Is rape an evolved mating adaptation?

I want your honest opinions here. Please read the following link about why men rape.

http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/features/why-men-want-to-rape...

I will be honest. The thought that this might be true is freeing. I am recovering from multiple rapes throughout my life. For the past 24 hours I have been very sick. I have been retraumatized and now I am trying to get centered to where I feel safe again. I don't feel safe right now. I want to know why so many men have raped me. Why??? So I just googled "why men rape" and I found this article. It seems like a theory that has been dismissed, yet it is the first time I have ever read that rape is an evolutionary adaptation to mating. Do you realize how freeing this is for me????? If this is true then it really does mean that 1. I am truly NOT to blame, and 2. I am not a "victim" of violence. I know that probably doesn't make sense to you, but in a twisted sort of way it gives me my power back to accept that the men who have hurt me throughout my life.....all of them....were doing so because of an evolutionary drive, not because there was or is anything wrong with ME!

For years I have been told that MY boundaries are weak. And I am sure (I know) this is true. But I am not any more "weak" or "soft" than many women, and I am sick of racking my brain trying to figure out what I did wrong and how to "fix" myself. What if I don't need fixing? What if I am just fine? What if WE need to take a look as a society to realize our own understanding of rape is incomplete? I understand the worry that sex offenders will use this defense to their benefit, but the current judicial system here in the U.S really does no justice. Rapists are rarely prosecuted anyway. What if it REALLY is not my fault.....but furthermore.....what of there isn't a DAMN thing wrong with me?

Do you think rape is an evolved adaptation as this article suggests? Or is it an act of violence as we have always been told? Or am I just too fucked up to know what I'm saying right now? I am sick, and tired, and I am afraid to face the world, because I don't feel safe at all. So I don't know if anyone even can identify with me. I don't know.

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Permalink Reply by Simon Paynton on April 25, 2014 at 6:49am

How about this analogy?  I don't mean this to sound terrible, as things often do when talking about this subject. 

When you go out for the evening, you wouldn't leave your front door open, because there are burglars around.  But sometimes they break in anyway.  Similarly, women need to take some care to protect themselves from burglars. 

Men don't have to worry about this at all.  It's not part of our landscape in any way. 

Permalink Reply by Simon Paynton on April 25, 2014 at 1:42pm

I'm not talking about being provocative, I'm talking about basic security and saying safe. 

Easier said than done. 

Permalink Reply by Jimmy Russell on April 26, 2014 at 8:05pm

I try to explain to people that there are 3 ways of approaching a situation or a problem.  How you want it to be, how it should be, and how it is.  What you are explaining here pretty much is the same.  Dave Chappelle has an analogy in his Killing them Softly stand-up where he explains it like this here .  I recommend the whole bit but you can fast forward to about 7:30.  

Permalink Reply by Dustin on May 26, 2014 at 8:24pm

I think it goes back to a lot of women wanting equal rights without equal responsibilities.  

Permalink Reply by _Robert_ on April 25, 2014 at 7:45am

When I was about 25 I realized I had to break free of everybody I knew. I left the old hood and associated only with educated, positive people. People who believe rape, drug use, and abuse should not be a way of life. It has made all the difference. Nobody's perfect, but if you associate with bad examples, (either to help them or because of love) well..there you have it.

-And I am not just talking about "friends". I had to get away from family members too. I was accused of thinking that I was too good for them. First smart thing they ever said to me.

Permalink Reply by Reg The Fronkey Farmer on April 25, 2014 at 8:25am

No woman should ever be viewed as being available for rape. That is not the way to look at it. It does not matter where you are, what you are doing or what you are wearing. Rape is first and foremost a violent act. It is a physical assault.

The majority of rapes are not because the man assumed “I thought she wanted sex”. They are not provoked in any way by the victim. They are usually committed by persons known to the victim and the act is more one of dominance than of sex. They are only committed by men who have no respect for women. That is not a fault of evolution but of individuals (or societies) that do not cherish such principles. I do agree it is a more complex issue than my few sentences. We need to remember that rape is not just a women’s issue. We are all responsible, maybe men even more so, to recognise rape for what it is – a crime of violence against women where no excuses or justification is tolerated. Only when we all take action will attitudes change.

Permalink Reply by onyango makagutu on April 25, 2014 at 9:02am

There is nothing I can say to make you feel safe or to take the experience away but all I hope for is it doesn't happen to you ever again. There are many ways to dominate and degrade another and rape I think comes very high on the list.

Be well

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on April 26, 2014 at 4:27am

But feminism, with its pie-in-the-sky fantasies about the perfect world, keeps young women from seeing life as it is.

Paglia's remarks are worth a listen, but during the Equal Rights Amendment ratification campaign I met a few hundred feminists and they were not in a pie-in-a-sky world.

They were getting out of such worlds and many were angry with their mothers for living in someday-there-will-be-pie-in-my-sky fantasies.

The world Paglia had lived in may have been more awful than the world of the feminists she criticizes. In time she will, if she hasn't already, cool off and make more accurate statements.

Permalink Reply by Jesse Selasi on April 25, 2014 at 3:27pm

Whatever article that is i would not waste my time reading it. I am thinking its some kind of justification for this unwholesome act. Rape no matter what is wrong and you are not to blame for the acts of a socially derailed human being, Anything that happens against your will is wrong and feeling guilty for it for me somehow justifies the act. I don't think you will agree with any theory trying to justify why people for instance would like to kill even if there is a proven theory. The idea of being "weak" and "soft" is a socially manufactured perception, you are as capable and strong as your male counterparts. 

Permalink Reply by Unseen on April 25, 2014 at 5:12pm

She's a classics professor, if I remember right. Or was. I'm unsure. Anyway, she's more qualified than most to make a statement like that and if you were to read her works, like Sexual Personae, you'd probably get your answer in there somewhere. 

Anyway, are you a big fan of Rousseau? I'm not sure I could tell anyone what his views were.

She's for realistically educating women, too, rather than teaching them to expect the world to nice and kind even when it's not, so I would imagine you'd find her a kindred spirit.

Permalink Reply by Michael on May 30, 2014 at 9:02pm

Rousseau's view can be summed up as: "Humans are born good, and made evil by society." Anyone who accepts biological factors in rape must disagree on that score, as Paglia does.

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on April 26, 2014 at 4:33am

Jesse, I read the article and agree with your conclusion about it's being a justification.

In another post here I said those two researchers owe their readers a study of rapists, who might well be men most women would find not suitable as fathers.

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