illegal. There may be other counrties under both lists too, I haven't read them both thoroughly. Matthew Fennell (talk) 17:52, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

The current list of criminalizing countries is problematic. I've been trying to sort this out to completion on Talk:Marital rape/Country lists. Read the section New Map, Fixing the country lists above before going there. A big problem is that the principal source on the page isn't available to confirm what it says. So the goal of this sub-page is to sort out and document all the countries. This has been easier for the does not criminalize countries, which are fully updated on the main page. Thanks for your help!--Carwil (talk) 20:45, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

India, Indonesia and domestic violence law

It appears from text already in the article that India "criminalizes" marital rape in a different and more limited way than most other criminalizers, through the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act 2005. While thanks are due to the efforts of the IP contributor who moved India to the "does not criminalize" section, I don't think it's quite that straightforward:

Current text: In India, the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act 2005 (passed August 2005; entered into force October 2006) created a civil remedy for victims, but it did not criminalize marital rape,[26][27] and jail time is only considered if a court order has been violated.

I think the same situation obtains in Indonesia

• "In Indonesia, the marital rape provision is within the Domestic Violence act." [2]
• "Our breakthrough finally came in September 2004. After years of effort, the parliament passed the law on violence against women in the home (Law No. 23/2004). The new law outlaws four forms of violence – physical, psychological, sexual (including marital rape), and economic neglect. Significantly the law makes ‘criminal’ violence against all members of the household, including husbands, wives, children and extended family members." Ratna Bataramunti "Justice for women? New anti-domestic violence law brings hope for women," Inside Indonesia, July-September 2006.

Does anyone object to a new color on maps to reflect this different criminalization, perhaps orange?--Carwil (talk) 12:31, 18 April 2011 (UTC)