Friday 26 September 2014

What motivates a rapist?

These days sadly  'rape' has been a burning social crime not only in Nepal but in all over the world. Every day there are several news stories related to sexual assault on media. The rape victims range from little girls of 4-5 years to old women even in their 90s. So, basically every female is in the danger zone. No place is safe for them. You never know who will be the victim next.


Usually it is understood that a rapist is motivated by the attraction of a female body to commit the crime. This may be the reason sometimes the victimized girls are blamed for wearing short or sexually appealing clothing to invite the perpetrators. However, considering the victims of all ages it is hard to believe that the sexual attraction is a single motive for the rapists. If it were true sexual attraction then most probably it would lead to mutual understanding instead of one-sided force.

A news story appeared last week in the Nepali newspapers said that a blind girl was raped by the hostel in-charge simply because she refused to study the 'subjects' that the person had suggested. This indicates that the man's motivation was clearly something else, not the sexual attraction.

A recent study on the sexual assault of older women in community and care settings conducted by a group of researchers from La Trobe University, Victoria, Australia shows that sexual assault is a crime more about power and violence rather than about physical attraction. The hostel in-charge and blind girl case above justifies this point.

The idea given by the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Nath Modi to control the crime of rape sounds more convincing than anything else. He said something like 'rape' is not related to females at all, so you do not need to worry about your daughters, let them go where they want to go. In contrast, you must always watch your sons, you must know where they go and what they do. Then only the number of rapists starts to decline. I hope Modi's terminology of 'sons' may include men of all ages, not only young boys otherwise the old farts will get away.      


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