Helping the Media Keep Up with the Different Kinds of Rape

So, we all knew that there’s rape-rape, which is the really bad one, and then there’s “rape,” which is presumably bad but not as bad. And then somewhere down the scale from that comes “male rape,” which is the Daily Mail’s term for their scandal-crime story today about a police officer accused of raping a man. (Important to know: men can’t be raped in Scotland!) Somewhere down beneath that is partner rape, because marriage is a sacred contract in the eyes of Baby Jesus, and then there’s prison rape, most often brought up as a punchline by morons. But yeah, we reviewed England’s 2003 Sexual Offences Act and found no crime called “male rape.” It’s still just “rape”! Or maybe “rape-rape,” I guess. So confusing.