Gratuitous Rape in Fantasy novels

[Brian G Turner]

Cheers, allmywires, that would be appreciated - I'm looking at how the civilian population especially was affected in the Bosnian War, so that would be great.

 

[The Judge]

I've no idea of the incidence of male rape, in war or otherwise, but there are three factors skewed against women which may help, in part, to explain Brian's figures.

First, rape in wartime is used against women not only to degrade them personally, but also their extended family and indeed their society as a whole, since in patriarchal societies female "purity" is a matter of honour. Second, there is a real chance that many women will become pregnant after being raped, which adds to the degradation of such a society, and from the rapists' POV, gives children of the "right" sort. Third, as Brian mentions, women are forced to be unpaid prostitutes, such as the so-called comfort women (despicable phrase) used by the Japanese in the war -- although there might be the equivalent of male brothels, they are likely to be fewer in number.

 

[Nerds_feather]

Apologies for reviving a thread about a horrible subject, but I'm doing some research on the Bosnian War in the 1990's when Yugoslavia broke up.

Mass rape of women is very easy to find material on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_in_the_Bosnian_War

However, I can find very little evidence of systematic male rape, other than "hundreds of cases" as mentioned here: http://iwpr.net/report-news/bosnia-struggle-overcome-male-rape-taboo

While there's an argument of male rape being under-reported, it seems clear that, using higher estimates, for every man raped there were at least 100 women raped. Additionally, there's systematic rape of women and even designated rape camps, and women used as sex slaves.

Comparatively, it appears implied that men were raped as part of a general process of torture and humiliation, rather than any kind of general systemic abuse endemic to the conflict.

I raise this subject simply because earlier it seemed suggested (especially through posts referenced on other sites) that male rape in war was perfectly common. However, I don't find evidence of this in the Bosnian War, nor systematic in any other conflict.

Brian,

Sexual abuse of male prisoners by male guards was rampant at the Omarska and Trnapolje concentration camps. This has been well-established by the ICTY.

You should also know that IWPR reporting on events in ex-Yugoslavia was (and is) very credible.

 

[Brian G Turner]

I've got the ICTY document now.

Not that I think it will make fun reading, though, but nothing about the conflict was...

 

[Brian G Turner]

Well, I'm still getting almost nothing on male rape.

The ICTY document dealt specifically with trying to categorise targeting of men's genitals as sexual abuse, but the danger here is the grey area of intention: if a soldier kicks a male prisoner between the legs, is he doing so simply to inflict pain, or is there a specific undeniable sexual element?

I'm not able to answer that, but going back to Liz Bourke's conclusion on her blog before:

Sucks to be you, lads, but in a warzone you’re almost as likely to be raped as I am. And I am (women as a class are) a little less likely to be ******** myself for the rest of my life afterwards. How’s that for gritty and realistic?

I just don't see anything to justify the claim that male rape is particularly common "in a warzone".

Also, While Liz refers to specific cases of male rape in the Congo, she completely fails to acknowledge the far more widespread sexual abuse of women in that conflict, and the horrors associated with that.

 

[Gumboot]

It's worth pointing out that all of the "evidence" of male sexual abuse in warfare is modern. (I put "evidence" in quotes because some of it seems rather spurious). The entire nature of warfare, the purpose behind it, and in particular the relationship between armed forces and civilian populations has dramatically changed over time.

I would be very surprised if male rape in wartime was anything other than extremely rare prior to the modern era.

 

[Nerds_feather]

As far as Bosnia is concerned, it's pretty well-established that male rape was prevalent in the concentration camps. It may not have been very prevalent in the towns that were overrun by the militias and irregular forces that did the bulk of massacring for the Bosnian Serb side.

After all, the dominant discourses on ethnicity there are sort of inverses of the race discourses in places like segregation-era US and apartheid-era South Africa. In those places, "black" was considered something that would "taint" "white." Hence the fear of interracial coupling. In ex-Yugoslavia, by contrast, many seemed to feel that you could "claim" the children of interethnic coupling for their own group. This may help explain the gendered nature of violence, where the typical massacre was overwhelmingly of men, whereas women were often raped and sent back "carrying Serbian babies." It was another way to "annihilate the other."

 

[Glitch]

Pretty gruesome which ever way you look at it.

 

[allmywires]

I would be very surprised if male rape in wartime was anything other than extremely rare prior to the modern era.

Why? History is written by the winners, and thus almost always rewritten in their favour. Besides the fact a lot of ancient, and even fairly recent history is based on scraps and pieces. In the modern age we have a wealth of information at our hands, hence why male rape is apparently more prevalent (leaving aside the notion of the taboo of male-male rape). We have research and unbiased sources (which hardly any historical sources are). We also live in a society where discourse on male-male rape is possible to whatever little degree, whereas in the past it was presumably ignored (it was only fairly recently that legislation changed the wording on rape victims to unisex pronouns, to acknowledge men can be victims to. Is that because it never happened before the modern age? Or just that it's only now we can actually combat it?)

The thing is, if you can't see it, you can't see it, I can't change your mind. In any case, I'm in no way an expert on it. I just don't understand why it's so unthinkable that sexual violence is perpetrated against men on a reasonably large scale during wartime, when other atrocities are well accepted.

I'll paraphrase a quote from "Male on Male Rape: The Hidden Toll of Stigma and Shame" (easily found on google books): Male sexual assault is generally seen as a subset of homosexual behaviour and thus not a crime. Again perhaps another reason it goes unreported.

Anyway, I should have probably known better than to post in this thread again, but here you go.

 

[HoopyFrood]

Glad you did, definitely want a 'like' button for that post!

 

[Kissmequick]

It's worth pointing out that all of the "evidence" of male sexual abuse in warfare is modern. (I put "evidence" in quotes because some of it seems rather spurious). The entire nature of warfare, the purpose behind it, and in particular the relationship between armed forces and civilian populations has dramatically changed over time.

I would be very surprised if male rape in wartime was anything other than extremely rare prior to the modern era.

Why then would they have laws against it (documented btw) from as early as 2nd century bc (in Rome):

Roman law addressed the rape of a male citizen as early as the 2nd century BC, when a ruling was issued in a case that may have involved a male of same-sex orientation. Although a man who had worked as a prostitute could not be raped as a matter of law, it was ruled that even a man who was "disreputable (famosus) and questionable (suspiciosus)" had the same right as other free men not to have his body subjected to forced sex

Other documentation mentions using male wartime rape to humiliate the losers (I can look this up if you like, but I seem to have lost the link, though there were ...Persian? Near east anyway, ancient laws against male rape).

It's not like it suddenly got invented in the seventies or something. But I'll bet it was something that wasn't talked about much, much less documented as often as female rape (even today it's estimated only 1 in ten male rapes are reported) Just because it wasn't talked about/written down, doesn't mean it didn't happen. And it was written down, in laws etc.

I'd be extremely surprised if this hasn't been going on since men invented war,

 

[Hex]

Random internet search turned this up:

Historically, the rape of males was more widely recognized in ancient times. Several of the legends in Greek mythology involved abductions and sexual assaults of males by other males or gods. The rape of a defeated male enemy was considered the special right of the victorious soldier in some societies and was a signal of the totality of the defeat. There was a widespread belief that a male who was sexually penetrated, even if it was by forced sexual assault, thus "lost his manhood," and could no longer be a warrior or ruler. Gang rape of a male was considered an ultimate form of punishment and, as such, was known to the Romans as punishment for adultery and the Persians and Iranians as punishment for violation of the sanctity of the harem (Donaldson, 1990).

Donaldson, Donald. (1990). "Rape of Males," in Dynes, Wayne, ed. Encyclopedia of Homosexuality. New York: Garland Publications.
(though, actually, they got the reference wrong and the author was in fact Stephen Donaldson -- you can read the whole thing here.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I think probably at this juncture it's worth saying that I don't think anyone is saying male rape is more common than male on female, simply that the instances of male on male rape vastly outnumber the number reported (as, indeed, does female rape.) but to say it doesn't happen, or is a purely modern occurence, woud be naive in the extreme, imho.

 

[Hex]

No, absolutely. There are -- as TJ pointed out -- more reasons for the rape of women (humiliation of their extended family through robbing the woman of "purity" -- which brings us nicely back to the OP) and the possibility of pregnancy.

The issue is, I think, that *if* you're including rape of women in your story because that's "historically accurate", maybe consider that rape of men is also historically accurate.

Personally, I have little patience for the whole historical accuracy argument -- like amw, I think there's so much that doesn't get included. And that's as it should be. History books tell a different kind of story from the ones we're trying to tell.

People aren't generally very interested in the objective facts of history -- they're interested in using history to enrich and justify their current experience of the world.

So if you'd rather not write a book with male rape (and I'd rather not) then that's fine -- no one's saying you should. However, maybe you should reconsider using historical accuracy as a justification for the other stuff you include, and think about it a little.

 

[Kissmequick]

So if you'd rather not write a book with male rape (and I'd rather not) then that's fine -- no one's saying you should. However, maybe you should reconsider using historical accuracy as a justification for the other stuff you include, and think about it a little.

That's it precisely.

 

[Gumboot]

Why then would they have laws against it (documented btw) from as early as 2nd century bc (in Rome): Other documentation mentions using male wartime rape to humiliate the losers (I can look this up if you like, but I seem to have lost the link, though there were ...Persian? Near east anyway, ancient laws against male rape).

It's not like it suddenly got invented in the seventies or something. But I'll bet it was something that wasn't talked about much, much less documented as often as female rape (even today it's estimated only 1 in ten male rapes are reported) Just because it wasn't talked about/written down, doesn't mean it didn't happen. And it was written down, in laws etc.

I'd be extremely surprised if this hasn't been going on since men invented war,

Sorry, you're quite right, I didn't phrase myself properly. I'd be surprised if it happened with any frequency in the Christian world prior to the modern era.

Male-male rape isn't likely to happen as often in a culture where any participation in homosexual sex is viewed as the lowest degradation. The rapist shames themselves as much, sometimes more, than their victim.

In any event I certainly never claimed it didn't happen at all. It most certainly did, and all through history has almost certainly been much more common than we think, but, aside from specific instances where particular circumstances dictated otherwise (it would be interesting to apply the psychology of atrocity to male-male rape, actually...) I would imagine that male-female rape vastly outnumbers male-male rape in warfare. My an order of magnitude at least.

Everything else being equal, you'd expect that anyway given in historic warfare generally rape only happened after the battles, in which the vast majority of men would have been dead.

One other thing I think bears repeating is I, Brian's observation that studies of this nature tend to blend sexual abuse and rape together. Sexual abuse of men in warfare has almost certainly been very widespread throughout all of human history. That's not the same as rape.

 

[Gumboot]

Why? History is written by the winners, and thus almost always rewritten in their favour. Besides the fact a lot of ancient, and even fairly recent history is based on scraps and pieces. In the modern age we have a wealth of information at our hands, hence why male rape is apparently more prevalent (leaving aside the notion of the taboo of male-male rape).

The entire dynamic of warfare has changed totally, that's why it has changed. In particular the way in which victorious armies and defeated armies and their civilians interact is totally different. Rape in warfare is a function of how these groups interact.

The thing is, if you can't see it, you can't see it, I can't change your mind. In any case, I'm in no way an expert on it. I just don't understand why it's so unthinkable that sexual violence is perpetrated against men on a reasonably large scale during wartime, when other atrocities are well accepted.

I've never denied it happens, and has happened throughout history. My basis for questioning the frequency of male-male rape in the pre-modern era of warfare is not based on a refusal to accept it, but on a pretty good understanding of the psychology of atrocity, and the way in which interaction between victor armies and their enemies has changed over time. The main reason I think male-male rape was so rare in the pre-modern era was because it served no purpose.

 

[Kissmequick]

The main reason I think male-male rape was so rare in the pre-modern era was because it served no purpose.

Apart from that whole shame/humiliation thing you mean? (in several cultures, it was only a male receiving male, ahem, attention that was shamed. Romans for example. So, for one man to rape another only shamed the rapee)

Male-male rape isn't likely to happen as often in a culture where any participation in homosexual sex is viewed as the lowest degradation. The rapist shames themselves as much, sometimes more, than their victim.

Which hasn't stopped swathes of Christian men perpetrating sexual abuse and rape on other men/boys in modern times now has it? Perhaps it led to it not being talked about/written down as much....

 

[Gumboot]

Apart from that whole shame/humiliation thing you mean?

This is exactly my point. Shame and humiliation? That's a product of modern war. That's not how most pre-modern wars were fought. One of two things happened;

1. You conquer the enemy and assimilate them into your empire.
In this instance the last thing you want to do is give your newly acquired citizens a reason to rebel. Conquerors were typically decidedly generous to their new citizens once the initial fighting had ceased, providing they behaved. In many instances even the rulers got to keep their positions.

2. You defeat the enemy to punish them for doing something wrong.
In this instance, the historical tradition was pretty straight forward; mass slaughter and enslavement. What would you care about the shame or humiliation of dead people?

You might want to shame and humiliate specific individuals in either scenario, such as political leaders or other figureheads, but usually even in this instance the purpose was public shaming - for example after Rome defeated Egypt, Cleopatra was paraded through the city.

Like I said, mass rape of civilian populations generally serves no purpose other than sexual gratification in the pre-modern world.

(in several cultures, it was only a male receiving male, ahem, attention that was shamed. Romans for example. So, for one man to rape another only shamed the rapee)

Yes I know, I pointed this out in one of my earliest posts in this thread. But Romans didn't care about "shaming or humiliating" defeated enemy barbarians in battle. They enslaved them or killed them. They'd be much more likely to rape a fellow Roman.

Which hasn't stopped swathes of Christian men perpetrating sexual abuse and rape on other men/boys in modern times now has it? Perhaps it led to it not being talked about/written down as much....

I'm not sure what you're talking about, or what the relevance is to mass rape of men by other men in war time.


Anyway... dragging the thread back onto topic...

I think the common theme running through this thread, from both sides, is that any sort of violence, but in particular sexual violence, is something a writer has to handle pretty carefully. I've come across a lot of fantasy writers who've piled their books with mountains of violence and then hidden behind the "gritty realism" plea to justify it. Some of these depictions are grossly unrealistic. George RR Martin springs to mind immediately.

What's particularly interesting to me is that so often you get these extreme shades of good and evil, even in supposedly more realistic books. The typical way of showing a "less black and white" world is not actually to write characters in shades of grey, but to write characters in black and white, as opposed to all black and all white.

Again, George RR Martin is a good example.

But characters who do purely good deeds one moment and purely evil deeds the next aren't any more realistic and wholly good or wholly evil characters.

Consider, if you will, the classic "forced betrothal" wedding night. In typical "gritty realistic fantasy" you'll get one of these two scenarios:

1. Husband honorably chooses not to bed wife. Wife is relieved.
2. Husband violently forces himself on wife, who fights back, and is beaten for her efforts.
3. Husband begins gently and carefully to bed wife, who finds herself rather quickly going from fear and trepidation to enjoyment.

But what about a much more realistic, much more common outcome, which is decidedly more murky when it comes to morality?

1. Husband dutifully and clumsily beds wife, who complies without resisting.

How many fantasy books have you read where a scene plays out like that?

That's a realistic medieval rape scene.

 

[Kissmequick]

This is exactly my point. Shame and humiliation? That's a product of modern war.
Like I said, mass rape of civilian populations generally serves no purpose other than sexual gratification in the pre-modern world.

Not necessarily, but for argument's sake I'll say no more now - I need to go out so no time! (Apart from people do things all the time that serve no purpose. But rape does serve an emotional purpose, twisted though it maybe.) Links may follow. But what purpose does any sexual abuse serve?

I'm not sure what you're talking about, or what the relevance is to mass rape of men by other men in war time.

Merely pointing out that it has through history and does still go on quite a lot among people who should be ashamed because of the prevailing morals/religion of the time, in peacetime. I don't see that they'd suddenly be more ashamed/less likely to do it in wartime.