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Tyler O'Neil, assistant editor at PJ Media, titles in an article from 2017-04-21:

German Judge Says Turkish Man's Forced Violent Sex Is 'Culturally' Not Rape

The article goes into lot of details, the girl could not run properly for two weeks.

I can't believe cultural relativism would go that far. Seems to me like a fake news.

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1 Answers1

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No. The official press release makes it clear that the Turkish origin of the accused was not relevant to the decision.

The source for this claim is generally this Märkische Allgemeine article. It claims that the victim mentioned the Turkish origin of the accused, but it makes no claim regarding the judge. The important part from the article:

[D]ie entscheidende Frage für den Ausgang des Strafprozesses war an die Zeugin, das Opfer, gerichtet: „Könnte es sein, dass der Angeklagte dachte, Sie seien einverstanden?“ Das könnte sein, ließ die Zeugin das Gericht wissen. Sie könne nicht beurteilen, ob er mit der Mentalität des türkischen Kulturkreises das Geschehen, das sie als Vergewaltigung erlebte, vielleicht für wilden Sex gehalten hat.

my translation: The important question for the result of the trial was given to the victim: "Could it be, that the accused thought that you consented?". The victim said that this could be. She could not evaluate whether the accused - with the mentality of the Turkish culture - mistook the event - which she perceived as rape - for rough sex.

Another article by Vice quotes a press secretary:

Die Pressesprecherin erklärt gegenüber VICE: "Die Geschädigte hat leider nicht deutlich genug Nein gesagt." Das habe sie selbst so geäußert. Man müsse auch berücksichtigen, dass Drogen konsumiert wurden – und die anfängliche Ablehnung des Opfers vielleicht doch umschlug und das Geschehen vom Angeklagten dann irrtümlich als einvernehmlicher Sex wahrgenommen wurde.

my translation: The press secretary said to VICE: "The victim did not say no clearly enough." The victim herself has said so. According to the press secretary, it should also be considered that drugs were taken, and that the initial rejection of the victim could have changed, so that the accused might have incorrectly assumed consent.

The official press release can be seen here. It specifically says that the Turkish background of the accused was not relevant for their decision, and that the court only followed the request of the prosecution which did not want to convict the accused:

Nach Würdigung der erhobenen Beweise ist das Gericht im Ergebnis der Beweisaufnahme zu der Auffassung gelangt, dass dem Angeklagten nicht nachgewiesen werden kann, dass er vorsätzlich handelte . Dabei hat die wiederholte Aussage der Geschädigten, sie könne nicht ausschließen, dass der Angeklagte von einem einvernehmlichen Geschehen ausgegangen sei, eine tragende Rolle gespielt. Für das Gericht nicht erheblich war hingegen der Umstand, dass der Angeklagte türkischer Herkunft ist.
Das Gericht ist dem Antrag der Staatsanwaltschaft gefolgt und hat auf Freispruch erkannt.

my translation:In light of the evidence, the court reached the conclusion that the accused did not act with intent. The repeated statement by the victim that she could not rule out that the accused assumed consent played a major role in this decision. The Turkish origin of the accused was not relevant for the court. The court followed the request of the prosecution for acquittal.

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tim
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    A quote you include specifically states that the "turkish culture" was the main reason for the victim's statements. Which is specifically mentioned as the main reason for the ruling. So, is that not proof that being Turkish was specifically what got him off? – Jonathon May 21 '17 at 19:21
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    @JonathonWisnoski I included that quote to show that the claim didn't even represent the MA article correctly. What got him off was that the German law requires intent (feel free do disagree with this, but that is how it currently works), but because of repeated statements made by the victim, intent could not be shown. The background of the accused is irrelevant to this, and no judge said that rape by a Turkish man is culturally not rape. The official press release specifically says that the Turkish background was not relevant to the decision. – tim May 21 '17 at 19:30
  • I am not sure I understand @tim. Are you saying that the victim never stated or implied anything like: "She could not evaluate whether the accused - with the mentality of the turkish culture - mistook the event - which she perceived as rape - for rough sex" That that part was madeup? – Jonathon May 21 '17 at 19:33
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    @JonathonWisnoski I'm saying that it's not relevant. The claim in question is clearly false either way, and the official press release specifically says that the Turkish origin was not relevant for the court. – tim May 21 '17 at 19:36
  • I am not understanding at all then, sorry. Perhaps, I could use an analogy to explain my confusion with your thought process. So say some black man is accused of murder and there is a court case. The court hears testimony from the father who states that "all black men are thugs and murderers". The court finds the accused guilty, and in a press release states: "The statement by the victim's father played a major role in this decision. The ethnicity of the accused was not relevant for the court." – Jonathon May 21 '17 at 21:09
  • In both cases we have all parties agreeing that the court decision was based on testimony that not only took the culture/ethnicity/or origin into consideration, but in which it was the entire argument. "he is possibly not guilty because he is from Turkey" -> "We consider this statement proof that he is not guilty, but we personally did not consider his origin in our ruling." – Jonathon May 21 '17 at 21:12
  • Who or what produced the official press release? Should we take it at face value? – Andrew Grimm May 21 '17 at 21:18
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    @JonathonWisnoski I'm not sure what is confusing. The claim is "A judge said that this rape was not rape because of the culture of the accused". But the given source does not claim this, and further sources confirm that this is not the case. What actually happened is that the court could not determin intent, but determination of intent is required for conviction. Missing intent is based on statements by the victim. It does seem that the victim determined this at least partly based on the origin of the accused - at least according to the MAZ (seemingly the only source for this). – tim May 21 '17 at 21:35
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    @AndrewGrimm The press release is from the court (AG Brandenburg). I see no reason not to take it at face value, and there will be no better sources before the full written verdict will be done (according to the press release it does not exist yet; it may also never be part of public record). – tim May 21 '17 at 21:39
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    @tim if a court had taken the accused's ethnicity into account, would you be confident that the press release would have acknowledged that? – Andrew Grimm May 21 '17 at 22:41
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    @AndrewGrimm, since now you are accusing a German court of lying about their motives I think the burden of proof now falls on you. Besides, what is the point of this site when we can simply say "I refuse to believe in primary sources that do not confirm my bias" ? –  May 22 '17 at 04:45
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    @AndrewGrimm Maybe, and maybe not. But here, the court specifically said that it did not take it into account and there would need to be good reasons to think that a court is explicitly lying. Additionally, the German MAZ and VICE article do not contradict what the press release says. The English PJ Media article misunderstood or purposefully misrepresents the MAZ article - which it uses as its only source -, so I see no reason to believe it over the official press release. – tim May 22 '17 at 07:11
  • @JonathonWisnoski : The statement "all black men are thugs and murderers" doesn't imply that black men who do murder don't know that they engage in murder. Imagine that the black man is accused of murder after cooking a pufferfish and then the person who eats it dies. Then a person who knows the black man says: "People like him don't know that you have to prefer a pufferfish in a specific way, so he might not have wanted to kill the person who ate the fish." The opinion of the father of a murdered person is also not comparable to that of a woman who has a first person account of being raped. – Christian May 22 '17 at 10:21
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    Can you include in your answer that the press release says that the prosecutor asked for the accused to go free? To me, that seems important information. – Christian May 22 '17 at 10:26
  • @Christian thanks, that does seem relevant, I added it. – tim May 22 '17 at 10:34
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    It also seems relevant to me that [German laws about rape are a little... unusual by Anglo-Saxon standards](https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/32202/did-germany-until-recently-require-rape-victims-to-physically-resist-their-attac) – Avery May 22 '17 at 12:49
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    @Avery Yes, it's definitely somewhat relevant (although in this case, there seems to be little doubt that the victim physically resisted at some point, at least at the beginning). The fact that afaik the rape happened before the reform of the law likely complicates matters even more. Personally, the verdict shocked me and I think that it is unjust, but I wanted to stick to the basic facts in disputing the claim and not complicate matters too much. There are definitely topics about this though that would deserve an in-depth look, maybe via a question at law.SE. – tim May 22 '17 at 13:04
  • while I know it's not relevant to the question, I would be quite interested in why the accused was deemed to believe consent had been provided. At least one quote refers to the victim "not saying no clearly enough", did the defendant say no at all? What made their no not clear enough? I could understand if the law didn't specifically require a yes (affirmative consent) to be considered rape, but how was a no expressed that wasn't sufficient? If the article linked by the OP is accurately describing the encounter it seems a pretty blatant no. – dsollen May 24 '17 at 16:57
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    @dsollen Because the victim said that the accused may have believed that. Regarding the quote, I left out the next sentense from the article as it wasn't that relevant, but it might provide some more information for you (it suggests that there was an initial no (in addition to the physical resistance), but that during the actual rape, the victim may not have continued to resist). I don't think it's that relevant though, as the initial no should be more than enough according to the law; it's really about not being able to prove intent here. – tim May 24 '17 at 17:11
  • tim, your quote clearly shows that under German law Turks can not, because of their cultural background, be held responsible for rape. Yet you claim he was not let off because he is a Turk. How do you explain that? – jwenting May 29 '17 at 08:24
  • @jwenting There is nothing to explain, as the quotes show no such thing. It will also be trivial to disprove your claim, as there obviously are people of Turkish origin which were convicted of rape. My guess is that your personal bias let you to misunderstand the quotes. – tim May 29 '17 at 12:08