Actually, the only thing that makes me consider rape to be as awful as it is IS the possibility of life, and also STDs. In of itself, while it can be fairly painful, is not that much of a big deal. Certainly, it's trespassing against your property and could result in great bodily harm, and you have the right to defend yourself, but mostly it's psychologically damaging more than anything else. I'm always very skeptical of women who claim they were raped- especially to completion- because it is actually extremely difficult to rape a struggling, dry woman. Now, if there's a weapon involved I could see why a woman might not resist, but for the most part I think that if a woman regrets having sex, she thinks it was rape.
I'm always very skeptical of women who claim they were raped- especially to completion- because it is actually extremely difficult to rape a struggling, dry woman. Now, if there's a weapon involved I could see why a woman might not resist, but for the most part I think that if a woman regrets having sex, she thinks it was rape.
And there's lots more where that came from. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
because old bad ideas always serve someone's self-interest...
I'll bet a quarter -- no a whole dollar -- that those words were written by a guy, and that the guy who wrote them has never been raped. though it could also be a woman "talking tough" or trying to overcome her own fears by making light of them. but I have known enough women who survived being raped, and the aftereffects they lived with for years, to know that "no big deal" is hardly an accurate description for most.
it's as transparent as the old doctrine that the Darkies are differently made from you and me, and their simple minds and strong backs make it no hardship for them to sweat and slave in the fields under the blazing sun. or that "they just don't feel these things the way we do" so they don't care when we tear their children from their arms and sell them downriver. it's no big deal.
someone else's pain is always "no big deal" when we want to exonerate ourselves from our share of the responsibility for it...
having said this, it is somewhat difficult for a man to rape a struggling and determined woman of roughly equal weight, who has the will and determination to fight it out. but most women are not trained in physical fighting -- they don't teach wrestling, boxing, or tackle football to girls in most schools -- many women don't expect to be hit or hurt and go into shock/fear at the first blow or threat. this "freeze-up" and confusion gives the deliberate and premeditated attacker a decisive advantage. most women are also incredibly squeamish about hurting anyone else, physically. I remember taking a basic self-defence course for women, many years ago, through a City program; the hardest thing for most of the students was to be able to imagine themselves actually hitting another person, to get past the horror of "not being nice." this may be less true today with more tough-girl media role models, female martial artists, etc. widening the envelope of acceptable female behaviour.
other solutions that rapists often adopt to make it safer and easier to appropriate another person's body: getting the woman drunk to slow her reflexes and muddle her thinking, or drugging her (roofie rape), or talking her into "bondage play" so as to tie her up first; picking on women who are markedly weaker and smaller than the predator; brandishing a weapon; threatening to harm the woman's children. ganging up (hunting in pairs or groups) is a disturbingly common tactic. all of which shows that despite the persistence of fairly marked sexual dimorphism in late model humans, the average rapist is a coward as well as a jerk.
more later -- many interesting points are being raised here which I think could with a little effort be separated out into distinct topics. law, ethics, culture, nature/nurture debates all come into play as we approach the vexed topic of sex and power.
btw, speaking of power, male prerogative, female inability to negotiate sexual terms, etc, dryness does nothing to prevent intromission or apparently to reduce male satisfaction. a woman can be raped without lubrication, as can a man; it just hurts a lot more.
perhaps the fundamental challenge of human sexuality is its inherent asymmetry: a "functional" man can, if he chooses and can get away with it, get genuine physical pleasure and orgasm from acts which hurt or injure the other person. although 2nd wave feminists staunchly insisted that "rape is violence, not sex," the uncomfortable truth is that -- if we accept e.g. tyronen's assertion that "sex" for men begins and ends with physical stimulation and the use of another person's body for same, regardless of intimacy, trust, respect, affection and all that "feminised" stuff -- then for the successful rapist, rape is perfectly good sex. does the exchange of money really solve this problem? I wonder. The difference between theory and practise in practise ...
