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Feminists continue to push for presumption of male guilt: "Amherst College is a place where men who've raped have been allowed to stay in roles of power and prestige on campus."

AnthonyZarat

October 23, 2012

15 upvotes

/r/MensRights

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/avery-stone/amherst-sexual-assault_b_2000849.html?utm_hp_ref=college

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Title	Feminists continue to push for presumption of male guilt: "Amherst College is a place where men who've raped have been allowed to stay in roles of power and prestige on campus."
Author	AnthonyZarat
Upvotes	15
Comments	17
Date	October 23, 2012 7:26 PM UTC (13 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/MensRights
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/11yn4e/feminists_continue_to_push_for_presumption_of/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/MensRights/feminists-continue-to-push-for-presumption-of-male.1010705 https://theredarchive.com/post/1010705

Comments

[–][deleted] 7 points8 points9 points 13 years ago (1 child) | Copy Link

[–]AnthonyZarat[S,🍰] 2 points3 points4 points 13 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points4 points 13 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link

[–]AnthonyZarat[S,🍰] -4 points-3 points-2 points 13 years ago (22 children) | Copy Link

My response to the feminist bigots:

The number of women who rape men is exactly equal to the number of men who rape women:

1.27 million male victims of female forced intercourse

1.27 million female victims of male forced intercourse

Feminists like Stone work hard to bury the pain (and lives) of male victims, then cover their tracks with trite statements like "largely women, but a few men, too". The fact is that feminists made sure that male victims of female assault were NOT counted under the new FBI definition (which only counts victims who are penetrated by their assailants):

"Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration of a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim."

You can see the truth that lies behind the feminist lies here:

http://i.imgur.com/Ps9wW.jpg

[–]RealQuickPoint 2 points3 points4 points 13 years ago (21 children) | Copy Link

[–]girlwriteswhat 1 point2 points3 points 13 years ago (20 children) | Copy Link

Also realize that women are bound to be more psychologically traumatized by forced sex, due to the greater biological consequences, and that male-perpetrated rape complies with the cultural gendered narrative, while female-perpetrated rape does not, AND that differences exist in memory retention as a function of time when it comes to violence and female perpetrators, all of which may play into the fact that in one study designed to catch victims of child sexual abuse, only 16% of men (vs 64% of women) with documented histories of CSA disclosed, therefore women would likely remember incidents of forced sex by men over a lifetime more reliably than men would remember incidents of forced sex by women.

In other words, the lifetime numbers are likely less indicative of what's actually going on than the previous 12 month numbers.

http://www.genderratic.com/p/836/manufacturing-female-victimhood-and-marginalizing-vulnerable-men/

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point2 points 13 years ago (19 children) | Copy Link

I'm going to disagree on your evolutionary tenet for one reason.

In terms of being forced to have sex, it would be ultimately horrible for a man to be raped, due to the burdens that patriarchal systems would place on a man to spend his resources on the woman who bore his child.

Taking that into account, it would be horrible evolutionarily for a man to be raped, because he'd lose much of his resources (which were likely gained through dangerous means) to a woman who's probably not the ideal in terms of being able to take care of his offspring. Taking that into account, the cutting down on resources for men is somewhat similar to the cutting down on fertility for women. Most men cannot support more than one family, so that would also be a factor in forced sex.

I think the rates of depression in men vs. women along with the rates of drug abuse would paint a picture of this. The trauma that comes from rape is probably internalized for a lot of men, and they learn to deal with it in ways that are ultimately non-verbalized.

[–]girlwriteswhat 0 points1 point2 points 13 years ago (18 children) | Copy Link

"In terms of being forced to have sex, it would be ultimately horrible for a man to be raped, due to the burdens that patriarchal systems would place on a man to spend his resources on the woman who bore his child."

Patriarchal systems have not been in place long enough to generate in men the kind of psychological response common to women. The biological costs to women have been around for literally millions of years, from before we branched off from chimpanzees 2 million years ago.

Biological cost to females exists whether a species is monogamous (like, say, marmosets), promiscuous (bonobos), or tournament (gorillas). If you look at the paternal investment of modern chimpanzees (our closest relatives), you won't find ANYTHING similar to the expected level of human paternal investment, which is a relatively recent phenomenon in evolutionary terms. What you find is tolerance and protection, but little to no provisioning of mother or offspring.

IOW, greater female caloric investment in offspring has been around for most species since the origin of internal gestation and lactation. Invested fatherhood has only been around for humans for a fraction of that time. Not long enough to matter.

Even so, even if it did matter, you have to ask HOW does it matter. If a man was raped and is expected/forced to invest beyond the donation of a gamete, you have to look at the impact that would have on his reproductive success. A man who was "taken advantage of" and run to the altar with a shotgun was... provided a wife to provide him more children.

Even considering the expected investment, this is not nearly the same thing as a woman's level of risk, and the fact that being raped might mean the end of her reproductive career if she got pregnant.

I'm not saying that men don't or can't experience trauma when raped, or that all women end up in the shower scrubbing themselves for hours and flinching at any sudden noise. But the long-term consequences that are reflected in our instincts are not the same. The level of anxiety around being taken advantage of will be different, as will the nature of the trauma itself.

I would imagine a man's trauma might derive chiefly from not, "OMG, my life is over!" but rather, "OMG, I'm not in control of what happens to me!" If it's the second, then it's certainly predictable that a man might reinterpret such an incident in his past as consensual to circumvent having to admit that he was not in control of his situation--that he was actually a victim.

[–]typhonblue 1 point2 points3 points 13 years ago (16 children) | Copy Link

But the long-term consequences that are reflected in our instincts are not the same.

There is no reliable evidence that women are more impacted, psychologically, then men. In fact sexually abused boys are more likely to be suicidal then sexually abused girls.

Adult female victims report more emotional impact, but of the one survey I've seen that compared, men reported more time lost from work/studies. Which is a more objective measure on the whole.

A pair bonding species tends to bond through sex; in fact our sexuality with it's uniquely psychological nature replaced hormonal compulsion with desire and consent suggesting an even stronger psychological bonding component to our sexuality.

In that sense rape damages those psychological and hormonal structures in men that allow them to form pair-bonds.

They also go through physical changes during pregnancy, irreversible ones. Such as a permanently lowered testosterone level. So pregnancy itself holds risks for men. They also risk losing the child they are being hormonally primed to care for as the mother may just walk away.

And if she doesn't, he loses the right to invest his paternal resources in a female he chose... and there's likely a reason why he didn't chose her.

If human males weren't pair bonders, they wouldn't risk these things. But they are and they do.

[–]girlwriteswhat 2 points3 points4 points 13 years ago (15 children) | Copy Link

I'm not saying that men don't or can't experience trauma when raped, or that all women end up in the shower scrubbing themselves for hours and flinching at any sudden noise. But the long-term consequences that are reflected in our instincts are not the same. The level of anxiety around being taken advantage of will be different, as will the nature of the trauma itself.

Our female ancestors have been gestating and lactating (biologically investing) in offspring since we were rodents running around the ankles of dinosaurs.

The fact that sexual dimorphism in humans has been decreasing since the time we split off from chimps, but that we still display more of it than many other typical pair-bonding species of primates (both in body size and appearance), tells me we have not been pair-bonders through our entire history. The psychological/hormonal structures you're talking about will be "younger" than the ones responsible for rape trauma in females.

I'm not sure, though, what you mean by "replacing" hormonal compulsion with desire and consent. Desire is a largely hormonal state. Other animals exercise consent/nonconsent to sex. I also am not particularly interested in looking at child sexual abuse in this context, because there are differences there as well (perhaps not between genders, but between child and adult victims) that make it not something I think is applicable here. For instance, prepubescent and postmenopausal women report less immediate psychological trauma after rapes.

There are other differences among women, as well. Trauma is generally worse if there are few visible physical injuries, especially if the woman is in a long term relationship.

Your examples of suicide and time lost from work/studies while reporting less trauma (I'd be interested to know, too, if the men in the study were raped by women, other men, or both), only emphasizes that the psychological trauma of men who are raped by women is different in nature than that of women. You might also consider that boys in general are more likely to commit suicide than girls. A higher rate of suicide is not solid evidence of greater trauma.

Men may well be being honest when reporting less "trauma" around an incident of forced sex by a woman, yet feel a greater sense of loss of control, helplessness, disillusionment, all of which may feel less painful but do more lasting damage.

Again, we haven't been pair-bonders anywhere near as long as females have been paying the biological cost of pregnancy.

[–]typhonblue 0 points1 point2 points 13 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link

tells me we have not been pair-bonders through our entire history

The latest anthropological findings suggests that loss of sexual dimorphism occurred either almost immediately after splitting off of our shared ancestor with chimps or that the shared ancestor we have with chimps didn't have a chimp-like sexual dichotomy either.

Now our sexual dichotomy(115%) is actually not that unusual for pair-bonding primates. Which ranges from 90%-120%. It also parallels the other species which inhabits our ecological niche: canids. And you have to consider that smaller bodied animals (which pair bonding primates usually are) have a lower percentage of sexual dichotomy in the first place.

Again, we haven't been pair-bonders anywhere near as long as females have been paying the biological cost of pregnancy.

If we want to look at our evolutionary history, biologists are suggesting that paternal investment in children evolved before maternal.

But ultimately this doesn't matter because a pair-bonding species will have pair-bonding instincts regardless of their evolutionary history.

Other animals exercise consent/nonconsent to sex.

Can you call it consent/nonconsent when it's compelled through hormonal compulsion?

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point2 points 13 years ago (13 children) | Copy Link

[–]girlwriteswhat 1 point2 points3 points 13 years ago (12 children) | Copy Link

Please bear in mind--I believe the entire reason why we're human at all is because of paternal investment combined with monogamous *egalitarian mating. I will even go so far as to stipulate that I believe male pair bonding is less conditional than female pair bonding--I think the longer recovery men typically need to get over a break-up certainly bolsters that view.

However, the neurological and hormonal mechanisms based on mammalian female biological investment in offspring are WAY older than any mechanisms based on more material paternal investment. They are literally as old as male and female gametes.

Typhonblue mentioned consent and desire. Desire is hormonally driven--it may be less immediate a compulsion among humans (possibly in part because female ovulation is concealed), but it's still a compulsion, and one in which individuals of many species exercise choice. Consent is not unique to humans, either (though it may not manifest as consent to sex).

Look at some insects, where the females have special holding sacs within their vaginas that store the semen of different males in different compartments. Male soapberry bugs hang around females after mating. Are they mate guarding? Not exactly. The female attracts and mates with other males who then fight with each other, and she preferentially inseminates herself with the semen of the victor, stored in her reproductive tract. That is when she exercises consent--not to copulating with a given individual, but to reproducing with a given individual. In humans, one might consider the common female preference for more masculine men approaching ovulation and for more "beta" men approaching menses to be a similar mechanism in human women.

I suppose if one were to look at female and male reproductive choice, perhaps women would weigh choice more heavily before the fact, and men more heavily after--that a woman will tend to be "picky before she chooses (and after, if she can get away with it)" while a man tends to be "devoted to what he's chosen".

IF one were to posit that male rape trauma is "equal" to female, based on some affront or damage to the pair-bonding mechanism in males, one has to either 1) assume that there would be little to no trauma to females based on the greater, involuntary biological investment/risk of pregnancy, or 2) women do not pair bond. If there is trauma associated with affront to the pair bonding mechanism, then that would manifest in both men and women, unless women don't pair bond. OR one would have to discount the biological investment/risk to presume that the trauma would be equivalent.

If you consider that psychological trauma to raped women is more intense if they are biologically fertile when they are raped, as opposed to when they are prepubescent or postmenopausal, AND you pair that with the fact that boys who are sexually abused are more likely to commit suicide than girls... you have to consider that there is a different psychological mechanism at work in men and women, or perhaps that men are less likely to find means to cope.

It may well be the case of "she has cancer, but can get the best treatment and therefore recovers," versus, "he died of an easily preventable disease, a staph infection."

In other words, men may need more time off work or may be at higher risk of suicide not because they experience equivalent or greater trauma, but because they have zero support through any of it.

The deep psychological pain that often accompanies a rape for a woman is there for a reason. It's to ensure that what happened doesn't happen again, and if that instinct evolved, it evolved because women who experienced that trauma had more viable babies than those who didn't. That's been going on a lot longer than paternal investment. It's because of this immediate and visceral trauma that I think the phenomenon of "victim-blaming" is such a hot-button issue with rape of women--the woman involved will be instinctively attempting to figure out what she did that might have led to it, so she can prevent it ever happening again. That's what the trauma is there for.

Oddly enough, I think that it's probably easier to recover from, because when it happens, you KNOW it's damaged you. Maybe men's reported lower levels of trauma act like leprosy--they can't tell that something in them has been damaged because there's less immediate pain associated with it?

Regardless, it's certainly something that requires a lot more (and better) investigation. But I just can't buy the idea that men have female-equivalent instincts to feel trauma over it, let alone greater-than-equivalent. In order to believe that, you would have to believe that men are actually superior to women innately--that their emotional loyalty to pair-bonding and offspring survival is significantly greater than women's, enough to offset the biological cost/risk of pregnancy to women as it would have existed 20,000 years ago.

I don't see this as impossible on an individual level, but I do see it not playing out in general. I just don't.

Edit: *By egalitarian mating, I mean all members of a community are permitted to pair up if they can manage, unlike most monogamous social species.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point2 points 13 years ago (1 child) | Copy Link

[–]typhonblue 0 points1 point2 points 13 years ago (9 children) | Copy Link

Typhonblue mentioned consent and desire. Desire is hormonally driven--it may be less immediate a compulsion among humans (possibly in part because female ovulation is concealed), but it's still a compulsion, and one in which individuals of many species exercise choice. Consent is not unique to humans, either (though it may not manifest as consent to sex).

Desire is a psychological state. And, in fact, much of human desire is driven by the desire to be desired.

If human sexuality was supposed to be mechanistic, it would have remained so. Hormonal compulsion and muscular erections would be the order of the day.

Instead we switched to an arousal system based more on psychology then physical stimuli.

Vasocongestive erections (both internal--female--and external--male) respond more to psychological comfort then anything else.

IF one were to posit that male rape trauma is "equal" to female, based on some affront or damage to the pair-bonding mechanism in males, one has to either 1) assume that there would be little to no trauma to females based on the greater, involuntary biological investment/risk of pregnancy, or 2) women do not pair bond.

Or we could suppose this. If a man walks away from a woman who raped him, he has to walk away from any resultant child as well. A raped woman does not.

damage to pair bond + walking away from potential child > damage to pair bond alone

[–]typhonblue 1 point2 points3 points 13 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link

I mean we could use simple inductive reasoning.

With biparental mammals, the offspring need the father to survive. That means evolution will endeavour to reward him for sticking around and punish him if he fails to.

A man faces whatever punishment evolution created to prevent him leaving a potential conception if he should leave his rapist; and he faces the requirement of investing in offspring with a woman he did not chose (and likely for good reason) if he stays.

Either way there's no reason why his psychological state should be less impacted then hers in the reverse scenario.

In fact it may be worse for the simple reason that evolution may have evolved more psychological punishment for him leaving her then her leaving him, because he's more physically capable of leaving. More ability = more punishment to prevent.

Which explains why we expect more from men in terms of self sacrifice for and devotion to their sexual partners (re: batman shooting). And suicide after divorce, etc.

[–][deleted] -1 points0 points1 point 13 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link