Sexual fantasies

[BurningBuntingFlipFlop]

Many women have fantasies of rape, being controlled, abused etc (in a safe, loving relationship). Do you think this is due to patriarchal society conditioning us or are these genuine harmless desires?

Conditioning.

Its everywhere - passive women pornified for men's use in advertising, magazines, films and porn. Definitely agree with the violence as sexy message.

I don't think its in any way innate.

DO many women have those fantasies, though? I don't. Obviously I've never asked my female friends...
I've heard that many times but is it verifiable?

Good question Minty. It could be propaganda. Hmmm....

I would bet its exaggerated at the very least.

I would say, given the long history of men telling the world what women need, are, should be, and think...it's quite likely to be propaganda.

Women's erotic rape fantasies: an evaluation of theory and research

Journal of Sex Research, Feb, 2008 by Joseph W. Critelli, Jenny M. Bivona

findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2372/is_1_45/ai_n24383385/

I think it's conditionally - specifically the conditioning that good girls don't really want sex. Therefore a rape fantasy could be about getting to have the sex but without it being your responsibility.

I think it's due to conditioning - typos.

The more I think about this Minty, the more I think you may well be right.

I think it is about 'being taken', I thought I liked a rape fantasy but as DH points out I don't want to be hurt.

The fantasy is about sex but rape is about power, control etc.

I think the wording is just wrong. No one wants to be raped in the true sense of the word.

I would love to be ravished (lovingly) by a strong man who wouldn't take no for an answer though IYSWIM.

I think conditioning may play a part, but as a personal example I remember having "loss of control" type "daydreams" as a really quite young child - from 5 or 6 I used to imagine various senarios (being tied up and examined, etc) taken from things like Tom and Jerry cartoons, which looking back were definitely the precursor to those sorts of sexual fantasies. I'm not sure that as a 5 year old I had much awareness of the whole "good girls don't enjoy sex" idea!

If it is purely social conditioning then why do some men, particularly rich and very powerful men, like to be humiliated/flogged/have their testicles tortured by a dominatrix?

Women and men like BDSM , and there are lots of men into cuckolding or being kept in chastity devices for example, men seem to be more into extreme pain and humiliation ( for themselves) than women.

It's the lack of control that is both scary and exhilarating and I don't think that the contstraints of gender have that much to do with it tbh.

I think that strength rather than violence, is seen as sexy.

I also meant to say that some people are into being scared and the endorphin rush that accompanies it, that's why they love roller coasters or horror films it's much the same thing as enjoying being sexually dominated, for me at any rate.

Saw this yesterday and didn't get a chance to post.

My thought would be that although it's called a rape fantasy, it's not actually a fantasy about a real rape, so the name is wrong.

If you're fantasising in your own head, then you are obviously deciding what happens. So if you are fantasising about being raped, you are actually directing what is happening.

If you are acting out a "rape fantasy" it is with someone (presumably) who you have consented to act this out with and who will (presumably) stop if you become distressed (as opposed to pretending to be distressed). So again the person whose fantasy it is, is actually in control.

So therefore, in neither of these situations is it actually a rape. It's nothing to do with rape.

I had a quick look at sammy's link which was talking about how some researchers in the past have said that the existence of rape fantasies means women want to be raped - well that's clearly cobblers for the reasons I have just outlined - I am amazed that anyone would think otherwise TBH. Don't the understand the meaning of the word "fantasy", i wonder.

"According to Kanin, erotic rape fantasies contain low to moderate levels of fear with no realistic violence. In these fantasies, women typically are approached aggressively by a dominant and attractive male who is overcome with desire for her; she feels or expresses nonconsent and presents minimal resistance; he overpowers her and takes her sexually. Kanin made the interpretation that these were not true rape fantasies, that the described resistance amounted to a "token no," and he called these "seduction fantasies."

from sammy's thing

so the bloke asks women if they have rape fantasies, they say "yes, and this is what happens" and he decides that actually they are describing a seduction

says more about him than about them I think. sammy's article points out that this is ridiculous "As no evidence was presented that the self-character's nonconsent was insincere, the label of "seduction" does not seem justified. Certainly, in actual rapes minimal resistance and female sexual arousal do sometimes occur (Duddle, 1991; Johnson, 1985), and their occurrence would not render the encounter a seduction rather than a rape."

The term 'rape' fantasy isn't really correct i agree as there is actual consent so it's more 'forced sex role-play fantasy'

There's a huge difference between giving up control and having it taken away from you isn't there?

I think that a lot of people want, at times, to give up control to someone else. It can still be scary not to be in control even when you have voluntarily given it up. But it isn't the same thing as someone taking control from you against your wishes; even if its rough/involves restraints/play acting etc

So I think I agree with ISNT, that more than anything the labelling is wrong. Fantasising about giving up control or force isn't the same thing as actual rape.

it's because of the loss of responsibility, not the loss of control.

At one point, i had a small baby, a 3 year old with SN, a responsible job, and responsibility for all the household running, and a partner who didn't ever want to initiate sex.

And being tied up and ravaged would have completely taken away the responibility for the other person's enjoyment.

It's a kind of selfishness in a way. "Here we are, I'm at your mercy, I have to do everything you want - so you had better be good at this."

Agree with colditz' last post
I have these fantasies but when I first became sexually aware and active as a young teenager, my fantasies were completely different

So I am certain they've been implanted in my mind, which is a shame, really, because I think if we weren't bombarded with sex/violence images we could explore our true fantasies much further

I was reading in Sexual Politics that ..ooh, let me go and get it...

About all the ways that female sexuality was shaped by men during the twentieth century

"Nature, Freud concludes, has simply neglected to provide the female with a forceful libido; what happens then is her fault.
This attitude gave rise to a whole battery of military diction which psychology has ever since employed to describe sexuality: surrender, dominance, mastery
It is not very difficult once this type of language has gained respectability for writers affected by Freudian point of view to deprecate a less bellicose mating as tepid or prissy."

Maybe it is natural, maybe it isn't, but with all the images of sex/violence rammed down our throat we aren't going to know for sure

"it's because of the loss of responsibility, not the loss of control."

Depends on the people and situation involved surely?

Could be either or both?

Nancy Friday has published several books on women's sexual fantasies. Has anybody read any of those books? I've got a couple of her books on my bookshelf and this thread is prompting me to read them. So thanks for giving me the prompt.

Yes, I have at least three of Ms Friday's books. They're eye-opening, eh?

One of Ms Friday's books was about the fantasies of men.