Wednesday, July 20, 2011

"Rape for Men"

This started out as a comment - but I think it's too long.

It's in response to Ozymandias post at her blog: Myth of Male Power Rant

In her post, Ozy calls Warren Farrell (the founder of modern masculism) out for drawing an analogy between some things that happen to men and the rape that women experience.
I have to say, although I don't worship Warren Farrell as some sort of masculist god, this post raises my hackles a little bit.
Also, I haven't read the entirety of "MoMP" so judge me accordingly.

Warren writes from a position that many men who were raised in progressive circles in the 1970s and 1980s can relate to - and those men, like me, often view rape as a relatively unique violation that only women can be victimized by.
(Obviously: We are quickly learning that the number of male rape victims is greater than we suspected - so our views are changing.)

But with (the false, yet thoroughly ingrained mindset that) rape, being a violation only women can experience, it is a useful analogy for men to use to examine their own violation.

Most young men who grew up in the 70s and 80s view the violent rape (date or stranger) as one of the most heinous crimes imaginable. Many would kill anyone who did that to a woman they care about. We see rape as a unique, grotesque violation of that which we love - women.

By the same token, we were still taught that we, men, could not be victims. Either we deserve what we get, or we should've been strong enough to fight off our attackers.

I think what Warren was trying to do here was to use the visceral reaction we have of rape as a unique crime against women - and attempt to draw some line of similarity between these two gender-based injuries.

Ozy, if you subscribe to the oppressive concept of women as "sex objects" and men as "success objects" then I can perhaps help you see where I'm coming from:
If a woman's worth is seen as a "sex object" then to "violate" her in only a way that she can be violated is to take/use/destroy her sexuality and sexual agency. Rape, disfigurement (acid splashes and box-cutters) and genital mutilation are some common ways of doing this - I think we all agree here.
But the flip side is what I think you are misunderstanding from Warren's point of view. If a man's worth is seen as a "success object" then to "violate" him in only a way that he can be violated is to take/use/destroy his ability to provide for his family or himself.

In this gender concept, women who use child support systems to take wealth from the man are a form of "gender identity violation." When women encourage men to "rape them" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4hNaFkbZYU&feature=player_embedded) they are asking a man to engage in behavior that could put him in jail, ruining his reputation, ending his career and destroying his ability to perform as a "success object."
Child support can be $800 a month. That's $172,000 over 18 years going towards a woman and her child who should've used a sperm donor but who decided to be deceptive.
I know men who'd rather be raped by a stranger than pay $172,000 that they may never even be able to earn.

Men and women who grow up identifying their self worth in either their sexiness or wealth have different vulnerabilities - that is the point that Warren Farrell was trying to get across.

We can either divorce our genders from these notions of sex and success - or recognize that men have a unique way of being injured that women experience through sexual violation.

7 comments:

  1. You know, I disagree with that simply because (as far as I know) men forced to pay child support do not suffer from PTSD, high rates of alcohol and drug abuse, flashbacks, suicide, depression, eating disorders, sleep disorders, etc., at anywhere near the rate that rape survivors do. Which suggests that rape, as a violation of one's bodily integrity, is actually far more horrific than being made to pay child support or any of the other things Warren Farrell compared it to, and the comparison is therefore insulting to rape survivors.

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  2. Ozy, thanks for stopping by.

    I completely agree that rape is a far more damaging crime, both physically and psychologically.

    But which crime is more damaging - that's just oppression olympics, isn't it?

    When we talk about types of oppression - you have to admit some things hit closer to home based on the way you are raised and socialized.

    Which specific type of crime hurts more, causes more damage isn't the point the point of Warren's use of the word rape was to show that it is a violation that cuts to the core of the person's self-value.

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  3. Also:
    Which suggests that rape, as a violation of one's bodily integrity, is actually far more horrific than being made to pay child support or any of the other things Warren Farrell compared it to, and the comparison is therefore insulting to rape survivors.
    We don't consider it an insult to FGM survivors when we fight against Circumcision, do we? Isn't this a non-zero-sum game?

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  4. You have an interesting blog that is for sure (liked the Elevatorgate posts also).

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  5. Very interesting post. It helped give me a different perspective regarding men as success objects. I do have one nit-picky thing to mention. In your post, you said,
    We see rape as a unique, grotesque violation of that which we love - women. This quote assumes that all men love women. As a blogger who addresses feminist topics, I'm sure you can deduce the reason for mentioning this.

    @Ozy: I would be interested to see statistics for both "male rape" (men faced with financially supporting unwanted childen without shared custody) and traditional female rape. Though the post mainly dealt with the financial aspects of male rape, I believe there are quite a few non-monetary effects as well, including becoming a father, being separated from one's children, and entering an 18-year long relationship (for lack of a better term) with your child's mother, who you may have only wanted to be in contact with for one evening. Men faced with these situations, over the course of so many years, might develop many issues, including some of the effects of rape you mentioned earlier.

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  6. OZY, do you numbers to back your statement? A rape is a one time act, 18 years of frustration allows a lot of time for "PTSD, high rates of alcohol and drug abuse, flashbacks, suicide, depression, eating disorders, sleep disorders, etc.," has anyone even bothered to look? Is this another incidence where no one really cares what happens to men.

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  7. Well, the wife pointed out my bias this morning. I said that "men love women" and excluded gay men. But not only that - there's more to it.

    It's important to remember that some men actually hate women. I forget that sometimes. That's my blind spot.
    It's easy for me to remember that some women love men (I'm married to one.) It's easy for me to remember that some women hate men (I run into them on Feminist sites with some regularity.) It's easy for me to know that some men love women (I AM one!)
    But that some men HATE women - I have to remember that. It's easy to forget that a whole group of people exist - when you wish they didn't.
    *I'm using "love" above as agape, not romantic love.

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