I'm surprised that I did not see mentioned in the comments the prior interaction between fiance Greg and boss Roger, which was a catalyst to the date-rape. Greg, who earlier in the episode rebuffed Joan's advances at home, appears compelled to reestablish his sexual dominance in the office. Why the change of libido?
Roger escalates the tension of ego after being introduced to Greg, by telling Greg information about Joan that Greg doesn't know (that Joan dislikes French food). Greg is visibly thrown by this, and then leads Joan into the office.
Clearly, Joan is the powerless victim here. Unfortunately, the history of sexual tension in her relationship with Roger is a factor, which Roger selfishly exploits, and impacts Greg's descent into hell.
As much as this is about feminism, it's also about the masculine competitive drive taken to its logical destructively darwinian ends. Anyone who subscribes to natural (AND sexual) selection must concede this.
Greg, who earlier in the episode rebuffed Joan's advances at home, appears compelled to reestablish his sexual dominance in the office. Why the change of libido?
Because he's threatened by Joan's sexual history and experience, and raping her in the office is the way that he takes ownership of it. He's not just raping Joan, he sees it as taking something from Roger and everyone else he's imagined sleeping with her.
Anyone who subscribes to natural (AND sexual) selection must concede this.
I know that both exist but that only leads me to the conclusion that I have no idea what you're talking about. Sexual selection in humans isn't about males competing for mate ownership; it's about males competing for mate access from females. Cryptic fertility in humans ensures this has to be the case - it's almost impossible to impregnate a woman by rape. (It's almost impossible to do it consensually, in fact, since the vagina is such a hostile place to sperm. That's an indication that, in fact, reproduction is not the primary purpose of human sex.)
That would probably not have counted as rape back when the show is set, but it probably would count today.
Depends who you ask. Legal and social definitions of rape are necessarily ambiguous and require interpretation when applied to specific cases. If the scene in question was real and was presented as videotape evidence in a rape trial, I strongly doubt it would be enough to secure a conviction.
Exactly how long does the woman have to fight and say "no" for it to count as rape in your book?
Your question is silly. There is no "exact" amount of time. What if the woman resists and says "no" at first but then stops? Has she changed her mind or did she just give up? Did she really mean "no" in the first place? I think there are degrees of coercion and degrees of consent and that sex can be coerced in some sense without necessarily rising to the level of rape. I think the scene was ambiguous about Joan's state of mind.
Of course it's silly. I realize there's no "exact" amount of resistance required. But you're the one who seemed to suggest that she didn't resist enough for your satisfaction. Considering he had to use prolonged force to hold her down and move her clothing to get access, and considering that when she finally gave in she did NOT participate but simply lay there and zoned out makes it hard to believe that she changed her mind and didn't mean no in the first place.
I agree that sex can be coerced without rising to the level of rape. Having sex with a drunk-but-conscious girl (especially if the guy is drunk too) is a good example of what some people consider rape and I simply consider unfortunate.
But I don't know what more you would have required Joan to have done to show you that their intercourse was truly an invasive act.
hmmm...I just watched the scene again and her fiance is definitely more aggressive than I remembered from my first viewing. I guess I'd say it probably does cross the line into rape.
"Cryptic fertility in humans ensures this has to be the case - it's almost impossible to impregnate a woman by rape."
You might want to do some more reading on the matter. Rape is actually more effective at getting women pregnant than consentual sex. Women's bodies are primed to get pregnant with the genes of skilled rapists because skilled rapists have good genes for sons; ones that will impregnate many women. Hence the prevalence of rape fantasies among women and the elevated likelihood of female orgasm during rape (female orgasms, by making the cervix more permeable to sperm, make conception more likely). Reference: Sperm Wars by Robin Baker (a popularization which is then full of references to scholarly works).
Interesting, to me at least, that almost everybody described it as "Joan getting raped" instead of "Joan's fiance raping her."
I think that reflects more that people are invested in the character Joan and care what happens to her, whatsisname the fiance not so much.
Anyone who subscribes to natural (AND sexual) selection must concede this.
Hogwash. In general, insisting that everyone agree with your interpretation of evolution and how it applies to human relationships real and fictional is a nonstarter.
As noted by the poster below you, this is an inefficient way of producing offspring who live to maturity. But in terms of power, taking Joan's agency away in the office, daring her to get out of this by screaming for help and informing the whole office of what's happening to her, or lying there and taking it, is not about natural selection.
You might want to do some more reading on the matter
I've done considerable reading. You've apparently read one book. The conclusions of "Sperm Wars" have never achieved wide support in the scientific community, they have no support from either human or primate sociology, and the very biology of the human body contradicts them. Cryptic fertility, remember? Women are fertile for all of three to five days every month and they exhibit precisely zero external signs of ovulation. Terrible odds for a rapist. Much worse than for her legitimate mate.
There's no evolutionary advantage to rape in human beings, which is so few rapes result in pregnancy. Indeed the phenomenon of infertility caused by injuries sustained during rape is so common I wonder how this myth would ever get started. People looking to justify base impulses and patriarchy using phony science, I guess.
Rape = forced sex from a man of insufficiently high social status
Offensive, bone-headed, sexist, and moronic. Like your posts.
Except the copious peer-reviewed literature citations.
What does that matter? You can write any book you want, and cram the back page with all the citations you like, but it doesn't mean that the citations support your conclusions or that the scientific community as a whole puts much stock in them.
And, indeed, the scientific community puts about as much stock in "Sperm Wars" as they do in Crichton's "State of Fear."
You mean, a self-comforting argument you just came up with about the very biology of the human body.
I'm sorry, but I don't know what that's supposed to mean. It's a well-established matter of biological fact - as well as common experience - that women have no exterior signs of ovulation. Humans don't go into estrus, we're primates. Even the Natural Family Planning people have to use thermometers and complicated mucus-viscosity tests to determine the woman's fertile days; a rapist isn't likely to have that information, now is he?
Sperm live inside the vagina/uterus for no more than two days - it's an incredibly hostile environment - and it's actually too late once the woman has ovulated. The sperm have to already be there to have a chance. (This is a commonly mis-understood fact about human reproduction.)
It all adds up to a rapist needing to be incredibly lucky in any number of ways to fertilize a woman - he has to inseminate her during a basically invisible two-day window, and physically subdue her without causing so many injuries that she miscarries or skips ovulation altogether (or, indeed, dies.)
It's incredibly inefficient to say the least. It's not a successful strategy among bonobo chimps (our closest primate sexual analogs) and it's certainly not among humans.
And why every single romance novel has a rape fantasy?
Rape fantasies are common among women for the same reason bondage-submission fantasies are common among men. (The attraction of not being in control.) And despite your crude reasoning, no female victim of violent sexual assault ever looks back on it as anything but an incredible trauma.
Further I'd think twice before trying to develop any insights into the female mind from romance novels - most of them are written by men.
There's no "consenting" once you've started being raped.
Since whether she had "started being raped" was the very point in dispute, this isn't terribly relevant.
Did she "go along with it"? Or, like many women who are raped, did she enter an involuntary dissociative state? The latter, obviously.
How is this "obvious?"
There's no evolutionary advantage to rape in human beings, which is so few rapes result in pregnancy.
There is considerable evidence that rape is a conditional mating strategy for low-ranking males. The primary motive for rape usually seems to be sexual gratification.
Playing "count the errors" and "spot the bad reasoning" is going to be fun with Chet's latest:
"Except the copious peer-reviewed literature citations.
What does that matter? You can write any book you want, and cram the back page with all the citations you like, but it doesn't mean that the citations support your conclusions or that the scientific community as a whole puts much stock in them."
Backup literature that you don't think is great beats bald assertions (which is all you've offered).
"I'm sorry, but I don't know what that's supposed to mean. It's a well-established matter of biological fact - as well as common experience - that women have no exterior signs of ovulation."
Humans actually do have observable signs of ovulation. Females dress more revealingly, are more likely to wear makeup and appear more attractive when ovulating. All of these are exterior signs. There are papers documenting each of these points.
"Humans don't go into estrus, we're primates."
Half right. Humans don't go into estrus (and we are primates) but some other primates sure do. Like chimpanzees. Try a bit harder, you're looking quite foolish here.
"Even the Natural Family Planning people have to use thermometers and complicated mucus-viscosity tests to determine the woman's fertile days; a rapist isn't likely to have that information, now is he?"
If randomly chosen volunteers can spot the differences between women who are ovulating and not (by rating ovulating women more attractive) don't you think that guys with genes that dispose them towards rape would also have genes that make them better than average at spotting ovulating women?
"Sperm live inside the vagina/uterus for no more than two days - it's an incredibly hostile environment - and it's actually too late once the woman has ovulated. The sperm have to already be there to have a chance."
Part right. Sperm do live for about two days (give or take) but it's not too late once the woman has ovulated. In fact, when a woman is ovulating is when she is most fertile. On top of this there are all sorts of adaptations that women have so they are better able to capture desirable sperm (like that of skilled rapists). To name two, female orgasms make conception more likely since orgasm increase the permeability of the cervix to sperm and second, women are capable of ovulating in response to sexual stimuli (like a mating with a high value male).
"It's incredibly inefficient to say the least. It's not a successful strategy among bonobo chimps (our closest primate sexual analogs) and it's certainly not among humans."
The big difference is that bonobos and chimps are animals that have estrus cycles. If humans did, rape would not be a successful strategy since the less able to detect ovulation males would guard their long term mates during estrus and eliminate the opportunities for profitable rape. Humans have imperfectly concealed ovulation; women themselves are aware of it and men notice it.
"Rape fantasies are common among women for the same reason bondage-submission fantasies are common among men. (The attraction of not being in control.)"
Women in the WNBA are taller than the average man. Women are not "taller" than men. Because there are some men who have bondage-submission fantasies does not nearly match the numbers of women who have rape fantasies. Bondage porn is a fringe industry. Rape fantasies are the heart of the female equivalent ("romance" novels).
"Further I'd think twice before trying to develop any insights into the female mind from romance novels - most of them are written by men."
But they're bought by women (in huge numbers); doesn't matter if they're written by men or by space aliens - clearly they appeal to something in women's psyches (the desire for sperm from high quality men).
"Rape fantasies" definitionally aren't; the fantasizer may play out a sequence that mimics the motions of being forced against one's will, but this overlooks the fact that the fantasizer is in control of the fantasy. Actually being forced against one's will in a real world setting is something entirely different.
Meanwhile, some women read bodice rippers for the same reason that some men use porn: The partcipant voluntarily stimulates his/her sexual desire with a setup and finale that are deemed fundamentally good for the participant without the normal real-world consequences that would follow such an event.
Attempting to engage in definitive psychological analysis of root sexual desires based on what people will seek out in a voluntary, imaginary setting free from physical consequences is a fool's errand, and some of the posters here are disturbingly willing to fulfill it.
Maybe you have to not have a head full of bullshit, 18th-century ideas about women and their sexuality to see it, maybe?
Did you not see the part where she's staring off at the furniture? If that's what you think it looks like when a woman is consensually taking part in sex, you must be a rapist.
Backup literature that you don't think is great beats bald assertions (which is all you've offered).
Look, if you don't believe that women have no readily-identifiable external signs of ovulation, you should be able to ask one and tell me what they are.
Giving me the title of one book isn't support for your position.
Humans don't go into estrus (and we are primates) but some other primates sure do. Like chimpanzees.
Chimpanzees menstruate, they don't enter estrus. You're woefully misinformed, I'm afraid.
Sperm do live for about two days (give or take) but it's not too late once the woman has ovulated. In fact, when a woman is ovulating is when she is most fertile.
Again, absolutely incorrect. Ova have to be fertilized inside the fallopian tubes or its game-over. They're only there for a matter of hours before they pass into the uterus, and if sperm aren't already in the tubes fertilization is almost impossible.
As I said this is a common misconception (so to speak). It's not surprising you have it completely backwards.
clearly they appeal to something in women's psyches (the desire for sperm from high quality men).
This is the most offensive aspect of all - the idea that a rapist is a "high quality man." Absolutely disgusting and completely unsupported by any science or even common sense.
Did you not see the part where she's staring off at the furniture?
Wow, a three-second shot of Joan staring at furniture allows you to diagnose a condition of "involuntary dissociative state." Where did you get your medical degree, again, you pompous fool?
Well, if Chet's offended, whomever he's arguing with must be wrong.
Even a female chimp in estrus, which occurs every 35-40 days, could tell that. A male chimp in her presence could tell too. He wouldn't be distracted by "the sex skin of her genital area becom[ing] swollen....A swelling usually persists for about ten days before becoming flabby and wrinkled and then shrinking away to nothing again". Nope. Because he would know that chimps do not have estrus cycles.
The rest of your assertions are of similar quality and factual content.
Natural selection is about genetic bias (towards survival); sexual selection is about mating bias (also towards survival). My point is that both genetic aggressiveness AND mating competition each will naturally promote males to step ahead of each other in consummation of intercourse, regardless of whether permission is signaled a priori.
I fail to see where I've gone off the reservation on this, as much as the outcome makes people squirm.
Ramond Chandler once said that "any plot problem can be solved by two men coming through the door with guns blazing."
He usually had a detective show up at Phillip Marlowe's apartment for a talk, instead.
Interesting, to me at least, that almost everybody described it as "Joan getting raped" instead of "Joan's fiance raping her."
I guess feminists are the only ones who recognize male agency these days.
I'm surprised that I did not see mentioned in the comments the prior interaction between fiance Greg and boss Roger, which was a catalyst to the date-rape. Greg, who earlier in the episode rebuffed Joan's advances at home, appears compelled to reestablish his sexual dominance in the office. Why the change of libido?
Roger escalates the tension of ego after being introduced to Greg, by telling Greg information about Joan that Greg doesn't know (that Joan dislikes French food). Greg is visibly thrown by this, and then leads Joan into the office.
Clearly, Joan is the powerless victim here. Unfortunately, the history of sexual tension in her relationship with Roger is a factor, which Roger selfishly exploits, and impacts Greg's descent into hell.
As much as this is about feminism, it's also about the masculine competitive drive taken to its logical destructively darwinian ends. Anyone who subscribes to natural (AND sexual) selection must concede this.
Greg, who earlier in the episode rebuffed Joan's advances at home, appears compelled to reestablish his sexual dominance in the office. Why the change of libido?
Because he's threatened by Joan's sexual history and experience, and raping her in the office is the way that he takes ownership of it. He's not just raping Joan, he sees it as taking something from Roger and everyone else he's imagined sleeping with her.
Anyone who subscribes to natural (AND sexual) selection must concede this.
I know that both exist but that only leads me to the conclusion that I have no idea what you're talking about. Sexual selection in humans isn't about males competing for mate ownership; it's about males competing for mate access from females. Cryptic fertility in humans ensures this has to be the case - it's almost impossible to impregnate a woman by rape. (It's almost impossible to do it consensually, in fact, since the vagina is such a hostile place to sperm. That's an indication that, in fact, reproduction is not the primary purpose of human sex.)
Interesting, to me at least, that almost everybody described it as "Joan getting raped" instead of "Joan's fiance raping her."
I'm not sure the act as portrayed properly counts as rape. Joan certainly resisted at first, but then seemed to decide to just go along with it.
Joan certainly resisted at first, but then seemed to decide to just go along with it.
That would probably not have counted as rape back when the show is set, but it probably would count today.
As for the impossibility of conception, I've never had a problem.
That would probably not have counted as rape back when the show is set, but it probably would count today.
Depends who you ask. Legal and social definitions of rape are necessarily ambiguous and require interpretation when applied to specific cases. If the scene in question was real and was presented as videotape evidence in a rape trial, I strongly doubt it would be enough to secure a conviction.
Exactly how long does the woman have to fight and say "no" for it to count as rape in your book?
Based on that scene alone, I'd happily vote to convict the guy.
Exactly how long does the woman have to fight and say "no" for it to count as rape in your book?
Your question is silly. There is no "exact" amount of time. What if the woman resists and says "no" at first but then stops? Has she changed her mind or did she just give up? Did she really mean "no" in the first place? I think there are degrees of coercion and degrees of consent and that sex can be coerced in some sense without necessarily rising to the level of rape. I think the scene was ambiguous about Joan's state of mind.
Of course it's silly. I realize there's no "exact" amount of resistance required. But you're the one who seemed to suggest that she didn't resist enough for your satisfaction. Considering he had to use prolonged force to hold her down and move her clothing to get access, and considering that when she finally gave in she did NOT participate but simply lay there and zoned out makes it hard to believe that she changed her mind and didn't mean no in the first place.
I agree that sex can be coerced without rising to the level of rape. Having sex with a drunk-but-conscious girl (especially if the guy is drunk too) is a good example of what some people consider rape and I simply consider unfortunate.
But I don't know what more you would have required Joan to have done to show you that their intercourse was truly an invasive act.
hmmm...I just watched the scene again and her fiance is definitely more aggressive than I remembered from my first viewing. I guess I'd say it probably does cross the line into rape.
Well, Mad Men is very much a show that reveals itself more upon subsequent viewings
Chet-
"Cryptic fertility in humans ensures this has to be the case - it's almost impossible to impregnate a woman by rape."
You might want to do some more reading on the matter. Rape is actually more effective at getting women pregnant than consentual sex. Women's bodies are primed to get pregnant with the genes of skilled rapists because skilled rapists have good genes for sons; ones that will impregnate many women. Hence the prevalence of rape fantasies among women and the elevated likelihood of female orgasm during rape (female orgasms, by making the cervix more permeable to sperm, make conception more likely). Reference: Sperm Wars by Robin Baker (a popularization which is then full of references to scholarly works).
Interesting, to me at least, that almost everybody described it as "Joan getting raped" instead of "Joan's fiance raping her."
I think that reflects more that people are invested in the character Joan and care what happens to her, whatsisname the fiance not so much.
Anyone who subscribes to natural (AND sexual) selection must concede this.
Hogwash. In general, insisting that everyone agree with your interpretation of evolution and how it applies to human relationships real and fictional is a nonstarter.
As noted by the poster below you, this is an inefficient way of producing offspring who live to maturity. But in terms of power, taking Joan's agency away in the office, daring her to get out of this by screaming for help and informing the whole office of what's happening to her, or lying there and taking it, is not about natural selection.
I'm not sure the act as portrayed properly counts as rape. Joan certainly resisted at first, but then seemed to decide to just go along with it.
1) You're an idiot. There's no "consenting" once you've started being raped. Further even attempted rape is sexual assault.
2) Did she "go along with it"? Or, like many women who are raped, did she enter an involuntary dissociative state? The latter, obviously.
I don't see how you could watch that scene and think that, at any point, she consented to that sexual encounter.
You might want to do some more reading on the matter
I've done considerable reading. You've apparently read one book. The conclusions of "Sperm Wars" have never achieved wide support in the scientific community, they have no support from either human or primate sociology, and the very biology of the human body contradicts them. Cryptic fertility, remember? Women are fertile for all of three to five days every month and they exhibit precisely zero external signs of ovulation. Terrible odds for a rapist. Much worse than for her legitimate mate.
There's no evolutionary advantage to rape in human beings, which is so few rapes result in pregnancy. Indeed the phenomenon of infertility caused by injuries sustained during rape is so common I wonder how this myth would ever get started. People looking to justify base impulses and patriarchy using phony science, I guess.
Rape = forced sex from a man of insufficiently high social status
Chet: The conclusions of "Sperm Wars" have never achieved wide support in the scientific community,
Except the copious peer-reviewed literature citations.
they have no support from either human or primate sociology,
No support in rarely-falsifiable social sciences? Hate to break it to you, but all that means is, "not politically correct".
very biology of the human body contradicts them.
You mean, a self-comforting argument you just came up with about the very biology of the human body.
There's no evolutionary advantage to rape in human beings, which is so few rapes result in pregnancy.
And why every single romance novel has a rape fantasy?
Oh wait, I forgot, that doesn't count as rape because the guy was desirable/successful enough.
Rape = forced sex from a man of insufficiently high social status
Offensive, bone-headed, sexist, and moronic. Like your posts.
Except the copious peer-reviewed literature citations.
What does that matter? You can write any book you want, and cram the back page with all the citations you like, but it doesn't mean that the citations support your conclusions or that the scientific community as a whole puts much stock in them.
And, indeed, the scientific community puts about as much stock in "Sperm Wars" as they do in Crichton's "State of Fear."
You mean, a self-comforting argument you just came up with about the very biology of the human body.
I'm sorry, but I don't know what that's supposed to mean. It's a well-established matter of biological fact - as well as common experience - that women have no exterior signs of ovulation. Humans don't go into estrus, we're primates. Even the Natural Family Planning people have to use thermometers and complicated mucus-viscosity tests to determine the woman's fertile days; a rapist isn't likely to have that information, now is he?
Sperm live inside the vagina/uterus for no more than two days - it's an incredibly hostile environment - and it's actually too late once the woman has ovulated. The sperm have to already be there to have a chance. (This is a commonly mis-understood fact about human reproduction.)
It all adds up to a rapist needing to be incredibly lucky in any number of ways to fertilize a woman - he has to inseminate her during a basically invisible two-day window, and physically subdue her without causing so many injuries that she miscarries or skips ovulation altogether (or, indeed, dies.)
It's incredibly inefficient to say the least. It's not a successful strategy among bonobo chimps (our closest primate sexual analogs) and it's certainly not among humans.
And why every single romance novel has a rape fantasy?
Rape fantasies are common among women for the same reason bondage-submission fantasies are common among men. (The attraction of not being in control.) And despite your crude reasoning, no female victim of violent sexual assault ever looks back on it as anything but an incredible trauma.
Further I'd think twice before trying to develop any insights into the female mind from romance novels - most of them are written by men.
You're an idiot.
You're a moron.
There's no "consenting" once you've started being raped.
Since whether she had "started being raped" was the very point in dispute, this isn't terribly relevant.
Did she "go along with it"? Or, like many women who are raped, did she enter an involuntary dissociative state? The latter, obviously.
How is this "obvious?"
There's no evolutionary advantage to rape in human beings, which is so few rapes result in pregnancy.
There is considerable evidence that rape is a conditional mating strategy for low-ranking males. The primary motive for rape usually seems to be sexual gratification.
Playing "count the errors" and "spot the bad reasoning" is going to be fun with Chet's latest:
"Except the copious peer-reviewed literature citations.
What does that matter? You can write any book you want, and cram the back page with all the citations you like, but it doesn't mean that the citations support your conclusions or that the scientific community as a whole puts much stock in them."
Backup literature that you don't think is great beats bald assertions (which is all you've offered).
"I'm sorry, but I don't know what that's supposed to mean. It's a well-established matter of biological fact - as well as common experience - that women have no exterior signs of ovulation."
Humans actually do have observable signs of ovulation. Females dress more revealingly, are more likely to wear makeup and appear more attractive when ovulating. All of these are exterior signs. There are papers documenting each of these points.
"Humans don't go into estrus, we're primates."
Half right. Humans don't go into estrus (and we are primates) but some other primates sure do. Like chimpanzees. Try a bit harder, you're looking quite foolish here.
"Even the Natural Family Planning people have to use thermometers and complicated mucus-viscosity tests to determine the woman's fertile days; a rapist isn't likely to have that information, now is he?"
If randomly chosen volunteers can spot the differences between women who are ovulating and not (by rating ovulating women more attractive) don't you think that guys with genes that dispose them towards rape would also have genes that make them better than average at spotting ovulating women?
"Sperm live inside the vagina/uterus for no more than two days - it's an incredibly hostile environment - and it's actually too late once the woman has ovulated. The sperm have to already be there to have a chance."
Part right. Sperm do live for about two days (give or take) but it's not too late once the woman has ovulated. In fact, when a woman is ovulating is when she is most fertile. On top of this there are all sorts of adaptations that women have so they are better able to capture desirable sperm (like that of skilled rapists). To name two, female orgasms make conception more likely since orgasm increase the permeability of the cervix to sperm and second, women are capable of ovulating in response to sexual stimuli (like a mating with a high value male).
"It's incredibly inefficient to say the least. It's not a successful strategy among bonobo chimps (our closest primate sexual analogs) and it's certainly not among humans."
The big difference is that bonobos and chimps are animals that have estrus cycles. If humans did, rape would not be a successful strategy since the less able to detect ovulation males would guard their long term mates during estrus and eliminate the opportunities for profitable rape. Humans have imperfectly concealed ovulation; women themselves are aware of it and men notice it.
"Rape fantasies are common among women for the same reason bondage-submission fantasies are common among men. (The attraction of not being in control.)"
Women in the WNBA are taller than the average man. Women are not "taller" than men. Because there are some men who have bondage-submission fantasies does not nearly match the numbers of women who have rape fantasies. Bondage porn is a fringe industry. Rape fantasies are the heart of the female equivalent ("romance" novels).
"Further I'd think twice before trying to develop any insights into the female mind from romance novels - most of them are written by men."
But they're bought by women (in huge numbers); doesn't matter if they're written by men or by space aliens - clearly they appeal to something in women's psyches (the desire for sperm from high quality men).
"Rape fantasies" definitionally aren't; the fantasizer may play out a sequence that mimics the motions of being forced against one's will, but this overlooks the fact that the fantasizer is in control of the fantasy. Actually being forced against one's will in a real world setting is something entirely different.
Meanwhile, some women read bodice rippers for the same reason that some men use porn: The partcipant voluntarily stimulates his/her sexual desire with a setup and finale that are deemed fundamentally good for the participant without the normal real-world consequences that would follow such an event.
Attempting to engage in definitive psychological analysis of root sexual desires based on what people will seek out in a voluntary, imaginary setting free from physical consequences is a fool's errand, and some of the posters here are disturbingly willing to fulfill it.
How is this "obvious?"
Maybe you have to not have a head full of bullshit, 18th-century ideas about women and their sexuality to see it, maybe?
Did you not see the part where she's staring off at the furniture? If that's what you think it looks like when a woman is consensually taking part in sex, you must be a rapist.
Backup literature that you don't think is great beats bald assertions (which is all you've offered).
Look, if you don't believe that women have no readily-identifiable external signs of ovulation, you should be able to ask one and tell me what they are.
Giving me the title of one book isn't support for your position.
Humans don't go into estrus (and we are primates) but some other primates sure do. Like chimpanzees.
Chimpanzees menstruate, they don't enter estrus. You're woefully misinformed, I'm afraid.
Sperm do live for about two days (give or take) but it's not too late once the woman has ovulated. In fact, when a woman is ovulating is when she is most fertile.
Again, absolutely incorrect. Ova have to be fertilized inside the fallopian tubes or its game-over. They're only there for a matter of hours before they pass into the uterus, and if sperm aren't already in the tubes fertilization is almost impossible.
As I said this is a common misconception (so to speak). It's not surprising you have it completely backwards.
clearly they appeal to something in women's psyches (the desire for sperm from high quality men).
This is the most offensive aspect of all - the idea that a rapist is a "high quality man." Absolutely disgusting and completely unsupported by any science or even common sense.
chet,
Did you not see the part where she's staring off at the furniture?
Wow, a three-second shot of Joan staring at furniture allows you to diagnose a condition of "involuntary dissociative state." Where did you get your medical degree, again, you pompous fool?
Well, if Chet's offended, whomever he's arguing with must be wrong.
Even a female chimp in estrus, which occurs every 35-40 days, could tell that. A male chimp in her presence could tell too. He wouldn't be distracted by "the sex skin of her genital area becom[ing] swollen....A swelling usually persists for about ten days before becoming flabby and wrinkled and then shrinking away to nothing again". Nope. Because he would know that chimps do not have estrus cycles.
The rest of your assertions are of similar quality and factual content.
Chet & Deborah:
Natural selection is about genetic bias (towards survival); sexual selection is about mating bias (also towards survival). My point is that both genetic aggressiveness AND mating competition each will naturally promote males to step ahead of each other in consummation of intercourse, regardless of whether permission is signaled a priori.
I fail to see where I've gone off the reservation on this, as much as the outcome makes people squirm.