Comments on: Meet The Predators: But Which Ones?

By: Abusive Men Overestimate the Rate at Which Other Men Abuse : The Curvature

Abusive Men Overestimate the Rate at Which Other Men Abuse : The Curvature — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:34:00 +0000

[...] used above and other studies show that only small minorities of men are abusive towards women. Even if the rates are actually higher than most statistics show, as many activists believe, the fact remains still that a large majority of men are not committing [...]

By: Vee

Vee — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 11:55:25 +0000

I just–thank you for this: Rape occurs whenever a person has sex with another person who has not meaningfully consented. Thus, if one partner says no, or to stop, or that they aren’t comfortable, or that they ought to slow down, pushes the partner away, etc., and the other partner continues anyway? Even without hitting the first partner, or restraining them, or threatening to? That is rape. Period.

Three months ago, a friend of mine told me something had happened to her. And she wouldn’t call it rape (she’s a legal student, and as such somewhat hung up on the legal definitions), but I recognized the way she was talking about it (I am somewhat of an inofficial peer counselor). She told him it hurt and she asked him to slow down and he kept going. Until I read what you said, I couldn’t articulate why something in me didn’t agree with how she was describing it as not being rape.

By: softestbullet

softestbullet — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 14:42:57 +0000

Thank you so much.

I absolutely think men would admit to coercive/power-differential rape. They already do, all the time. An example that comes to mind is that article about the “trend” of (straight, cis men penetrating women) anal sex, where all these men were interviewed saying things like, they liked doing it because they knew she didn’t like it or want it.

By: Janet

Janet — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 05:17:06 +0000

Hard to read but I think it was something I needed to hear. Its amazing how few people understand how rape could occur without violence. Even having been in that situation its hard to explain.

By: Thomas MacAulay Millar

Thomas MacAulay Millar — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 21:13:27 +0000

I discuss the limitations Cara outlined in this post, and some more in-depth Lisak research, here.

By: Cara

Cara — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 03:39:08 +0000

The Quilter,

Rape occurs whenever a person has sex with another person who has not meaningfully consented. Thus, if one partner says no, or to stop, or that they aren’t comfortable, or that they ought to slow down, pushes the partner away, etc., and the other partner continues anyway? Even without hitting the first partner, or restraining them, or threatening to? That is rape. Period. Rape is not (only) sex achieved through force or the threat of physical force; it is sex achieved without one person’s freely given, non-coerced or pressured agreement.

From your comment, I gather that you need some very basic information about rape. For that, I would suggest this article as a starting place.

By: the_quilter

the_quilter — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 03:17:37 +0000

I have read your column very carefully and I have never heard of a case of rape (of an adult) where there isn’t a threat of physical violence used. Can you give me an example of what you are speaking of so that I can understand better?

By: Nat

Nat — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 09:53:08 +0000

Thanks for the article Cara, and I completely agree that it would be great if they included all forms of rape in this research.

On the topic of power, I think the most power most men will admit to having is that of pure brute power and quite frankly I actually don’t think they understand the inherent power they have outside of the strength of their muscles.

When I speak with men about privilege, they really don’t understand what I mean. When I give them examples like being brought up to be afraid of walking alone and not trusting people because of your gender; when I mention constantly second guessing intentions because of messages, intentional or not, aimed directly at you for life; and when I mention the constant battle to tune out the images and advertising that belittle my gender, they just look bewildered…even the good guys.

They really don’t understand the plum hand they were dealt by chance with their gender. Getting people to understand this is key to ending rape.

By: abyss2hope

abyss2hope — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 23:22:47 +0000

Cara, you make excellent points about rapes that aren’t covered by these surveys. Non-consensual sexual behavior is so normalized that if boys and men will admit forcible rape they will also admit to other strategies and practices.

On FaceBook someone created National grab an ass day event, scheduled for tomorrow 20K+ “attending” http://bit.ly/RFR3G

I reported this event to FB as promoting violence.

By: Thomas MacAulay Millar

Thomas MacAulay Millar — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:46:54 +0000

Cara, excellent post. The research in this area is sparse and limited. As you say, some of the limitations are real difficulties in design, while some of it is just that very few studies of undetected rapists have been done. I hope that, with McWhorter confirming Lisak & Miller’s research, there will be greater interest in expanding research into this group and that there will be better answers in a few years than there are now. As of today, I think we can only conclude that the existing research is an undercount and that we can’t really say much about the prevalence of what is not captured.