Reply #309: No one is overlooking the force issue...

[TheMadMonk]

Hell that is what makes the crime of rape a crime. Be that force overt physical violence, the threat thereof, blackmail, or a micky slipped into the victim's drink.

What many are doing is refusing to see the sexual component. To take a particularly greusom example (Was it Ted Bundy?) if the perpetrator masturbates whilst watching the life drain out of a ten year old girl there there is definitely a sexual component to the crime. A twisted, utterly braindfucked component, but a sexual component nonetheless. There's obviously some very, very screwy wiring in such a person's head, but one thing you can be sure of, is that at least some of those connections are to the sex centres of their brain.

Control and power are of course a big part of the issue, and in many many cases, beneath those, feelings of crushing inadeqaucy. This does not excuse a rapists behaviour, nothing does. It may however explain it and let us get a better understanding of why they are the way they are and hopefull in the fullness of time help us figure out how to intervene before a potential rapist crosses the line.