Mr. Editor,

At the risk of appearing a raving chauvinist and the possibility of an horrendous mailbag, I must concur with remarks made by Dave Burrows of BFM when he said that perhaps we are getting ahead of ourselves with this talk of making marital rape a crime. Firstly I wholeheartedly agree rape of any kind is an inhuman, disgusting and degrading act against anyone – yes, a male can be raped as well – but RAPE is already a criminal offence, as is physical abuse; if a woman claims she has been raped, be the perpetrator a stranger, a boy-friend or a husband, then report it and see where the chips may fall.

However, to my mind, this brings up another, related question, that of women’s equality. Twice now different governments have put forward referenda for we, the people, to vote on to eliminate all forms of discrimination against our women, and what did our womenfolk do? They said “NO!” Now my understanding is there is a quite sizeable majority of females over males of voting age, so why would the Bahamian woman wish to appear subservient to her Bahamian male partner, thereby, apparently, giving the lie to the churchman on the news recently who said it is wrong for the Bahamian man to consider his wife as a possession, and, of course, the old adage that a husband cannot “rape” his wife.

As I stated above rape is an abomination and the perpetrator should be imprisoned and the key thrown away, so please, my Bahamian sisters stop giving mixed messages, "yes, rape is a crime and yes, I want to be your chattel"?

Seriously confused,

Harry Strachan

December 22, 2017