Pt. 2 Against His Will - Notes on the New Gay Predator (1 Viewer)

[stunning]

Secondly - and I don't like feeling like I have to do this - it might be obvious to some that I'm the M.C. Tom mentions above and as a result I feel I want to explain that my opinions aren't as a result of personal experience but are based on what I've heard from people who have been victims of sexual violence or have learned from studying counselling. The only reason I'm saying this at all is because I know a good few people on thumped and I want to stop any concerns/idle wonderings/whatever before they start.

My sincere apologies for any potential distress.

Oy vey. Won't do that again!

TD

 

[stunning]

On the subject of fantasies...it's impossible to stop people from thinking about whatever they wish to think about. Attempts to dictate what can go on inside a person's brain are dangerous and futile (1984 territory). At the same time I would classify anyone who is willing to grant approval to every type of fantasy as a misguided liberal at best because I suspect that it's the element of guilt or shame or the existence of societal taboos that prevents many of those with paedophile/rape fantasies from acting them out in reality.
I agree with Conor - the free expression of desires has to be somewhat curtailed for the protection of others.

I guess I'm feeling protective of the experience of desire rather than the expression of desire.

However, I know MANY, MANY people who engage in what's called age-play and rape-play and from a health promotion and STD/HIV prevention perspective, it's important for them to be able to talk about their experiences so they can be advised on how to do it safely. Some of these activities include blood-sport, spit, piss-play and I'll stop there for those with more delicate sensibilities than my own...

What was I saying?

Thomas

 

[kahlo]

oy vey indeed

What was I saying?

A lot....

And maybe you should read back over all of it?

Let's see... First there was the article which was supremely dodgy in a lot of what it was saying. I can start by saying I am not a gay man and I have not seen the play concerned. I am a gay woman though and so I know all about the oppression you fell back on when people challenged you too much, and I think that was a bit rich.
I also know how easy it is to fall into the whole homopolitical trap where any and every development in the portrayal of a gay person that gives an added dimension to them *has* to be seen as a good thing so I understand where this argument and that of the article is coming from. However - if you step back and breathe for a minute you must also accept that in this case the whole logic is fundamentally skewed.
Rape is a brutal crime, rape fantasies as with the issue of paedophilic ones are extremely problematic in that there is often a progression in terms of what is "enough" to satisfy them, the example of kiddie clothing catalogues given can (and often does) easily escalate to kiddie porn and onward... as Juno pointed out there is no *real* way to enact a rape fantasy, just as a true sadist can't get their kicks from S&M. It's all a matter of degree, and that's where we run into trouble where boundaries blur and discussions like this one become problematic because right away people become uncomfortable because the levels are not set.
I do not think any rape scene anywhere, be it a woman raping a man with a dildo, a gay guy raping his bully in the showers or even a rape victim sodomising their abuser could ever be construed as a positive image. That is a cold solid fact. There is nothing positive to be gained from having fantasies of inflicting lasting emotional damage on another human condoned by another, because it just means that that other is lacking something basic in themselves.
Seeking approbation for such fantasies is in itself an admission that there is something inappropriate about them, because this is in effect all that the article seemed to be doing, and all that you seemed to be doing by reproducing it here.
As for claiming that straight men are somehow encouraged/programmed to rape - I'll leave it to the good lads here to set you to rights on that score, that is a completely outrageous statement (and I do not mean that in a good way).
The tale of the boy in the car who pulled a gun on the "HetBoys" (puhleez, watch your labelling!) has already been sweetly dealt with as has your point about "Braveheart".
Now I'm not apolitical at all, I was thrilled to hear about the Supreme Court overturn on Texas and the Green Paper in the UK allowing for registration of same-sex partnerships and all of the recent milestones, and got all nostalgic today about marching the streets ten years ago here when law reform here had just been passed, but I do know where to draw the line when it comes to gay politics, and celebrating the portrayal of a gay man as a rapist as some sort of reclamation of power is something that would make me ill, not proud.
Yes, rape often is a crime of power, it is about power & sexual domination, and yes, power is an aphrodisiac (to many), but this *DOES NOT* categorically mean rape or rape fantasies are sexy. That's like saying I like mustard and I like jelly so I'm going to have mustard instead of custard in the next trifle I make. Methinks you were reaching a tad with that argument, about as far as I did with that analogy, in fact (mea culpa for watching Eddie Izzard earlier).
There were enough .02cs and crumbs in there to make up a quarter of a useful argument, possibly.

Any thoughts?

Kahlo

 

[stunning]

Any thoughts?

That was a really brilliant and well thought out discussion and I thank you for it. I disagree with a few of your points...and agree with a few as well.

My thought right now is that I have to get off the computer and start packing as I'm up at 5 to go to Spain for the week.

In Chicago I'd be challenging the assimilationists and celebrating Gay Shame instead of Gay Pride and throwing mudpies at the floats sponsered by Miller Light and Smirnoff.

I have to say that marching yesterday in Dublin was one of the best Pride moments I've ever had...

My proposal that men are programmed and encouraged to dominate society (sexually, physically, mentally) is not such a stretch. Is it not all rape?

The good men on this board are some of my dearest friends in the world. They're ok looking at institutionalized sexism within themselves and working to transcend it...as I do. Gay or not, I still benefit from male privlige. Even straight male privlige at times... As a feminist (with still a lot to learn), I know that men can stop rape. I believe that. No one here is saying rape is good. We're all clear on that...and I'll keep my fantasies to myself.

As I said, I'm going to Spain for a week in about 3 hours. I won't be on Thumped again until about the 14th. Just an FYI in case anyone was wondering why I wasn't posting or anything...

Be safe everyone, play safe, fantasize about whatever you want...it's your imagination. Safe, sane, consensual.

Yours in leather,

Thomas

 

[stunning]

Let's see... First there was the article which was supremely dodgy in a lot of what it was saying. I can start by saying I am not a gay man and I have not seen the play concerned. I am a gay woman though and so I know all about the oppression you fell back on when people challenged you too much, and I think that was a bit rich.

Ok, two thoughts.

1. If you took the article, without all this discussion around it (particularly mine which seems to have gotten under your skin and that's fair enough), and you just took it in isolation...is there anything in the article that you think has enough value in it to be discussed? I'd simply be curious to know.

2. I don't think I've been challenged too much anywhere on this thread. I've appreciated the discussion...I concede I got really frustrated at one point, but I'm entitled - its a hot topic and yeah, we didn't set limits or context so its spiralled a bit out of control. Nor do I feel I fell back on the fact that I am a member of sexual minority or that I fell back on the experience of a valid liberation struggle and my personal history involved in that struggle.

I hope I'll be clearer in future posts, granted I have a tendency to wander.

See ya'll next week.

Adios,

Thomas

 

[stunning]

I've decided to revisit the article while on the plane...

This was the note from the friend who sent it to me...thought I'd add it to the mix here.

Thomas
_________________________________

Fascinating piece on power and aggression. Is our collective cultural fantasy
life ready for gay men and women to start kicking (and raping) ass, and not
have to die for it in the end?

--jim

"no one said life was fair christina."

 

[egg_]

But the point of the article is that straight men are encouraged by the media, society, OUR OWN FAMILIES AND FRIENDS even, to not only fantasize about rape, but to do it!

Em ... explain this, Thomas. It doesn't make any sense to me

 

[kahlo]

Perhaps I'm sensitive to this because being a member of a sexual minority, throughout my life and still today I am told that my desires are sick and wrong. From childhood, that puts an incredible toll on a spirit.

I've had to struggle to find a way to somehow put that horrible information aside and find a way to embrace my desires...what I know is that most others aren't so lucky and never find a way to transcend that information.

There will always be people to tell all of us, gay straight or bi, that our thoughts are wrong, our desires are to be restricted.

To believe that puts one at risk for all sorts of self-harm.


Thomas

You asked where you had played the oppressed minority card...
Um, the above, to me, (as a fully paid-up member of said minority who doesn't consider myself in the least bit oppressed because I damn well refuse to be thank you very much!) smacks of "You couldn't possibly understand because you're not a member of an oppressed minority" and so I see it as a fall-back which someone of your obvious intelligence shouldn't have to use. Fair point?

Egg has highlighted what you said about men being "told to" rape. In a more recent post you backtrack from that talking about patriarchal society/cultural imperialsm and equating this with rape. Well, they are not the same thing. *Figuratively* speaking cultures have been "raped" and the Roman army (for one) used male rape as a tool of subjugation, but cultural imperalism does not immediately equate with the reality of rape as it has been discussed here (as a sex-crime). It's mustard and custard again. You cannot leap from the literal to the figurative whenever you like in order to change your argument. If you meant figurative rape in your first statement with regard to men being being encouraged by society to rape then you should have made that clear. I don't think that is what you meant, because that was not the thrust of the article.

Pardon the pun.

You asked if I found anything worth discussing in the article? Yup, I did, but it got kind of lost under all the other stuff. I found some of what he said about the repression of desire interesting, the notion of being a good little fag, because that's something anyone gay can relate to that straight people may not be all that familiar with: the age old problem of having to suss out the sexuality of anyone you may be interested in, behave yourself if they come up straight, and not be seen as a threat. Put them in an ivory tower lest you be seen as a predator and blot the Queer copybook for all the good little fags and dykes out there. However, I wouldn't say that embracing the concept of the queer predator is any kind of answer to that dilemma (there isn't an answer other than shit happens and life sucks sometimes ). Rather it buys into age-old sterotyping of the lecherous queen and the prowling bull-dagger where gay people were seen as predatory and dangerous and it did nobody any good whatsoever.

Thomas, I don't know about you, but I've been accused of "converting" people in my time and it burned because it was bull and because it cast me as precisely what the article talks about, a queer predator. It did not feel good, and it proves the point that this sterotype still exists and I don't know if it's one we should want to reclaim for ourselves even on a relatively benign level (casting aside the rape argument for a second).

BTW I was tossing no asparagus whatsoever (surreality break) at the lads here on Thumped, which is why I called them en masse "good lads", nor did I imply that you were, I don't know where those wires got crossed.

It wasn't a case either of your arguments per se getting under my skin, it was a case of something being seen as furthering the Queer agenda when to my mind it is rather a retardation of it. Is it a positive thing for someone struggling to come to terms with their sexuality to see a gay man rape a straight man in a shower in an award-winning play?

Will this make them feel good about their own emerging feelings or merely serve to compound their own internalised homophobia and/or shame? Tough question...

I'm not so naive as to claim that all gay people are angels, there are gay rapists, there are gay serial killers, gay society (such as it is) is a microcosm of the world at large with every subtype of humanity, including the scumbags, well represented. Should we, however, be whooping with joy at the fact that we can equally rape (or fantasise about it)? That we can equally kill? That we can all be assholes? Did we ever need permission from anyone for this? Does it somehow make us *more* equal (hello Mr Orwell, thought I'd concept-check you again) that we have these dark capacities within us too?

We already *are* equal. Not in the eyes of a lot of the world, not in the eyes of the lawmakers. But as people, humans, individuals, we are each of us equal to anyone else. Such a simple fact, and lost on so many because there is so much ballyhoo made by so much of society over one facet of any gay person, namely their sexuality, and many gay people can fall into the societal trap of letting their sexuality become the defining "all" of them - thus propagating society's concept that there is nothing to a queer but their queerdom (queerness, queeritude, choose your own, I like queerdom!). It's sad but true that a lot of society's sterotypes when it comes to us lot have had their roots in reality (the whole butch/femme thing etc.), and while that reality changes, it takes a heck of a long time for the stereotypes to
go away. So there is no need for us to resuscitate the one about the gay predator, I'm sorry, I keep seeing Uncle Monty from "Withnail and I" and cringing...

To reiterate, I feel no shame whatsoever for who I am, but it does sadden me to see someone celebrate the portrayal of a male rape as something positive for gay rights. Ass-kicking (so long as it's figurative) is one thing, "ass-raping" (?!) as your friend put it, another entirely.

Hasta luego, have fun in the sun!

K.

 

[LMD64]

Just remembered (was reminded by it being on Sky last night), gay rape's been covered by entertainment media loads of times in the past, case in point: Pulp Fiction was on last night. Of course, there was no ambivalence about the rapers motives or the consequences of their actions, they get the full weight of Quentin T's "righteous anger" dumped upon them.

I wonder what it has to say about society that, when female rape occurs in a film, at worst it's considered a shocking thing to happen to anyone and justice is supplied by the courts (eg. The Accused). Rarely is physical retribution used as the bad guy's payback. But when it happens to a guy, the 'homosexual panic' card gets played, and the perpetrator gets mangled to a bloody pulp. And this is seen by many as morally justifiable. "Yeah, I killed him, but HE raped ME."
Does this mean that a male victim of rape is more traumatised than a female victim, and so deserves a bigger slice of the revenge-pie? I somehow don't think so. Unless its the fact that men are more accustomed to taking the dominant role, and so, having that turned on its head is too much for their sensitive mentalities to handle...

I always felt that, in Pulp Fiction, that scene seemed to me to justify queer-bashing. Granted, the two redneck honkies weren't exactly squeaky clean innocents by a long shot, but there seemed to be just a little to much savoury relish heaped on the fact that vengeance was on its way. "Kill the queer, slit his throat, bash him in..."

# END OF RANT #

 

[snap-apple]

Just remembered (was reminded by it being on Sky last night), gay rape's been covered by entertainment media loads of times in the past, case in point: Pulp Fiction was on last night. Of course, there was no ambivalence about the rapers motives or the consequences of their actions, they get the full weight of Quentin T's "righteous anger" dumped upon them.

I wonder what it has to say about society that, when female rape occurs in a film, at worst it's considered a shocking thing to happen to anyone and justice is supplied by the courts (eg. The Accused). Rarely is physical retribution used as the bad guy's payback. But when it happens to a guy, the 'homosexual panic' card gets played, and the perpetrator gets mangled to a bloody pulp. And this is seen by many as morally justifiable. "Yeah, I killed him, but HE raped ME."
Does this mean that a male victim of rape is more traumatised than a female victim, and so deserves a bigger slice of the revenge-pie? I somehow don't think so. Unless its the fact that men are more accustomed to taking the dominant role, and so, having that turned on its head is too much for their sensitive mentalities to handle...

I always felt that, in Pulp Fiction, that scene seemed to me to justify queer-bashing. Granted, the two redneck honkies weren't exactly squeaky clean innocents by a long shot, but there seemed to be just a little to much savoury relish heaped on the fact that vengeance was on its way. "Kill the queer, slit his throat, bash him in..."

# END OF RANT #

in fairness tho a whole lotta people get it in the neck in pulp fiction.


but think about male and female reactions to violence carried out on them. guys are probably more likely to exact physical revenge.

 

[LMD64]

in fairness tho a whole lotta people get it in the neck in pulp fiction.


but think about male and female reactions to violence carried out on them. guys are probably more likely to exact physical revenge.

Yup, i agree. Guys are more likely to wreak havoc and lay waste and all that.
And that's getting back to the whole initial thread theme. Is it empowering/emancipating to see the reverse happening - the dominant male getting beaten by the more commonly considered submissive member of society, ie., female/gay male?
I can see how it could be taken that way (no pun intended), in that it "strikes a blow for the oppressed minority". But it's not quite as empowering as changing people's attitudes towards that oppressed minority. Which is a hell of a lot harder to do.
Thing is, in Pulp Fiction, there's no coming-to-terms with anyone else's sexuality. The evil fags rape the bad ganster, who in turn, gets medieval on their ass. Eye for an eye.

No one ends up learning anything, and the endless circle of violence is repeated, on and on, and on...

 

[stunning]

Em ... explain this, Thomas. It doesn't make any sense to me

I´d be refering to the patriarchal society we live in and its structures of power and privlige. See the part in the article where he talks about men raping women as a way the ¨pecking¨ order is reinforced.

 

[stunning]

You asked where you had played the oppressed minority card...

<snip>

Hasta luego, have fun in the sun!

K.

Thanks for another well thought out discussion.

I can´t wait to offer some ideas when I get home tomorrow night.

Adios!

Thomas

 

[egg_]

But the point of the article is that straight men are encouraged by the media, society, OUR OWN FAMILIES AND FRIENDS even, to not only fantasize about rape, but to do it!

I´d be refering to the patriarchal society we live in and its structures of power and privlige.

So you're saying that 'straight-men-are-encouraged-to-rape' is implicit in the fact that we have more power in society?
Seems like pretty weak logic to me

 

[turboman]

The guy that produced that play has serious issues if he thinks rape is something that young people (of any sexual persuation) can look up to. I recently saw a "documentary" about lesbian sex. Some of the lesbians on that programme sounded like yon playwright. Lesbians are "liberated" now and lesbian power is growing within society etc... In then went on to describe how many of these newly empowered females were getting into the porn industry and setting up businesses selling adult toys.
The doco also foccussed a lot on dildos and strap ons and other items. This to me, along with the above mentioned play does not seem to reflect a maturing homosexual identity and community but rather some sad individuals with problems of self worth. The attempt to shock in both cases is obvious.

To whomsoever used eminem as an example of mainstream society's tolerance to young girls being raped; think again. This guy is a reactionary that appeals to young people for his violent and anti-social ways. A society is always going to be protective of its children as they are the future.

 

[stunning]

So you're saying that 'straight-men-are-encouraged-to-rape' is implicit in the fact that we have more power in society?
Seems like pretty weak logic to me

No egg, I'm saying that the message is explict in view of how rape by straight men is seen as something different than rape by gay men.
I refer to lmb64's post (and the initial article) where he points out that when a straight man gets raped the world is horrofied and PUNISHMENT IS IMINENT and MANDATORY.

Why isn't the world horrified when a woman or a gay man are sexually assaulted...??? Because our bodies and our lives are not valued as much as a straight males. ...and I'm not playing the 'poor me' minority card here.

This is a simplified example of straight male privlige. Society doesn't accept a woman saying "of course I killed him, he tried to rape me" but they accept that from a straight man.

By lack of consequences for straight men when they assault others, in anyway, an encouragement can be assumed. Si?

Maybe I'm wrong...

Thomas

 

[spiritualtramp]

Why isn't the world horrified when a woman or a gay man are sexually assaulted...??? Because our bodies and our lives are not valued as much as a straight males. ...and I'm not playing the 'poor me' minority card here.

Thomas

oh for fucks sake .

I think you'll find the world is horrified when a woman or a gay man is raped , thomas .

 

[stunning]

oh for fucks sake .

I think you'll find the world is horrified when a woman or a gay man is raped , thomas .

of for fucks sake, no I don't find that. THAT'S MY WHOLE BLOODY POINT!
It's not about being equal...its about being treated equal.
The subjugation of women is so normalized in our society that I'm being blasted for even talking about it.

Fine, sexism doesn't exist.

There.

Happy?

 

[egg_]

Fine, sexism doesn't exist.

There.

Happy?

Do I detect some frustration in your tone?

The rape of a straight guy causes more outrage than that of a woman or a gay guy? That's not obvious to me ... could there be cultural differences at play here (between the US and Ireland)? I dunno, I don't read the newspapers or watch tv so perhaps I'm just unaware of this

By lack of consequences for straight men when they assault others, in anyway, an encouragement can be assumed.

I don't think one necessarily follows from the other ... there's no consequences for picking your nose, but I'd hardly say it's encouraged
And, y'know, there are consequences for raping someone ...

 

[billygannon]

Any person who fantasies about raping another person has problems with their own self-worth.

People may be entitled to their own desires, but these desires should be addressed simply because it indicates a fundamental lack of respect for the person you are raping. The desire for conquest stems from an unhappiness with what you've got. That unhappiness should be addressed and not manifested physically through something like a beating or rape.