Where do rapists come from?
28.04.28
Where do rapists come from?
Most start being made in pre-school or younger...
If we look at what makes a rapist and a community that both creates and shields rapists there are these reasons:
1. Rapists may have been raped or sexually assaulted themselves as children (especially those who rape children). It is called ‘siding with the oppressor’ and children who have been abused often choose this option – especially boys – while others choose to remain in the ‘victim role’. It is not their fault – this is what they know of how to behave in life – what other roles do they know? Also children of abusive home will be more likely to turn to rape and other violent crimes.
2. Feeling powerless and raping to get the feeling of power and control over another, weaker person.
Apartheid was a system that took power from people, putting them into impossible and hopeless situations, which engendered a great deal of impotent rage. It also broke up families with the migrant system and by preventing men and women from having their families with them.
Unfortunately, children who grow up in very authoritarian, paternalistic and abusive homes may have feelings of being powerless and need to find weaker people to subjugate in rape.
3. Boys who grow up without fathers or good male role models are far more likely to look for a spurious masculinity in gangs, violent behaviour and are in this way led into other criminal activities – one of them being rape.
4. Rapists have little empathy.
Empathy can only be learnt by a baby and child if they have empathetic care from their caregivers. With absent and dead parents, teenage parents, overworked parents and parents who themselves have grown up with too little good nurturing – how can we expect many children to grow up with little sense of or respect for others feelings? We also see that children who hurt and torture animals are showing that they wish to have power over something weaker than they are – because they have such low self- esteem.
5. Rapists have impulse control problems
Rapist often have many angry, disappointed, sad, terrified feelings inside them. Often these are unconscious and these feelings come from very early in their lives. They are not able to tolerate these bad feelings and push them deeper into their minds. When we cannot ‘process’ (think about, understand and accept our feelings) our feelings these feelings often get ‘acted out’.
For example: a father who loves his son may still feel great resentment towards his son (perhaps because now his wife is too busy being a mom to be a wife). A mature man who can look at his feelings will understand that his little son is not to blame and will be able to do something healthy about the situation he finds himself in. A man who has not learnt to manage his feelings might be horrified by these resentful feelings and not accept, acknowledge or process them. Instead he ‘acts out’ and becomes very strict and unkind to his little son – saying to himself ‘this is good for him, it will make a man of him’ instead of realising that his resentment of his little son is what is making him such a hard, emotionally bereft parent...Father and son will miss out on a good, rich and happy relationship in this way.
In the same way rapists have not processed all the negative feelings they are holding and they ‘act out’ by hurting others who are weaker or more vulnerable than they are.
6. Women and children have too little power.
We are still struggling with an authoritarian and paternalistic society despite all our good laws and progressive constitution. Apartheid supported this sort of society and we have yet to grow out of it as a country. How can children be given more agency by people who had none themselves as small children?
Young men grow up thinking that women and children do not need to be respected or given as many rights as they have...so it is alright to get your girlfriend into a dark corner and rape her – it isn’t even seen as rape.