... I daren't say, but I am pretty sure that the answer is not "engage in obviously ridiculous hermeneutics in order to invent excuses that have nothing to do

QueerCoup: "This analysis is attempting to be on the right track, but it misses the mark greatly." Maybe so. But the analysis in the article is an attempt to interpret somebody else's analysis -- that is, Susan Brownmiller's discussion of "police blotter" stranger rape in Chapter 6 of Against Our Will (published in 1975). Do you think that the mark-missing is in Brownmiller's analysis (i.e., that she got it wrong about rape)? Or in my attempt to make sense of Brownmiller's analysis (i.e., that I got it wrong about Brownmiller's meaning)? Or both? Something else? QueerCoup: "They're reinforcing the stereotype of the back ally rape. This pushes accountablilty for the invisible fist onto these shadowy figures and away from every husband, father, boyfriend, aquaintance, date who has furthered patriarchy ..." Again, maybe, but what do you make of the long paragraph near the end that begins "I've been talking about 'stranger rape' all this time because that's what Brownmiller's theory is about, and Brownmiller's theory is a good case study in the point I'm trying to make. But similar remarks, with different but importantly related consequences, could be made for forms of violence against women which feminist activists and researchers have, over the past 30 years, demonstrated to be even more prevalent and even harder to escape than the threat of stranger rape -- date rape, rape in marriage, battery, and so on....", or the paragraph in an early comment which begins "It's a good thing, because in point of fact I don't even agree entirely with Brownmiller's theory. I do agree entirely with something in the neighborhood..."?

QueerCoup: "This analysis is attempting to be on the right track, but it misses the mark greatly." Maybe so. But the analysis in the article is an attempt to interpret somebody else's analysis -- that is, Susan Brownmiller's discussion of "police blotter" stranger rape in Chapter 6 of Against Our Will (published in 1975). Do you think that the mark-missing is in Brownmiller's analysis (i.e., that she got it wrong about rape)? Or in my attempt to make sense of Brownmiller's analysis (i.e., that I got it wrong about Brownmiller's meaning)? Or both? Something else? QueerCoup: "They're reinforcing the stereotype of the back ally rape. This pushes accountablilty for the invisible fist onto these shadowy figures and away from every husband, father, boyfriend, aquaintance, date who has furthered patriarchy ..." Again, maybe, but what do you make of the long paragraph near the end that begins "I've been talking about 'stranger rape' all this time because that's what Brownmiller's theory is about, and Brownmiller's theory is a good case study in the point I'm trying to make. But similar remarks, with different but importantly related consequences, could be made for forms of violence against women which feminist activists and researchers have, over the past 30 years, demonstrated to be even more prevalent and even harder to escape than the threat of stranger rape -- date rape, rape in marriage, battery, and so on....", or the paragraph in an early comment which begins "It's a good thing, because in point of fact I don't even agree entirely with Brownmiller's theory. I do agree entirely with something in the neighborhood..."?

... You're probably thinking of Crispin Sartwell's recent post at Eye of the Storm: -C

... Yes, Old English had something you could definitely call a nominative case. Modern English does not (although, of course, it has its own ways of indicating

... Not coincidentally, of course: "du" is a direct cognate of "thou," and "dich"/"dir" of "thee," under standard phonetic rules. Originally, "ye" was the

... Well, when you say "Billy and me went to the store." If this doesn't "make sense," I'd like to know what you find confusing or odd in it. ... No, and in

... My suspicion -- completely unresearched at this point, so salt it to taste -- is that people tend to multiply negatives in spontaneous speech, even when

... It's low for the tiny handful of doddering incumbents who have held onto their rent-controlled apartment since 1957. It's extremely high for everyone else,

... "Bowling for Columbine" is a rather weird movie, in part because September 11th happened in the middle of producing it, and as a result (as Moore has said