Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site calmasd.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!prls!amdimage!amdcad!decwrl!decvax!ittatc!dcdwest!sdcsvax!sdcc3!sdcc6!calmasd!tami From: tami@calmasd.UUCP (Tami Morse) Newsgroups: net.women Subject: Re: Re: Re RAPE, etc.../ "understanding" horrible behavior and people Message-ID: <525@calmasd.UUCP> Date: Thu, 8-Aug-85 20:55:20 EDT Article-I.D.: calmasd.525 Posted: Thu Aug 8 20:55:20 1985 Date-Received: Mon, 12-Aug-85 06:40:01 EDT References: <739@udenva.UUCP> <540@hou2g.UUCP> <3014@hplabsb.UUCP> <6443@ucla-cs.ARPA> <1698@mnetor.UUCP> Reply-To: tami@calmasd.UUCP (Tami Morse) Organization: Calma Company, San Diego, CA Lines: 50 In article <1698@mnetor.UUCP> sophie@mnetor.UUCP (Sophie Quigley) writes: > >I personally don't think there is anything wrong with trying to >understand what goes on through a rapist's mind. I think it is an >obsolutely necessary pursuit in order to stop rape. > ... >The best work on rape that I have seen so far has been Susan >Brownmiller's book, which she wrote already 10 years ago, I believe. >The title is something like "men, women, and rape". > Susan Brownmiller's book is called "Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape", and it is a very good analysis of the societal bases for rape. > >By the way, my opinion (and that of quite a few feminists) is that rape >is not a personal problem of a few individuals with a distorted world >view, but a deep societal problem of the inequality between the sexes. >Society will have to be cured if we want the individuals cured. Another good book that answers to this and also the observation that we need to understand what goes on in a rapist's mind to end rape once and for all is the book 'Men and Rape' (I've forgotten the author's name), in which a man interviews other men on the subject of rape. The interviewees include rapists and men whose SOs have been raped, as well as men who had had no such direct contact with rape. One of the most striking (to me) interviews was with a male file clerk who felt women used their good looks to make men feel powerless. He watched women in the office where he worked come in dressed up and looking good, and flirting with the more powerful men there, totally ignoring him. The sense I got was of frustration and powerlessness, and he said it made him so mad that he might very well rape. This isn't a personal problem, this is a societal one -- a matter of class distinctions, women as status objects, sexual baiting in a professional environment... As long as power is an aphrodisiac, as long as sex is a valid way for women to improve their positions in life and more effective than ways that are more personally rewarding, as long as women are seen on any level as prizes to be claimed, rape will exist. Sorry to get so preachy, I just got carried away. Anyway, check out these two books; they are enlightening. >-- >Sophie Quigley >{allegra|decvax|ihnp4|linus|watmath}!utzoo!mnetor!sophie Tami Morse G.E. Calma Co., San Diego, CA {ihnp4,decvax,ucbvax}!sdcsvax!calmasd!tami