Something the public needs to understand is that the capitalist media is making big money off the Kobe case. The media should not be trusted on questions of fact especially in this case, because it's first priority is to entertain the public to boost ratings or sales and increase advertising revenue. In contrast, we at MIM put out a newspaper called "MIM Notes," which far from being for profit gives us the dubious honor of draining comrades' bank accounts. We drain our bank accounts out of a sense of duty and we believe the public should often take advantage of such non-commercial sources of political and social analysis.

MIM would like to emphasize that it has no first-hand involvement in the Kobe Bryant case just like 99.9% of the media. We have no secret stash of info on the accuser, but we are willing to talk about the details as a matter of principle. That means that we talk about the Kobe case by ASSUMING certain things to be true and then wondering about the implications. Our assumptions may be entirely wrong in the Kobe Bryant case, but the implications drawn would not be in other cases where those assumptions would be true.

The Kobe and Mike Tyson cases in the bourgeois legal senses

Something undeniable is that sports stars like Kobe Bryant are constantly besieged at hotels by attractive young wimmin plying them for sex. Those who did not know this: count yourself naive. This is not something the public likes to talk about much, because it is afraid of the message. There is a strong need to identify with these stars and judge them by ordinary reasoning, such as when Tracy McGrady told Kobe to "stay with your wife." Many surveys show that a majority of the public cheats on its spouses (See MT2/3 on this.) and other surveys show a large minority say around 40% cheat, but a tiny percentage of that cheating group faces rape charges, so it is wrong to connect anything legally to Kobe's cheating on his wife--unless we take the law literally. If we take the law completely seriously that means that rape occurs where there is not consent, in which case, those people having sex under conditions where their partners lied to them about the conditions have suffered rape, which means most of the population on that account alone. After all it is not possible to consent to a lie; although probably in Kobe's case his wife knew the conditions before she became his wife. This is something we do want the public to look at more carefully before it claims it understands what the existing law is about. In actual fact, the law can convict a large portion of society--probably a majority for rape-- but the court system selects only a small minority for prosecution. As one might guess the targets are the usual suspects--the oppressed nationalities and youth. We at MIM are tired of the bourgeois legal system's opportunism and we seek to redefine the crime and the approach to eliminating it.

McGrady's statement against adultery may help him get a new endorsement deal, but it has nothing to do with the reality of famous athletes and musicians. Any NBA wife exists in a world unknown to the commoner, but we do not believe they are naive going into their marriages. Rock stars and athletes much less famous (and by the way not always wealthy) than Kobe Bryant have wimmin lined up outside their hotel doors taking turns to have sex. It's not a question of views, only of what the public knows about this fact and how the public processes it. Hence, the commoner should try not to judge either Kobe or Woody Allen, because they simply live in different worlds, and quite frankly, while we are for monogamy at MIM, we do not think it is so crucial that we want people to get distracted by this sort of case.

In the Mike Tyson case, the media reported that earlier in the day of his alleged rape of Desiree Washington he had gone among young wimmin in public at a Black beauty pageant--any and all that he could find--to ask "do you wanna fuck?" From what we can see in the media, Mike Tyson's "crudeness" may have appalled some jurors; even though the point was that Mike Tyson always asked for consent. He was crude but asking. It is apparent that at the very least reactionary talk show host Rush Limbaugh did not see the point, because he equated crudeness with rape in his talks on the subject.(1) We at MIM have to stress that that is wrong. Asking in crude language is still asking for consent and consent is what rape is all about. Rape is not about DNA/semen or crude language if the accused says s/he had consent. Let us add that Mike Tyson's approach has no doubt worked countless times in his and other media stars' cases. The public should not hold Mike Tyson to blame for that. That's how it is and it has nothing to do with rape in the bourgeois legal sense.

An example is Chris Elliott calling Tyson a "monster." Here is what Tyson said that caused it, "'I seen this Tori Amos video. I couldn't tell what she was singin' about, but she had this nice, big ass hangin' off da piano bench, and she got them big, fluffy lips. I'd love to fuck that bitch.'"(2) Whether or not this story is exactly true, it fits Tyson's language and image, but let's be clear it in no way makes him a rapist. If people did put him in prison for language like that, they are in fact oppressing him by appropriating Tyson's sexuality.

Let's also be clear that the Kobe/Tyson cases are great reasons why MIM rejected the line that "rape is theft" (thereby putting the whole subject on a consent/contract/property ground) instead of "all sex is rape." Yes, from a sexual point of view, these stars see so many wimmin it's probable that they have a certain attitude toward them. On the other hand, we do not want to rule out the possibility that a star may have done something particularly twisted just because he is a star (and let's be honest that wimmin are not accused of the crime despite evidence that a high percentage also do not obtain men's consent, but that's something to read up on in MIM Theory 2/3.) Yet, what will happen with the "rape is like theft" line (where some men are rapists and others are not) is this: people will question why Kobe and Mike Tyson would ever steal sex when they can always get it for free. The best defense will be that someone has had thousands of wimmin and is good-looking and famous, and this is something the public thinks but it is wrong--a whole other reason why MIM disrespects the "Justice System." At the very least we have to allow that someone might have gone nutty and started attacking wimmin, but the point is that the we should never "have to go there." It's our pornographic system's fault that we do go there.

Rumor also says that consent issues aside, the physical evidence in the Mike Tyson case carried the day. We at MIM only hope so, because as we shall see MIM shares the stinking suspicion along with most Black people about what really settled the case. Given that the courts convicted Tyson, we hope that it was possible to prove physically that Mike Tyson submitted Desiree Washington to something she could not have wanted. We at MIM do not know. Tyson says that he is innocent and the 1991 rape conviction was wrong. He does so in such colorful language that he no doubt raises his public profile to sell more tickets for boxing matches--part of the whole problem of having an entertainment media for profit that ends up spreading pornography of the worst sort.(3)

Related to the question of consent and superstar contexts is the rumor that in Colorado where Kobe is charged, the court system convicts men without corroborating physical evidence or witnesses.(4) In other words, there have been cases where juries found the accuser so much more credible than the accused that they convicted him.

On this question we part ways with Catharine MacKinnon. We at MIM would much prefer to advocate the total separation of men and wimmin in the strictest Islamic fashion before countenancing an ancient abuse--especially given that the imprisonment rate in the united $tates is already the highest in the world. Since the French Revolution of 1789, we Marxists have been very clear that the ability of one persyn to imprison another strictly on his/her word is an injustice left behind in the feudal era and outlawed in France. Such a method belongs in an open dictatorship not a democracy with some pretense of equality before the law. If convicting someone of crime on the strength of one persyn's word is not illegal in the united $tates and just overlooked by judges, it should be illegal in order that Amerika catch up with the France of 1789. In 1789 the issue was lords accusing peasants and imprisoning them without any need for proof or procedure other than their word. Today, we can be sure that what a jury finds "credible" in someone's word is entirely subjective and will only reek of class, nation and even gender privileges, where a persyn of female genitalia may nonetheless rank higher in the sexual social hierarchy of our society than a persyn of male genitalia. Setting up the beauty pageant winner against someone with crude language who is a dangerous Black male to boot just reeks of oppression in Mike Tyson's case. Likewise, we do not want to see a white womyn of the countryside West be able to accuse an urban Black male and put him in prison just on her word and for that reason we are willing to advocate many other tough solutions to the rape problem--among the most important the abolition of pornography for profit.

Nation

A survey already shows that Blacks and whites have divided on the Kobe case just as they did on the O.J. case. Two thirds of Blacks respect the alleged U.$. system of civics and consider Kobe "innocent" as he should be till "proven guilty." However, surveys show that a majority of whites already consider him guilty.(5) A majority of whites believed OJ guilty while a majority of Blacks (55%) believed he should have been let off. Only one fifth of whites agreed on the OJ case.(5) Where the victim was Black, it made no difference. In the Mike Tyson case the alleged victim was Black, but 71% of Blacks believe the charge by beauty queen Desiree Washington to have been false. One third of whites did.(5) For MIM, this shows that Blacks really have to have their own nation with their own system of justice or issues of white oppression will find themselves mixed in.

In this, we want to be clear that we do not know what happened with OJ, and unlike the rest of the media, we don't claim to have been there for the blood or even the trial depositions, but legally speaking, the Black position is correct. If the details on Mark Fuhrman,(6) the glove, the position of the Bronco etc. did not prove "reasonable doubt," then nothing could ever prove "reasonable doubt." As a result of the OJ case, Los Angeles had to redo countless cases based on fuck-ups like Fuhrerman. OJ Simpson was totally vindicated for that reason alone: his actions brought justice in countless other Los Angeles cases re-examined after OJ Simpson's investigations paid for with his fortune. Whites may not like the system regarding "reasonable doubt," but then they should attack the whole judicial system, not just the OJ case. We at MIM believe almost any other society's system regarding the causation and handling of crime is superior in a statistical sense.

MIM will spell something out in Black on white crime that most people will not. As of a precise 1983 government survey, 63.3% of the time that a Black man finds himself accused of rape, he is accused by a white womyn. People who will read MIM Theory 2/3 thoroughly will know how we know that that is a key proof that contrary to Catharine MacKinnon, wimmin are not innocent products of our racist society. We also get into all the bullshit about wimmin never lying and rape being "underreported." And anyway what exactly does it mean to be an "honest" KKK member or voter for David Duke as most whites in Louisiana were for example? Obviously it's completely possible to be "honest with oneself" and create a totally bullshit racist result as happens in the criminal injustice system every day.

Trying to find someone to be on the jury who has not heard of the case will lead to old white wimmin in the remote countryside of Colorado who pay no attention to sports or the media. This will have the same effect of not giving Kobe Bryant his legally mandated "trial by peers." As MIM has said before, whites as a nation are not ready to handle Blacks in the criminal justice system as a nation, and that will be true for some time into the future of the dictatorship of the proletariat of the oppressed nations over Amerikkka.

Another aspect of nation in this case, is that the population of the West (as in Europe and Amerika) needs to recognize that this particular situation of rape is only possible in Western culture. In East Asia there would be hotel hallway monitors who would not allow a young womyn, especially a hotel employee (off duty or not) onto the floors. (This is the case even in some Western hotels!) The hotel monitors in East Asian hotels are "a drag" in many ways, but we see that in cases like this, much small annoyance pays off by making the Kobe case impossible. It also goes without saying that this kind of thing would have no meaning in Islamic and other cultures, which would presume a prostitution relationship, and this would be known to both the womyn and the man in advance.

We have to agree with one Muslim on a Pakistan Internet discussion group: "You see, in an Islamic state, ridiculous cases like Mike Tyson's are never possible. Islam attacks the problem at the 'root'. Isn't it ridiculous to spend millions of taxpayer money to decide whether Ms. whatever at 2:00 pm [a.m.] at night, alone in Mike Tyson's room, giggling and laughing throughout the evening in flimsy pageant bikanis [sic.] 'intended' to have sex or not!!!!!!!!!!"(6) It is indeed completely irrational to judge the credibility of one of two people in an incident with no witnesses. Because Amerikkkans settled land with their own individual farms stolen from the indigenous people, they have these irrational ideas about how far to push individualism. It's so important that what we call "settler" Amerikkkans even think they can do a good job on cases like this and do not put any effort into getting out of having to judge such situations! On this point Islam has the advantage by making matters clear in an objective fashion before such incidents can happen--no need for individual determinations of fact.

In the West we like to think we are superior to East Asia or Islam with their confining roles. We want to think wimmin can go anywhere and do anything without social restrictions. However, if we believe some of the media rumors, Kobe confined his victim in the hotel by blocking the door.(8) Hence, this would seem to be one of many cases where the West lacks accuracy in its idea of actually existing freedom. Wishing something so does not make it so. If we go the other way and assume the alleged victim has a poor sense of right and wrong and Kobe is blameless, it still remains that Kobe's freedom is thus destroyed. Whatever the details in the rape case, either way someone's freedom has been trampled in a way that would not happen in other capitalist or semi-feudal countries.

Conclusion

There are particular issues of the Kobe Bryant case and there are matters that the whole society needs to consider. For MIM the bottom line is that the society has failed no matter how we look at this case. A false sense of "freedom" has caused either someone to suffer a terrible slander or a worse-than-usual rape. (MIM's position is that all sex is rape until the broader context of coercion between genders is completely eliminated.) In the short run, the society should either adopt a system of consent forms required for sex or it should bring in some social separation of the sexes in such a way that if a womyn shows up at a hotel room she does not expect that she can prevail in a rape case later. True, as a result, some wimmin will stop showing up at hotel rooms and we sacrifice the freedom of wimmin going to men's hotel rooms, as in the Mike Tyson case where rumor has it that the alleged victim showed up at Tyson's room at 2a.m. in pajamas and then expected to be a credible witness afterwards (and succeeded!). However, losing the freedom to go to men's hotel rooms is a small price to pay given the alternatives which are a portion of slander in some cases, a portion of rapes unconvicted in others and a situation debasing the court system where one persyn is deemed to have such a higher social station than another that she can accuse someone and make it stick beyond "a reasonable doubt" strictly on her word. That is not to mention that in the best of all situations where the system does happen to convict the right man who slashed a womyn in a brutal attack, the fact is that the attack still happened thanks to a premature notion of "freedom." Only after communism has turned people into angels by removing the causes of social violence, by among other things putting pornography in its place, only then will there be a real freedom for people to visit among each other the way they should be able to, and only then will Islam and other various conservative cultures putting some confinements on us with gender roles be completely redundant.