Why can't men take responsibility for their own depraved desires?

Great Debates
1

I was reading an interview with the author of “The Deil’s Ain”, a look at the persecution of witches in Scotland, and one of the points he made was that women would frequently be raped and then be accused of using magic to “make” the man do it. If he was a member of the church, they would execute her, convienently exonerating him from any blame.

It seems they had the perfect basis in scripture for this (you know, that whole Adam and Eve thingy).

To me this is representative of a whole male attitude, that although prevalent in religion, is not confined to it. Take the perverts who need a domina to force them to do depraved sexual acts - its a simple switching of responsibility because they can’t handle having such desires themselves.

In fact I am of the opinion that the two phenomena are inextricably bound together - the religious attitude which makes it acceptable to pass responsibility for lustful desires onto a woman gives license to men everywhere to do so. In fact because of the linking of pleasure to sin, you could argue that it is positively encouraged, as the burden of guilt is removed on doing so.

So will men ever take responsibility for their own perverted lusts, or will woman have to bear the burden forever more?

2

I would take responsibility for my desires, but my girlfriend won’t let me.

3

It works both way, you know. Many women have given consent to sex, then cried “rape” when the deed was uncovered. End result: Dire consequences for the man.

The problem is not either men or women. *People]/i] are the problem.

4

What, and get in trouble? When there’s someone else around to take the heat? :rolleyes:

5

Lust is not a perversion, it is a pretty universal physical reaction and I think in the vast majority of situations men who are prepared to take responsibility for their actions without being forced will be able to control them in the first place.
Those that aren’t will always try to get away with what they can.
I think a majority of men fall into the first category.

6

I’m no expert on BDSM, but there are plenty of submissive women looking for male masters. Not to mention gay men who seek out male masters. There are some men who seek out dominatrixes in order to avoid guilt, but that is not the case with every man.

Re Witch Hunts

I refer you to Marvin Harris Cows, Pigs, War, And Witches The Riddles Of Culture. Harris makes a very good argument that misogyny was not the cause of the Inquisition and witch hunting. Peasant revolt was. Most people saw the nobility and the church as corrupt and greedy, they imposed harsh taxes so that they could live in luxury. In order to prevent widespread revolt, the church and crown created an enemy and proved their usefulness by fighting it. ‘Of course we impose heavy taxes. We need the money to defend you against witches.’

Think of the Simpsons episode in which Quimby diverts attention by blaming illegal immigrants.

7

Gotta go with Qadgop on this one. Name a sensationalist event in which men disassociate themselves with their own desires and actions, and there will be another event somewhere else where women do the same thing. Wasn’t it Susan Smith who strapped her children into the car and drowned them in a lake and blamed an imaginary black man for the crime—or what of that woman in Texas who killed her children because God told her to?

There’s no shortage of unaccountable people of either gender. People have blamed witches, devils, evil spirits, and more recently, UFOs, microchips implanted in their butts by the CIA, orbital mind-control lasers, and one guy who claimed to be mind-controlled by the Internet.

So what was your point about a male attitude, exactly?

8

I gotta agree with Qadgop.

When I have dealt with children, I have seen a tendency in many of them, when busted, to point a finger. “I didn’t do it,” the child says, “HE did it!”

“I saw you do it,” says the parent.

“But he MADE me do it!” shrieks the kid.

I hate to say it, but shrugging off responsibility is a pretty common human reaction to being faced with consequence, you know? At least, when faced with a consequence you could avoid if you can shunt it off to someone else.

In working with crazy people, I often found this same reaction pretty common in adolescents. Sometimes, they do it because they got away with it as children. Sometimes they did it because they thought it might work right now. But they often passed the responsibility for their actions to the next guy, fast as they could go.

And if you lie to yourself often enough, you can begin to believe it. More than one wifebeater or abuser has, at one point or another, said, “Why do you make me do this? Why do you make me angry? Why do you make me beat you stupid like this?”

First time I saw this, I couldn’t believe it. “Why do you make me beat you like this?” What kind of insanity is that?

Well, a fairly common kind, I’m afraid. If I can blame my rottenness on YOU, then I don’t have to feel bad about what a bastard I am. And it ain’t limited to men, either. Seen plenty of women do it, too, most often in child abuse situations.

But, due to physiology and psychology, men tend to rape more often than women do; we’re more sexually driven in more obvious ways. And if sex is evil, and we can blame you women for bringing about that evil, well, why should we not punish you?

“Why do you make us do these things to you?”

No, it’s not right. Neither is murder. But it happens anyway.

At least, until we all grow the hell up and take responsibility for ourselves and our actions, is all.

9

I try to take responsibility for my depraved desires, but just the other night, while I was asleep, my depraved desires snuck out of the house, stole a car, and drove it into a creek.

10

Says Meta…

Ok, first, I’m in agreement with both Doc and Qadgop. But allow me to take it one step further. I don’t think for a second that women bear the weight of the “perversions of men” in this day and age. I think you’re making difficult what is already simple. There is no removal guilt if the law of the land is broken. In fact, the law sides generally with women in cases where crimes against person are committed against them. Men are forced, with all due necessity, to bear the guilt of their crimes, be they motivated by lust, or some other personal illness (i.e. mental illness) in the courts of competent jurisdiction across the world, so it’s an outright falsehood to state otherwise.

Secondly, I’d pose the question; precisely what is perversion? By whom is perversion defined in your example? What parameters contain the perversion you reference?

Third, without lust, there would be no us. Lust is a fundamental component of love. The puritannical ideals we hold ourselves to today, are far more relaxed than the draconian ideals of several hundred years ago, neither then, nor now, do the cultures realize the need to address the radical ends of the spectrum of human contact (i.e love). There will be, in any society, a “fringe” group, defined so by the majority, and their actions (or at least the ones they show to the world), that group will fulfill the prophesy set forth by the ones who have determined them and their behaviours to be “fringe” when in fact, they are their own majority, within a seperate category. I submit that the definitions of perversion are linear, rather than abstract, and follow concurrent paths that diverge from the same line of thought processes.

Finally, men and women are both human, and both have desires that decry what is called common decency. Neither carries the weight of the other disproportionately over the entirety of the population. On an individual basis, this may not be true, but I would argue that overall, in the modern world, the balance exists absolutely.

11

Another vote for Quadgop. I think you have to make a better case than that to say it tips in favor of men to blame other people for sexual feeling they don’t want to admit to. Now, when men had a massively dispropotionate amount of power - say the Middle ages - they had a lot more opportunity to blame women and make it stick…power corrupts :). That said

…I don’t think it’s a male attitude. And unlike Doc I am and expert on BDSM…ok, I’m not but I am a pervert :D…and I wouldn’t agree with that take on it. First of all, among the pervert I consort with the skew goes toward men being the Doms (which definately entails taking responsibility).

And moreover in my experience, perverts, Dominent and submissive, take more responsibility for their desires than most people.

So, I don’t take your point :D.

12

Cmon, Qadgop! That doesn’t fit nicely in line with what was taught in women’s studies 101. Keep your patriarchal oppressive attitudes out of this thread! We want real dialogue in here!

13

I’m sure that they can handle the desires themselves, but sex is more fun when it’s shared. :smiley: I’ll agree with Betenoir that pervs are a little more responsible than you claim. After all, how many non-kinky sex books read like first aid manuals?

M-G, would you care to come back to this thread to elaborate or defend your position? You may have a lot of company out there in left field, but I still think that is where your claim is coming from.

14

Wow. That’s so wrongheaded, I just don’t know where to start.

Suffice to say that your pejorative use of “perverts” fits in quite well with your clear lack of knowledge of BDSM.

As far as “switching of responsibility” goes, what about women who like to be “swept off their feet” so they can maintain their self-image of being good girls who aren’t choosing to mess around? Shirking responsibility is a human recreation, not a gender-based one.
[There are too many puns on “switch” so I’m avoiding them all with great personal restraint]

15

Meta-Gumble, when you chastise me about my depraved desires…
…you make me so HOTT!!!

Thank you Meta!! May I have another?

16

Here’s hoping this thread gets moved to the Pit so I can give this the response it deserves.

17

Cause we’re all pigs.

And rapists. Anything with a penis is a rapist.
:rolleyes:

18

Oooooh, BDSM, SDMB… coincidence? I think not!

19

Didn’t Christianity teach from the beginning that women were “occasions of sin”. And to this day, in some countries women who are raped are murdered by their families for shaming them. In Saudia Arabia, the women have to wear covers over their heads for just this reason; they might tempt men to do things the Koran forbids. Why don’t the men wear a lock on their penis? something like the iron belt women had to wear during the Crusades? The men sure as hell don’t wear a chasity belt when they travel to western countries and drink and have sex with prostitutes. And what kind of reward are they promised in heaven? Virgins. Virgins? If it wasn’t so absolutely degrading and disgusting to women it could be hysterical to think that that is enough to get some dumb ass man to blow himself up. Just like the 9/11 terrorists. Where did they spend their last night? It was common in Asia only 800 years ago for women to be stolen from a tribe and forced to be a sex (and otherwise) slave to her new “owners”. This caused problems in Ghengis Khan’s clan because he never knew if his oldest child was his, once he stole his wife back. Women were only property. In Afghanistan, the men keep burning down the new schools and threatening the teachers because they think it’s wrong to educate women. And why do you suppose this would be a threat? My observation, esp in places where the rule of law doesn’t exist or supports this kind of thing, that men will in general abuse women because they are physically weaker and can’t do anything about it. In parts of Africa men insist that young women have their clitoris cut out because it’s sinful to feel pleasure and they won’t marry these “sinful” women. In China not so long ago, the young royalty were introduced to sex at such a young age that they were jaded by the time they were 15 and so resorted to more perverted sexual behavior with the female slaves. Today, young female children locked in brothels in Myramar servicing sometimes 20 men a day. Even American women kidnapped for the sex trade in foreign countires. I even hear today in rape cases where men testify that the woman was “asking for it” by the way she was dressed or acting. I can’t think of one country without a system of democratic law, where women, at least on the surface, are equals; otherwise, ladies, we are out of luck. I have three sons so I don’t say lightly that for some reason, unexplainable and unfathomable, men can and do, and probably always will if they can get away with it, oppress and abuse women sexually in many parts of the world. And it will always be our fault because since we aren’t volunteering for it, it must be that they just can’t help themselves.

20

Um, suzeekay, that covers quite a lot of ground. In many of those cases, society does impose responsibility upon an abusing man who says the woman was “asking for it,” or would impose such responsibility if it happened in modern times in a more civilized culture. If you feel that the male half of all mankind deserves a venomous rant for everything that could ever have been conceiveably be blamed upon them throughout the whole of human history in every culture on Earth, there’s always the BBQ pit for that. I’m sure you’d get plenty of spirited rejoinders detailing what may be considered by some to be wrong with womankind.

Until then I shall wait for the OP to explain the logic which shows that shirking responsibility for one’s own actions is a uniquely male habit.