What experiments, Steven? What methodology? What possible conflation of variables? I’m sure you’ll enlighten us, right?

I personally could live the rest of my life quite happily without being thus “enlightened.”

I agree. But I’m saying – is it possible that neither gender is more insatiable than the other? that “insatiability” is a sort of fakey concept?

For a couple thousand years it was considered a THE TRUTH in many places that women were bottomless pits of sexual need who cannot rise above their base desire, and that men could rise above their base desires by avoiding women.

Now we’re told it’s THE TRUTH that women are, as you said, too alluring and distracting for men, who are bottomless pits of sexual need and cannot rise above their base desires.

I’m saying – maybe this whole “insatiability” thing is kind of made up, and we (the human “we”) are only “insatiable” when we’re told we’re “insatiable”.

The World Economic Forum puts out a Global Gender Gap Report every year based on economic participation, economic opportunity, political empowerment, educational attainment and health and well-being.

Perhaps those are the measurements that Alon was using. OK. Without understanding more about the rapists, it is very difficult to assess how much Sweden’s political culture impacts the rape rate in Sweden.

Those criteria do not measure how individual men in Sweden view individual women. You could make the case that the laws that make those things a reality in Sweden are a proxy for how the majority of individual men view individual women, and you would have a point. However, if the rapes are primarily committed by men who do not hold the same views as the majority of Swedish men, then the political culture in Sweden is irrelevant to whether or not sexism is a direct cause of rape. It’s not Sweden that is raping women. It is men in Sweden. What matters is whether the rapists are misogynistic in determining the impact of sexism on rape.

Also, I find it deeply disconcerting that being denied sex leads men to take it by force.

Leads SOME men to take it by force, just like SOME men will kill each other over a parking space. If people will seize a pair of shoes by violence, why not a piece of ass?

Mysogyny, yes.
Sociopathy, definitely…its a violent crime, like any other.
I don’t know what you mean by entitlement.

I would also think that rape victims in Sweeden are way, way, way less stigmatized than their American counterparts. There is a massive underreporting problem in the USA, and comparing bulk statistics across countries like that is wildy problematic for that very reason.

I don’t think this paper *does* settle the question, not at all. It just seems excessive to say that the question was already settled, in the other direction.

It’s not, and I do apologize if I gave that impression. It’s been a really long day.

It seems very intuitive that sexual frustration IS a direct cause of rape.

I find it unlikely that rape is just about denial of pussy or sexual gratification. Like I said elsewhere, if masturbation to porn alleviates misogyny, the world should look very different. Also, I find it deeply disconcerting that being denied sex leads men to take it by force. My own take is that rape is elements of entitlement, misogyny, and a certain level of sociopathy (i.e., a lack of empathy). I suspect, although I don’t know how to demonstrate this empirically, that sexual gratification is way down on the list.

Frankly, I’m not sure which is worse: the idea that if a man can’t jerk off to porn he’s more likely to commit rape or that sexual frustration is a direct cause of rape.

Errr…

It seems very intuitive that sexual frustration IS a direct cause of rape. I would think that the burden of proof would be to show that it is not. Men are willing to pay for sex, hence it is a object of desire, presumably there are also those who are willing to take it by force.

Sweden
Norway
Iceland
Denmark
Finland
N. Zealand
Canada
U.K.
Germany
Australia