30 American Senators: Profits > Rape
Paydon Miller
Undergraduate/Political Science and Journalism
I’m not going to break any ground with this article. I won’t be turning any heads with my pissed off diatribes. I won’t be changing anyone’s mind at all. Mostly because I assume the majority of Flip Side readers are against rape.
This week an amendment to a bill that would make it illegal for Halliburton and other contractors to ban people raped by coworkers from suing for damages was introduced into the United States Senate. You read that correctly. Right now, overseas female contractors of any kind often cannot seek financial restitution if they are raped.
Author, Senator Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot Franken, introduced this amendment after a story surfaced about contractor Jamie Leigh Jones, who was gang-raped by multiple male coworkers and was told by her employer that she could not seek any settlement.
Want to hear the best (and by “best” I mean mind-numbingly terrifying and nauseating) part? Thirty senators voted against the bill. Their reasoning? According to Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama, such a law infringes on a business’s right to litigate their own contracts with their employers. It isn’t Senate’s place to step in and regulate such things as who America hires to do their dirty work overseas. Of course not. Why would Senate look out for America’s best interest?
Among the other senators that voted against the amendment: Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, Tom Colburn of Oklahoma, Sam Brownback of Kansas and the Maverick himself, John McCain of Arizona.
Not surprisingly, every single senator that voted against the anti-rape bill was old, white, and Republican.
For the second time in two articles, I’m at a loss for words. I usually can at least wrap my head around the Republican argument. I get the ring-wing arguments against abortion and for the death penalty. But at what point does a profit supersede the indignity suffered by a woman gang-raped by a group of her coworkers?
But where do we draw the line? If we let Senate litigate what can and cannot be agreed to in contract, where do we stop? WHERE, I ask you, reader!
Frankly, I’m not sure. But I AM sure that it should stop somewhere after turning a blind-eye to the gang-rape of a woman.
What these thirty senators have done is misrepresented the opinion of the vast majority of Americans. You cannot tell me enough of these senators’ constituents cherish their ability to sign a contract so much that they’re willing to let such a blatantly un-American law to be in place.
Yes. Un-American. America has an unspoken value that we, as American citizens, have the right to seek reparations for crimes against them or their property. By voting against this bill, Senate voted for this misconstrued idea of infallible capitalism and the beauty of big business over the idea of individual physical integrity.
Senate, in theory, is supposed to represent the American people. As such, each senator represents 50 percent of the population of their state. On that theory, thanks to Senators McCain and Kyl, 100 percent of Arizona citizens are okay with gang-raping a woman as long as the sacred trust of anti-litigation remains unbroken.
Sounds hinkey? That’s because it is. I refuse to believe that 30 percent of all of America can rationalize voting against this amendment. Because they don’t.
Like I said, I know I’m not saying anything 95 percent of you don’t already believe in already. Most of us believe that allowing someone to be gang-raped is not worth boosting the bottom line a little bit. But if you feel as strong about this as I do, visit the incredibly funny website www.republicansforrape.org. Fair warning: this website is both hilarious, satirical and semi-tasteless. But it also has the e-mails for every Republican Senator that voted to continue to allow rape to occur so we can pad Halliburton’s bottom line.