News
Words from a perpetrator
Sorry I’ve been a little absent, all - just started law school on Monday and I’m trying to get my sea legs. It’s gonna take a little while before I figure out where I am and what I’m doing with myself as a student again, but in the meantime, this particular item caught my eye. Many thanks to Leah for sending it my direction.
Major Trigger Warning for that link: it’s a reddit from a convicted rapist, who answered anonymous questions about his perpetration. If you have the stomach for it, the perpetrator says some pretty insightful things about why he perpetrated. I thought this part was the most to-the-point:
Q: Why did you do it? Do you regret hurting them? (I mean, actually, not just “I regret going to jail for it”.)
A: It’s not very satisfying, but I did it because I wanted it. I wanted them, I wanted to do what I did to them. The sexual arousal was intense, but the desire to overpower them, to take control was even more so. It was an urge that built and built until I surrenered [sic] to it.
I’m still trying to figure out what I think about this in general, but it was interesting seeing a perpetrator echo what sexual violence prevention folks have been saying for a long time. Dominance, control, power - these are the roots of rape, not sexual arousal or being horny.