“the major distinction between intercourse (normal) and rape (abnormal) is that the normal happens so often that one cannot get anyone to see anything wrong with it.”

—  Catharine A. MacKinnon

Sexuality, Pornography, and Method: "Pleasure under Patriarchy" (1989) Ethics, Vol. 99, No. 2 pp. 314-346

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "the major distinction between intercourse (normal) and rape (abnormal) is that the normal happens so often that one can…" by Catharine A. MacKinnon?
Catharine A. MacKinnon photo
Catharine A. MacKinnon28
American feminist and legal activist 1946

Related quotes

Cory Doctorow photo

“Abnormal is so common, it's practically normal.”

Cory Doctorow Little Brother

Source: Little Brother (2008)

“He knew that he was caught up in one of those stretches of time when for anything to happen normally would be abnormal. The dawn was too tense and highly charged for any common happening to survive.”

Mervyn Peake (1911–1968) English writer, artist, poet and illustrator

Source: Gormenghast (1950), Chapter 57, section 3 (p. 686)

Viktor E. Frankl photo

“An abnormal reaction to an abnormal situation is normal behavior.”

Viktor E. Frankl book Man's Search for Meaning

Source: Man's Search for Meaning (1946; 1959; 1984), p. 32 in the 1992 edition, ISBN 0807014265, Beacon Press

“Normal is the wrong name often used for average.”

Henry S. Haskins (1875–1957)

Source: Meditations in Wall Street (1940), p.135

D.H. Lawrence photo

“They wanted genuine intimacy, but they could not get even normally near to anyone, because they scorned to take the first steps, they scorned the triviality which forms common human intercourse.”

D.H. Lawrence book Sons and Lovers

Source: Sons and Lovers

Catharine A. MacKinnon photo

“Perhaps the wrong of rape has proven so difficult to articulate because the unquestionable starting point has been that rape is definable as distinct from intercourse, when for women it is difficult to distinguish them under conditions of male dominance.”

Catharine A. MacKinnon (1946) American feminist and legal activist

Source: Feminism, Marxism, Method, and the State: Toward Feminist Jurisprudence (1983) Signs Vol. 8 No. 4, p. 647

“…we are willing to admit the normality of the abnormal—are willing to admit that we never understood the normal better than when it has been allowed to reach its full growth and become the abnormal.”

Randall Jarrell (1914–1965) poet, critic, novelist, essayist

“An Unread Book”, p. 5
The Third Book of Criticism (1969)

Jennifer Beals photo

“[On cancer] One of the problems is that the notion of cancer has been so normalized. You hear about it so often, and it's not ok… it's not ok to normalize this disease. And with all of the pinkwashing that goes on —where companies are selling products based on breast cancer month — it's a lovely gesture, but consumers get so used to it that it becomes more normal.”

Jennifer Beals (1963) American actress and a former teen model

Interview at Susan G. Komen for the Cure (October 2011) http://www.kstreetkate.net/2011/10/jennifer-beals-honors-promise-talks.html

José Mourinho photo

“The only thing that I want to say is that we are the best ones and in normal conditions we are more than the best ones. In normal conditions we will be champions. In abnormal conditions we also will be champions.”

José Mourinho (1963) Portuguese association football player and manager

http://trivela.uol.com.br/mourinho-50-anos-as-melhores-frases-do-special-one/ <br class="br">2003

Gertrude Stein photo

“She always says she dislikes the abnormal, it is so obvious. She says the normal is so much more simply complicated and interesting.”

Gertrude Stein book The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas

Source: The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas

Related topics