On Silencing, Rape, and Responsibility

Abstract

In a recent article in this journal, Nellie Wieland argues that silencing in the sense put forward by Rae Langton and Jennifer Hornsby has the unpalatable consequence of diminishing a rapist's responsibility for the rape. We argue both that Wieland misidentifies Langton and Hornsby's conception of silencing, and that neither Langton and Hornsby's actual conception, nor the one that Wieland attributes to them, in fact generates this consequence.

Notes

¹Wieland does not herself endorse this conception of silencing, or the claim that pornography silences. In fact, she argues against the latter. We will argue here that her attribution of this particular conception of silencing to Langton and Hornsby is incorrect.

²Thanks to an anonymous referee for bringing up this sort of case.

³We would like to thank two anonymous referees for this journal for very helpful comments and criticism on earlier drafts.