Wednesday, June 27, 2007

6/27/2007 Rape And Orgasm

6/27/2007 Rape And Orgasm



After reading on the issue, I have to say no one really understands rape or why we do it. But I'll say this: Rape fantasies are common among both men and women.

That says something right there, that women, who are often terrified of being raped and equate it with torture or murder, fantasize about being raped. Why would that be? The popular answer is that it takes responsibility away. They can submit without being “slutty”. But if this is true, than why does the same dynamic not apply to real-life rape? We mostly, (in this society, anyway), agree that women are not responsible for controlling the actions of men. Apart from the ignorance of a court that acquitted four gang rapists because the victim wasn't wearing any underwear, most of us do not hold a rape victim responsible for being raped. Yet, women who are raped often feel responsible for the rape, and experience significant feelings of distress. So why fantasize about it?

Controversy

I have had many people tell me that if a woman orgasms during rape, that means it's not rape. Two of these people were women. Ignorance about rape abounds and I will go into that later. Lack of understanding of the issue does not prohibit people from having strong opinions, and this causes me to believe that any expose on my part is both pointless and banal.

But suffice to say that if the women orgasms during the rape, that doesn't mean it's not rape. In fact, the emotional distress that victims feel has an inverse ratio to the amount of violence the victim incurred. What I am saying is that when a women is badly beaten during a rape, she is tends to feel less distress than otherwise. Furthermore, studies indicate that women who orgasm during rape then have more trouble dealing with the rape than others. This indicates to me that women see rape itself, more so than physical pain or loss of control, as being the real transgression. Evolutionary Psychologists theorize that this may be because a man never really can know if his mates' offspring belongs to him. That explains the brutal attitudes that societies of the past had towards rape victims and perhaps the instinctive reaction that women have that being raped reduces their “value” as a mate. I will further address Evolutionary Psychologies' view of rape later. For now...



The Rape Orgasm



Most of us realize it happens, but there is some confusion as to why. The idea of females being submissive by nature has it's roots in the middle ages, with the Christian thought of the time. Subsequently, the view got some affirmation by scientific studies. For a lot of people, the act of being raped is the ultimate act of submission. And men are supposed to be aggressive, dominant. The act of raping, therefore, must be the ultimate in masculine behavior. So it makes sense, right? By raping a women, the man proves his own sexual worth. By giving in, the women proves hers. The women may be troubled by the loss of her autonomy, but she cannot deny that she is in the ultimate sexual situation. She cannot help but be aroused by such a manly act, and while she may later regret it, for now she submits to the overwhelming pleasure. All that is crap, of course, but that is likely the mental framework of rape fantasy in many of our minds.

In one study, upon being shown visual depictions of rape situations, a minority of males and females said that they found the depictions to be erotic. But when the female was shown to have an orgasm, a majority of men and women said they found it erotic. The orgasm means everything. Indeed, I myself have scoured the Internet to find videos featuring rape resulting in orgasm. Unfortunately, most of the videos I find do not contain female orgasms. Could be an untapped market. Many may rationalize by saying that people figure it was really consensual if the women orgasms. But there is no way around this: people want to see a women raped and have an orgasm from being raped. Only guilt stops us from doing more about this.

So do women really orgasm during rape? There is much secrecy surrounding rape, it seldom happens in view of the public. Victims are afraid to talk. So the question is, is all of that male-female role-playing that leads us to fantasize coming into play during the rape? How many victims orgasm during rape? I try not to site too many sources, so this doesn't become some scholarly dullfest. But this one I feel necessary. From the book, “A Natural History Of Rape”, by Thornhill and Palmer:

Human rape victims rarely show much sexual arousal and almost never achieve orgasm.”

Pretty simple. Sorry fantasizer. But wait...



Not Exactly John Edward's Two Americas



Much information is gleaned on the act of rape from studying convicted criminals. But what of the rapists who benefit from the secrecy caused by the shame of rape? How to discover their motives?

“A Natural History Of Rape” gives an account of men's own reports of rapes. The questions were asked as part of a study of sexual habits of a certain type of man. It has been discovered that female orgasm during intercourse is tied in to the body symmetry of their mate. So one study found that men who report histories of high numbers of sexual partners also report high instances of rape. There is a correlation between men having the body symmetry I mentioned and abusive behavior towards women, and also lack of committed relationships. Despite the previous statement that rape victims rarely display signs of arousal during rape, these men give accounts of rape that include, “significant amounts of female arousal, including orgasm.” So it is possible that many of the rapes that include orgasms are not reported and furthermore are being perpetrated by the same small percentage of men.

This, to me, explains why women would fantasize about rape. Most female rape fantasies in romance novels and such involve “manly men”, no doubt conjuring images of these symmetrical men. Evidence I have mentioned in previous posts indicate that women often “flag” such men for short term relationships, so the rape aspect does take away some responsibility and it is likely that keeping such a rape a secret reduces the pain of it to a degree.

I would think that though many rape victims are quite old, rape is, in a way, an attempt at social climbing in terms of genetics for both men and women.

So I wonder, what are we really fantasizing about? I mean, I am absent, even today, from most of my own rape fantasies. Add to that the theory that we all have memories of our entire lives locked away in our minds. In fact, the theory goes, that we all have our own memories plus the memories of our ancestors locked away in our heads. If that is true, then we all have memories of a time when rape was common. In situations of warfare, rape was often encouraged and sanctioned. In some pagan rituals, rape was rampant. When I fantasize about rape, is it my own I am fantasizing about? Or a distant past I cannot recall?

Furthermore, how does the genetics of the rapist effect all of this? I mean, suppose that we are in a war situation. Ten soldiers go up to a hut in which five women or girls live. The ten soldiers then take turns raping the females. Supposing that every soldier completes the rape of every one of the women once, and that all five females become pregnant as a result of the rape. I would propose that four of the five women would have become pregnant by one of the ten soldiers, the most fertile. I would also guess that this one soldier was one of the men who had the body symmetry that women prefer. So it follows that while nine of the ten men will rape the women without causing anything but pain, the one man may be able to bring about arousal and orgasm. It could be this situation that arouses me. Because women are not sexually attracted to most men, it may follow that in the past this would be an opportunity for reproduction. The female's orgasm would be particularly arousing because it would signal her arousal, which I could not have brought about myself in such a situation but would be unlikely to go away were I to “follow up” the symmetrical guy.

I would mention also that the Evolutionary Psychological idea of rape is that men will see it as a betrayal because it keeps them from knowing if the offspring they invest in is their own. But when I fantasize about rape, or read a story about rape written by a female who appears to be relating a real life (or close to real life) story, I do not feel anger or betrayal at all. In fact, it's the opposite. What I feel for that women goes beyond mere sympathy. I feel like she is more beautiful. I feel like she is more of a women. And I feel like having sex with her would be an amazing experience, and i feel all sorts of affection and desire come out of me; and I even feel feelings of commitment. I feel like her value to me is higher for having orgasmed during rape, not the opposite. And prior to my own fantasy, I never have seen a movie or heard anything that indicated that a women would orgasm during rape. I had little or no encouragement to rape.

Two Americas. One set of males that females come for, one that females don't. Funny, the same God who brought us the concept of universal justice and gave us a sense of having all the same expectations also badly favored some of us over others when he made us.



Clearing Up A Few Misconceptions



When it comes to rape, the subject is so explosive and profound that we tend to believe whatever we can live with. So much of this is pointless to say, but here it is.

There are three levels of misconceptions about rape.

  1. Level one is embodied by a study that came out a decade or so ago. They asked a bunch of 14 year old boys if a man had a right to rape a women after buying her dinner. 40% said yes. Level one is stupidity. First, boys don't get how painful rape is to women. And it's not something you can figure out logically. I mean, if you rape your soul-mate, wouldn't she not be your soul-mate anymore? If love is cosmic and mysterious, and women have intuitive access to it by things like kissing and sex, then doesn't that mean if you rape your soul-mate then she'll realize she's your soul-mate? What I'm saying is that justification for rape is more written into the way we see things then we know. A lot of these misconceptions come from simple logic.

  2. Level Two is explained by the statement: Rape is not sex. Level two is politics. Just like men are not born with an understanding of the way female victims feel about being raped, feminists are the last people who know the motives of a rapist. And to say that men who rape are not motivated by sex is clearly politically motivated. Given that so many of us fantasize about rape, no one gives in to the temptation? All rapists have political agendas against you? 1/3 of men say that they would engage in rape if they were assured of not getting caught. Case closed.

    Some other misconceptions that spring from this; animals never rape each other. Wrong. All rapists are crazy and like to rape but don't like consensual sex. Wrong again. Most rape victims are above or below reproductive age. Wrong.

    Don't think that feminists are the only ones in this category. There are men's groups out there saying that rape does not exist. They believe that since a women's legs are stronger than a man's arms, this means in all rapes, the women have consented. The fallacy of such an argument is too apparent for me to address it here.

  3. Level three is the searching for explanations stage. But in the end, we have yet to get past this one explanation: men want sex. And if men can't get what they want, they often take it.

Evolutionary Psychology



A few observations about their view of this subject. First of all, if it's logical that if men compete for the attentions of women in every aspect of society, then men are evolving faster than women. This would not apply to intelligence, as women probably have to evolve to be able to outsmart men, who are physically stronger. But it may apply to rape.

The book, “A Natural History Of Rape” sites statistics from the war in Rwanda, where rapes were widespread. The numbers indicated that one third of women who were raped became pregnant from the rapes. That's compared to one in nine copulations that result in pregnancy the acceptable way. That's hard to accept, but it seems that whatever evolutionary adaptations by women to avoid rape have been surpassed by men. It might also be that most of that 33% was by a very small percentage of the rapists.



No Conclusions



That's all. I am still not sure why these rape fantasies are so powerful for me, but I am past feeling bad about it. I would never rape someone because I am sure I'd get caught. Also, if I were to rape someone it would be about making her cum, and I doubt I am the symmetrical man. I may be able to accomplish it through other means, but it wouldn't pleasurable.

Rape remains the ultimate expression of our sexuality, and we'll keep fantasizing about it and arguing over the real thing. But there are those of us that do not have such traditional conceptions of their sexuality. My next dissertation will be about subversive relationships.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

very interesting thoughts on rape, much appreciated that I could find a real opinion on the matter and not just ideological views.

Hadding said...

You have some weird biases. The subordination of women to men didn't start with Christianity. Men are BIGGER and STRONGER than women. Did you ever hear of the Rape of the Sabine Women? It's part of the founding myth of Rome.

Of course rape is sex.

The highest affirmation of one's value as a man is not rape. The highest affirmation is if she gives willingly.