Wednesday, April 22, 2015

Wednesday Links

Cattle crossing.

Tough day. Too tired to post. Enjoy some links...
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6 comments:

Mike Fagan said...

"Taiwan Take on Spanish man in Taichung accused of raping 17 year old girl."

What is the court standard of proof in cases like this: innocent until proven guilty, or are the feminists already in charge (with their insistence that the burden of proof be reversed in order to secure a higher number of rape convictions)?

Michael Turton said...

It's not feminists, but the media.

Anonymous said...

If the guy wasn't a foreigner it would not even be an issue.

It plays into the existing trope of the wild, libidinous foreigner corrupting "our women" as a form of ethnic integration through othering and the construction of an "outside" threat. It is usually a phenomenon in response to an awareness that ethnic integration is unclear and may result in challenges to the existing sociopolitical paradigm.

Mike Fagan said...

"If the guy wasn't a foreigner it would not even be an issue."

As in raised in the media, you mean?

Whilst I agree it does seem to be the case that the Taiwanese media jump on cases involving foreigners, I only wonder whether this perception is actually false; how many cases of alleged bad behaviour involving foreigners do not make the headlines?
I know of many cases anecdotally which could and perhaps should have made headlines but which didn't.

In any case, my earlier comment about feminism was more in the vein that I don't think it'll be too long before Taiwan has feminists in the judicial system arguing for some form of the reversal of the burden of proof for cases of rape allegations, i.e. that a man accused of raping a woman would have to prove her consent and that he would therefore be presumed guilty until proven innocent.

Unknown said...

The "sleepwalking towards war" article makes a compelling case based on historical precedents that when a new power rises (as China is doing), trying to keep it from becoming a regional hegemon is a recipe for war. However we have just as compelling historical precedents showing that appeasing such a rising power that demands annexation of its neighbors is also a recipe for war.

Michael Turton said...

Yes, I tend to take the latter view. History doesn't give many examples of peaceful rises.