This is a post, which I admit reveals rather more about myself than I would like. Nonetheless, I have something to say. More so because not a single site or article on the Internet says what I feel is the truth. Not even close. The time has come for someone to stand up and stick out his neck with the facts.
First, my formal position on the whole rape issue. I do not condone rape. It’s a violation of a person’s privacy. This article is merely an examination of mostly subconscious responses in more or less every man or woman I have spoken to and is academic in nature. So no flaming please!
Here goes…
Rape elicits extreme reactions from the public. Repulsion, anger, hatred, and most interestingly, moral outrage. It is this last emotion that I am most interested in and all that I disclose below is in relation to moral outrage alone. This won’t apply to men who don’t feel a degree of moral outrage. Let me start by examining myself.
When I hear about the rape of a young woman, there are two conflicting forces inside me. One is to view the woman as a person. The others is to view her as an object. The moment I view her as a sexual object, rape doesn’t become something I abhor. When I view her as a person, I pity the raped woman as if she was bitten by a rabid dog. Not her fault, but hey, shit happens. Moreover, in this case, the rapist is behaving like an animal with no self control. So I would treat it as if some animal had assaulted the woman.
Image Credit: Grahford
Hidden Motivations!
I think the sexual desire, when combined with the desire for power is what makes rape such a fantasy. Mind you, if it actually comes down to it, I know I won’t rape because when the victim looks frightened, or angry, she ceases to be an object, and becomes a person. In such a situation, I’m pretty sure I can’t commit a rape.
Nonetheless, the time has come for plain speaking. After holding detailed discussions with several men in confidence, and analyzing my own reactions to news about rapes happening, I can see that the first emotion that flares up in men, including me, is moral outrage. Now this may sound noble, but just wait until I reveal the sinister cause for this.
The truth is, it’s jealousy masquerading as moral outrage! This is specially true of Indian Society, which is still heavily sexually repressed. Sex is still taboo, and most Indian men just don’t get good quality sexual fulfillment. Men feel jealous of rapists, because they got sex outright without having to go through the tedious channels of courtship that most of us have to go through. They “Cut the line”! “Bastards!” they say. Yeah right. Let’s own up to the truth. We envy the guy who got a 20 something woman into his car and had his way with her for 3 hours.
Of course we can’t come out and say this. We want to kill the guy then and there, but we can’t do it in the name of jealousy. We have to disguise our hate in another way. I’ve learned always to be suspicious of moral outrage. Chances are, the real issue is something else.
Consider that men (I speak only for men here), feel moral outrage when a young pretty woman is raped. At the same time, they feel something like disgust, amusement, or confusion when an old sixty year old is raped. Why? If the outrage is actually about issues like violation of rights, and privacy etc, why the less outrage regarding rapes against old and ugly women?
Image Credit: dungodung
Men feel jealous of rapists!
Consider also, that if the real issue is pain and violation of rights, then why do we not feel the same way for other violations. Suppose a woman had her arm cut off. That also is a violation of a woman’s rights to herself, and most of us would roundly condemn the criminal. And rightly so. But, no moral outrage. In fact, all the women to whom I have put the question, say they would rather be raped, than have their arm cut off.
But why do men go up in arms (no pun intended) against rape, when for the limb cutting crime, they would not do so? Why are there no “Hang the mutilator” rallies? Most women I have met, would again rather be raped than have their faces disfigured with acid or something horrible like that. For other crimes which violate one’s privacy like robbery, there is condemnation, and hate, but the quality of the feeling that is felt towards rapists is very different. Again I say, the crime of rape provokes moral outrage.
And I say that this is a cover up for feelings of envy and jealousy. Envy, maybe even for the fact that the rapist had the guts to do in reality, what some of us dare not do even in fantasy. And if the social class of the rapist is much lower than that of the victim, the outrage is even more. This is because the jealousy is greater, that the rapist “got” what he would never have got, had he gone through the proper channels. A young woman being helplessly ravaged by a bunch of slavering dirty scoundrels, is one of the most difficult things to digest, precisely because of the class difference that exists. The outrage is even greater here.
Anyway, the point is, fantasy is fantasy, and reality is reality. Real rape would entail too much of an emotional strain on me. To see the victims fear, and hate, and to hear her screams, would bring home the fact that she is a human being with rights. Since I value my own rights, I would not be capable of taking hers away. In addition to this, raping a woman would make ME too much of an object. I would lose my self control, and see myself as too much of an animal than my pride would allow.
Now I just have to sit back and wait to get lynched.
I am surprised at how obvious and simple the facts you relate are.. and I wonder why more people, including myself are unable to see this reality without someone having to spell it out.
Hmmm… makes sense… but I guess there's a part of me that is too shocked to accept that this is a 100% true. I am willing to agree that most (or all) men have subconscious impulses like this. But I would like to believe that it is not the major cause of the outrage that is felt against rape.
Call me a mindless optimist! ;)
Waiting to see responses from some men here!
Can I say one thing: Rape is not about sexual desire. It has and is and always will be about power. The power to exploit. The power to have sex with someone who doesn't want to. The power to be able to see fear in someone's eyes. The power to get what you want no matter what the other person feels.
Now, moving on to what you have said…about men feeling jealous and diguising it in the form of moral outrage…all I can say is: shame! I find it hard to fathom that there are men that are jealous that a rapist of all people has had sex. It has nothing to do with sex…it's about power. Why else do they rape an 11 year old or even an 11 month old? It worries me to think that there are men out there like you mentioned…so in addition to fearing rapists and perverts, do women in India need to worry about men in general?
Psych Babbler, to answer your statements and questions.
Perhaps you are not one of these woman, but something that may frighten you more than knowing that most men have compound emotions about rape, is that most woman, also have compound emotions about rape. Perhaps the word "rape," in the last sentence could be substituted withe the word "sex." Perhaps, that would make the sentence more agreeable?
May I remind you that "rape" can be a highly fickle term. One moment, a woman may consider something rape, and the next it is not, or visa verse. Also, under exactly the same circumstances, one woman may consider an action rape, and another, not.
May I also remind you that it is solely the woman who defines something as, "rape" or "not rape;" the man has no say.
I'm curious . . . do you think that a woman who believes that she is entirely not responsible for being raped, is more or less likely to be raped, than someone who believes she has some control in the matter?
Modern day psychology's answer, that all rapes be attributed to a simple "need for power," was designed specifically to comfort woman who would like believe as you might, that woman should be absolved of all responsibility in "rape." A simple answer is easier for our justice system to handle, and easier for our psychologists to make money "helping" clients.
People rape for different reasons, just as people kill for different reasons. Any sane person would agree that it is acceptable to kill someone in self defense. All rapes, like all deaths, should not be clumped into a panacean culprit. You would be hard pressed to convince modern psychology, that most people who kill, kill because they solely in need of power. Many fight, or kill for money, their woman, country, of for defense. You will have some people who kill for power, as I'm sure you will have some who rape for power, but even proving a majority, would be difficult.
I'm not convinced that the majority of rapes occur solely because of a lack of sex, nor am I convinced that the majority of rapes occur because of a need for power, but I'm fully sure that not all rapes are solely because of a need for power.
This is one of many flaws, of modern day, American Psychology.
Rape is like miscarriage, there are a lot of emotions involved, but when playing the blame game, a clean and straight finger can rarely be pointed accurately.
Here is a great essay on the topic by Professors Randy Thornhill and Craig Palmer: http://iranscope.ghandchi.com/Anthology/Women/rap…
Erik,
Yes, that's exactly what I would have liked to state. People (especially in my knowledge, females) point out few exceptions where sexual attraction or more so provocation by the female would not have been responsible for rape to make a wide-sweeping judgment that sexuality is not in play. This I equate with people pointing out non-smokers who suffer from lung cancer to conclude that cigarette smoking has no role to play in the development of lung cancer. Just like lung cancer, driving forces for rape could be varied and would depend upon circumstances.
Bhagwad,
I must congratulate you for writing such an introspective post and also for its boldness. I cannot comment on the validity of your claim because I have not observed sufficient number of people nor have I asked them related questions. But from people's online behavior, I think there is one more factor there is so much moral or for that matter, any kind of outrage that is seen on such issues – faking it! I have seen there are some issues, where there is so much peer pressure to denounce it that people get overboard. You will not find people simply proclaiming that "this is a ghastly crime, it ought to be condemned", but there would be people coming up with suggestions of 'castration' and 'Bobbit-ing', etc. Such responses coming from females would be more understandable, because there would be some sense of insecurity that this might occur to them also. But still somehow I feel lot of words are wasted in trying to throw the best piece of literary prose to seem 'cool'. Perhaps, just like how you would stop when the potential victim would cry for help and would plead, you wold stop, I hope the very same people who talk of castration and Bobbit-ing would stop when the accused would do the same.
Perhaps, there is another kind of jealousy at play. If the victim would have been a beautiful person, and males would know/feel that her beauty had a role to play in her career-related success, then they might think in terms of "the bitch deserved it", meaning they wouldn't be sympathetic towards her. While, I do not know a rape victim in real life, I could see something analogous in in my final year exam, when a good looking girl who had in the many past occasions been given better marks than what others (& even I) thought she deserved simply for being good looking, had been flunked, most of the people (including girls) had ended up with this feeling of "bitch, she deserved it". I had caught myself thinking on the same lines. But it later turned out that she had cried before the examiner and used some of her contacts to have the result altered to emerge as the topper in that subject! ;)
So perhaps, one of the problems with our psychology is that when we start disliking a person, we tend to overlook that the pain they suffer might be disproportionate to what their mistakes (or undeserved advantages) were. E.g., the above girl, had indeed scored somewhat better than those more knowledgeable than her, but she was not so bad that she deserved to fail! Failure in the medical field is seen as a huge setback (most students would have been class toppers in their school days, etc., and plus also given the long career path involved), it would entail a minimum loss of 6 months. So most people overlooked this fact to start thinking that she 'deserved' to be flunked. It is this kind of jealousy that I am talking about (and thus is different from what you had indicated in your post).
Hmm – very interesting. I didn't think about that kind of jealousy. It sort of makes sense doesn't it?
@Psych Babbler
In my opinion, the feeling of outrage in men is generated only for those rapes involving a stranger and a young woman. I know that most rapes take place when the attacker is known to the woman, but these are not the rapes I'm talking about.
I'm talking about the sensational rapes that make it into the papers. It is for these that the involuntary reaction of jealously takes place.
And of course, there's no need to fear anyone because of this. One can't blame another for unconscious thoughts. If that were so, we would all be in the dock, men and women. Even the most puritanical person would never consent to have their thoughts and dreams broadcast on TV. We would all be executed for the hidden meaning of our dreams.
So we can't judge a person by their thoughts – only their actions.
A very interesting perspective you have :)
You are almost fully correct in what you wrote. All that you miss, is that emotion is not black or white, and that emotion can be conditioned in to, or out of us. Outrage, pity, jealousy, and disgust can be felt at the same time, for any action. What describes our emotions is very complex, however, most would agree that it is our actions that define who we are, not our thoughts or our feelings. We can be conditioned to feel different emotions at almost any age, which can affect our actions. See the movie "A Clockwork Orange." What makes a man, in our society, "good" is that he doesn't take action on raping a woman, ie . . . that's you. To your benefit, you have not been conditioned out of thinking about rape, or conditioned out of your honesty (many are conditioned out of being honest). What you feel inside, is purely instinctual, unless someone conditioned you into thinking about rape, which is very unlikey, if you are American.
The real question, is whether the truth that you speak of, is of benefit, or detriment, to everyone as a whole? The fatal flaw which causes the ignorance of so many, on so many topics, is that most people do not consider themselves to be animals . . . and consequently, they don't consider others to be animals either. You cannot understand human nature or what it is to be human, without understanding and giving credence to human instinct, nor can you understand humanity without understanding that genetics and environment contribute 50%, and that instinct, can be from either (though commonly used only in reference to genetic instinct).
Is is this same flaw, which is the cause of the religion of "Global Warming." People think they are removed from nature, but in fact, we are nature, as other living things. Fix this arrogant misconception, and you shall find so many answers, that others, truly cannot understand.
Perhaps, some of us are "animals" and some of us are not . . . whom are the ones to be corrected?
Eric, thanks for your thoughts! It's nice to hear a voice advocating the putting aside of moral judgment temporarily for the sake of the discussion :) .
Clockwork orange is one of those interesting movies where we're forced to decide if we merely want good behavior, or good thinking. In the case of Alex, his willingness to rape wasn't destroyed. Merely his ability to do so. But there's also a gap between thinking (or fantasizing about) something and the willingness to do it. How moral a person is depends on which stage it stops.
And while it's true we're part of nature, a large part of our angst arises from the fact that we are in fact separate from it at an intellectual level and there's no point denying it. Since man is more or less always battling nature (through medicines, roads, clothes and even brushing our teeth), it's hard to not think of nature as "the other" and while we may try and get close to it, we're never fully a part of it. Which is why man isn't at peace – and that's neither a good or bad thing. It's just the way we are.
Each individual is essentially alone no matter how hard we try and get close to others. And just as we can't fully merge with other people, we can never fully merge with nature either.
Just my thoughts on the subject..
Very profound, Bhagwad! Very impressed with your analysis of disconnect between 'nature' and 'what we want/ought to be' being the cause of suffering.
Now i know the male mentality and the truth behind why men sympathize with a rape victim (coz they are jelous of that they couldnt do it!) I thnx god for making me a lesbian.
Thx god i wont have to live with a man who feels like a rapist whenever he makes love to me.
Whoes main motive is to get sex out of me, even if he has to rape!
You said that men curse the rapist coz he got what he wanted, without the burden of courthship?
And to think many women enjoy these courtship things as romantic while all the time their 'lover' (?) is thinking "Oh what a fuck i have to do all these.If I could just rape her and get what i want then i wont have to play the romantic stupid actings"!
At least a woman really condemns a rape as a disgraceful thing and not becoz she couldnt do it herself.
Thats why i believe its better to be with a woman then a man coz you know what she feels coz the feelings and emotions are at least same and not fake.
You really never know whats inside a man unless you are not one.
And those women who appreciate rape fantacies i think arent woman at all. This is what happen when you live with a man-he makes you genderless, and you start thinking like him.
If she can have or appreciate a man's rape fantasy? You dont deserve to be calling yourself women then!
You cannot escape saying-"Oh boys will be boys" or ""men are like that, you cant do anything" of course i can do, and that is to stay away from as dirty thing as that for whom a rape is a fantasy or a thing to feel jelalous of . At least i wont be degrading myself by living with such a person who looks at me like an 'object' and not as a person.
Thnx for publishing the real thoughts you men have. At least you are not wearing the fake mask of a 'hero'.
"Men are never good.They are just big villians or small villians".
You must understand the way subconscious motivations work. Women have thoughts that are just as shameful as men which they wouldn't want brought out into the open. If I were to show you every little deep motivation of yours, you would cringe in shame.
There is no good or bad here. When dealing in psychology, you leave moral judgment behind. It's not a courtroom.
hey hey dont try to put your dirt on me okay.Its u people who are dirty.not us.I dont fantacise about rape or feel jelous of the rapist.For me rape is the most inhuman thing any person can do to other.So dont try to think that other people are also shitty and dirty like you.
I am not one of your women.And dont try to say that women also fantasies about rape.Haha what a joke! Its as stupid and vulgur and fake as to think that a man would fantacise about his dicks being cut off would he enjoy it!!!
.Dont bring women into your gutter.When you dont even know whats going in a woman's mind.She isnt dirty like you unless she is a whore made by you.
I really pity your girlfriend,wife,mother,sister if you have any.
When you come to Rape, Morality is the issue.And if its not issue then you are as bad as the rapist.
You cannot escape by saying that men are naturally like this or that.Men can control themselves if they want.But no. You always want to put the blame of your wrong doings on something. You are the one who are more favoured by nature then us, coz you can walk freely in night in street even with your upperu body naked without any tension of being raped.
But the women who suffers rape is like something you people can never understand.Why dont you go to a victim and ask her.All your theories would be useless to her.What she want is justice which is never given to her on time.
But you dont want it.All you want is fantacy, then why not label your site under Male Porn Rape Fantacies'.
You will get lots of moral support from your pals in here.If you want to lighten a major and heavy subject as rape then you should really start a pornographic site man.
But please stop using such a dirty thing as rape as a weapon to get cheap publicity (Like your pal Max Tucker)
Coz for a woman it can be worse then a nightmare.
I am talking about real women and not your porno stars.
AND I WOULD RATHER GIVE MY ARM, THEN GET RAPED
A woman's dignity is everything to her.more then her amr.more then anything.So stop putting your own thoughts by using fake female names.Man were you born out of two men? dont you have a mother?
Ask her what is a rape, she would tell you the right words for it.And believe me they wont be funny for your porn loving pals, they would be grave, and full of moral thinking and rechecking.
Rape is not funny, rape is not fantacy, rape is not excuseable, rape is painful, rape is degradation and complete devastation, more horrible then death for the victim.
You've ended up demonizing men, making sweeping generalizations and turning this into an "us" and "them" issue. Perhaps you need to see that you're not the spokesperson for all women here and neither am I the spokesperson for all men.
lezbereal, Let's be real? ;)
Bhagwad, I was going to respond to lezbereal above, good I didn't!
There are many who think that people are what they seem on the outside and that unconscious thoughts, desires and fantasies are examples of a perverse mindset. My post isn't targeted towards such people :)
Thank you for your courage to say something authentic and new. I am not here to agree or disagree with the jealousy angle. I’m going to have to think about it and get some more feedback. But I did want to respond on the issue of the etiology of rape. I’ve had several clients (I’m a forensic social worker) who are rapists and have had the need to research, reflect upon, and discuss the etiology of rape with my clients, psychologists, and attorneys. This is a complex topic and I don’t mean to oversimplify, but I bristle at the smugness of the current “conventional wisdom” that rape is NOT about sex. Right. I personally believe this derives from feminist politics about sex, which men have embraced with open arms because they’d RATHER rape be about power than about sex. In fact, I’ll bet that BOTH men and women would prefer rape to be about power and anger than about sex because, in my opinion, we are too embarrassed to confront the SEX in rape. Let’s be logical. If power and anger were the primary motives in a assault, why not simply injure or kill the woman, child or man? There are many types of crimes whose motivation is anger and the expression of dominance and power. (Shooting helpless animals, abusing children, beating one’s domestic parter, setting fires, racist acts etc.) But rape has the additional and significantly unique component of sex. This means, specifically, that the rapist gets sexual pleasure from the sex act, usually through ejaculation, which comprises a dopamine reward system. If we politicize our interpretation of rape by removing sex from it, then we will never understand it nor will we ever be able to prevent it. I believe that rape is about sex AND power, but what is also vital is what is ABSENT from this mix—i.e. intimacy. It is well-known that when sex is experienced in a context of a nurturing, committed relationship, vasopresin is released in the brain. Vasopresin is the neurochemical that leads to emotional bonding in men. A man could experience sexual pleasure with a component of dominance within an intimate relationship which is not a rape. So it is really not power that is pathological, nor is it sex. Rape, by common sense, is the use of force to obtain sexual pleasure, despite its adverse impact upon the sex object (not partner), and perhaps even BECAUSE of its adverse impact. In either case . . . we can’t take the sex out of it.
Oh yes I fully agree. Rape is more often than not about sex. And when a rape takes place after say for example a woman has turned down a man repeatedly I think it’s pretty clear that sex plays a huge role in the equation.
am sure u feel very jealous while u read in the newspapers about middle aged village women getting raped…..or 6 month old babies getting raped…….don’t know why I continually forget how pathetic and mindless the Indian male can be…..the fact that you seem to be educated and yet you try to justify jealousy and have people chiming in with approval and calling you bold shows how devastating the effects of male child preference in our country is.The typical Indian male is so self consumed and shielded that even his mother will defend him till death for committing rape
Rape has always been about power and always will be.If you are jealous of ugly filthy villagers and scoundrels getting away with rape then either you are too ugly to get laid or too poor to afford prostitutes.In India it is quite common to find a man with both the dilemmas.
I work for a non profit organization prior to which I was actively involved in covering the news of socially stigmatised victims in Pakistan and India.Heart breaking stories such as that of Mukhtaran Mai’s or poor dalit girl’s such as Bhagwanti , gang raped and left scarred for life,only leaves one to think how men perceive rape to be such a normal act,let alone an act of perverse pleasure which is in your case.
I still believe I haven’t lynched you enough.If you respect women at all don’t waste your time writing such pathetic articles again.
Please re-read the second paragraph of this post. You can comment again when you’re ready to discuss things with an open mind.
In fact, I suspect you haven’t read my entire post at all. Otherwise you wouldn’t have displayed your ignorance of what I’ve said. I don’t need moral lectures from you telling me about the situation or rape and women in the Indian subcontinent.
This post is a frank psychological examination. It’s like a scientific experiment. The fact that you can’t appreciate that speaks volumes of your mental maturity.
I think I understand what you’re saying about the formation of jealousy and “cutting the line” but would you think it fair that I think this would be the opinion of males that never had a personalized opinion of rape?
For example, in England most teenagers at the moment like to tell rape jokes. Obviously if ever they tell one of these jokes to a rape victim they victim becomes understandably upset, however I have noticed that any male who knows a victim of rape well, will also become disgusted by the joke.
I don’t believe this is out of jealousy, I believe its because they know the pain and suffering a rape victim undertook not only in the physical act but emotionally for many years after. I showed this article to a few males who knew victims and although they understood how other males who only saw rape as something that happened on the news could feel this, they could not. They said they felt this due to the fact that the rapist got what they wanted but its not a reciprocal sexual act and the emotional effects on the woman can change her life completely. After seeing how a rape victim changes after an attack being jealous of the attacker is like being jealous of a mugger, they didn’t have to work for the money they stole but the person who was robbed is not only out of pocket, they may now be frightened to walk alone.
I think when someone has no “name to a face” and so see rape as an act that happens to someone else it is hard to comprehend the implications of rape and how extreme it can get. It can then seem like “just another crime” and then, like you said ” The moment I view her as a sexual object, rape doesn’t become something I abhor.”
Actually rape fantasy is common in both male and female sexuality. This however, is wildly different from actually committing a rape and does not in any way mean a woman would enjoy being raped. (sideline: this is generally why blaming the victim makes absolutely no sense as rape means the act was unwilling, if it were consensual it wouldn’t BE rape, it would be sex) so when you state “I’m pretty sure I can’t commit a rape.” I think you’re absolutely right. The article you have written, to me, shows the feelings of a a large proportion of perfectly normal human beings.
Thanks for that insightful commentary Apple. I realize of course that rape is terribly traumatic and my article in no way means to diminish the truth of that. It’s just that sometimes your reactions to something are contradictory and that’s what psychology is all about I guess.
It’s very clear to me that you don’t know anyone on a personal level who was the victim of rape. Rape is a very personal crime. It affects the victim, her family, her boyfriend/husband, and will have an impact on all of her future relationships and interactions with others. It will impact her day to day life, her sleeping and eating habits, her ability to cope with stress, with life, to succeed in work or school, to form new relationships, and her ability to trust in others. If someone were bit by a rabid animal, the animal would be found and put down for the safety and well being of the public. This is not the case for rapists, many of which go unreported and unprosecuted for their crimes. The “shit happens” mentality is part of what allows these events to continue happening.
You say that men who express “moral outrage” are in reality feeling jealousy. Clearly they have never experienced sexual assault or rape either personally or through a friend, family member, or lover. I do not think anyone who has ever been touched by the effects of rape would say that they are “jealous” of the rapist. As the other poster said, it is like being jealous of a mugger. It makes no sense.
I got the impression that you genuinely do not understand the effects or consequences of rape and its impact not only on the victims but upon society. You said that the women you talked to would much rather be raped than lose a limb. Many victims are in fact suicidal after rape. That is, they would rather kill themselves than go through the physical, social, and psychological trauma that occurs following rape.
true kathryn. i guess this guy bhagwat doesn’t understand the point that most of rapes happen under the threat of death and where a woman’s physical weakness is exploited. I come from armed forces background and i know for a fact that how does so called manly guys react when under the threat of a brutal death. most of them shit in their pants. I want to see this guy under the same situation going through a rape under a knife and then i would love to analyze his psychology and fantasies with him. he is just a sick bastard who is pretending to be an intellectual.
Just to give another possible explanation for the comparison of a young woman and an old lady. This may not necessarily due to jealousy. I think it is more because of perceived damage. We subconciously assume that there might more damage done to the young woman, because again we perceive that the young woman may have a higher value/status. Like for example, she has got more years to her life, more things to experience etc and now she will have to face trauma. Whereas, in the case of old lady we think that since she is already near the end of life, so less damage done. It is the same case when we hear the case of a young man dying and an old man dying, we feel more for the young man. And similarly, we also feel greater outrage when a baby is sexually assaulted compared to a young woman. This I dont think could be to jealousy, because I dont think we are more attracted to a baby than to a young lady. Same argument for the case of a higher class woman and lower class. Now, im not saying that it is justified to feel less outrage for the cases of older women, lower class women etc. Just stating my opinion that maybe that is how our judgement works subconciously…..
Interesting viewpoint. It might be that as well. Though if a baby is raped, the quality of outrage is different. It’s a feeling of sickness, or disgust…not the peculiar quality of outrage that accompanies other rapes.
I would like to add few more things to “jealousy disguised as moral outrage” to the response of men to rape. It sounds true that we often feel pity about those cases in which a young women is raped rather than any rape case involving elderly women but the moral outrage response also springs up from a sense of insecurity and fear about the society and surrounding we live in. A sub-conscious fear that many of us may feel that same may happen with our sister,girlfriend, wife also is one of the factor for such outrage. we feel intimidated that we can’t leave our sisters,girlfriend ,wife alone . I think this is also one of the common reason behind our outrageous reaction to news of rape.
Bhagwat, i would really like you facing some goons with knives out …on your throat asking you to undress and do whatever they want to do with you. i want to see how would you react in this situation and where does this pseudo-male-mentality go over there. i have been in a situation where i faced some real aggression that could have left me dead although it was not of a sexual nature. i want to see how manly-jealous you feel when you go through a real raw act of aggression. i bet, that you would willingly put your pants down under such an attack and will ask for mercy. i really want to see you go through that buddy and then we can have a psychological analysis purely on a academic basis. Rape is an act of aggression which by accident have anything to do with genders or sex. with your kind of over-weight body type and subtle ironic smile, i really want to know how would you react under a knife. i bet, you going to piss in your pants.
My article wasn’t meant for people who react like you do.
On second thoughts, even before i read your response, i was of view that i prolly over-reacted. I may have and i accept the point. But i didn’t mean to get it personal against you and that’s really not the point. Well, somehow i feel very strongly about this issue and NO its not because of jealousy. I am not jealous of any guy who physically over-powered an unwilling girl and has his way with her among cries and all that that ugly human expressions. I cant even believe, someone can be although i know few of the guys out there, really are. You know, the freedom to be what you want to be and do as you want to do is much more precious than we normally think and mostly we take it for granted, until something happens that takes that freedom away from you. When that happens, something changes inside you forever. You stop trusting life and this world. You lose a part of your self-belief and along with that you lose the singularity and purity of your aspirations and dreams. life cease to be 100%. You cease to be 100% yourself. Its much more complicated than your dry so called academic analysis. What angered me most was the callousness with which you explained that ordeal called rape and try to define it with some psychological mumbo-jumbo. forget about rape, let me give you another example of freedom stolen and someone else’s “Will” inforced upon you. Lets say, you got caught up in a police lock-up without any fault of yours. They are beating you to no end and asking you to accept a crime you never committed. The experience is downright humiliating and you feel utter helpless. You know, whats going to happen, you will follow exactly as they will ask you to do. You will do it because, you know you cant help it and you will try to save as much as you can of a piece of your future or your life. you will be a changed person after such an experience and that change wont be a positive change. trust me on that. Rape, by all means is an act of brutality. Its no different than anything other crime where someone does something for his or her own benefit with no regards to other’s well-being. Its criminal by all means and ends. Now, how does Guys react to a rape reported depends on their own sanity or the lack of it. How can you feel jealous of a goon beating some helpless weak guy on road? do you? how can you feel jealous of a man who has stolen something from someone? do you? if you do, then there is something wrong with you. How can you feel jealous with a man who scarred a girl for all her life by raping her? do you?
let me give you a rather personal account of reality and may be the reason i feel so violently about this issue. I am an armed forces officer. A decorated one on top of that. I mean, i carry the formal credentials of being a brave man, is at all there is some way to authenticate it.
I was 15 years old, 10th standard school going boy. there was a stretch of deserted and densely forested land of around 10 sq kms in my home-town. It was favorite hang-out of me and my friends. it was a place where we can be ourselves and steal an occasional smoke and other taboo things. This incident happened when i reached earlier and i was alone waiting for a friend to turn up. its was 7 pm or so and it was already dark. That place was also a favorite place for young couples who wanted to steal a moment of privacy. So there was on young couple at some distance from me. A group of 10 men or so barged in to those couples of privacy and i saw the guy with that girl running away after few mins. he just ran for his life. Then i saw those guys dragging the girl to some distance to a place hidden among few trees and bushes. i saw her trying to struggle and i saw her trying to cry out. i was shocked to react. After few mins i went near to the place where they took that girl. I saw her lying naked on bare ground like an animal and one guy raping her and others drinking around them, waiting for their turn. i can feel the expression on her face ..She felt my presence too. i kind of shouted something. The next moment those guys were standing in front of me wielding knives at me. one guy almost made a thrust at me, seriously trying to wound me. and then me, i ran for my life as well. i can hear the muted cries of that girl but 15 years old me was too scared to do anything. Although being a 3 party in that incident and all of them being a stranger to me, that incident never left my sub-conscious mind. it still lingers around deep in some hidden corner of my mind and it shouts at me time and again and it shouts “coward”. it also changed my perspective of life forever and fundamentally. once in a while, i still cry alone thinking about that incident. i cry for my cowardice. i cry for helplessness of that girl and of life in general. i cry in anger and angst. since then, i did many deeds which can classify me as a brave man. may be somewhere in someway it was a response to that incident. The point is – that experience changed me and it never left me. IT NEVER LEAVES YOU. its still there with me and i never gained my complete faith in this world and in people after that. Now think about that girl. what would happened to her Psychology? i cant even think about that, forget about rationalizing. Now, you made a point somewhere that why dont me make a moral issue when someone disembered a woman. why only rape to call for such an moral outrage. Well, we men only put women on pedestal in many ways. As mothers, sisters wives we want them to be holier than thou. we need this. Thats how a woman’s modesty becomes a precious thing for her and for the society at large. Now that’s a different thread of discussion but its society which makes a woman – woman. its more about conditioning.
I will ask you to read a book by a famous contemporary american write Alice Sebold. peter jackson of Lord of the rings – making movies of every book of her. Read a memoir by her, a true story. its called – Lucky. the book is famous for its searing and candid and honorable narration of being a rape victim. read it if you can handle it. its too honest and true that it almost physically hurt you. and yes, its also an excellent analysis of psychology of rape, which seems to amuse you.
I don’t emphatically agree with your position Bhagwad, but I can see your thought process. I would say there are grains of truth. Like a poor man who is jealous of a rich man, so a non-rapist is of a rapist perhaps on some level.
I would posit from experience that everyone deals differently with the emotions and thoughts that go into seeing, experiencing, or committing such an act. I do not agree as many would posit that such an act as rape is all power, or must be experienced to be understood. Each thing is a separate thing unto itself, and in each situation one must ask “What is its nature?”
For some viewing a rape, it would be disgust, others glee, and the rest a mingling of lurid trepidation, like watching an accident; they can’t help but hurt for that person, feel glad it’s not them, but also yearn to see and experience vicariously.
In the end I don’t believe it is all one thing. Some people rape for power, some for sex, some because the Easter bunny told them too. Whatever the reason, we cannot define it by one thing alone, be it jealousy, power, gender. It is an act, abhorrent as it may be to many, that has historical, pyscological, and sociological implications. If one cannot view it with its myriad of facets, like a piece of ‘Fools Gold’, then what is the point of morality, ethics, or society for that matter? The reasoned thought is paramount to the subject at hand.
-N.
There is this article by BY RANDY THORNHILL AND CRAIG T. PALMER about Why Men Rape. They say rape is a reproductive strategy exercised by defranchised males across all species who would otherwise not have access to females. Read it. Maybe the jealousy thing is couched into some bigger meaning
And if all the people you talked to, were jealous maybe they could all be defranchised males who cannot gain access to women by their looks, money or social standing. No self respecting man who can woo a woman would feel this way. I don’t know how you picked your sample but you talked to a lot of wrong people and then wrote an article based on that. Try talking to people who are comfortable with women and then write a balanced article.
And if all the people you talked to, were jealous maybe they could all be defranchised males who cannot gain access to women by their looks, money or social standing. No self respecting man who can woo a woman would feel this way. I don’t know how you picked your sample but you talked to a lot of wrong people and then wrote an article based on that. Try talking to people who are comfortable with women and then write a balanced article. This a a very serious issue. Please don’t trivialize this.
Jealousy may play a role in the moral outrage. But something you said was very jarring to me.
“Men feel jealous of rapists, because they got sex outright without having to go through the tedious channels of courtship that most of us have to go through.”
This made me think that jealousy is not the reason. Perhaps it is because a woman’s virginity is valued above many other things. If she is not a virgin, perhaps it is because a man’s “property” (his wife) has been disparaged, the idea that a man has “trespassed” on another man’s property. Perhaps certain emotions are elicited when one thinks of how this could happen to his own wife. If she was no man’s wife and she was not a virgin, most people would think of her as less of a victim, even though this line of thinking is deeply flawed. This is assuming that women are seen as objects. If the man has any decency at all, then the mere thought of his daughter, mother, sister, etc. being raped should elicit some form of anger or disgust, as abhi mentioned in an earlier post.
It seems like an unspoken belief that women should not enjoy sex (or at least show that they do), in public that is. Would not a woman be called a slut if she openly expressed that she loved sex? It is quite undignified even in my opinion as a woman. Perhaps the moral outrage comes from the “dirtying” of the innocent. If a woman’s virginity or a man’s exclusive possession of her sexuality is not so valued, then why else would men be willing to endure those “tedious channels of courtship” of which you speak?
It is also my understanding that healthy men want reciprocally loving relationships. Perhaps this belief is much too idealistic. I am not sure if the “tedious courtship” that you mention is referring to arranged marriage. Arranged marriages, in my opinion, are not representative of truly loving relationships in most cases, but it still should not drive a man to rape a woman. Rapists are seen as ugly, desperate scumbags. I do not think any man with a healthy mind would wish to be a rapist in real life. Fantasies are okay as long as they are not put into action.
In love, one would not think about building a relationship as a “tedious courtship.” If it is true love and not lust, then courting would be enjoyable, would it not? If it is not, then we know all you want is the sex.
That’s quite insightful, especially the part about a non virgin, non attached woman being viewed as “less than a victim” on a visceral level.