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By the same author Sexual Honesty, By Women, For Women (1974) The Hite Report on Female Sexuality (1976) The Hite Report on Men and Male Sexuality (1981) Women and Love: A Cultural Revolution in Progress (The Hite Report on Love, Passion and Emotional Violence) (1987) Fliegen nit Jupiter (1993) This compilation includes previously published extracts from Shere. Hite's: Sexual Honesty, By Women, For Women (1974) ; The Hite Report on Female Sexuality (1976) ; The Hite Report on Men and Male Sexuality (1981), and Women and Love: A Cultural Revolution in Progress (The Hite Report on Love, Passion, and Emotional Violence) (1987) . Excerpts from The Hite Report on Female Sexuality by Shere Hite are reprinted with the permission of Macmillan Publishing Company, Copyright CD 1976 by Shere Hite. All right reserved. Excerpts from The Hite Report on Men and Male Sexuality by Shere Hite (Text) Copyright © 1978, 1981 by Shere Hite. Reprinted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, Inc and Little Brown UK Ltd. Excerpts from Women and Love : A Cultural Revolution in Progress (The Hite Report on Love, Passion, and Emotional Violence) by Shere Hite Copyright 1987 by Shere Hite. Reprinted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, Inc and Little Brown UK Ltd. This compilation first published in Great Britain 1993 Copyright DC 1993 by Shere Hite Preface copyright @ 1993 by Dale Spender The moral-right of the author has been asserted Bloomsbury Publishing Ltd, 2 Soho Square, London WlV 5DE A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 0-7475-1377-5 Typeset in Great Britain by Hewer Text Composition Services, Edinburgh Printed in England by Clays Ltd, St Ives plc Rape, Sexual Violence, and Pornography Sexual Violence in the Culture Where do pressuring women into sex, rape (of various kinds), paying women for sex (either outright, or as many men said, in marriage or on dates), and buying women in pornography fit into men's lives-if they do? Are they things only "abnormal" men are involved with, or do they in some way involve and affect all men's lives and relationships with women, because they somehow involve the basic underpinnings of the entire social structure? If sex/intercourse has traditionally been the basic symbol of male domination and ownership of women (whether or not an individual man may feel this at any given time), rape and paying women for sex, or buying women through pornography, are basic extensions of this ideology-not biologic "urges" or part of a physical male "sex drive." It is what "sex" means to men that makes them sometimes want to rape or buy women, not a desire for orgasm or sexual sharing. The general culture-in movies, books, jokes, and popular say- ings-reinforces the idea that men "get" or "take" sex from women, men "have" women, men conquer and possess women, women say "no" but mean yes, women "give in" to men-and "penetration" is the symbol of this victory. Men, brought up to feel that a vital part of being a male is to orgasm in a vagina, often resent women's "power" to withhold this "male need" from them-not realizing that this is in many ways the only "power" left to many women. It is this dynamic that in part sometimes leads men to say that women are "more powerful" than men. In fact, the model of sex as we know it has even been called the "rape model" of sex. If men have more power, money, and privilege than women, can the definition of "sex" change? Won't forcing women into sex (intercourse), either physically through rape, or financially through paying a woman or buying pornography, continue its appeal, due to its meaning? Arguably a real and profound change may occur. Right now, RAPE, SEXUAL VIOLENCE, AND PORNOGRAPHY in many ways "fucking" and physical rape stand as an overwhelming metaphor for the rape-physical, emotional, and spiritual-of an entire gender by our culture. Rape Do men want to rape women? "Sometimes I've found myself getting excited watching a show in which is), paying a man is planning a rape. It bothered me that I was being aroused by it. zarriage or I'm not sure I understand why." 's lives-if "I have often wanted to rape a woman, and I fantasize about it a lot. d with, or But the idea disturbs me because it runs counter to my sense of mutual lationships respect, humanism, feminism, etc. I'm really anxious to see what other erpinnings men feel about rape.." mean to men? Is the desire of of What does the physical rape of a woman male reassert an injured individual sexual? A form of hostility and anger? Or a way to "n for sex, "masculine pride"? as a way of putting a woman "back in her ins of this Many men think of rape . Others say women are "asking for it," -x drive. " place"-this was a man's right have no right to be sexual unless it int to rape the implication being that women leads to intercourse with men, and that men have the right to control )ular say- women's sexuality: seem to be asking for it . just women, "I've seen a lot of women who with a fistful of money is asking for robbery by flaunting amen say as a person especially in a gin mill or dark alley. I also feel sympathy ration" is his money, After all, when someone wants to protect one's money :al part of for women. << the money can be placed in a bank. But how does power" from being stolen, her body from being raped? I wish I knew . A little this is in a woman protect dynamic more prudence, I guess. I'm glad I'm a man." of `dry hustling.' Dry hustling is making owerful" "There is the provocation oneself available for sex and then withdrawing or withholding it. The public place is a dry hustler. The bra-less look :alley the brassiere-less woman in a be. And it is a provocation." lege than is attractive. It is supposed to men into A few say rape is justified by the male "sex drive" and the "failure" through of women to meet that "need." Underlying this point of view is the lue to its idea, strong in our culture and in all patriarchal cultures, that men own ;ht now, women's bodies. As one man said, "She is mine. I have a right to orgasm 223 1981 : THE HITE REPORT ON MEN through intercourse. God gave me the right when he made women for men." A man should not have to masturbate for orgasm when sexual desire is not mutual, according to this point of view; he should have his orgasm through a woman at all times (only an orgasm had through intercourse with a woman is legitimate), and it is a woman's duty at all times to help him do this . Also implicit in many of the replies is the idea that a woman denying a man sex is somehow denying his manhood and that by raping a woman a man is re-asserting his masculinity-not only with the woman but in his own mind: "Once I was going with a woman (in high school) and she would not let me have sex. All my friends had done it with their girlfriends, and even did it with us when we went out on double dates and parked together after. I got to feel like a real reject. I could have lied to them about it, but then my girlfriend would have found out, and they probably wouldn't have believed nie anyway, since I couldn't have described the feeling. This made me so angry I felt like raping her. Finally, without anybody knowing, I picked up a streetwalker and had intercourse. This did a lot for my feeling of confidence in my own masculinity. Soon after, I broke up with my girlfriend and started going with somebody else who would go all the way. Then I could tell the guys, and I felt like one of the group again . One man writes about his desire to rape being connected to the teachings of the culture: "It's pretty obvious that I have some hostility toward women that started way back-they have something I want, and I'm a `bad boy' for wanting it-they're excluding me-they have a secret-they have a sex organ, but dirty little boys don't get any, etc., etc., ad nauseam. I have become aware of these feelings and know when they are active; when I feel them, I back off whatever situation is causing them and find something else to do." One man describes chillingly his generalized feeling of rejec- tion-feeling left out of what "everyone else" is enjoying, what other men are having: "I have certainly wanted to. Usually this desire comes after I have been rejected by a very attractive woman, e.g., at the office. Then I fantasize following her, putting ,a gun to her head (I own a revolver), and asking her something like `Now tell me who you want to go to bed with.' In recent months, I have become more sympathetic toward rapists, because I see in myself the other side of-the sexual revolution: it is all well and good for the Beautiful People to decide to bring their 224 RAPE, SEXUAL VIOLENCE, AND PORNOGRAPHY women for fantasies out of the closet and talk about the joys of sex in public-it hen sexual is another to be tantalized day after day by the sight of beautiful could have women you desire but can't have.