Some Thoughts Concerning Rape

In what has been a rather disastrous period for the Republic of India with regard to a variety of issues ranging from territorial incursions in Indo-China border to a dampening economy with a flailing currency, none has touched the raw nerve of the public more than the issue of rape and violence against women. Ever since the brutal gangrape of a pre-med student in Delhi last December, the public has grown accustomed to reports of sexual assaults across the media spectrum. Despite this increased exposure, people are still out on the streets fighting for victims' justice and trying to put an end to these assaults against women. I for one have been relatively aware of these issues but unlike most people, I had become too desensitized to these stories and the supposed 'brutality' of these acts simply stopped being so merely because of the sheer magnitude and frequency by which these incidents happened. I also did not contribute towards the national discourse (via the online and print media, let alone some protest march) concerning these issues largely because I perceived them as just another social malady that needed to be sorted out by the authorities and the public at large. In other words, as a member of a relatively privileged social and political group, rape was simply a new addition to already commonplace issues that were want of my attention such as poverty, illiteracy, corruption and so on. However, there was a peculiar case of rape that I came across that really disturbed me and I wish share it with the reader, not just for the sake of sharing a moment of shock, but as a starting point to engage in a series of questions that sheds light on both the complexity of the topic at hand and more importantly, the depravity of a certain gender.

Towards the end of November last year, Tehelka reported a horrible story concerning the rape of a thirteen year old girl from Kannur at the hands of her father, brother and uncle. Although the three accused have been nabbed by the police, stories also emerged about the suicide of this girl's older sister two years ago. One could reasonably suggest that rape and sexual assault would have been the primary cause for her suicide. Now, contrast this story with the major rape case that occurred last year in Delhi, that of the pre-med student who was brutally gang-raped on a moving bus while her male friend was beaten up and left immobile. To add to the gruesomeness, the men stuffed various objects inside her vagina and had she been alive now, she would not have been able to conceive children given the distraught state of her reproductive organs. Both the stories concern with rape but both of them seem to have a different character. I am of course not trying to rank cases according to certain arbitrary notions such as 'gruesomeness' or 'violence', rather, I am trying to understand why men commit the act of rape. What causes many members of my gender to engage in this kind of behavior?

To answer this question sufficiently well, we would have to sift through all known cases of rape and sexual assault against woman and try to pick up some general characteristics of those who do this. However, this itself is no simple task as I will show you. Consider the Delhi rape case: what would have been the possible reasons for a group of men to commit this act? Without referring to the actual characteristics of those accused, let us engage in some reasonable speculation. Going by certain pre-conceived notions, we could suggest that they were migrants from Bihar, Orissa or Uttar Pradesh, in a strange and alien metropolis with little or no familial connections. The kind of work they engage in may be menial in nature and they may also be quite sexually frustrated, given their new surroundings and the kind of cultural and social immobility in terms of having access to those willing to embark on relationships or even submit to casual sex. Compounding this must be some perversion for women from middle class society and above, with their modern conceptions of attire and looks. Raping a member from this group would be a release of frustrations of all kinds, class as well as sexual, it may be suggested. But what explains the ensuing violence after the rape, that of stuffing material objects such as rods into the vagina? Are there social causal structures that lead to this despicable act or are they just the product of mindless male aggression and animalism manifesting in a group setting? Questions remain.

Consider the other, in my mind, more disturbing example, that of three immediate members of the family sexually assaulting a thirteen year old school-going girl. Can we engage in some speculation here, at the risk of causing a great deal of discomfort to ourselves? Why and how could all three males here access the vagina of this girl with mutual consent? Does the raw energy of the testosterone override any sense of social norms or decency? Does not the father have a wife who can cater to his sexual needs? Cannot the uncle, assuming he is a single, solicit prostitutes or use pornography for some kind of temporary release, lest the sexual appetite becomes too unbearable to handle? What about her own brother, fifteen years of age, who took turns in penetrating his little sister while his father and uncle turned their backs on her, both literally and metaphorically? Do all these three males possess a certain genetic condition that pre-disposes them towards seeking sexual gratification from immediate family members? Silly question but this may appear in most people's minds. At least in the father's case, is it not something else other than sexual frustration manifesting itself in the form of vaginal penetration of his own daughter? Questions still remain.

Although we have only looked at two cases, even comparing a range of cases of rape does not really give us an insight into why someone primarily commits an act of rape. In other words, to say that all rapists commit rape because they are sexually frustrated would be a misleading statement, so would any other claim that seeks to explain this phenomena with a single explanatory factor. For each case, we may find that the primary reason for the act may be different from some other case or even worse, unidentifiable. All we know is that at the receiving end of the penetration was someone powerless and forced to submit to a sexual act without consent. Due to these complexities, instant solutions to reducing instances of rape are complicated and quite hard to come by. Even when policies and changes to social norms, both subtle and explicit, are being discussed to reduce the incidence of these acts, I feel quite pessimistic when it comes to reforming society in this respect. The range of cases, the kind people involved in it, some of the relationships with their victims, the unimaginable violence and cruelty inflicted, and all of the scum and depravity that makes up this aspect of our social reality makes me cringe. In a society where relatively decent familial norms are in currency, what effective legal or social changes are we speaking of when a father, brother and uncle takes advantage of a little girl's age and uses her vagina?  Both legal and social deterrents are already in place and also enforced quite strictly. Are we then witnessing a decaying society or is it just the way things always have been and always will be? There are no easy answers.

I would like to conclude with the following story - a couple of days ago, I was standing near a yard waiting for someone to pick me up. The area was quite desolate except for a few cars parked on the side. I noticed that there were a lot of stray dogs and a few of them were lying beneath some of these stationary cars. After spending some time observing all this, I noticed that it was mainly female dogs who were lying beneath the cars while the males were busty circling around it making growls and noises of a scary kind. Suddenly, I saw a male dog go under one of the cars with a lot of force and scare a female dog, who in turn reacted by coming out on the open. She then started running but was no match for the two male dogs running behind her. One of them (who initially frightened the female) was strong and ferocious enough to scare the other male dog away and after doing so, he caught her from behind, brought her movement to a halt and started fucking her while she moaned and howled; one moment she was safe under the car but in no time, she seemed to be experiencing a world of torment. I could ultimately perceive this either as a depraved act or just the normal way the forces of nature function. In my heart however, I felt like I was witnessing an act of rape and just then, I had a moment of realization. It struck me like a bolt of lightening, that men are also savages. Forces of civilization and humanistic values such as the pursuit of love, the idea of courtship and reserving the best of ourselves exclusively for those we choose to be with are nothing but illusions and distractions to keep us distanced from our savage tendencies. Still, these are necessary illusions and if believed with a religious conviction, they may very well descend upon Earth and come true. At least, one has to have faith in such ideals and try and live by them because the alternative would be to become degenerates like these dogs or worse, the rapist scum among us.