Could There Be Any Justice For Rape Victim?
This article tries to cover the various aspects of rape including its root cause and the ways to tackle it effectively in addition to the reply of the questions raised in Indispire Edition 23 at Indiblogger.
The article mainly deals with:
- Nature of Justice
- Male & Female Brain Hardwiring
- Role of Punishment
- Rape & Its Complexities
- Marital Rape
- Difference between Rape & Sadism
- Gender Bias on Rape (Rape not a female problem alone)
- Suicide Associated with Rape Cases
- Measures should be taken to prevent rape
- Measures should be taken to protect the dignity of victim
Let me begin with a story. Once upon a time, there was an eagle that was chasing a dove. And, the dove came to a man and asked the man to save it. The man agreed to save the dove and asked it to come by his side. Then, the eagle asked the man if he saved the dove, what’d it eat? The man said the eagle to eat another dove. The eagle asked the man why’d another dove die to save that dove? So, the man advised the eagle to eat a rat. Then, the eagle asked why’d a rat die to save that dove? Finally, the man asked the eagle to eat him. The eagle laughed and asked the man how long could he feed him? Sooner or later after the man’s death, it’d eat that dove. The eagle found that the man was unnecessarily delaying and concluded him as extremely cruel. But, the dove found the man extremely kind.
Look at these words: cruel and kind; both are attributed to the same man. What’d the man do? What’d be the nature of justice for this situation? If the man saves the dove, he’s doing injustice to the eagle because he’s depriving the eagle from its food and indirectly compelling the eagle to die of starvation. And, if he doesn’t save the dove, he’s indirectly helping the eagle in its killing because he can save it easily. How to do justice?
In Nature, there are no such things as cruel, kind or justice. In Nature, there is only one truth and that is: Every morning, when the sun rises, the gazelle has to run fast to stay alive and the leopard has to run faster if it doesn’t want to be hungry. Who is kind? Who is cruel? What is justice? Where do these words come from: kind & cruel, good & evil, right & wrong? These do not come from Nature. Buddha said “In the Sky, there is no distinction of East & West; people create distinction out of their own minds and then believe them to be true.”
In Nature, all animals are equal; all have been given strength and cleverness to survive. If one is strong and clever, one will survive or else help others in their survival by dying. This is the Law of Nature. In the words of Darwin, “Survival of the Fittest.” Survival has two forms: survival of oneself and survival through progenies. In order to prevent extinction, animals fight for their lives and reproduce.
The scene changed with advent of humans on stage. We are different- apparently evolved. We have a large brain that creates these words. We have a larger brain than any other animal. In fact, we are animals; 99% of our being is still animal. We still react like animals in stress. What makes us different? We have a brain region called neocortex, meaning new brain. This is the part of the brain that distinguishes us from other animals due to the large amount of its mass (cortex) used for thinking. With its ability to compute, analyze, interpret, and intuit at a level unique to the human species; it is our critical and creative brain.
It is our critical and creative brain that analyzes the Law of Jungle and decides to create a better place where one not only cares about one’s own survival but the survival of others also. How’s this planned? By controlling our animal instinct - the beast inside us. How’s it decided to control the beast within? By forming rules. This is the beginning of CULTURE. Culture is a human construct where the concepts like kind & cruel, good & evil, right or wrong are defined to help the helpless and stop the domination by mightier one. It is essentially about fencing - keeping the wild out, especially, the beast within us. We try to tame, control and domesticate it by rules. We don’t want to live in the world of survival of fittest. We want a world where strong has responsibilities & duties towards weak. We almost forget that culture is only the tip of iceberg, beneath is the jungle waiting to envelope us. We are still 99% animal. Culture is all about domestication. Rules create domesticated animals not moral beings. Morality comes from introspection which draws its inspiration from education.
In nature, things are not in Black & White. In fact, everything in nature is paradoxical. There is no clear cut demarcation of anything; even the thing which helps us in living, at the same time, preparing our death. Oxygen is very essential to sustain life. Life without oxygen could not be imagined; even in a dream. Oxygen is oxidized in the process called oxidation in the mitochondria of cell where electrons are passed between different molecules, with each pass producing useful chemical energy needed for life but in the very process also releases free radicals of oxygen called oxidants which accumulates over time and shuts down mitochondria, causing cells to die, the organism to age and finally die.
The same is true with our critical and creative brain. According to Bible, our miseries started after eating of that prohibited apple by Adam. What did that apple provide Adam? The ability to think. Strange! But true. Thinking is a double bladed sword. By the faculty of thinking, we are able to think of a better place. And, equally we can think of a worse place.
The concept of culture is fear-driven. We are afraid that we’ll extinct by the oppression of strong. Now, we can even think of the situations that don’t exist and this amplification of fear makes us worse than animals. We start exploiting others. Animals don’t exploit but humans. Freud said that what we repress, it manifests in others ways. We are repressing our animality and it is being manifested in subtle ways. We have formed imaginary territory. We are celebrating territoriality of being. Our self becomes self-image. The concept of chastity is about self-image.
What makes us similar with animals? The part of the brain called limbic. It is the part of the brain that reacts to the world around us reflexively and instantaneously, in real time, and without thought. It is uniquely responsible for our survival, the limbic brain does not take breaks. It is always on. The limbic brain is also our emotional center. It is from there that signals go out to various other parts of the brain, which in turn orchestrate our behaviors as they relate to emotions or our survival. It triggers fight-or-flight response to ensure our survival in stress or threats.
Unfortunately or fortunately, limbic brain regulates our sexual desire. It doesn’t count chastity during initiating sex drives. The prime concern for limbic brain is survival. Lust obviously evolved to lead to procreation and to ensure the survival of the human species and would have been necessary in extremely difficult survival circumstances when there was no time for romance. Also, human females can bear only one offspring a year, which means that without lust, the human species could be threatened with extinction—because we are slow reproducers, Nature made us enthusiastic procreators. This is why people in dangerous and threatening situations, such as wartime, can suddenly find themselves lusting after each other even though they are strangers. If their lives are in danger, they have the immediate urge to pass on their genes. To achieve this goal, men are hardwired to have sex with lots of attractive women. They have little warning and no apparent control over it. The feelings come from the primitive part of the brain and overpower the rational, thinking part, making them behave in irrational ways—in the same way that the fight-or-flight response makes a person run when confronted by a lion, as opposed to calmly thinking about an escape plan.
Lust is brought on by surges in sex hormones such as testosterone and estrogen. These hormones cause an urgent push for physical gratification. Dopamine is secreted heavily during lust, and it triggers the production of testosterone, causing sexual attraction to occur. It happens when you first see someone and have an overwhelming urge to ‘have’ that person. A study conducted in 2006 at the University of Chicago demonstrated that even during a casual chat with a female stranger testosterone levels shoot up by a third in men and that the stronger this hormonal reaction, the more dramatic the changes in a man’s behavior. Marazziti, Fisher, Brown and Aron compared lust with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). They found the same brain areas and hormonal changes associated with OCD become active during lust.
It is the finding of many studies carried by various researchers such as Bartels, Zeki, David Buss & others that men use their eyes as the primary tool to evaluate women for sexual potential. Men’s brains are wired to seek out the reliable biological clues to a woman’s reproductive potential and are attracted to the hourglass figure. It’s the 70% ratio that counts, not the actual weight. This is because a 70% hips-to-waist ratio signals higher fertility in a woman, and higher body-fat content—particularly stored on the butt and thighs—is a signal of a woman’s ability to breast-feed an infant. This is why women always find men ogling towards women’s breast and butts. It is hardwired in men’s brain; they can’t help it. Women should understand this.
When Bartels and Zeki showed images of attractive women to men, they found that men showed higher activity in two regions in the brain: one associated with visual stimuli and the other with penile erection. When these areas in men’s brains are lit up, the researchers found that the men’s brain areas linked to making moral judgments also diminish in activity.
Testosterone is the main hormone responsible for the sex drive, and men have ten to twenty times more of it than women. This is why the male sex drive is strong and so urgent. It is also likely to note that the only times a woman feels compelled to have sex for physical-gratification reasons are when she has a high testosterone level. To desire only physical sex you need to be high on testosterone and most women rarely are. Men always are.
The study conducted in 2006 at the University of Chicago also showed testosterone readings in married men and fathers are significantly lower than in single males who are “playing the field” because the fathers have moved into a nurturing, parental role and have higher oxytocin levels than single men, who are still searching for somewhere to pass on their genes. Dr. David Schmitt of Bradley University, Illinois, collected data on the sexual habits of men and women from forty-eight countries across the world and found that men dunk the love muscle more in their late twenties than at any other age. This is the time when male testosterone has peaked and begun its decline.
It could be observed from these studies that the role of testosterone increases in men at puberty and at peak during late teenage to late twenties and then begins to decline. Testosterone injections have become common for older men and women with declining sex drives. Testosterone level also decreases when one is involved in love. Love and lust have different circuitry in brain.
What is the point of saying all these? The point is men are 99% animals as other humans. They are constantly struggling to outgrow the beast within which has been lurking for an opportunity to take control of men. It is not fair to give capital punishment for a weak moment during high testosterone activity phase of life which activity decreases significantly with age and other factors.
We, all, are familiar with incidences of marital rape. Does every sexual intercourse happen in marriage with mutual consent? Would you hang your spouse till death for that?
Now, I am not talking about sadism. So, please don’t think about Nirbhaya case here. Now, I’m talking about the rape charges on juvenile involving sexual intercourse only. Sadism is more than just sex; it’s sexual gratification by inflicting pain on others cruelly.
Mahatma Gandhi in his autobiography confessed about a time when he felt double shame because of his carnal lust. His father was suffering from fistula and he was one of the principal attendants with the duties of a nurse which mainly consisted dressing the wound, giving the medicines and massaging his leg untill his father fell asleep. This was also the time when his wife was expecting a baby. He mentioned that while every night his hands were busy massaging his father’s legs, his mind was hovering about the bed-room—and that too at a time when religion, medical science, and commonsense alike forbade sexual intercourse and when relieved from duty, went straight to the bed-room. His father’s condition had been deteorating day by day and then the dreadful night came. As usual he was giving the massage, this time his uncle offered to relieve him and he gladly accepted and went straight to the bed-room, woke his sleeping wife up but within five or six minutes, the news came that his father was no more. He realized that if animal passion had not blinded him, he should have been spared the torture of separation from his father during his last moments. He took it as a blot that he would have never been able to efface or forget. But he overcame that desire in later stages of his life. He wrote “It took me long to get free from the shackles of lust, and I had to pass through many ordeals before I could overcome it.”
That was the time when child marriages were common. Mahatma Gandhi was of 15 at that time. What one does now? In the biography of Om Puri, written by his wife, an incidence is mentioned where he slept with his house maid at the age of 14.
Has he become a serial rapist later?
The incidence goes like this: He was assisting her daily in drawing water from hand pump. She was a middle aged woman. Days went by normally, till one day Om realized that she would first touch, then caress and finally fondle him during the task. The young boy began to get turned on without knowing what was happening to him. One day there was a power failure and in the dark, she grabbed Om, who was by then totally aroused and they slept together.
Isn’t it the rape of a juvenile by an aged woman? Whom should be given capital punishment in cases like this?
Women are more likely to philander in their thirties because their biological clock starts ticking as their fertility lessens. Women reach their sexual peak in their middle to late thirties, when testosterone levels rise, and this is nature’s way of pushing women to reproduce before time runs out. The middle aged women yearn for highly testosterone active young boys. The psychology behind this is beautifully depicted in Bollywood movie ‘Oops.’ See, whether a man rapes a woman or a woman rapes a man the reason is high testosterone level.
I simply don’t understand when there happens a discussion on rape, peoples start gender fight. I want to tell that rape is nothing to do with gender. It is not only the problem of female only; sometimes, males also become the victim. The children irrespective of its gender are equally prone to be abused by adults.
Reports on suicides associated with rape cases reveal shocking results on the percentage of culprit suicide as well as victim suicide. The reason for suicide is the mindset of society. People are demanding capital punishment for rapist and yet do not give proper respect to the victim. And, there are many cases in which rapists are raped later in the name of justice. They are not given second chance; therefore, they commit suicide. Rape is a very big curse whoever were tagged with it, whether culprit or victim, their lives are spoiled forever.
Rape is a collective problem of society. It should be fight collectively; both men & women have to contribute seriously instead of opening a gender front on the issue.
Could punishment of culprit be justice for victim? Would punishment of culprit restore the previous state of victim —- the state before the crime? The answer to these entire questions is a Big NO.
Then, why is there a provision for punishment?
One thing is sure that it is least concerned with victim. The entire concept of punishment is focused on preventing the society from collapse. It is focused on transformation of culprit into a good human being and rehabilitation of culprit. In rare of the rarest case, when there is no hope left for culprit transformation, then in such cases, capital punishment is given. Giving capital punishment is not a victory for society but a defeat that it couldn’t transform the culprit into a better being. It is not the moment of triumph. In having satisfaction in punishment of others, we are no different from the criminals who committed the crime for their pleasure. It is the animal instinct that seeks pleasure in others pain - a sadist mind. Revengeful attitude in the name of justice is the manifestation of our animal instinct in a subtle way. The principle behind origin of culture, development of society, idea of justice is to outgrow the beast within us but we start showing our animal behavior in the name of justice and it is normal. We are 99% animal and we take pleasure in inflicting pain right from infancy. Nursing mothers have experiences of child’s biting while breastfeeding. We are trying hard to overcome this impulsive animal instinct. Sometimes, we win and some other times we lose. It’s absolutely OK. The problem does not begin when we accept our limitations but when we start pretending.
Freud believed that aggression is one of the drives inherent in human nature. We may conceive of aggression as energy, a powerful force which can be used for either constructive or destructive purposes. It takes the same energy to kiss or to bite, to caress or to scratch, to take a step or to kick. We are born with different emotional potentials, including a lesser or greater aggressive potential. What happens to this potential will partly depend on the external influences after the individual is born and comes into contact with the outside world.
There lived a highway man called Angulimal in ancient India. He can be called as a psychopath serial killer as per the modern terminology. He was called Angulimal because he wore a garland of human fingers. He had taken a vow that he would kill one thousand people; from each single person he would take one finger so that he could remember how many he had killed and he will make a garland of all those fingers. In his garland of fingers he had nine hundred and ninety-nine fingers—only one was missing. And that one was missing because his road was closed; nobody was coming that way. But Gautam Buddha entered that closed road. People warned Buddha that Angulimal was a psycho-killer. He had collected 999 fingers. He had been waiting for the last finger. They requested Buddha not to go on that path. But Buddha said, “If I don’t go then who will go? Only two things are possible: either I will change him or I will provide him with one finger so that his desire is fulfilled. Anyway I am going to die one day. Giving my head to Angulimal will be at least of some use. Despite the protests from the peoples present there, he met Angulimal and Angulimal became his disciple. Angulimal like other disciples started to beg for alms in villages. Soon, people of the village knew his identity and stoned him to death. They didn’t have dare to face him when he was a criminal but kill him when he became Saint. This wasn’t the behavior of cultured people but the follower of Law of Jungle where might is right. Angulimal didn’t resist but accept that as his Karma. It is said that he was relieved from the bondage of Karma at the very moment.
We have lots of stories of murderers becoming saint. The other most prominent story is of Valmiki who wrote “The Ramayana.” The promising in this context is the plot of the worldwide best seller trilogy “Fifty Shades of Grey.” Before entering into the plot, I’d like to share another story of a photographer who was searching for the most innocent personality on earth. After his extensive research and wandering across the globe, he found a child of 5yrs old in some small tribe far away from civilized humans who met his criteria. About 20yrs later, the same photographer began a search for the cruelest personality on earth and he met a person in a jail who was sentenced death penalty. When he met the person he found out that he was the person whose photograph he took 20yrs ago in his childhood.
The point is that no one is born as veteran criminal. It is the circumstances that led one to wrong directions and he can be brought back in mainstream as seen in the case of Angulimal and Valmiki. The same is the case of the protagonist of the trilogy who was abused in his childhood and become a sadist and later returns back to normal life by unconditional love of his beloved. The story shows that what one becomes will depend on his inherent potentials, the inner conflicts of maturation and the influence of his environment. The aggressive drive can be cultivated, modified and utilized for constructive purposes or it can be channeled into increased violence. Love is a very useful tool in transformation of human whether it is in the form of Buddha’s compassion or simple caring from loved one. Napoleon Hill sees love as a safety valve which insures balance, poise and constructive effort. When the emotion of love is mixed with the emotion of sex, that same man will guide his actions with more sanity, balance and reason. And, the emotions of sex and jealousy, when mixed, may turn a person into an insane beast. One may have seen that cuddling and mothering alone will quiet the child for a time, even if he is not fed or changed. The opposite is also true, with consequences just as serious.
Some people brought a woman to Jesus and said, “She has committed adultery. It is written in the ancient scriptures, that she should be stoned to death. What do you think?” Jesus was sitting on the bank of a river. He must have fallen deep in thought: “If I tell them to stone her to death, it will be violence.” Then what will happen to Jesus’ principle of love? “And if I say no, pardon her, people will be angry. People will say you are speaking against our ancient religion, you are repudiating our ancient scriptures.” Jesus said the ancient scriptures are right. They must be right. Take up stones and kill this woman — but let only those throw stones who have never committed adultery nor who have ever even thought of committing adultery. To find a man who has not thought of adultery is difficult, one who has not been infatuated, who has not been attracted.
The same is the case with women too. Recent surveys reveal that overpowered by man is among the top 10 sexual fantasies for all women. From 1973 through 2008, nine surveys of women’s rape fantasies have been published. The confession percentage has increased from 31 to 57. This is because of feminism movement; now, they openly talk on their sexual fantasies. Still, actual prevalence of rape fantasies is expected to be higher owing to the fact that despite women liberalization movement, they may not feel comfortable admitting them. In the latest report (Bivona, J. and J. Critelli. “The Nature of Women’s Rape Fantasies: An Analysis of Prevalence, Frequency, and Contents,” Journal of Sex Research (2009)), it is found that women preferred the phrase “overpowered by a man” over the word “rape.”
All quietly moved back even the women who came to punish that adulteress. They also couldn’t stand on Jesus criteria. The adulteress woman was left behind, alone. The woman put her head at Jesus’ feet and said, “Give me whatsoever punishment you want. I am an adulteress. I accept it. I am a sinner. And your compassion has overwhelmed my heart. Whatsoever punishment you want to give…” Jesus said, “Who am I to mete out punishments? Who am I to stand between you and your god? You know, you know what you need to do, and your god knows. I am not going to make any judgement. If you feel you have done something bad, then don’t do it any more. And if it feels alright to you then continue. The one to decide is god. The final decision will be between you and god. There is no intermediary. Go now.”
Do we have right to punish? Aren’t we overwhelmed by the same animal instinct that provoked the culprit to commit crime in demanding the brutal punishment for him?
In Islamic Law, the family of the victim has the right to demand punishment or to ask for monitory compensation. The third alternative the Islamic Law provides is pardon. The Holy Quran states that it is preferable for people to forgive. Forgiveness itself is an act that frees the people who have been harmed from the sense of anger and the sense of victimization, it empowers them to have some control of the situation by giving that act of forgiveness.
The entire debate is culprit centric. Our inner animal is waiting to perform in the name of justice. I want to shift the debate from culprit to victim. No punishment can do good for the victim except for some relief to animal instinct of aggressive drive. It don’t channelize this aggressive drive in positive ways. We have to work in the direction where rape victim would not be considered as degraded or secondary thing. The incidence of rape should not be integrated with matter of pride or self confidence. There was a time when male’s mustache was associated with this pride thing and he had to commit suicide if someone shaved the mustache of a male. Now-a-days, clean shave without mustache is a fashion. We have to understand the biology behind sex and our limitation in that area. It is the suppression of sex that is the main problem. We have to accept it as it is.
While reading confession of a rape victim, I couldn’t hold back my tears, my mouth became dry. I couldn’t express it in words. She had been gone through many sessions for chronic depression. She started hating her body because it betrayed her. She wrote “A man forced into me against my will and raped me and I orgasmed from it. My mouth said no but my body said yes and I have had to deal with these two irreconcilable things for years. I cried and told him to stop as I was climaxing. I shouldn’t be like this. I hated my body and wanted to put an end to it.”
We cannot change the circumstances but our attitude only. Hugh Dawn said “A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes.” Just make a knot in mind that whatever happens happens for good. Try to see the positive part of the scene. Even a stopped clock say correct time twice a day.
A girl was passing through a forest alone and suddenly he was abducted by a tribal youth. The youth was assigned a job of searching a young girl by tribal head. The youth couldn’t control himself upon seeing that beautiful girl and raped her before presenting her to the tribal head. The girl was abducted for the purpose of sacrifice but she was freed because there was a tradition of sacrificing only virgins. And, instead of the girl that youth was sacrificed because of his mistake. In this way, the girl was saved from dying and that youth was also not spared. Every action has its consequences. No one has spared from cycle of Karma. Remember the Jesus’ word and leave the judgment or punishment for god. Don’t corrupt your mind with the feelings of anger, depression or revenge.
Andrew Solomon for his book about “How family manages to deal with various kind of challenges or unusual offspring” interviewed many mothers. One mother he interviewed had been raped as an adolescent and had a child following that rape which had thrown away her career plans and damaged all of her emotional relationships. But, when he met her, she was 50. He asked her “Do you often think about the man who raped you? She said “I used to think about him with anger but mow with pity.” Andrew exclaimed pity! He thought she meant pity because the culprit was so unevolved as to have done this terrible thing. He asked “Pity?” And, she said “Yes, because he has a beautiful daughter and two beautiful grandchildren and he doesn’t know that and I do. So, as it turns out, I’m the lucky one.”