A Rape is a Rape is a Rape

In A Rape in Cyberspace; or How an Evil Clown, a Haitian Trickster Spirit, Two Wizards, and a Cast of Dozens Turned a Database into a Society (Dibbell, Village Voice, 1993) the thing that jumps out at me is the human need for order. I kept being reminded of the children in William Golding’s 1954 novel, Lord of the Flies and thinking of how they wanted to run free without any laws and that without any laws, everything is anarchy. Maybe it is just human nature to want order and civility, even in cyberspace. The fact that these images were taken so seriously and the group convened just as they would if this happened in their own neighborhood, says something about ourselves as humans. Maybe the only thing that does separate us from the animals is the ability to control our base urges. I think we are starting to see evidence that these abilities to control even cyberspace speak to our humanity. The one thing that really jumped out at me, was not the hierarchy that ultimately ensued, but the fact that one of the conclusions reached by the author is that rape must be “classed as a crime against the mind – more intimately and deeply hurtful…and virtual rape, but undeniably located on the same conceptual continuum.” The information concerning rape has been trying to get to this point all along. It’s not the physical repercussions but the emotional and psychological that are far more damaging in cases of rape. It is a violent attempt at control that denigrates the person or maybe even the avatar, because this case shows that the difference between cyberspace and reality may not be that far apart after all.

~ by hannaj30 on April 17, 2008.