It used to be that a woman had to have said no very clearly. While now in many places, lack of acceptance is the same as no. That goes for both rape and sexual assault.

This is a weird fucking thing to fixate on and rail about on a thread about a sleeping 15 year old girl getting raped by a 44 year old. Whether or not she said no changes fuck all.

The only definition that matters is the one used by Swiss courts. And Swiss courts found him guilty of rape.

People keep quoting Swiss law at you, as if that has any bearing on what the English word “rape” means in common parlance.

I would say in English speaking countries, rape means “non-consensual sexual intercourse”. This is in spite of the fact that the UK also requires the rapist to penetrate the victim.

In normal speech, and not a court of law, people do routinely say, for instance, “the female office manager raped the new male apprentice in the store cupboard” - even though the victim was the one penetrating the rapist. In the UK, the female office manager in this instance would be tried for sexual assault, not rape, although the punishment would be the same.

I think you’re right that the headline would mislead many readers here, given that native English speakers would, in normal speech, say that someone who non-consensually fingered someone (I assume that’s what this guy did) committed sexual assault, rather than rape. But because of how laws define things, penetration occurred so this is legally considered rape in Switzerland.

However whoever writes a law does not get to dictate what the “real meanings” of words are. The fact is that words are often ambiguous, and do not have a clear meaning for all people. In this case, the authors of the article must have known that, and by choosing not to clear up the ambiguity in the headline, I have to wonder if they were either trying to get clicks, or trying to spread a racist narrative.

notice the article mentions absolutely NOTHING about rape, and why it should be considered as such. it was ONLY in the headline!

From the article:

Application of the new sexual criminal law

The new sexual criminal law was applied at the trial. This law, which came into force a year ago, is based on the formula “No means no”. Rape is now deemed to have occurred if the victim shows through words or gestures that they do not consent. A state of shock on the part of the victim is sufficient as a sign of refusal.

According to the Tages-Anzeiger, the 15-year-old’s state of shock was emphasized in the indictment. She was unable to defend herself against the acts and endured the assault without saying a word or moving. Before the law was changed, rape would only have been recognized if the perpetrator had used violence or threatened the victim.

Stop defending your proven mistake already and just admit that you did not read and learn to improve and not do it again.