It’s no secret that a woman dressing all sexy-like is all it takes to negate a rape accusation. But just how sexy is all sexy-like? I don’t know for sure, but courtesy of Virginia state Senator Dick Black, we can guess that in marital rape it goes as far south as “flannel nightie.”
In 2005, when Black was serving in the Virginia House of Delegates, he made a speech in which he said he “did not know how on earth you could validly get a conviction of a husband-wife rape, when they’re living together, sleeping in the same bed, she’s in a nightie, and so forth, there’s no injury, there’s no separation or anything.”
His floor speech was delivered in response to a proposed bill that would strike language from Virginia’s definition of rape that excludes marital rape unless, at the time of the offense, the spouses were living separately and/or the rapist caused physical injury to the victim. It’s important, Black said, that the legislature “establish rules to reasonably ensure that we’re not going to convict an innocent person,” like a man who’s simply overcome with lust at the sight of his wife in her Tweety Bird nightshirt. The bill was passed and the language was stricken despite Black’s reservations.
Black has recently announced interest in taking a stab at a GOP seat in Congress. He recently disclosed that he opposes both same-sex marriage and polygamy, but polygamy less because “at least it functions biologically” and “[y]ou actually have cultures over history that have permitted it,” unlike, of course, same-sex marriage, which has never happened in history before ever.
In the House of Representatives, Virginia rep and Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte defends the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act” as a job creator because of all the care that will be necessary for all the kids that will be born to mothers who have no other options.
“I would suggest that it is very much the case that those of us in the majority support this legislation because it is the morally right thing to do, but it is also very true that having a growing population and having new children brought into the world is not harmful to job creation,” Goodlatte said at the committee mark-up of the bill. “It very much promotes job creation for all the care and services and so on that need to be provided by a lot of people to raise children.”
The bill in question would make the Hyde Amendment permanent and would impose tax penalties on women and small businesses who purchase private insurance plans that include abortion coverage. It would also, obviously, create jobs, because the women having children they didn’t plan for and/or don’t have the resources to support will need child care, more administrators for government and private assistance, and probably therapists to deal with the stress of unsuccessfully pleading her rape case to the IRS.
In short: Yes, Virginia, there is a senator in your vagina.