Female sexuality

[Monkeytrousers]

hello and welcome

Hi MT
Did you not see Olivia Judson (Dr Tatiana) on that C4 series Gene Farm, was it? Where they looked at genetic engineering eg in food production? And C4 also did an all-singing, all-dancing adaptation of her book, with her as Dr T. Not very good though!!!

Wondering if anyone's interested in evolution of the sexes and sexual dimorphism - ie, why there are two sexes. I know some people find it too far removed from humans in the here and now, but it's what got me to understand the whys and wherefores of sexual differences.

I suppose this is the crux of the matter in many ways ie how many of us accept the influence of our evolutionary past and connection to other life on this planet and how many of us want humans to be treated as pretty much totally different from other species.

Got sick granson here today so may have to disappear suddenly at any time. Also had little sleep as grown son with problems needed deep and meaningful conversation with mother into the wee small hours of the morning.

I'm at work today too - temping - nothing exciting!

What I need is a laptop!!

Madamez: ".....men's pathological desire to control women's sexuality?"

This is, I think, what ultimately puts humans in a different category to other species.
In other species, though reproductive success can lead to the sexes being at least sometimes at odds with each other (ie what's good for the goose is not necessarily good for the gander as far as sex and reproduction goes), with human societies and cultures the human male was able to control reproduction in ways beyond what males of other species could possibly do.

This is at least something to do with the particular 'burden' of reproduction on human females and the need for males to be involved in parenting.

Have to go.

But this point is something that both feminism and evolutionary theory can both concur, in fact evolutionary theory goes further and tells us why this happens. Up until now, that it happens has been a given, and feminism has generally asked how could this happen. The 'how' and the 'why' are very complementary though; the 'why' a technical scientific question, the 'how' a political question - feminism and evolutuionary theory are actually very good bedfellows!

compatible bedfellows

Etin - on evolution of two sexes - I had thought that the theory on this was that sexual reproduction encourages genetic mutation to occur, which in turn allows adaptation to environment?

OBM I agree. I was driven mad during the porno thread with the desire for a quiet rational discussion of the issues, but now that we've got one it's really not as much fun as a big old bunfight.

I think the Lucyellensmum's rape question has a lot of potential though.

So why do we think men are driven to rape? Is it:

a)Male desire to assert dominance over women, driven by their desire to control female sexuality in the face of the eternal uncertainty over paternity.

b) Male desire to assert dominance over other males through male rape(see Human Rights Watch website on this if you are feeling strong enough), and through rape of females perceived to "belong" to other men (see hrw website again re rape during war)

c)A by-product of the fact that testosterone affects both aggression and sexual drive, so that the two are inextricably linked

d)A by-product of the "pornification" of society in which men are encouraged to indulge their sexually violent fantasies

Or do all these factors play parts to varying degrees depending on circumstances? (please don't say yes!)

yes

Oh I was going to say that.

Great.

So, which is your favourite muppet then?

I always liked gonzo but I've been reading such terrible things on mumsnet about his porn career.

tho suspect others will disagree.

and actually am not up to speed with the testosterone sciency bit enough to agree with utter conviction, but it sounds .. more than possible.

is the speed and extent that we think culture has been pornificateratified (which i do), equal to the speed and extent to which rape figures have risen?

Again, don't know enough about the stats for this one, and presumably it's imposs to prove. But again, sounds .. more than possible.

lol kittock.
equally I heart Animal, then heard terrible things about his farm on MN

I like pornificateratified.

You don't hear that word enough.

The whole show was a nest of depravity.

OBM - Have been skimming through various home office reports on rape figures.

Like you say obm interpreting rape figures does seem a rather complicated business.
Reported rape figures have increased fourfold between 1985 and 1999, so this could correspond to the pornography explosion. However, there doesn't seem to be a consensus on how far this reflects a actual rise in rape as opposed to a rise in reporting.

The common perception 20 years ago was that rape was something that strangers did to you in dark alleys. You couldn't report that your husband had raped you because marital rape didn't become a crime until 1991 . Recent figures show that 45% of rapes are committed by the victim's current partner and 92% are committed by men known to the victim. Only 8% are strangers. I would think that while a lot of sexual assaults by partners/dates are still going unreported, this figure has been considerably higher in the past (particularly before the 1991 change in law).

So it's a tricky one to unravel. Maybe the thing to do would be to compare statistics in countries where there are tighter controls on pornography, such as Islamic states. But I'm not sure you would get a comparable picture on actual as opposed to reported rape in these countries either.

Women who have been sexually assaulted by partners/close rtelatives are less likely to report or even believe that a sexual offence has been commiteed - this is due to a number of factors, but one of which is a rationalisation that they do not want to catagorise people they love/depend upon as rapists.

The rape laws in this country have not been changed for over 100 years - they were written when the Victorian midset about women being 'coy' and asexual was still the common consensus.

As for why men rape - it is simple really - they rape to gain reproductive advantage over their rivals. If they cannot access a female by legitimate means, they do so by other means.

The debate at the minute is about whether the male propensity to rape is a direct adaptation or a bi-product of other adaptations, such as high levels of androgens such as testosterone which are present if a male is to win in a fight for females, be it mano a mano or in gathering resourses to attract the best females to him.

The most obvious evidence against the direct adaption theory is that human males to not have any special built tools to assist rape, as other species do. This isn't concusive however, as Orangutangs do seem to have an adaptive rape behaivour and tehy have no special built tools either.

For me, it just seems a bit like a cheater strategy. Rape is known to be an opportunistic crime which is even more likely to occur if the chances of being punished are low - as they are even in the West.

There are taboo's on rape in almost every culture (and rape occurs in every culture too, contrary to popular belief) - mostly from kin groups and communities. When communities become atomised, and women (especially young women) move away from home, they are known to be in a very vulnerable group.

and rape is endemic in Islamic cultures - a man must consumate his marriage on the first night, whether his bride wants him to or not. Arranged marriage is, in the words of Hirsi Ali, sanctioned rape.

If the woman has been circimcised and infidulated this is an even more gruesome and bloody act as the male must "break through".

This is the fetish of the blood on the sheet to declare virginity - not just a broken hymen, but all the rest.

infibulated, i.e stitched up

The islamic states porn/rape stats might have Madamez punching the air!
Wasn't one of her key points that anti-porn states are also misogynist?

but v interesting and also would like to know whether i've read etin right that there's an argument for rape being purely about sex. Is this the testosterone argumetn?

kids bedtime back later with brain remnants

Sort of, it's not just testosterone, though that is one of the essential elements probably.

It's rather the scientific repost to the traditional/radical feminist position that rape is an act of power and subordination thart all men use to oppress all women. That it isn't about sex (and desire or sexuality) at all.

Loosing ones autonomy is a consequence of being attacked, and rape being probably the most traumatic thing that can happen to a woman, knowing what we do today about the important role of 'female choice' in evolution.

But again, basically put, because women are more discriminating then men about who they sleep with (on average) this makes sex a 'limiting resource' - one than men must compete with one another for access to. Even more simply put, if women were not discriminating, rape would not exist.

Soz lost my thread and forgot to finish this one;

Loosing ones autonomy is a consequence of being attacked, and rape being probably the most traumatic thing that can happen to a woman, knowing what we do today about the important role of 'female choice' in evolution. But the power thing is a secondary (or proximate - can I use that word in this sense Etin?) consequence, gaining a reproductive advantage, i.e possibly fertilising the female and having offspring, is the primary (or ultimate) motivating factor - though again, much of this is unconscious - the rapist just wants to have sex not procreate, but by default, any sexual urge is the mechanism evolution has selected as the best means of getting genes from one generation to the next.

Hows that? Clear as mud?

Oh, and human females might have evolved anti-rape adaptations too, such as not taking risks by taking a short cut home through the park if she is in her fertile period. It is very complicated, and I have to go back to the data to refamiliarise myself with it. Of course, if women have evolved anti-rape adaptations then that would point to rape being an adaptive strategy in men.