Understanding Sexual Assault

In My Humble Opinion
1

A woman in our general vicinity (out in Virginia’s Hunt Country) was sexually assaulted last week, and we’re all trying to understand why and how it could have happened in this rather secluded area.

Fortunately, the culprit (a stranger) was quickly apprehended, but while a female neighbor and I were talking about it today, she explained this barbaric act by saying, “Rape is an act of violence.”

No argument there, but that doesn’t explain WHY it happens so frequently across this nation. To offer the explanation, “rape is an act of violence,” strikes me as an obvious truism, yet fails to explain why it occurs and what the perpetrator’s motivation for assaulting a woman he has never met might be.

2

I don’t know per se - I’m not a psychologist, criminologist, or rapist… and I’ve never talked to any of the above on the subject at hand. However, I have heard that there are different motivations.

Perhaps the rapist is sexually aroused by the feeling of power. When you molest or rape someone, you’re in complete control. That’s my best guess. I know men who’re aroused by the feeling of power but would never rape instead, they enjoy role playing games. No one gets hurt, and both parties have fun.

3

Some people have no regard for the feelings of others. I think sociopath is the term for that type. I think also that sometimes some people might see some type of violence on tv or movies and then want to emulate that. WAG

4

I’ve heard that it’s a lust for power.

5

I think I’ve outgrown the phase during which I thought there was a single answer to this question, and that I knew what it was.

Having said that, here’s my theory pertaining to why at least some of the sexual violence against women takes place:

Historically (western culture, at least), the system was set up in such a way that women were economically dependent on men (unlikely or less likely to be hired or likely to be paid less than men, etc) and denied reproductive control (contraceptive and abortion resources, techniques and information kept unavailable). That’s enough by itself to set up a tendency for women to feel that they had to trade off sexual access to themselves in return for a man’s economic support. Add in a double dose of double-standard attitudes (in which men were encouraged and considered manly for having sex where and with whatever women they could find it, but women were regarded as sluts and considered contempt-worthy if they had sex indiscriminately) and you intensify that trend.

We still live in the aftermath of that system, and there are more than mere vestiges of it remaining in attitude and behavior, with sexual mores lagging behing economic and legal changes.

Now let’s kind of confuse things by interjecting the fact that women, nevertheless, have sexual appetites of their own, and that therefore even when a consideration for the factors in the above paragraph might make sex with a guy seem undesirable, he might be found desireable nonetheless. If you’ve got (as you do in fact tend to have) a lot of males asking, requesting, suggesting, pestering, hinting, and otherwise seeking sex from women in the situation I’m describing, you end up with a lot of women getting annoyed (not just with the guys but with the situation I’m describing) and most of the time (even if the guy is, as I said, possibly desirable even if the situation makes sex inadvisable) saying “NO”. But among the males who do not easily get their feelings hurt by rejection and who don’t accept “NO” for an answer would be some whose skills at manipulation and talent for knowing when to try what would let them play off of women’s tendency to have a sexual appetite of their own (often a frustrated and seldom-satiated one), and so they get laid. If the situation is such that they feel safe and beyond retaliation, they are not above using raw coercion, too, so some of them rape.

Meanwhile, such males are generally seen by other males as pushy and cruel and guys are generally aware that such males do not like or care about women much as people. Many guys resent the sexual successes attained by such guys.

Quite often, their resentment (and their resentment over the fact that their ‘nicer’ approaches of asking, begging, wheedling, etc., which DO respect a woman’s “NO”, at least in the sense of acknowleding her authority to say it) becomes resentment of women much more than of the manipulative men. They sour on women and say a lot of things like “I don’t understand these bitches, they tease guys by being so cute and female and all, and they say NO to guys who ask nicely and take them out to dinner and such, but they’ll lay down and put out for assholes who treat them like dirt. Well if that’s what does it for them maybe I should learn how to be an asshole.”

You’ve heard them, you know you have, you’re nodding aren’t you?

Most of them are just talk but I think with some of them the resentment and growing hatred for women goes beyond talk and they try to be “like the assholes” which mainly takes the form of becoming coercive about sex. So they rape sometimes too.

In both cases, I think a certain degree of depersonalizing of women has to occur. With the self-centered spoiled-asshole guys, I think most people aren’t “people” to them in a way that counts and they would and will do similarly hurtful things to other people in other contexts with comparable nonchalance. With the angry hateful ones, the depersonalizing is the result of their anger and frustration–the system I described in the first paragraph is what is screwing them but they blame women–as if women would have set up such a system??? Hello?!?

6

AHunter3
That would only be true if sexual assualt were a phenomenon restricted to the late 20th century. It obviously is not.

(And women have, for a very long time and in many cultures, exchanged sex for so-called protection. It was (is) commonly referred to as “marriage”. )

7

xcheopis, marriage is no longer a system of protection. It IS possible that some women get married in exchange for protection - but as a woman who would never do that (my friends feel the same way) I resent that statement. People marry for different reasons - don’t act like the little woman needs to be taken care of so she marries a guy and just HAS to have sex with him (like she doesn’t want to).

8

It’s generally defined as having sex with someone without their consent (websters). Its not always a man doing it to a woman, it can be male-male, woman-woman, etc.

There is an old book that Susan wrote that explains alot: “Men, Women & Rape”

9

Susan’s book provides this explanation: “because they can”

10

mandielise, this is going to come as a terrible shock to you but your opinions on love, marriage, and male-female relationships are not now, nor have they ever been, universal.

The idea of female autonomy is very new and still fought against, even in first world countries. Trillions of women throughout history and all over the world have been forced into marriages they did not want, with men they despised. For that matter, my great-grandmother disliked both sex and children but was given no choice in the matter; she was, after all, chattel and subject to her husbands demands. Hers was hardly a unique situation in late 19th century U.S.A., a country then considered very progressive in its attitudes towards women.

Marriage evolved as both a form of policital alliance and a means of providing the woman (and I use “woman” to mean “considered eligible for marriage”, which age may be as low as 11) and her offspring, with economic support and physical protection from other men. Whether or not she enjoyed sex was never even considered; some Western Cultures have, in fact, demanded that she not enjoy it.

If you insist on taking offense at a comment that was neither directed towards you nor your friends, then I happily leave you to your life of bitter resentment at the path of history. In the meantime, I reccommend you take some courses in history and cultural anthropology before making assertions about how your opinions apply to all women living, dead, or yet to be born.

11

Xcheopis, I obviously don’t live in a cave. I’m minoring in anthropology and I’ve taken my share of history classes thank you very much. However, you said (and I quote):

“And women have, for a very long time and in many cultures, exchanged sex for so-called protection. It was (is) commonly referred to as ‘marriage’.”

Yes, it used to happen, and I’m sure in some places (and possibly for a few women in America) it does still happen. But you can’t make a generalization about something like this and not expect to be called on it. Marriage is NOT an exchange of sex for protection - to many people. As I said, it’s many things to many women. All I’m asking is that you not generalize.

Off topic, I’m used to people on the board being at least somewhat polite. It’s too bad you had to make a false generalization, then demean me for calling you on it.

12

mandielise, a false generalization would be one that is untrue. In this case, the general statement is true, which you would know if you were paying attention in class. You even agreed with my statement, to whit:

You continue to use language which implies you believe late 20th century North America is the marriage model for all of human history. You are wrong.

Even into the 1970’s, in the San Francisco Bay Area, little girls were being told that sex was the price you had to pay for the privilage of having children. You don’t like that fact? Too bad. It’s only been in the past three decades that the concept of spousal rape evolved and became prosecutable. Why? Because it was commonly accepted that the wife should have sex with her husband whether or not she wanted to.

The price for being a housewife is sex. The number of marriges, even today, where the husband took care of the woman and never, ever, had sex with her is vanishingly small. You may not wish to see it phrased that way, but that’s how it works. You may also with to do some reading on the rationales for paying women less than men for equal work. Helpful hint: it revolves around the idea that the man takes care of (i.e., protects) the woman financially.

13

To continue the hijack, I fail to see where xcheopis’ statement is a generalization. Logic dictates that the a statement that begins with ‘women have blah blah blah’ does not equal ‘all women have blah blah blah’.

14

mandielise, xcheopis–

What are we arguing about here?

Do we all accept as a starting point that if we look back over our shoulder into the past we see eons of patriarchy, in which, as xcheopis says, women were culturally placed in a situation where they had to trade sex for economic support? Is anyone arguing that this is NOT the case?

I have suggested (even if it isn’t an absolute explanatory device) that against that backdrop rape would exist for reasons such as I described in my post above. These dynamics, far from being specific to the late 20th century, would be found anywhere that women were situated to barter sexual acess to themselves in exchange for (…economic support, but actually anything other than a good roll in the proverbial hay would apply equally well here, the situation would remain the same).

Do we all agree that women’s sexuality is not intrinsically defined as a trading asset, and that women tend to prefer to couple because they are in love with someone and/or are horny and find someone cute and eminently beddable? And that therefore the culturally dominant arrangment of human sexuality has been at odds with this? That there is a conflict of interests, so to speak, between what individual women would most likely want to do in expression of their sexuality and what cultural forces such as economic necessity and societal morality codes dictate to them that they should do instead?

OK, then. I am suggesting that the conflict catches males up in it, too. That it becomes part of the general shared male folklore that sex, and great sexual experiences with women, are under some circumstances available other than as assets in trade for support (which isn’t, I daresay, how most males most crave to be found lustworthy–on the basis of their cute wallets and prominent incomes. Ugh.). And that one big factor in male rape is a tendency to blame women for the cultural sex-as-female-commodity arrangement (as if it were women’s fault) after getting their feelings hurt trying to pursue the much more romantic notions of sex for lust and sex for love.

15

You said marriage is still defined as a woman exchanging sex for protection. That’s absolutely untrue. Yes, I admitted that some women get married to be protected - but that’s somewhat rare nowadays. Have you noticed that people for themost part disagree with the idea that women should be paid less? I’ve never met a woman who got married after the 70’s and did it to be protected. NEVER. Yes, it happens, but you made a generalization that the current definition of marriage is an exchange - false generalization. Furthermore, I hate to break it to you, but women like sex too. Women have one-night stands (though they’re less often due to social stigmas), and women cheat. Don’t act like the poor girls just HAVE to have sex or they’ll starve to death. That’s called prostitution.

BTW, it should be noted that, among my friends, I’m considered the anti-feminist. Just thought you’d like to know
AHunter3 - I agree with you. My only problem with the original statement was that defined current marriage as a trade-off of sex for protection. That’s just untrue in most societies. I was further upset by being personally attacked and treated as if I must be ignorant to not agree.

16

No, I said

The parenthetical “is” tells the educated that this definition is not necessarily the accepted norm anymore. You’ll note, (warning: reading comprehension needed here), that the main point was, indeed, that marriage has been traditionally for the “protection” of women. If you try to argue otherwise, than you are worse than ignorant.

What a cute little strawman. Perhaps you can take it to the Wizard and obtain for it some brains. Also, you need to check your dictionary for the definition of prostitution.

Of course many wives enjoy sex. But, (and here I’m must repeat myself because you missed it the first time) it has not been an accepted idea that they should enjoy it. Quite the contrary, in fact. Wives were primarily considered useful for bearing offspring; whether or not they enjoyed the mating process was not necessary to their conjugal duty. Sadly for you, those interfering feminists came along and demanded some conjugal rights of their own. Would you believe they even expected women to be allowed to vote? Tsk. What were they thinking?

Your problem here is that you are assuming that all wives, everywhere and throughout time, have always enjoyed sex with their husbands. That assumption is errant nonsense.

And a lot of wives didn’t want to. Who wants to have sex with someone who regards you as personal property and pays no more attention to your own sexuality than is necessary for him to impregnate you? But that was the reality for the majority of women and remains true for others today. The fact that you live in a time and country where women’s sexuality is making progress as a positive idea (thanks to those feminists you so dislike), instead of something to be feared and abhorred, does not mean that others have enjoyed the same privilege. It doesn’t mean they do today.

Wives were (are) for having children. Prostitutes, mistresses, and concubines were (are) for sexual pleasure. His, mostly. You don’t think so? Read up on the histories of Japan, China, India, Europe, Russia, North Africa, Korea… well, it’s a long list. You may also wish to compare lists of countries where wives were (are) encouraged, nay, allowed to work outside the home. If a woman is actively prevented from supporting herself, then it becomes necessary that she be dependent on either her husband or a male relative for support. Check out all those help-wanted listings in Saudi Arabia and let me know how many of them are advertising for women to work outside the home for a reasonable wage. It would be nice to belive that women everywhere enjoy the same status as those in first-world countries but that is just not true. And if it were for those darn feminists, you wouldn’t either. Sucks, huh? Pushy bitches.

Your repeated insistance that you, personally, don’t feel that way does nothing to change their lives. It is doubtful that you’d even think the way you do, were it not for the feminist movement. After all, were it not for their courage and hard work, you’d just be some man’s property, to dispose with as he pleased. Good to know you disapprove of their efforts.

You need to stop assuming that all marriages, all the time, everywhere, were a matter of free choice for women. A man was far, far more likely to have personal choice than a woman. The idea of marrying for love is very new, even in our society. The overwhelming majority of marriages, all through known history, have been either arranged (by the parents) or forced (by kidnapping and rape.) And wouldn’t you know, some damn feminists had to come along and spoil the whole thing by spreading the pernicious idea that women were entitiled to choose their mates. Why, if it weren’t for them, you might even already have 2 or more kids, instead of making your own procreative decisions! Bloody hags!

If you spend less time on the mistaken idea that your belief system is universal, you’ll also spend less time having knee-jerk reactions that result in you taking personal offense at an historical fact. I’ll be nice and offer you a helpful hint for future reading: If you are not certain of the meaning of a statement, ask for clarification instead of insisting on being resentful. Should you still be confused, it is considered perfectly acceptable to ask for further clarification.

AHunter3, am I correct in my assumption that your theory revolves around refusal to recognize a woman’s right to choose?

17

Here’s the quote (again)-

“And women have, for a very long time and in many cultures, exchanged sex for so-called protection.”

That’s written in the past tense. Xcheopis never said marriage is still defined as a woman exchanging sex for protection, and he/she never said that it was ALWAYS the case.

18

“And women have, for a very long time and in many cultures, exchanged sex for so-called protection.”

I wonder if Susan writes in her book about this happening in prisons?

19

xcheopsis

I don’t think so. Of course on some level any theory of rape has to make some reference to refusal to recognize a woman’s right to choose. However, the main thing I am emphasizing is a pair of connected points. I did my best to explain them in my previous posts. [sigh…] OK, I’ll try to restate them more coherently.

• The sex-for-barter thing creates a conflict of interests for women: regardless of what they might feel erotically & romantically drawn towards, they are under a lot of practical and social pressure to ignore that in order to trade sex off for what they can get for it. Because sexual desire and appetite is what it is, some sex does occur in response to what is erotic or romantically attractive anyway. With me so far? Well, women would experience the flicker of sexual interest in a lot of situations, but acting on it would be foolhardy, so generally they would not do this unless the feelings were particularly strong OR they were caught off-guard or off-balance.

• Men are also caught up in this sex-for-barter system: it isn’t at all flattering to be told that if you provide for a female’s material needs she’ll “let you do it to her”–guys would rather have women have sex with them because they love them or find them sexy and hot. Since it is possible to catch women off-guard (see above point), caught up in sensations and emotions that lead them to disregard the social imperative to use sex as a bartering asset, some men get to experience this more satisfying form of sex; some are even adept at it. How are we doing? You with me so far on this one? OK, consider this, then: since this involves tricking women, compromising their necessary intentions of ignoring their own sexual appetites because of the sex-for-barter arrangement, the men who are most likely to be good at this are not men who like women. This is not rape, though.

All that is backdrop. It doesn’t have to be that way–as mandielise points out, sex and ongoing sexual relationships are not intrically sex-for-barter arrangements–but it has historically been this way. Quite a bit and over a long period of time if not necessarily always and inevitably. And if it were not this way at all, if the pattern by which women barter sex in exchange for economic support and whatnot were a totally foreign concept unshared by people and their culture, then we would expect a different pattern. We would expect a pattern in which women had sex because they were in love and/or were horny, and did not seek to suppress or deny those feelings as I said that they do within the sex-for-barter arrangement. We would therefore expect the experience of sharing this kind of sex with women to be readily available to men who were attractive, likeable, and easy to be with.

But because it has so often been the other way, the sex-for-barter way, men who start off as relatively nice people and who lack the manipulative streak or instinct that helps some men enjoy success at catching women off-balance and off-guard–those originally ‘nicer’ men may and (I think) often do sour on women, blaming women, complaining that this very desirable experience (sex and love freely given rather than provided in exchange like a commodity) is handed out to creepazoid manipulative guys who don’t even like women. Sometimes, this turns to bitterness, and then to hate.

And these bitter resentful men often only analyze things this much: enough to say “women go for men who treat them like dirt and who don’t care what women want”. And they say to themselves and to their buddies and whatnot, “I oughta treat that girl over there like dirt, I’m tired of the manipulative guys getting all the action”. This does not transform the guy into a successful sneaky manipulator of women, one who is suddenly adept at catching women off-guard and off-balance. It only transforms him into a bitter angry guy whose hate is ready to spill over.

And there’s your rape. Or at least there is some of it. As I said in passing in my first attempt to write about this, there are other types of rapists, including some of the callous manipulative ones, who may not be beyond a bit of physical coercion now and then themselves. But I wasn’t really writing about them. I was writing about the other guys.

And so, in a nutshell: the main point is that the sex-for-barter system itself causes rape. If it were not present rape would be far less common.

20

I think a problem with that theory is that it assumes the men would have no other option for sex but through marriage. Historically, though, that is not true. Some cultures provide for mulitple wives, others for one wife but mulitple consorts, some opt for mistresses. This is not even counting, of course, those societies where sexual assault on slaves/servants was not unusual. All cultures of which I am aware had some type of prostituition. Some men who were commiting rape (and here I’m thinking of soldiers and the like) were also married, possibly to more than one woman. That did not stop them from attacking women whenever they went to war. In other words, historically most men have had no need for manipulation or excessive force in order to obtain sex.