There are infamous dolphin rape gangs but scientists say we can't say that is true as we don't know if the females consented or if that behavior is aberrant or normal. If human males were truly acting on instinct, then female consent would never have been needed and society would be completely different.
Why do people commit rape?"Can i commit a rape?" Reality is, most of us don't want to hurt other people. We don't want to hurt their feelings. We don't want to cause them pain. We don't like the feelings that come with stealing the peace-of-mind and feelings of safety from another person.
If you watch a lot of TV, you will hear repeatedly that rape is not about sex, and that people prone to rape that have been castrated either physically or chemically are prone to stabbing as it has the same up-close-and-personal type of action against the other person.
The temperance movement (which had a high Venn diagram-type cross-over with the suffragettes and was probably the same women that are called feminists, only 100 years before, felt that prohibition was the answer as alcohol was the cause of male misbehavior. To live, women needed a husband or a male employer to have a place to live and food to eat. It was not illegal to beat your wife or children or your female employees (or male employees or child employees for that matter). A drunk was more likely to beat or rape or in other ways act out. Rather than blame the men, the 'demon drink" was blamed. Therefore, if no more alcohol, no more beatings and rapes and other forms of control and domination.
But where does that need to compete/drive to control/desire to dominate actually come from? I recently heard an NPR article about the new attempts to aim the campaign ads at women by removing the facts and issues and focusing on grabbing at the emotional strings that control women because "THAT IS HOW WOMEN THINK" (I'm probably foaming at the mouth right now) Is that a stereotypical statement? Are all women really that alike? I don't like it when women say things like all men are dogs or all men are cavemen and have never heard anyone say that Blah-blah-blah is how all men think. In other words, I don't think testosterone is causing men to rape and pillage. In fact, men are not all alike . Most of those things we consider to be male or female are learned, society teaches them, and most of us humans just fall into line. "girls need to be submissive, real women are emotional and caring and not at all analytical, women are mothers because it is there inborn nature to be soft and nurturing, men are hunter, protectors, dominant and violent because that was needed to fight off the men of the other tribes"
Reality check #1---women are mothers because that is the word we gave the people with uteruses (uteri?) that gave birth. Reality check #2, the only reason one sex needs to be submissive is to get along with the other sex that is thinking that it is dominant (learned behavior, not inborn or there wouldn't be so many people of both sexes having such a hard time with that) Reality check #3, men have to be dominant to protect women from other men that have to be dominant (really? is that not circular enough to make your head spin?) Reality check #3 women are weak; minded, bodied, spirited, add your area, there is no evidence that this is true, but plenty of women that have proven it is not, minded--think Rosalyn Sussman Yalow, Madame Curie,Irène Joliot-Curie, Barbara McClintock, Rita Levi-Montalcini, bodied(would it be shocking to know that when this is googled, half the returned hits include the words sexiest or hottest?)--Dr. Jan Todd, Babe Zaharias, Lisa Leslie, Llyn Padarn, Spiritual--Mother Theresa, Emily Dickinson,Jane Addams,Tawakkol Abdel-Salam Karman, Tamara Siuda, Ida B. Robinson, Ellen Gould White, and just plain powerful--Emperor Wu (not empress as she didn't want anyone thinking she was anyone's subordinate) Margaret Thatcher, Indira Gandhi, Susan B. Anthony, Hillary Clinton, Aung San Suu Kyi, Gudit, Trieu Thi Trinh, Boudicca, Ahhotep I. (if you don't recognize them all, look them up, women have been doing more than birthing babies, housekeeping and making men happy for a very long time.
So that reality check was the lead in to what is actually behind the myth of why men are dominant and therefore women must be submissive.
Dominance and submission is a set of behaviors, customs and rituals involving the giving by one individual to another individual of control over them ... this implies that the submissive voluntarily gave over their will to another, but frequently in history this giving is at the behest of the religion and/or laws of the land. In hindsight, most of us have no problem with seeing that slavery was wrong (still is, but no longer legal in this country). But while the first feminists were getting us the right to vote and trying to "stay the powers of demon rum" they were being ruled by a religion that told them to submit. The book by Alice Walker "Possessing the secret of Joy" described very well how the little bit of power that is given to women over women but under the domination of the men can make us our daughter's worst enemy. The book, (read it, beautiful and tragic and in her style which is like staring at a haunting painting while listening to the wind) the highest women in the tribe are also the ones that perform the female circumcision, and they do it to make the girls marriageable, and clean and acceptable. Even when they know that it makes sex a nightmare and childbirth a life-threatening event, they continue. And they are no different than our own society. We would rather call our daughters sluts and whores when they do what teenagers do than educate them on how to be safe. We discourage careers that compete with male applicants and train our female children to do laundry and wash dishes and clean house while our sons watch TV.
So men are raised to believe that their will is more important than the will of women. That boys are better than girls at everything that matters. That it is alright to expect someone of the opposite sex to take care of them, their laundry, cooking, cleaning, raise their kids, make them happy, and if the woman is not happy with that, there is something wrong with her. Wrong with her. But if she expects a man to make her happy she is a nag, a princess, a bitch, a tease, or "not a real woman".
So men are raised to believe that their will is more important than the will of women. That boys are better than girls at everything that matters. That it is alright to expect someone of the opposite sex to take care of them, their laundry, cooking, cleaning, raise their kids, make them happy, and if the woman is not happy with that, there is something wrong with her. Wrong with her. But if she expects a man to make her happy she is a nag, a princess, a bitch, a tease, or "not a real woman".
If you were born with a uterus (or for the transgenders out there--should have been) you are a real woman. There are no fake women anymore than there are fake men or fake horses or fake pastures. The word has a meaning. It does not include behavior, expectations, submission, roles, jobs, intelligence (or lack thereof) in that meaning.
Who we each are, no matter what sex we were born, or race, or culture, or religion, does not give us the right to dominate another person, nor does it make us have to submit to be acceptable. There are no excuses for dominating other's against their will, neither drugs nor alcohol, being born male, not mental illness, not cultural upbringing, not badly written laws or excessive money gives anyone a right to dominate another person. The need to dominate, compete, win is an act of utter selfishness. It implies that the person acting in that way thinks they are in some way superior to the people they are treating that way. If they were 3 on the playground they would be stopped, but they are grown, and they are bullies and they always find someone like them that will slap them on the back and tell them they are fine, they are great, and they deserve to treat others badly because they are strong and powerful.
There have a been a number of men that wanted to be the king of the world. Such ego, such an immense need for power. What is missing from the people, and how do we fill that need without letting them abuse the people whose on egos and needs are more on scale with the less than 100 years we each have.
Perhaps, the first step is to stop playing to them. And stop training our own sons and daughters to fall into the same old patterns. We all deserve to be happy as humans.
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