Nonconsensual sex: How colleges rebranded rape

[Tansy_Gold]

43. If the word doesn't exist, then there is no such thing (semantic sarcasm)

MineralMan wrote: Nonconsensual sex is rape. But, the wording somehow makes it sound less vile.

The concept becomes "less vile" because there is no single word that can be derived from the noun-phrase "nonconsensual sex" to label the person who commits the act. The act then becomes a thing in and of itself, divorced from the actor. There isn't even a verb to be derived.

If that somehow sounds like mumbo-jumbo, compare it to the other word we have:

verb (transitive and intransitive): to rape
noun (act): rape
noun (actor): rapist

By using "nonconsensual sex" to label the act, there is no way to label the person committing it. He (or less often, she) cannot be a rapist because he didn't rape.

Someone who kills is a killer.
Someone who farms is a farmer.
Someone who dances is a dancer.
Someone who plagiarizes is a plagiarist.
Someone who rapes is a rapist.

"Nonconsensual sex" doesn't even generate a verb. The person "has" (owns? possesses?) (the act of) nonconsensual sex; he doesn't even "do" it. Thus the actor is separated not only from the deed itself but from the doing of it. All we're left with is this sort of disembodied (pun intended) act,

To take it another step further, one is required (semantically) to "have" nonconsensual sex "with" the other person. Not "to" or "at" them, implying they had nothing to do with it; but rather "with" them, as if they were some kind of partner or accomplice.