The Most Sexist Comments By Judges In 2017 Are Shocking

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Publish Date:
November 7, 2017
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Bustle
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Summary

The courtroom is supposed to be a bastion of fairness, justice, and rule of the law. However, even in court there have been displays of misogyny in the form of sexist comments from judges, which illustrate just how pervasive and problematic discrimination against women still is around the world, even in 2017.

Unfortunately, judges in the U.S. and other countries have been making sexist comments — and putting forth sexist rulings — for many years. For example, in 2016 Canadian judge Robin Camp asked a sexual assault survivor why she couldn’t “just keep her knees together” to “prevent” the alleged assault. The judge also pointedly asked the victim — who was alleged assaulted over a bathroom sink — why she didn’t do more to thwart the alleged attack, saying, “Why didn’t you just sink your bottom down into the basin so he couldn’t penetrate you?” Camp ended up acquitting the individual accused.

Many condemned the court’s decision as detrimental to pay equity. Deborah Rhode, a professor of gender equity law at Stanford Law School, told the Los Angeles Times, “This decision is a step in the wrong direction if we’re trying to really ensure that women have work opportunities of equal pay … You can’t allow prior discriminatory salary setting to justify future ones or you perpetuate the discrimination.”

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