Is rape actually as heinous as its made out to be? (1 Viewer)

[Ben Netanyahu]

Don't get me wrong - it's a heinous crime. I'm watching this Bilal Skaf documentary and it makes me sick to watch it. As a form of sexual torture it's quite possibly the second or worst crime, competing with non-sexual torture for second place to murder.

However, it's often made out to be much worse than it actually is. Sentences for rape rank up there with murder.

I suggest that the deprivation of liberty is limited in rape, and that suggestions of mental damage are drastically overstated. Discounting physical injury, I suggest that the mental damage incurred is no worse than that of schoolyard bullying, or other forms of mental abuse. Physical abuse is often far less worse than the worst cases of physical abuse, which attract incredibly minute sentences by comparison.

It's probably intuitive to suggest that rape is far worse than the sum of its parts: the mental and the physical. But why is this the case? Why is it that rape is not punished by the sum of:
-zero punishment for bullying/mental abuse
-physical abuse/battery
Why is there a constant in this equation? What is this constant? Perhaps it is a constant that is added for the disregard for humanity, liberty and freedom that a rape entails. I don't believe this to be the case - the disregard is temporary and freedom deprivation is small by comparison to other crimes.

This is either a suggestion for ramping up the sentences for mental abuse and bullying, or a call for ORDER against a Daily Telegraph inspired wave of hysteria! I suggest that it's the former, since I reckon rape is pretty bad ey?

Life in prison for bullying, or, slaps on the wrist for rapes. YOU DECIDE!

 

[Iron]

I agree that there's a large gap between the rigid social attitude to rape and the liberal social attitude to sex. It's just one of many contours marking the tragedy of a post-Christian age

 

[cactuar]

I agree that there's a large gap between the rigid social attitude to rape and the liberal social attitude to sex. It's just one of many contours marking the tragedy of a post-Christian age

well said.

depends on the circumstances really. given that murder has a definite permanent outcome (loss of life) it is slightly bewildering. however, rape does affect the woman/man for most likely the rest of their life and in quite a few cases, it results in the suicide of the woman. i tend to think that rapists get such sentences because of the general public outcry that would eventuate if they didn't get such long sentences.

 

[ComingUpForAir]

You lower this form of discoarse down another notch, perhaps an unwitting attempt to decend others into the abject sqaulor that is your mind

 

[Ben Netanyahu]

good post cactuar. i misunderestimated you, comrade.

a) men...rape?!?! DOES NOT COMPUTE. Only rape cases involving attractive, single, and hence available women are bothered with by the media....Or those involving Muslim people also. No-one cares if a man is raped.

b) The same can be said of any form of physical abuse. Someone called fat in high school is often troubled by being called fat for the rest of their lives - sometimes resulting in anorexia, bullemia, and possibly even death.

We're all smart people so we're not going to apply double standards, so which side are we shifting to? A more casual attitude to rape or a more rigorous and demanding attitude against all forms of mental assault?

 

[Ben Netanyahu]

You lower this form of discoarse down another notch, perhaps an unwitting attempt to decend others into the abject sqaulor that is your mind

i assumed that, of course, there would be people unwilling to challenge anything on the subject of rape for fear of Daily Telegraph retribution, but I didn't expect them to come out so quickly!

Well done comrade!

For the record: I'm not suggesting rape is not bad. I'm suggesting all forms of mental assault, or perhaps not all but some, are as bad as rape. Whether or not that downgrades the status of rape from the second worst crime, or elevates bullying to that level, is up to you.

 

[yoddle]

You lower this form of discoarse down another notch, perhaps an unwitting attempt to decend others into the abject sqaulor that is your mind

You lower and descend this form of discourse with your bad spelling.

 

[Ben Netanyahu]

discoarse because of the coarse subject matter, no doubt

 

[Iron]

i assumed that, of course, there would be people unwilling to challenge anything on the subject of rape for fear of Daily Telegraph retribution, but I didn't expect them to come out so quickly!

Well done comrade!

For the record: I'm not suggesting rape is not bad. I'm suggesting all forms of mental assault, or perhaps not all but some, are as bad as rape. Whether or not that downgrades the status of rape from the second worst crime, or elevates bullying to that level, is up to you.

Clearly the distinction is between a higher public valuation of sex and virginity, or loosening our standards of criminality in this regard

Reminds me of the info packs they give UK ps kids, about how sex is natural, healthy and should be experienced often in the teen years as long as free condoms are used, such as the bunch contained in this message

 

[ComingUpForAir]

i assumed that, of course, there would be people unwilling to challenge anything on the subject of rape for fear of Daily Telegraph retribution, but I didn't expect them to come out so quickly!

Well done comrade!

For the record: I'm not suggesting rape is not bad. I'm suggesting all forms of mental assault, or perhaps not all but some, are as bad as rape. Whether or not that downgrades the status of rape from the second worst crime, or elevates bullying to that level, is up to you.

..what is this nonsense
You remind me of that senile muslim cleric talking about rape and how 'undressed meat invites the cats'.
your comparison of rape and bullying is unworthy of refutation,
repulsive babble

 

[Ben Netanyahu]

so you concede defeat?
excellent. judge judy is happy

 

[loquasagacious]

As I've said in the past rape exists on a broad spectrum of sexual assualt. On the one end is aggravated sexual assualt - the archetypal violent rape of one individual by another, this is where the gang rapes sit. On the opposite end of the spectrum are the boyfriends/husbands/friends/etc of women who pressure or bully them into sex. In between lies every form of non-consensual or coerced consent sex.

In this regard 'rape' (sexual assualt) is a very broad crime with many permutations. A stark contrast to most other crimes. In murder the victim is always dead, in theft the stolen items have a tangible value. In rape there is no single yardstick with which to measure the severity of the crime.

While I strongly believe that all types of sexual assualt are morally reprehensible and should be condemned it is simply impossible to prosecute bullied/pressured sex and extremly difficult to prosecute drunk-could-not-consent sex. The variables are simply so great and complex that they defy a single simple set of rules for this reason I believe that it is a matter for judicial judgement on a case-by-case basis.

In extreme cases such as the Sikaf gang rapes heavy sentences are warranted, in less extreme cases lighter sentences are more appropriate and imo thisd is a matter for the courts to decide.

The biggest issue imo is the appalling low conviction rates as a percentage of total rapes. Only a fraction of the total are reported, only a fraction of these go to trial and only a fraction again result in a conviction. Some statistics I've seen indicate as few as 1% of rapes result in a conviction. Imagine if that were the case for murder.

 

[Serius]

I guess it depends, not all sexual assaults are the same. In one case it could be a wife putting up with the drunken advances of her husband, or a date rape scenario, then compare this with the brutal rapes we had in the 80's where women were gang raped and beaten nearly to death. Both are wrong and horrid crimes, but one seems worse than the other.

Its a horrid crime, but just like not all murders are alike and some are particularly horrifying[such as torure murders] some sexual assaults arent as bad as others.

Basically my scale of wrongs goes something like this

torture
murder
rape

and its easy to see how rape is comparable or sometimes worse than a clean bullet to the head. The victims are psychologically damaged for life, they wont ever be "normal" again because they have been in effect, tortured.

 

[cookkii]

rape is torture. and it is heinous.
the psycholigical and physical effects will stay with them for the rest of their lives.
but the only people who could comment on the effect that rape has on the victims is the victims themselves.

 

[zombie omie jay]

Other forms of torture do not generally attract the penalties othat rape does even though nebs is suggesting that the psychological and physical effects may be overstated in rape.

This is suggesting that even if rape is on par with other forms of torture that it may attract heavier penalties because of the fact that the media may cause a form of moral outrage due to the sexual nature of the crime.

Do u get it?

 

[cookkii]

i understand that rape crimes are overly covered by the media, but why not advocate for harsher torture penalties, rather than lesser rape penalties?

 

[zombie omie jay]

Eaxctly. Another point already covered by the op and other posters.

 

[cookkii]

but then its not so much is rape as heinous as its made out to be, as it is why isnt torture seen as just as heinous.
my argument was towards those who do not think that rape is as heinous, not towards those who think that torture is just as.

 

[zombie omie jay]

did you even read the thread?

that is what is it is about

is rape as heinous as other forms of torture
or
is rape made out to be more heinous and it isnt really as bad as they make out

 

[lolokay]

everyone who has ever committed an act of bullying should be imprisoned, imo