Why women hate rape

Rape is reported on surveys to be one of women's very worst fears. The fear is often a very disturbing facet of most women's experience of life. I believe that for many, the prospect has a kind of horror to it that would not be present from being beaten, even if it resulted in broken bones.

Evolutionary theory includes a distinction between how an organism works and why the organism works that way. For one example, in <this earlierpost> I explained how a desire for sex is explained in evolutionary terms because it resulted in producing offspring, and that evolution has not endowed us with a similarly strong desire to actually produce offspring. This allows widespread use of contraceptives without any sort of turmoil.

Consider non-evolutionary explanations for why rape is so upsetting. It rarely leads to serious physical trauma. Plan B can prevent pregnancy, STI transmission is rare and most STIs are treatable. What makes it uniquely upsetting? Sometimes the problem is explained as physical penetration of the body. Yet if some man put his fingers in a woman's mouth, the penetration aspect is there but the insult would be less. Ingesting food is also a penetration of the body, but we think about it entirely differently. Sometimes it is explained as a reaction to the male's desire to dominate and humiliate. Yet of course such desires could be expressed in many other ways. If women and men perceive it as uniquely humiliating, we are left wondering WHY it is perceived that way.

A man is in uncomfortable territory talking about women's experience as I did above (though it's worth considering that each woman actually knows nothing for sure beyond her own individual experience). In what follows I'm discussing what lies behind conscious experience and is thus not accessible to anyone based on reflection. Men and women are on an equal footing here.

Evolutionary psychology asks whether evolution has "wired" women to hate rape, and it has a good story to tell as to why the answer is "yes". A very naive story might be that since descendants are good, sex is what produces descendants, and rape is a form of sex, women might welcome it. But this ignores how women left successful offspring in the environment we evolved in. Ignoring many complications, humans tend to have long-term pair bonds so that only one man has sex with a woman and he assumes that any children the woman has are his children, and he provides food for those children (mostly meat, in the environment we evolved in). The number of children a woman can bear is primarily a function of time -- every 2, 3, or 4 years, in natural conditions of nursing and a somewhat restricted diet. She invests enormous resources in each child through pregnancy and nursing. She also runs a significant risk of dying in childbirth. She of course requires sperm to conceive those children, but sperm is very easy for her to get. In a typical hunter-gatherer band there were plenty of adult men around, many or most of whom will be happy to inseminate her. In contrast, a large determinant of whether her children will thrive is whether a man will be providing food for them. All else being equal, it is in her interest to only have sex with her assigned mate (call him a "husband") and to do whatever she can to reassure him that he is indeed the father of her children.

If she does not have a husband and gets pregnant, this is terrible for her as there is no male to help her raise the child. If she is married and is raped, there are other dangers. If word gets back to her husband, he may abandon her in search of a new woman where he would be more certain that future children are his. Abandoning a wife after she is raped might seem like a callous thing to do, but evolution has its own imperatives, and providing for children who carry your genes as opposed to some other man's is a big factor in male reproductive success.

So possible consequences of rape for a woman include loss of material support for any child she might bear as a result of that sexual encounter or for one that was conceived in roughly the same time frame, and for her other children if she has children already. This is a huge risk for her. Women also have a strong incentive in the environment we evolved in to not to report rape, to avoid these consequences.

Women of course desire sex under the right circumstances, and need it to leave descendants. But they feel extremely strongly about not wanting it under the wrong circumstances. They are not just being picky or difficult. Evolution has wired them to care a great deal about the circumstances.

In the modern world, morning-after pills can ensure that rape victims do not become pregnant. They can likely trust that if they are partnered, their partner will not abandon them. Yet these conscious considerations cannot simply overcome the tendencies wired into our genes.

I'm not sure if understanding this could lead to more empathy from men, in turn leading to taking the crime of rape more seriously, and to actually deterring rape itself. But if it has any effect it should point in that direction.