Rape?

[Koldo]

Why did Karla Homolka use bottles to sexually assault her victims if it was "just" violence? Who cares? Just stick the dangerous, violent criminal in a jail cell so they can't hurt anybody. What on earth is so damn confusing about that? Even if Karla Homolka was super horny, what difference does it make? She raped and murdered people. Whether or not she got off on it sexually is completely irrelevant.

We were talking about motivations behind this behaviour.
If rape is always all about violence, and nothing else, why is rape being the chosen method to manifest the violence?

 

[Alceste]

Consent or not, copulation is copulation. Semantic games aside however, rape is of course never excusable or justified, ever.

Not all sexual assault involves copulation. Quite a lot of child molestation, for example, basically amounts to heavy petting and masturbation. The sexual abuse at Abu Ghraib involved pure sexual humiliation. No copulation. The Columbus, OH rape case also did not involve copulation. The sexual assaults that are currently endemic in Egypt hardly ever involve copulation.

Getting our understanding of what constitutes a sexual assault sorted out in our own minds is not a semantic game. It's our responsibility as sexually active adults. Considering the possible consequences of getting it wrong, I'd have thought most people would be very keen to get it right.

 

[Sunstone]

I can't think of any human behavior which can be boiled down to one motivation, or any behavior that couldn't conceivably have almost any motivation. It's overly simplistic to attempt to reduce the range and scope of human behaviors in this way.

Spot on!

 

[Father Heathen]

Not all sexual assault involves copulation. Quite a lot of child molestation, for example, basically amounts to heavy petting and masturbation. The sexual abuse at Abu Ghraib involved pure sexual humiliation. No copulation. The Columbus, OH rape case also did not involve copulation. The sexual assaults that are currently endemic in Egypt hardly ever involve copulation.

Getting our understanding of what constitutes a sexual assault sorted out in our own minds is not a semantic game. It's our responsibility as sexually active adults. Considering the possible consequences of getting it wrong, I'd have thought most people would be very keen to get it right.

Well no ****.

What I'm referencing is the suggestion that rape has nothing to do with sex even if it involves copulation. If something involves arousal and even ejaculate, then yes, it's also sexual rather than purely power/violence.

 

[Debater Slayer]

The sexual assaults that are currently endemic in Egypt hardly ever involve copulation.

While I suspect that there are cases of unreported rapes or sexual assault there, I really don't see how yelling obscenities at a woman walking down the street or pinching her without her consent has anything to do with sexual desire. If someone has an explanation as to how the two may be connected, I'd honestly like to see that.

 

[Alceste]

We were talking about motivations behind this behaviour.
If rape is always all about violence, and nothing else, why is rape being the chosen method to manifest the violence?

Violent individuals manifest their violence in all kinds of ways. Take gang culture, for example. Those guys don't just objectify and sexually assault women and brag about their conquests, they also participate in every other imaginable kind of violence, including murdering children over territorial disputes. The American soldiers in Iraq who plotted and carried out the gang rape and murder of a 14 year old girl, also murdering her entire family and setting her house on fire, also spent most of their work day shooting at Iraqis or getting shot at. Psychological profiles of convicted sexual criminals illustrate that they generally express violence and aggression in all sorts of other ways in addition to sexual assault.

Perfectly healthy, non-aggressive, non-violent people don't "choose rape" no matter how horny they are. They also don't choose bullying, gay bashing, child or elder abuse, etc. Violent people who "choose rape" choose that other stuff as well.

Horny people just choose consensual sex or masturbation.

 

[Vinayaka]

Violent individuals manifest their violence in all kinds of ways. Take gang culture, for example. Those guys don't just objectify and sexually assault women and brag about their conquests, they also participate in every other imaginable kind of violence, including murdering children over territorial disputes. The American soldiers in Iraq who plotted and carried out the gang rape and murder of a 14 year old girl, also murdering her entire family and setting her house on fire, also spent most of their work day shooting at Iraqis or getting shot at. Psychological profiles of convicted sexual criminals illustrate that they generally express violence and aggression in all sorts of other ways in addition to sexual assault.

Perfectly healthy, non-aggressive, non-violent people don't "choose rape" no matter how horny they are. They also don't choose bullying, gay bashing, child or elder abuse, etc. Violent people who "choose rape" choose that other stuff as well.

Horny people just choose consensual sex or masturbation.

I admire you so much for keeping at this. You're so persistent, in a topic that obviously, from some of the responses on here, still needs a ton of work in society. Thank you for staying after it. :bow:

 

[Debater Slayer]

Well no ****.

What I'm referencing is the suggestion that rape has nothing to do with sex even if it involves copulation. If something involves arousal and even ejaculate, then yes, it's also sexual rather than purely power/violence.

I think there's a difference between saying that a sexual component might be involved and saying that the primary motivator for a rapist was sexual desire.

Wouldn't you agree that there would have to be far more issues than being "too horny" for someone to commit rape or sexual assault?

 

[Alceste]

Well no ****.

What I'm referencing is the suggestion that rape has nothing to do with sex even if it involves copulation. If something involves arousal and even ejaculate, then yes, it's also sexual rather than purely power/violence.

I think that point of view unnecessarily confuses the issue. It implies that sexually assaulting somebody with your penis is in a completely different category than sexually assaulting somebody with a finger or a beer bottle, or sexually assaulting them for the sole purpose of their own sexual humiliation.

We don't judge the severity of a sexual crime based on the emotions precise state and location of an assailant's penis at any given moment, or his reasons for putting it there. We judge it entirely based on the presence or absence of consent and gauge it's severity based on the psychological and physical impact of the assault on the victim.

The idea that the Mighty Penis is a major factor that we must always consider very carefully in order to understand the issue of sexual aggression is what I've been referring to as phallocentric reasoning. The feelings of victims of sexual assault are not caused by having unwanted contact with somebody's penis. They're caused by the fact that WHATEVER HAPPENED, they did not consent to it.

 

[Father Heathen]

Violent individuals manifest their violence in all kinds of ways. Take gang culture, for example. Those guys don't just objectify and sexually assault women and brag about their conquests, they also participate in every other imaginable kind of violence, including murdering children over territorial disputes. The American soldiers in Iraq who plotted and carried out the gang rape and murder of a 14 year old girl, also murdering her entire family and setting her house on fire, also spent most of their work day shooting at Iraqis or getting shot at. Psychological profiles of convicted sexual criminals illustrate that they generally express violence and aggression in all sorts of other ways in addition to sexual assault.

Perfectly healthy, non-aggressive, non-violent people don't "choose rape" no matter how horny they are. They also don't choose bullying, gay bashing, child or elder abuse, etc. Violent people who "choose rape" choose that other stuff as well.

Horny people just choose consensual sex or masturbation.

Agreed. To prey upon and victimize others is a sign of a deep, psychological disturbance. No mentally sound person would resort to heinous and sadistic acts just to fulfill themselves without regards to the effects and consequences. One would hope that one's humanity would prevail over their "horniness."

 

[Koldo]

Violent individuals manifest their violence in all kinds of ways. Take gang culture, for example. Those guys don't just objectify and sexually assault women and brag about their conquests, they also participate in every other imaginable kind of violence, including murdering children over territorial disputes. The American soldiers in Iraq who plotted and carried out the gang rape and murder of a 14 year old girl, also murdering her entire family and setting her house on fire, also spent most of their work day shooting at Iraqis or getting shot at. Psychological profiles of convicted sexual criminals illustrate that they generally express violence and aggression in all sorts of other ways in addition to sexual assault.

This still doesn't explain why 'rape' is being chosen at any given moment.
And it doesn't even attempt to explain all the other cases.

Perfectly healthy, non-aggressive, non-violent people don't "choose rape" no matter how horny they are. They also don't choose bullying, gay bashing, child or elder abuse, etc. Violent people who "choose rape" choose that other stuff as well.

Horny people just choose consensual sex or masturbation.

You don't need to state the obvious.

 

[Father Heathen]

I think that point of view unnecessarily confuses the issue. It implies that sexually assaulting somebody with your penis is in a completely different category than sexually assaulting somebody with a finger or a beer bottle, or sexually assaulting them for the sole purpose of their own sexual humiliation.

We don't judge the severity of a sexual crime based on the emotions precise state and location of an assailant's penis at any given moment, or his reasons for putting it there. We judge it entirely based on the presence or absence of consent and gauge it's severity based on the psychological and physical impact of the assault on the victim.

The idea that the Mighty Penis is a major factor that we must always consider very carefully in order to understand the issue of sexual aggression is what I've been referring to as phallocentric reasoning. The feelings of victims of sexual assault are not caused by having unwanted contact with somebody's penis. They're caused by the fact that WHATEVER HAPPENED, they did not consent to it.

Um... again, no ****.

You've been making a habit of inferring some pretty bizarre and wacky stuff from my posts lately.

 

[MysticSang'ha]

There's a lot of insistence on the "sex" part as relevant. And the insistence is on the assumed experience of the perpetrator.

Anyone ask how relevant the experience is for the victim(s)?

 

[Alceste]

I admire you so much for keeping at this. You're so persistent, in a topic that obviously, from some of the responses on here, still needs a ton of work in society. Thank you for staying after it. :bow:

Hey, no problem. I pretty much have nothing else to do today. I'm lying around in bed with my laptop. I think it's an important issue, and related to a lot of other peripherally related issues that are currently bubbling around in my mind. Dehumanization and lack of empathy is a big one. It's a necessary factor for social tolerance of the most appalling forms of human aggression and injustice, as Legion pointed out ten million pages ago. I know I can't force anyone to perceive outsider groups, minority groups, oppressed groups etc. with empathy and compassion, but I also can't sit idly by while indifferent and dehumanizing positions are advocated.

From what I've seen, focusing on how a perpetrator of some form of abuse feels is always paired with indifference toward how the victim feels. In this case, the hypothetical rapist we're discussing is a man with needs. A man with desires, sexual impulses, a pent up man with an erection with nowhere to put it, poor guy. But also a man with "other psychological issues" of some kind, but mainly a man with a sexual need. That's a pretty well-rounded hypothetical person. Ready for the big screen. So who's the victim? WHERE is the victim? Is there even a victim? Nobody who has adopted a view that empathizes with the perpetrators of sexual assault has bothered in all this time to talk about that at all, except in outrageously dehumanizing terms. The victim is just a means to an end. A teller at the vagina bank. The unlucky driver of a car-jacked vaginamobile. A person who will be forever incapable of forming a coherent, rational opinion of the social problem of sexual assault. The words they type sometimes look like "rape is bad", it always seems like a disclaimer, not a conviction. The true sentiment these attitudes convey is "Meh."

 

[Alceste]

Agreed. To prey upon and victimize others is a sign of a deep, psychological disturbance. No mentally sound person would resort to heinous and sadistic acts just to fulfill themselves without regards to the effects and consequences. One would hope that one's humanity would prevail over their "horniness."

:flower2: Absolutely. There are healthy ways to express natural inclinations toward aggression, hierarchy and competition for those who have them. There are also healthy ways to express our natural inclination to get laid. There are even healthy ways to combine the two. But sexual aggression is not called aggressive sex for a reason.

 

[Alceste]

There's a lot of insistence on the "sex" part as relevant. And the insistence is on the assumed experience of the perpetrator.

Anyone ask how relevant the experience is for the victim(s)?

I would like to ask, if you're willing to share your perspective again knowing how insensitive or oblivious some of the folks in this thread were last time. I personally don't feel like I'd be particularly worried about the precise location of anybody's penis compared to the major horror of being violently assaulted, but I admit I don't know first hand.

If you are willing to share, that would be great. Otherwise, I can go ask science.

 

[Vinayaka]

I know a young man who witnessed his sister and mother get raped, and then his father get hacked to death by axes. It was in a war. He has trouble sleeping 30 years later, and will never be sane. So those of you who have any tolerance for such brutal and inhuman activity as torture, rape, and any other demented animal stuff you can think of, really really need to give your head a good shake. What comes around goes around. It may be your sister, your mother, your wife, or you next in line.

We are not animals. Humane is derived from human, is it not?

 

[Alceste]

I know a young man who witnessed his sister and mother get raped, and then his father get hacked to death by axes. It was in a war. He has trouble sleeping 30 years later, and will never be sane. So those of you who have any tolerance for such brutal and inhuman activity as torture, rape, and any other demented animal stuff you can think of, really really need to give your head a good shake. What comes around goes around. It may be your sister, your mother, your wife, or you next in line.

We are not animals. Humane is derived from human, is it not?

That's awful.

I think they're just worried that if we recognize sexual assault as violence, there will be a sudden epidemic of hungover college boys waking up in jail without any idea how they got there. They really don't need to worry. As things stand, date rape is almost never reported or prosecuted, and those prosecutions are almost never successful. Heck, sometimes the police just send the victim packing before she even gets a chance to file a report. Plus, if it goes to trial, the focus of the entire process will be on scrutinizing the victim's apparel or behavior to determine whether or not she was, in fact, "asking for it". The people who are waking up in jail are the ones where the aggression and sexual character of the assault and the lack of consent was totally unambiguous and they knew exactly what they were doing, like those football players in Ohio.

I'd be really surprised if anybody in the Western World is sitting in a jail cell over a foggily remembered wild night on the town, or not being sure whether or not it was OK to proceed.

 

[Vinayaka]

It's sad. I have a party rape true story ... it ends with one girl to another "I'm sorry, Honey, but that's what They do. You didn't know?"

It's practically normalised. But with MMA, glorified violence, glorified rough sex throughout the media, in movies, in sports, what did we expect? I think this normalisation of it is why we having this long discussion.

Taverns were originally places to have a few ales with a few friends. Now they're places to pick fights and pick up potential rape victims.

 

[Alceste]

It's sad. I have a party rape true story ... it ends with one girl to another "I'm sorry, Honey, but that's what They do. You didn't know?"

It's practically normalised. But with MMA, glorified violence, glorified rough sex throughout the media, in movies, in sports, what did we expect? I think this normalisation of it is why we having this long discussion.

Taverns were originally places to have a few ales with a few friends. Now they're places to pick fights and pick up potential rape victims.

Yeah, women perpetuate rape myths too, and it's socially destructive for both men and women.

I was actually reading some science after I told Mystic I was going to ask science about the experience and attitudes of rape victims. It was predictable but depressing to read that RMA (rape myth acceptance, including the belief that rape is primarily sexually motivated) was not only correlated with heightened RP (rape proclivity) in men, but also correlated in avoidance behavior by female rape victims. For example, women who are influenced by RMA fail to define a sexual assault legally meeting the definition of rape as a rape because he only used a finger, or because the assault was short in duration, or because she didn't fight back, or because she had been drinking, yada yada. Of course if she's not defining a her sexual assault as an assault, the perpetrator is not being reported, prosecuted or held accountable for the crime. RMA is also correlated with self-destructive coping strategies in victims, like drug or alcohol abuse.

Anyway, what I've been reading reminded me why this is important. Not only does RMA increase your likelihood of raping if you're a man, it also correlates with self-destructive and self-blaming behavior for female rape victims. So we need to challenge rape myths whenever they spring up.