Men who fantasise about rape (Trigger?)

[alicemalice]

Hope I don't trigger anyone with this thread.

I've been online dating for a bit and chatting to this guy who I seemed to have a lot in common with.

Looking at his answers on Okcupid, there's one that said 'Do you have fantasies about rape?' to which he replied, yes.

This really bothers me. I understand it's not real and I suspect rape fantasies are quite common. But still, I find it very off-putting.

I also find it odd that he answered it so publicly.

Are rape fantasies so common they're seen as fairly normal?

Bdsm is, as I understand it about willingly submitting or dominating a willing partner. So akin to the typical female rape fantasy, but not to actual rape.

I wouldn't agree with this since the typical female rape fantasy does not involve actual or imagined violence whereas BSDS includes both.

MyEmpire - I think you're spot on.

And yes, BDSSM does include violence. But it isn't all violence. I rarely use physical violence. I am much more into the D/s element than the S/M - it's why I call it BDSSM, rather than BDSM since BDSM only recognises the sadism and not the submission.

Joe, I find I have to keep quiet in any sort of conversation about BDSM, except with others who feel like me! Unequal power has absolutely no place in sex for me and I've found that, as my understanding of relationship power dynamics deepens, my preferences get more & more vanilla. In fact, I probably make vanilla seem like a curry

I'm not saying I don't get it, Helga, because my 'dark side' does. It's more that I've become incapable of separating the political and the personal - and I think you must be doing that, to some extent, perhaps by acting out sub-conscious responses to the political factors?

I know I'm not going to get anywhere with this, however, and have just broken my own rule; I hope I haven't been offensive, as I'm not meaning to.

This raise the troubling question of whether women who act out submissive fantasies are complicit in their own subordination.

Not saying I think that's necessarily the case - just that it's a question that's been troubling me. In other words, if, as many feminist maintain, gender and sexuality is encultured, then female fantasies of submission must be constructed according to the same system of power that creates masculine fantasies of dominance. It would therefore be incumbent on women as well as men to resist patriarchially determined sexual identities. Maybe I'm thinking too much about this!!

GrlicNovember: I kind of agree (and likewise, no offense intended to anyone). There's a perception that sex exists in some sort of private sphere independent of society and culture. I just can't accept that either.

Not offended Garlic - you know I asked a similar question!

Joe - so where would you sit me, the Dominant woman?

Is it acting out when you're like me and it's all you desire?

But it's only a scenario when it's not lifestyle. When what they do is "play" on occasion.

Some don't do that.

Joe, I think too much about it as well! I completely reject the proposition that sexuality is a construct. It may well be for some or many, but I'd be a happier woman if I were a lesbian. My body responds differently to female bodies than male, though. Several of my women friends have said the same of themselves. And nobody really criticises lesbians for not wanting sex with a penis-owner, unless they're some kind of misogynist twit.

If you were talking about the finer points of sexuality, like sexual behaviours, then I'm sure they are constructed to a large extent. As you say, female fantasies of submission may be constructed according to the same system of power that creates masculine fantasies of dominance. Given that much of our history features values which make men rapists by default, and punish women for liking sex, it wouldn't be surprising.

A sexually dominant woman might be reacting against that, consciously or unconsciously.

I don't accept the term "vanilla" in mainstream discourse. I'm opposed to BDSM for a number of reasons including:

1. I don't believe consent is enough for some things, including assault and murder. It is illegal to assault or murder someone even with their consent.

1. On a personal level, I believe in equality including equal dignity and I think it degrades the human experience for one person to practise domination over or submission to another person.

1. On the political level, I agree with Audrey Lorde that the practise of BDSM recognises that some people may be abused and some people may be abusers. The acceptance of this at the cultural level through the normalisation of BDSM normalises and minimises abuse and abusers.

1. People who wish to be abused seem highly likely to have factors in their past that drive this desire. Focussing on consent makes them complicit in their own continued abuse.

1. For the people who are subject to forcible submission and torture, whether it is the millions of Jews tortured by the Nazis, the women being sold as sex slaves by ISIS or the women currently being held captive in unknown individual dungeons across the world, the thought of role playing their agony for an orgasm is repulsive.

This is a bit of a simplistic point, but one way of looking at the 'women have rape fantasies' argument is that there is no such thing as a rape fantasy. If you are fantasising about something - being overpowered, willing surrender, whatever, you are willingly putting yourself in that position. You want it to be happening. You are a willing participant. By definition, that isn't rape. There is no such thing as a rape fantasy, because if it is a fantasy, it isn't rape you are fantasising about.

MyEmpireOfDirt: Well, I wouldn't say women should wearing lipstick or shaving their lengths are complicit in their own subordination, no. That would be a crypto- misogyny.

It's just that I've been reading some rad fem (Dworkin mainly - who I think is a massively underrated and misunderstood thinker btw), that assets hetrosexual culture and gender identity to be the root of female subjugation. Art, literature, pornography, much popular culture, courtship and the whole cult of romance has conspired to define women as lesser and legitimize sexual violence. Biological maleness is not the problem, but masculinity, which is a constructed identity internalised in boys growing up in a patriarchial culture. But masculinity cannot exist without femininity. So it would follow that the only way for true equality to be achieved is if both masculinity and femininity go.

But the problem there is that many people (including many women) don't want to give up many aspects of gender identity.

The question therefore is this: can equality be achieved if partiarchy is partially deconstructed or does it have to be completely bulldozed (femininity and all)?

In other words, is a woman who, say, always likes a man to make the first move when dating (without questioning this assumption) complicit in her subordination or is she not?

I don't actually know the answer myslf btw!

And Joe, what about people like me then?

FrauHelgaMissMarople: Hi. I do respect your choices and views, and really wouldn't want to make any kind of personal comment. My question doesn't really relate to BDSM specifically but sexual cultures generally.

And anyway I honestly don't know the answer. I was really just wanted to put the question out there and see what people thought.

The question therefore is this: can equality be achieved if patriarchy is partially deconstructed or does it have to be completely bulldozed (femininity and all)? Could you not bull-doze the patriarchy, then people who want to do some of the traditionally 'feminine' things can, regardless of gender.

I am thinking of my DD and her little friends. She is having a Frozen party and of the invited guests only one wants to dress as Elsa. He is not allowed. Not by me or DD; we would love it. After the patriarchy is destroyed, he can wear a sparkly dress and heels, because they are pretty, and DD can shoot ice from her fingers (that's why she likes Frozen). Or vice versa, because all behaviours will be fine for everyone.

what about people like me then? - In the context of gender roles & assumptions, Helga, it would make you an iconoclast. A sexy transgressive.

Well, either that or someone giving too much rein to their dark side - and we really can't suppose that on the basis of this thread

I rather like a sexy transgressive.

I had a date on Tuesday (I may have mentioned it once or twice).

We went for dinner.

I wanted to go halves, but he paid - because I'd driven 90 minutes to get to his and he posited that I'd paid out on petrol, so he should pay for dinner.

But then, I asked him out.

I have no idea how to sort it all in my head.

MrsTerrorPratchett: That's a good point - I hadn't thought about like that. Interchangeable gender roles is a great way to disrupt to gender essentialism.

I suppose I was thinking more of erotic culture. Although things have changed for the better, lots of assumptions about how men and women should behave are very resistant to change (and the fact is that some of that resistance will be coming from women, purely because, as human beings, they are just as susceptible to cultural influences as men). Of course men are the ones treating women like shit, but if (to take the rad fem line) that's culturally determined behaviour, then the culture must be attacked. Men need to stop being made to feel they need to be men - in control, powerful, always active - whether that pressure is coming from other men or women. Conversely, women would need to see that they can be strong, active, powerful and should not automatically masculine qualities from men.