Ugh, I'm disgusted.

It is disgusting that the doc they signed "forces them to settle disputes through private arbitration". When the hell did harassment and rape become a DISPUTE?!? Horrifying.

Violent sexual predators need to be strung up by their small berries and gutted like a fish. Period.

But I'm skeptical & leery of another magnum/duke poop scandal of lets-lynch-em-in-the-media-before-we-know-any-facts.

This whole gangrape/iraq/halliburton/boooshitler/cover-up thang is all too pat. Smells like a mfg'd. victim looking for a deep pockets pay day.

Pardon me for being cynical, but it doesn't bode well for victims anywhere if this 2 year old 'crime' with no evidence, no investigation, and damn little proof besides he said/she said doesn't turn out to be just and true.

If the pricks are guilty, string em up and gut em. I just hope for all victims sakes, that this is not a deep pockets pay day scam.

wait wait wait.

Arbitration for a *criminal* act?? I didn't think it worked like that.

What if someone was robbed over there by a Halliburton employee? Murdered, even??? Would the family have to resort to arbitration and the murderer never see the inside of a jail cell?

Rape, last I checked, is a crime. Why can they not get this prosecuted as one?

Oh no. The second I saw this post, I was counting down the seconds before someone brought up the Duke case.
As far as this being a 'crime' (nice attempt at scare quotes) with no evidence, investigation or proof, wouldn't the fact that this incident is being reported as a COVERUP. Generally, in a cover-up folks attempt to destroy evidence in order to thwart an investigation which will not result in proof of a crime.
Unless, of course, you're the type of person who believes that women routinely lie about being gangraped in order to steal money out of the pockets of corporations or men or whomever has the deepest pockets.

I don't understand. If this were some type of murder case most people would jump to the conclusion that the accused is guilty. You wouldn't be saying "crime" if it were a murder case. But when a woman (or women in this case) is raped people just brush it off and say "oh, it's just he said she said," or they find other ways to simplify, justify, and belittle the issue. OR they just focus on the monetary aspect of it! I understand "innocent until proven guilty," but I will never understand why people jump to conclusions about the victim(s) of sexual assault, or why people get blinded by the money involved. Stop focusing on the money and ask yourself WHY one victim's rape kit is missing, or how our justice system is still set up in way that the accused is protected more than the victims of sexual assault cases.

locomotivebreath1901: I think your cynicism is very telling as far as how victims of rape and sexual assault who come forward are viewed. Automatically, you bring up that there is a possibility that it's just a "deep pockets pay day scam." Even though you say that you "hope for all victims sakes" that it's not a scam, the fact that you even bring up the possibility still shows an instilled bias against women who bring forward charges of rape and sexual assault.

Would you ever claim that a missing person/murder case such a Natalee Hollaway, where there is not evidence because the body has never been found, is just her parents trying to get money out of Jordan Van der Sloot's politico family?

I'm not trying to knock your comment, but I do think it's interesting that a pay day scam was even brought up.

On a side note, was anyone watching the beginning of the Bush press conference today?? He made a joke about counting the silver before they let the reporters into the White House. Yeah, because with all the shit going on in the US, W wouldn't want anyone to steal his silver. What a jerk. I didn't think it was possible for me to hate him anymore, but somehow he always finds a way.

Well, this is a shining example of the intersections of power and hegemonic masculinity, right? Goddess forbid anyone criticize Halliburton and their motives. Victim blaming is yet another way to maintain a false sense of security about the role of men as leaders of multi-national corporations. Sexual assault and the subsequent denial of it is tied up in corporate power and sexist greed. Rape is a violent crime and refusing to understand that puts everyone at a disadvantage, the leaders of the free world and they people they try to govern.

This is just a shining example of the intersection of hegemonic masculinity and power, though, right? Goddess forbid anyone criticize Halliburton, especially a woman or women. Rape is a crime 100 percent of the time and should be treated as such, but victim blaming is a way to reify the power of these male leaders -- and in turn, solidify this false sense of security about being powerful men doing important things. Coverups and victim blaming aren't detrimental to just the victims but to everyone -- including the leaders of the free world who think they are "above it all." Yeah, okay.

This is just a shining example of the intersection of hegemonic masculinity and power, though, right? Goddess forbid anyone criticize Halliburton, especially a woman or women. Rape is a crime 100 percent of the time and should be treated as such, but victim blaming is a way to reify the power of these male leaders -- and in turn, solidify this false sense of security about being powerful men doing important things. Coverups and victim blaming aren't detrimental to just the victims but to everyone -- including the leaders of the free world who think they are "above it all." Yeah, okay.

How much involvement can the US government have since the alleged rape occurred in Iraq? As I understand it, criminal prosecution in the US would be impossible, but the lawsuit could be heard in US courts since The company is a US entity. Is this correct?

locomotivebreath1901 - The lesson of the Duke case wasn't that we should assume the AV is lying. The lesson should have been that we should limit our assumptions either way until evidence (or lack thereof) becomes available.

Does anyone know yet if there are official records of the rape kit results, or did those disappear with the kit?

ahhh so sorry for the multiple posts.

Locomotivebreath1901. Dear Christ.
I'm sure the money-grubbing whore involved her father and the fucking STATE DEPARTMENT in this little pay-day-scam, and busted her own breast implant for additional credibility.

'Cause rape accusations are always soooo profitable for the victims. :rolls eyes:

Is it that unbelievable to you that Halliburton would destroy evidence or attempt a coverup of such an incident?

AFAIK, everything having to do with the rape kit disappeared.

Rape denialism, noun, the ideology of denying or minimizing the prevalence of rape.

Contrast with rape apologism, the ideology of denying the seriousness of rape.

The rape denialist acknowledges the category "rape" and overtly endorses the view that it is wrong and grievously so. The rape denialist then attempts to construct arguments by which few or no rapes can be defined or verified.

Because rape denialists acknowledge the seriousness of rape, they frequently make extravagant assertions about how rapists should be dealt with; often through torture. The severity of proposed consequences, however, can be pressed into service in (1) defining rape as so aberrant that only the non-functional mentally ill would commit the act; and (2) that it is quite rare. The rape denialist often seeks to exclude acquaintance rape of any kind, any rape not causing visible physical injuries, and any rape where the rapist or any other party could pay a money judgment in any civil action, usually on the premise (among others) that fabricated allegations are common. For this proposition, only anecdotal evidence is generally offered, often in the form of an aside about the Duke rape case. Before Duke, the anecdote of choice was Tawana Brawley.

Rape denial and rape apology are conceptually separate, but are often simply rhetorical strategies employed by the same men. Properly understod, then, rape denialism is a special class of rape apology.

I volunteer as a rape crisis/ domestic violence counselor, and one of the things we learned in training was to emphasize to the survivor, who is likely to blame herself, that what happened to her was a crime. Unfortunately, the reason why this needs to be said is that people don't consider sexual assault and domestic violence crimes in the sense that murder and robbery are. It seems to me that the only way for a rape victim to guarantee she is believed is to be killed during the attack. If Jamie Leigh Jones had been killed by her attackers, I doubt anyone would be calling it a "crime."

(I am using female pronouns for the purpose of syntactical clarity; however, I do realize men are victimized, too.)

I volunteer as a rape crisis/ domestic violence counselor, and one of the things we learned in training was to emphasize to the survivor, who is likely to blame herself, that what happened to her was a crime. Unfortunately, the reason why this needs to be said is that people don't consider sexual assault and domestic violence crimes in the sense that murder and robbery are. It seems to me that the only way for a rape victim to guarantee she is believed is to be killed during the attack. If Jamie Leigh Jones had been killed by her attackers, I doubt anyone would be calling it a "crime."

(I am using female pronouns for the purpose of syntactical clarity; however, I do realize men are victimized, too.)

Thomas, I tuned in to this thread partly to see how soon denialism or apology would appear. That it appeared so soon was disheartening, but your response is encouraging and useful. Thanks for laying out the concept of denialism and its relation to apologism so clearly.

For all those interesting in exploring how to address denialists, check out Science Blogs' denialism blog
(I have no affiliation with the blog, I'm just interested in the topic :)

I volunteer as a rape crisis/ domestic violence counselor, and one of the things we learned in training was to emphasize to the survivor, who is likely to blame herself, that what happened to her was a crime. Unfortunately, the reason why this needs to be said is that people don't consider sexual assault and domestic violence crimes in the sense that murder and robbery are. It seems to me that the only way for a rape victim to guarantee she is believed is to be killed during the attack.

(I am using female pronouns for the purpose of syntactical clarity; however, I do realize men are victimized, too.)

Just a note that upon posting, I got an "internal server error" message, but my comment posted anyway. That probably explains the multiple posts here at the moment. Don't be fooled by the error message!

I volunteer as a rape crisis/ domestic violence counselor, and one of the things we learned in training was to emphasize to the survivor, who is likely to blame herself, that what happened to her was a crime. Unfortunately, the reason why this needs to be said is that people don't consider sexual assault and domestic violence crimes in the sense that murder and robbery are. It seems to me that the only way for a rape victim to guarantee she is believed is to be killed during the attack.

(I am using female pronouns for the purpose of syntactical clarity; however, I do realize men are victimized, too.)

I volunteer as a rape crisis/ domestic violence counselor, and one of the things we learned in training was to emphasize to the survivor, who is likely to blame herself, that what happened to her was a crime. Unfortunately, the reason why this needs to be said is that people don't consider sexual assault and domestic violence crimes in the sense that murder and robbery are. It seems to me that the only way for a rape victim to guarantee she is believed is to be killed during the attack.

(I am using female pronouns for the purpose of syntactical clarity; however, I do realize men are victimized, too.)

I, too, got an internal server error and checked back a few minutes later and didn't see my post. So sorry for the quadruple postings!!!

In order for a criminal case to be brought in the United States, a court must have jurisdiction over the matter. Jurisdiction is based on where the crime occurred. Because it occurred abroad, no U.S. court would have jurisdiction.

This leaves the victims with a civil suit to vindicate their rights. Civil matters, like suits for damages, have a wider basis for jurisdiction. The plaintiff could bring suit where Halliburton/K.B.R. is based, for example. Arbitration clauses tend to be incredibly broad. If you intend to sue your employer for *anything* arising out of your employment and you signed an arbitration clause, it's going before a private arbitrator and you're no longer in court.

Thomas: You fucking rock my socks every time. Please write a book!

The reason the victim is being forced to arbitrate is that she's bringing claims against he employer, probably for not keeping her safe, and for discrimination. The bad news is that these clauses are enforceable, and arbitrators vary widely in quality (also, the company will have a say in who's on the panel).

The good news is that at least with a Title VII claim, which she'd be insane not to bring, she'll have the same substantive rights that she would have in court, because you can't sign away your civil rights, and being free from sexual discrimination is a civil right. That's not the case in, say, contract disputes.