b) Your examples are offensive, and I don't appreciate people who carelessly use the word "rape" like that. You might think it's OK in some twisted way, but it's probably worse than calling random things "gay" even though they have nothing to do with homosexuality.
I never said it was OK - I simply asked how does anyone know which definition an algorithm selected and does it matter? I thought you gave an insightful answer noting intent matters, but in this case you feel it does not because either use is offensive.
I did give the examples of how I have heard rape used in non-sexual contexts, and I am sorry if you were offended - but more importantly it is you who personally gets offensive by saying I am OK with that usage in some "twisted way". Did I ever say I was OK with it? No. In fact I go out of my way to explain that is how I have heard it used, but that is not enough you go on to say my being OK with using the word rape in a non-sexual context (which I don't) is worse than some form of homophobia where one calls things "gay".
Please do not make up behvior I do NOT engage in and then compare it to other forms of behavior I do not engage in.
Finally, you may have unknowingly brought up real insight to who you are, because even if I or others were to call something "gay" who is not to say it is being done using the traditional definition of gay meaning "happy or joyous"? Are you offended the same way when people use "gay" to describe something as "happy or joyous" having nothing to do with homosexuality, the same way you get offended when others use "rape" in a non-sexual context?
I get your point, though, but it was clearly generated by a computer, as are all the other shirts in that companies "KEEP CALM AND ______ ON" line. Most of them don't make any sense whatsoever.
The computer doesn't "mean" any particular use of the word, because it's a computer, and couldn't tell the contextual difference between "rape" and "yell" or "run".
The fault here is a poorly (or not at all) checked pool of words, and no human interaction between "generate slogan" and "submit to Amazon"
The dictionary gives 3 examples of rape in a non-sexual context. Again, know that I am not saying the t-shirt was not offensive or in bad taste generally, I certainly would never buy it or wear it if given to me (no one I know would give it to me).
At the same time, in a hypothetical where an automated Google car hit someone, would it make sense to yell and the Google car and say watch where you are going? See in this exagerated example, it becomes clear I am soliciting insight to human interaction to an automated system that did not have intent.
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rapio
EDIT: For a further stack trace, consider "enrapture", derived from "rapture", itself derived from the future form of "rapio": http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rapture .
And people say that a classical education and liberal arts is useless. :)
As for your final paragraph here, I'm pretty sure that you know perfectly well what the previous poster meant. Nobody actually confuses my grandmother happily exclaiming, "Oh, the decorations in this room are so gay!" (true story) with a seventh grader dismissively saying, "Social studies is so gay!" Discussions like this one proceed far more smoothly when everyone avoids deliberately misconstruing each other's words.
Notice how you had to qualify your hypothetical statement with "grandmother", re-read your own statement without your qualifier: "the decorations in this room are so gay!"? Still think "nobody" would confuse that?
Honestly, if you change your qualifier it only becomes more confusing what that statement means or which definition is intended:
1. What about your hypothetical seventh grader what would it mean if the seventh grader said, "the decorations in this room are so gay!"? Does it automatically become offensive unlike your grandmother saying it? What if the seventh grader was LGBT?
2. Finally, please tell me what an algorithm means when it automates the same statement, "the decorations in this room are so gay!"? Is the algorithm your grandmother or the seventh-grader?
I saw the show in 2001 and still remember how hard it was to not cringe at that word even though the context was clearly different and the show was comedy.
I am not saying that a shirt advocating more kidnapping would be appropriate, but thought you might appreciate the alternate use of the word from a historical perspective.