On Tuesday, Tsinghua University law professor Yi Yanyou wrote on his Sina Weibo, “Raping a chaste woman is more harmful than raping a bar girl, a dancing girl, a sanpeinu or a prostitute.” Because you know, in this world, some people just have it better than others, and deserve to be treated better because of it.
That Yi’s statement was in relation to the Li Tianyi gang rape case quickly became lost in the outcry and massively loud sighs against Yi. How could a law professor — at one of China’s most prestigious universities, no less — say such a dimwitted thing?
China Real Time, a Wall Street Journal blog, sought to find out, and caught up with the Tsinghua professor on Wednesday to get a clarification. Get your sighs out of the way right now.
Mr. Yi said his comments didn’t amount to a defense of Li Tianyi. “I’m not saying that Li Tianyi didn’t commit rape, nor that prostitutes could be raped,” he said.
Good start. Why am I waiting for the other shoe to drop?
Mr. Yi said each crime has a certain level of social harm, and the psychological harm is different on different victims.
Ah, there it is.
“The same curse words have different impacts on different people,” Mr. Yi said. “Chaste women and prostitutes have different views on chasteness,” he said, “so [rape has] a different impact on them.”
I don’t know where to begin. With Yi’s anachronistic view of chastity that teaches all women to neither seek nor accept pleasure unless it involves scrubbing the chinoiserie? With his casual linking of rape with sex, as if the former weren’t an act of violence against society, and the latter somehow demeaned woman in the eyes of that society? The impact of curse words? World’s worst sociologist here, ladies and gentlemen. Chaste women and prostitutes have different views on chasteness - now he’s a bloody mind-reader. Mel Gibson in What Women Want wouldn’t have gone that fucking far.
But what do you really think, Yi Yanyou?
Mr. Yi told China Real Time on Tuesday that Tsinghua Law School suggested he delete the controversial post, but he refused. “Deletion means that I think I’m wrong,” Mr. Yi said.
Yi Yanyou is an oaf, and one day, in a different life, will be viciously attacked by a black bear as he swims upstream with his mouth puckered into an oval. He will not survive. Be comforted.
But on Wednesday, Mr. Yi deleted the post. “I don’t want to be in this anymore,” he said in a call to China Real Time.
And by the end of the day Wednesday, he had apologized. “My comment yesterday was indeed improper,” he wrote on his Weibo account. “I’m disturbed by the negative impact and hereby apologize to all.”
Be well, Mr. Yi. May you never be negatively impacted by rape again.
Guy probably never shagged a woman he didn’t have to pay for. Sorry looking POS.
“Chaste women and prostitutes have different views on chasteness,” he said, “so [rape has] a different impact on them.”
I guess Tosh has to adjust his jokes to the acceptable Chinese standard when he starts out with, “You know what would be so funny right now?”