[Poll] Justice and Sexual Violence

Discussion in 'General Chat' started by lychee, Sep 12, 2019.

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Which Oracle orb would you prefer that the World Government take?

  1. Orb A: 100% sensitive 60% specific

    1 vote(s)
    1.2%
  2. Orb B: 95% sensitive 65% specific

    2 vote(s)
    2.3%
  3. Orb C: 90% sensitive 70% specific

    2 vote(s)
    2.3%
  4. Orb D: 80% sensitive 80% specific

    2 vote(s)
    2.3%
  5. Orb E: 70% sensitive 90% specific

    6 vote(s)
    7.0%
  6. Orb D: 65% sensitive 95% specific

    2 vote(s)
    2.3%
  7. Orb F: 60% sensitive 100% specific

    28 vote(s)
    32.6%
  8. I like our current justice system better

    3 vote(s)
    3.5%
  9. I don't like our current justice system, but these magic orbs aren't the answer

    35 vote(s)
    40.7%
  10. No opinion

    5 vote(s)
    5.8%
  1. pentadrian

    pentadrian Wandering donut

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    Aw shit, we Minority Report boys
     
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  2. Traveling Chef

    Traveling Chef ⁽ʕ•̀ω•́ʔ╯.+:。Professional Unichef~

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    so it's not that you want "the concept of rape to be abolished" you want the definition to a court of law to be changed? am I understanding you right?
    if I am right and that's what you mean then I agree, It could make cases of rape easier to settle.

    going by your words alone "the concept of rape to be abolished" I too would love for humanity as a whole to decide to abolish rape. if 100% of all people all over agree "rape is bad and we shouldn't be doing it or letting anyone do it" and they abolish it. then, huzzah!
     
  3. SummerForest

    SummerForest Well-Known Member

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    Yes, you understand me right XD

    The concept still remains the same. I'd really want women to take rape as an extreme sort of violence against them and not as a personal stigma, but it seems they will really need a change of heart for that.

    Women being treated as an 'object' of sexual desire is a very sensitive and debatable issue and I don't have the heart to engage in it.

    But the legal definition of rape should change so that it's easier for victims to get justice.
     
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  4. Traveling Chef

    Traveling Chef ⁽ʕ•̀ω•́ʔ╯.+:。Professional Unichef~

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    yeah, the biggest issue with the whole thing is that, regardless of gender, victims of rape, somehow feel it's thier fault. and any person with a brain could tell you it's not thier fault, they may even agree on the outside. but deep down a part of them will always feel it is.

    one thing to come out of a post with a bunch of people arguing about hypotheticals worlds is, we all recognize rape in any way, shape, or form is wrong. if only we could pass these ideas onto the world~

    also I realize that ultimately we have gone slightly offtopic from the OP
     
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  5. Zomula

    Zomula Well-Known Member

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    Sounds to me that the orbs would be pretty useless and possibly even dangerous to use as an absolute judge then. Even Orb F can't do what it says it does and could easily send an innocent person of a said crime to jail for a previous uncharged crime.

    There are so many problems that I can see with these orbs that it would be stupid and dangerous to use them. I have changed my answer since initially orb F sounded like the best option but now I see it as even more dangerous than orb A for condemning innocents.
     
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  6. xTachibana

    xTachibana Wincest King

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    Personally, I would rather see a hundred false negatives than a single false positive. No innocent person deserves to have their life ruined by a rape allegation, whether it was unintentional (the person who got raped didn't get the right person) or maliciously.

    On the note of false rape accusations, if we could tell with certainty that the "victim" is in fact lying, and they were never assaulted at all, can we please have a 25 to life cell for them? And while we're at it, please expand the definition of rape in regards to men? At least in the US iirc, men can only be "raped" if you shove something in one of their holes without their consent. But to the average person, if a woman decided to drug you, and then has sex with your unconscious body, you would think that is rape, but apparently not. I doubt that's going to change the issue of men under reporting rape and violence against them, but that's unfortunately a societal issue that I don't think will ever be solved.
     
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  7. Jojo775

    Jojo775 Honorary Algae Knight

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    I'd judge by character, if someone is a douchebag lock him up just for that, it's most probable he did rape too.
     
  8. lychee

    lychee [- slightly morbid fruit -] ❀[ 恋爱? ]❀

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    I really don't know how I feel about this, Summer!

    I've always learned about rape as "forced to have non-consensual sex", which certainly sounds like a black-and-white thing, but is in fact a really really gray thing. I don't know if I'm over-stepping my boundaries here, but I want to venture to say that the majority of adult women who have been through enough relationships have experienced a situation where they were pressured to have sex when they didn't want it -- yet their bedroom partner still initiated it with them anyways (or some variation on this theme).

    I don't really want to get too graphic, but often there might be a weak protest of "Not today... Wait... Stop... Stop... STOP!" while stuff is happening before the party on top finally gets the idea that whatever they're doing is seriously unwanted. But at that point already, maybe it's already halfway happening, or some variation on that idea. If you're unlucky, perhaps your partner is the type to keep going in the heat of the moment because they find resistance to be erotic or whatever.

    Men are sometimes beholden to the very distressing myth that if the female body responds, then she must 100% want it -- but actually that couldn't be further from the case and is a serious problem with popular culture (and hentai >.<). Just like morning wood is reflexive biology for men, there are physiologic responses for women that can occur regardless of how she actually feels or is thinking. Despite this, a lot of women can come out of a horrible rape situation feeling a lot of shame and humiliation because they don't understand why or how they were wet for it, or something.

    The result, more of than not, is an awkward conversation where one party is really really upset and the other party is apologetic with the famous explanation that they thought "No means yes!".

    The deeply complicated part to me, personally, is that to me this doesn't feel like an "extreme form of violence" because the setting occurred with (A) someone I love (B) in an intimate setting, (C) due to a lapse in judgement/miscommunication on behalf of the perpetrator, even though the technical act of "rape" (utilizing the dictionary definition: penetrative non-consensual sexual intercourse) has objectively occurred.

    From my hearsay, this is the most common type of "rape" that occurs on college campuses in the United States.

    And it is a deeply confusing and distressing and disconcerting situation to find yourself in because you desperately want to like this person, even though the situation poses an enormous affront on the degree of trust that you have in the other party. Just because they are your boyfriend or ex-boyfriend or classmate or friend doesn't change the fact of how shitty and miserable the act makes you feel to the degree that it crushes your self-worth.

    And it's true that the situation is ambiguous. Maybe the previous night you sat with the classmate you've always liked on the steps in front of the university library and looked at the stars while chatting, so maybe something happened that gave him the wrong idea. Or maybe there was alcohol involved.

    Maybe it was just a one time thing, and he says it was a mistake.

    The situation absolutely is not black and white.

    And... well... to speak honestly it's not the type of situation I would want to go to the police for. When it happens with a friend, I wouldn't want to see things explode publicly over this, or something horrible to happen to the person you've always liked. A lot of us wouldn't want that, particularly when the circumstances are semi-intimate in nature.

    I've heard it's actually quite common to hear on rape-crisis hotlines the question: "This won't get reported to the police if I'm calling here, right? Please don't report this. But I really need to talk to somebody."

    Some women are very tolerant about these kinds of things. People wonder how it is that women manage to stay in abusive relationships with wife-beaters or some variation of that, but honestly the feelings are very complicated.

    Only a minority of cases of rape occur with a pure stranger. An overwhelming majority occur with an intimate partners, relatives (yes this happens!! In fact, for juvenile cases it's 34%!), friends, or acquaintances.
     
    Last edited: Sep 12, 2019
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  9. lychee

    lychee [- slightly morbid fruit -] ❀[ 恋爱? ]❀

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    The other thing about these kinds of circumstances is that it’s impossible to talk about, from the perspective of the victim.

    You can’t tell your mom, best friend, or anybody — because sharing your feelings turns into gossip which then turns into a rumor and accusation.

    You’re actually kind of an idiot if you bring up this topic in your community. Unless you’re prepared to lay an accusation and seek those consequences (why even???), the only result to this kind of situation is that you fracture your community. All of the guy’s friends will side with the guy and all of the girl’s will side with the girl. Loyalties split along those divisions regardless of the truth of the matter, particularly in the absence of objective facts.

    In 100% of rape accusation incidents, I can assure you that there will always be people who will call the girl a liar or bitch or a slut or some variation on that theme.

    Drama like this inevitably damages both parties involved, and frankly gives headaches for everyone.

    A lot of people seem attracted to the idea of an evil woman who is out to destroy the reputation of her male acquaintance — but seriously — why even???

    What does the woman even gain from this?

    Nothing???????

    It’s not like a legal case where there’s money at stake. Why the heck does it make sense to sacrifice your own reputation to take down somebody else unless you’re stupidly spiteful??

    I mean, I understand that in non-western countries, there is the cultural norm that premarital sex is bad, and parents will encourage their daughters to claim rape rather than be seen as someone who had freely had consensual sex.

    That’s seriously messed up.

    I’ve never seen this kind of argument pushed in Western countries.

    Rather, from my understanding, here the status quo is the opposite. If you were raped, you never talk about it with anybody. You hold it deep inside your heart and you smile on the outside in your community pretending that it never occurred.

    It’s partially the reason why I had such a negative reaction to when I thought Summer and others were defining rape exclusively through the lens of law.

    It’s almost like implying it never happened.

    But regardless of how the government chooses to legally define rape, the dictionary definition still exists in everyone’s mind and 10/10 people you ask can give you a discrete definition of what rape is: coerced non-consexual sex.

    It happened, and a lot of people carry trauma buried deep inside them, and can include PTSD or whatever.

    But there’s also no way to talk about it.

    And lot’s of us don’t even care about justice for something that happened five or ten years ago with a person you’ll never see again.

    But the residual effects last a long time, and it can sit on a person’s thoughts for years.

    And honestly sometimes comments can rub me the wrong way when people imply that it didn’t happen, or didn’t exist, or that maybe the victim fabricated everything.

    To me, I’m bothered by the fact that guilt or innocence is up for debate. To me, an objective reality exists and something happened.

    A third party may not know what the truth is, but even the speculation itself can be hurtful. When something a private as an occurrence that happened between two people explodes and becomes the subject of everyone’s gossip and finger pointing...

    I don’t really know, it just makes my head hurt.
     
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  10. SummerForest

    SummerForest Well-Known Member

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    @lychee when I started to talk in your thread I predominantly focused to the cases of rape where it is a criminal offence, not such ambiguous cases such as marital rape and date rape.
    I sticked to cases where it is really a case of utter physical violence against the victim.
    The point of medical evidence of rape is whether the internal parts bear the testimony of forceful penetration or not.
    If the victim gets 'wet' then the case of rape is almost impossible to make unless it is a case of abduction and there are eye witnesses or video recordings of it available.
    This is a paradox in legal cases of rape. The victim's body inevitably produces lubricants in order to be not hurt and the law uses it against her!
    Non-consensual sex among partners can't be called rape imo.
     
  11. Traveling Chef

    Traveling Chef ⁽ʕ•̀ω•́ʔ╯.+:。Professional Unichef~

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    a whole lot to unpack there and I am confident I couldn't give any satisfactory answers. all I can say is, objectively everything is subjective and that's why reality can suck.

    I would like to point out that a lot of what you say is directed towards one sex but rape, or any kind, can and does happen(with similar frequency) to both male and female. the difference being that nearly no rapes involving a male victim are reported whereas it's a much smaller percentage of female rape victims go unreported(I couldn't give concrete numbers cuss...I'll be honest I don't feel like doing a ton of research for a forum thread, no offense)

    what people of all gender have to take into account when they are having sex (even if it might kill the mood) is No means no. even if it's a small no and could be misconstrued as "a sexy yes" if your partner says no then you stop. this is why it's imperative in BDSM and other aggressive fetishes to have an agreed-upon safe word beforehand and to always allow your partner the ability to use the safe word. so they can scream "NO!" all they want for the sake of roleplay or for their kink and you would continue doing to them what they desire. the second that safe word is uttered though, all action ceases, to continue past that safe word destroys and trust developed with your partner.

    having a safe word or action (such as tapping or something similar) is important to define "what means No and when" even in a "nonaggressive" sexual relationship it would be easier to discuss beforehand with your partner about a safe word. that way, going in, you both know that "No" means "yes, continue" but "Banana's foster"(or something similar that you wouldn't shout on accident but must use with intent" means "No Stop". if properly discussed beforehand with your partner you'll never have an issue, after all proper relationships are built on communication and trust.

    Legally it might not be called rape. if a husband or wife insists "NO!" and thier parnter continues it is still sex against thier wills and therefore rape imo.



    everyone, this has been an incredibly depressing topic of discussion so for your mental health I recomend some light reading to heal the soul https://mangadex.org/title/23279/wonder-cat-kyuu-chan
     
    Last edited: Sep 12, 2019
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  12. Arcturus

    Arcturus Cat, Hidden Sith Lord

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    Honestly, part of the reason that rape and sexual harassment is so sensitive is because of the stigma and importance our cultures attach to sex. These heighten and worsen what occurs. It's probably most correct to say that our cultures' current perceptions and treatment of sex is relatively unhealthy.

    Of course the power dynamics in our society and the glorification of power and control is inherently problematic. But, the way we handle sexual matters causes rape and sexual stigma to be exacerbated in how it is perceived and dealt with.
     
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  13. lychee

    lychee [- slightly morbid fruit -] ❀[ 恋爱? ]❀

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    Well, even then it depends on what country you are coming from.

    If you check the Wikipedia article on marital rape, it is criminal offense in a list of countries and it isn’t in a different subset of countries.

    That said, although it is a criminal offense in a large number of countries, practically speaking in many countries it may not be enforced.

    Furthermore, just because something is codefied or defined in the law does not imply that the case is easy for a prosecutor to make.

    Um, I’ll take that as a personal opinion.

    Linguistically in English, and as defined in the legal systems of many western countries, non-consensual (penetrative) sex is broadly considered rape, even among intimate partners.

    EDIT: Proving that an interaction was non-consensual is legally speaking very hard. That said, like I’ve been saying from the beginning, it’s my view that a crime is still a crime regardless of whether a charge is formally pressed or evidence exists in court.
     
    Last edited: Sep 12, 2019
  14. SummerForest

    SummerForest Well-Known Member

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    It makes me think of Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment.

    I think in your first post in this thread this philosophical view was not so apparent? It came out later after my post.

    The definition of crime may not be the same in every part of the world. It varies from culture to culture.

    Marital rape is a highly debatable issue. But I, personally, can never call it crime. It may be unacceptable and may be the reason of ending a marriage, but it'll be a bigotry to send a man to prison for having sex with his married wife. Staying in a marriage is in itself giving consent to have sex. Ending a marriage is predominantly equivalent to taking back this consent.

    From the opposite point of view, it has been debated if not having sex with one's married wife for a long period of time tantamounts to the act of cruelty and can be taken as a reason to end the marriage. What will you say about it?

    Irrespective of the popular romantic concepts, a marriage is primarily about the mutual consent to have sex and obtaining the social sanctity for it, so that the spouse and the offsprings produced from such consensual sex can be called the legal heirs of a person. Even in Western countries, where live-in is socially acceptable, people do get married and the institution of marriage hasn't really been abolished.

    But these are all my own opinions and please don't take them personally.
     
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  15. lychee

    lychee [- slightly morbid fruit -] ❀[ 恋爱? ]❀

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    I can understand where you're coming from and I respect your views!

    Many of these norms are socially and culturally defined, so it's not surprising there are differences.

    One difference that immediately pops to mind is the modern attitude of Western countries to "child abuse". As the child of an immigrant family from China, I've lived in both settings where it's normal for a teacher (or parent) to take a stick to hit children who are misbehaving. In some cultures, it is so normalized that people believe that parents have a right to discipline their children through quasi-violent means.

    However, currently in the United States, these sorts of behaviors are severely frowned upon and furthermore criminalized.

    Healthcare workers (e.g. pediatricians, doctors, therapists, psychologists, teachers) are mandated by law to report to the government any suspected cases of child abuse (objectively defined as evidence of physical injuries on a child inflicted by a parent or caretaker). A pediatrician who neglects to do this is considered to be performing malpractice -- so it's taken extremely seriously in the medical field.

    US laws surrounding child abuse are more intense than most other controversial topics.

    For instance, we do not have mandated reporting for domestic violence, rape, or even other mild criminal activity. The healthcare worker-patient confidentiality relationship covers many things but child abuse in particular is not confidential. Some states have mandated reporting for elder abuse too.

    Hmm, I feel like most millennial Americans would disagree with this view about marriage. It feels a bit dated.

    While the institution of marriage hasn't been "abolished" per say, its significance as an institution with a dedicated purpose has declined drastically in the past few decades.

    What I mean by this is that (A) couples are increasingly choosing to go without children.

    (B) Premarital sex is broadly accepted and overwhelmingly normalized in modern American culture, to the point I would argue that marriage isn't required for the "social sanctity" of sex anymore in American culture unless you come from a religious family.

    [​IMG]

    Interestingly, there's a huge gap between Western countries and Non-Western countries on the attitudes towards premarital sex:

    [​IMG]

    In either case for me personally, my instinctive reaction is that marriage does not inherently give a blank check with regards to having sex. Most Americans will have sex whether they are in a marital relationship or not, and it's becoming increasingly accepted for people to talk and negotiate their boundaries on a casual basis.

    Or specifically the converse, I don't believe that marriage obligates parties to engage in sex.

    I think my views are heavily influenced by liberal millennial perspectives on sexuality -- and a broad openness to non-conventional relationships. Whether it is with broad acceptance for homosexual marriages (where sexual intimacy can be defined/approached differently, and does not necessarily have to contain penetrative sex -- as in lesbian and gay couples can have perfectly satisfying sexual relationships without phallus penetration), and recognition/embracement of asexual individuals who have romantic/intimate desires but just not much of a sex drive (and that's okay!).

    Basically I wouldn't blink twice if somebody told me that they and their partner negotiated to have a sexless marriage and that they're still perfectly happy with it because they want to have an intimate union for other reasons.

    And I also wouldn't blink twice if somebody said they're polyamorous in an open marriage and they're regularly sleeping with other people.

    Neither of these things are particularly that weird, at least in my eyes.

    Will, I think my personal position is fairly clear based on what I've written.

    Actually, when I was doing research writing this post, I was really surprised to find that some Western countries have laws where marriage can be annulled if consummation does not occur. For instance, this is the case in England (for heterosexual marriages only), although in Australia has abolished the legal concept of consummation.

    Most US states do not have a legal concept of consummation, although a small handful do.

    I would not be surprised if the legal concept of consummation disappears over the next decades to centuries in most Western countries. It feels a bit antiquated and I didn't even realize there were still laws about it.
     
  16. SummerForest

    SummerForest Well-Known Member

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    Very well written, I must say.
    I understand your view points and I respect them, too.
    See the difference among cultures? XD
    You know me and you know I'm a rather liberal person, but the views expressed here are my general views about the society I come from.
    Even then, people of my State are much liberal.
    In my country having a marriage consummated is a pre requisite by law.
    Millennial Indians do have sex (not all of them) even before they reach the age of consent. The current debate is about lowering the age of consent to protect the teens from being tried for juvenile rape.
     
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  17. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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  18. Ddraig

    Ddraig Frostfire Dragon|Retired lurker|FFF|Loved by RNG

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    While it may or may not exist, Problem is you, confined to a limited perspective, would never experience or know objective reality, it shall always be an subjective version of it.
     
  19. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    People claim objectivity until they are victims or 1 degree removed from the victim when it happens to a loved one.
    Humans are beautiful hypocrites. :blobowoevil:
     
  20. lychee

    lychee [- slightly morbid fruit -] ❀[ 恋爱? ]❀

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    There are certain things in reality that are objectively complementary in nature. Observing one necessitates the complement to be true even if it’s not directly observed.

    The human killed the cat with a knife.

    The cat was killed by the human with a knife.

    Complementarity is a foundational principle of quantum mechanics, and these kinds of paired information are incredibly robust in reality because it is impossible for the information to be unpaired.

    [​IMG]

    There are certain things that it makes no sense to claim subjective reality for — other than for academic philosophical musings.

    + + +

    The other thing is that when something is defined subjectively, there are a few objective logical conclusions that can be certainly be reached.

    For instance, if rape is simplistically defined as non-consensual sex, which for that matter is a subjective definition since consent is a subjective concept...

    If either party (Observer A and Observer B) subjectively and genuinely believes they had a non-consensual sex at the time of the event, then the objective criteria for this shallow definition of rape is fulfilled.

    It is impossible for an outsider observer (Observer C) to determine the objective truth of whether non-consensual sex occurred, as it is impossible for Observer C to know with complete certainty if either Observers A/B are lying about whether the incident was (non-)consensual.

    Incidentally, it is impossible for Observer A to know with complete certainty if Observer B truly thought the encounter was (non-)consensual or not.

    Consequently, it is impossible for Observer A to objectively know whether consensual sex occurred from his/her perspective alone. This is because to reach the objective conclusion that the encounter was consensual, knowledge of the perspectives of both parties is required.

    However, if Observer A subjectively experiences the encounter as non-consensual, then irregardless of how Observer B experienced it, it is possible for for Observer A to objectively conclude that non-consensual sex occurred.

    Maybe this sounds trivial, but basically I’m saying that only the victim knows with any certainty how they themselves felt at the time of the event.

    No judge or jury is capable of ascertaining the objective reality. They can try their best to use outside evidence to evaluate whether the accused crime did occur, and they may or may not arrive at the correct conclusion.

    However, there is only one person in the entire room who knows the objective reality of whether non-consensual sex occurred.

    EDIT: Basically what I’m getting at is that statements like: “She didn’t want to do it, but it’s okay because she liked it.” are inherently problematic.
     
    Last edited: Sep 13, 2019
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