Rape ...

Dear Readers, after reading this post's title and the title of a previous post (Sexual connotations of murder), I hope that you have'nt gotten me pegged as some sort of homicidal rapist !! I assure you that this is not the case, and I am still the good ol' village boy, as always.

I have had, for a long time, a theory that the incidence of rape would be lowest in countries where sexual permissiveness was high and/or countries where escape valves for uncontrolled sexual desires existed (Brothels, strip clubs, escorts and such like).

So, I decided to do some research, and I looked up the number of rape victims per capita, and I was quite shocked at some of the stats.

Saudi Arabia had the lowest incidence of rape (0.0032/1000 People) which was quite in line with my expectation, given the fact that a convicted rapist has his member cut off, as punishment !

India was one of the better ones on this list at 0.014/1000 people.

Some of the scary ones:

• South Africa at 1.19/1000 people. Assuming that 99% of the people that are raped are women, this translates to 1 in every 424 women ! And if you assume that only 80% of rapes are reported, that is 1 in every 339 women !!
• Australia and Canada are both at around 1 in every 673 women (Both countries have pockets of legal prostitution)
• The United States is surprisingly high at 1 in every 1,683 women
• 11 of the Top 18 on the list are developed countries
• Netherlands, the world's favorite destination for paid sex, was No. 22 on the list (1 in every 5,000 women)

So, at first glance, it would seem that rape has little relation to income and access to sex (paid or otherwise). Rape, I must acknowledge, seems to have nothing to do with sex - It seems to be a tool of control and suppression (as always claimed by feminists).

Of course, in Bangalore, there was the recent rape of a call-centre worker. The reaction of the City Police was classic - It adviced the women to wear more conservative clothes and not be excessively physically demonstrative to co-passengers.

Of course, its common knowledge that the back seat of call center cabs are the most popular of "make-out" spots for these young 'uns.

The rationale of the Police was that the cab drivers, because of their different upbringing would not comprehend that a woman could kiss a guy in public and not be a whore.

My first instinct was to say "Bull Shit" to the police's request - However, on second thoughts I wonder if there is any other safe option ? It is all very well for women (and men) to behave in exactly the way they like and expect to be treated perfectly normally. However, with the gulf between the rich India and poor India growing (especially in matters of sexual morals), accentuated by dumb vernacular movies showing the woman in a short skirt as inevitably being a "vamp", it might be asking for too much to expect the cab-drivers to look beyond outward appearences and actions.

I believe that the problem is that of communication. Poor Indian men (indigent, that is !) have very very little communication with women - This is usually restricted to their mother, sister and an odd cousin or two. In this absence of communication, the man's perception/stereotypes of women is largely shaped by the movies !

There are men who want sex and women who want sex - Its just a matter of connecting these two groups, with a robust communication system to facilitate the negotiation !!