I do see and acknowledge the existence of women with rape fetish fantasies...but there is still a part of me that says it isn't the same as men with rape fetish fantasies.

That is a good one. And with great power comes great responsibility...

Then be prepared to justify your thought process. I'd be interested in hearing your reasoning why this is.

As an aside, I think I can already see where you're going based on your race comparison earlier. For the record, I am white, and attended a Historically Black University for half of my graduation requirements, and a mostly white prestigious state university for the other half at the same time. So I am as torn on that issue as I am on this one: I see coherent arguments for both. Especially as I do know what it is like the be on the opposite side of the fence (I was only one of two white students at the former school, and there were... incidents).

Which comment is this directed at?

This one. You say it's different, and imply that it is substantially so to warrant actions targeting male gamers over female gamers. I want to know your justification for saying so.

You earlier say that black entertainers can get away with jokes about white people that white entertainers can't as an example of the same sort of double-standard being acceptable.

As someone who has been in a situation where such commentary made me very, very uncomfortable (I was clearly a minority, and clearly suffered racism on a surprisingly, shockingly frequent basis... if I had it to do over, I would still do it, as it was a very disturbing, yet enriching experience), I question both your comparison AND the original issue.

Much like affirmative action, whether or not there is an inherent and relevant difference between the fantasies is germane to any decision being made about what actions should be taken. If no such relevant difference exists, then any action must be unilateral or else it is discriminatory. If there is a difference, it must be adequately demonstrated and backed up.

I said this statement two times, the first time backing away saying "a larger part of me says rape is rape."

I am not sure how you can say "substantially so to warrant actions against male gamers." What actions did I warrant? I think you are putting words in my mouth (but if I did say it, please show me).

Society accepts this standard. You can call it a double-standard, you can call it retributions. You can call it putting balance back into the force.

I too, have lived in a society where I was the minority. The nice thing that I had, and you had, was the power to leave at the drop of a dime and return to the comforts of a situation where I was safely in the majority any time I wanted. Women don't have that power, and blacks in America don't have that power.

I am a little confused because it sounds like you wanted me to acknowledge the fact that women can have rape fantasies but not talk about the fact that women are the vast majority of rape victims.

Black people may have prejudices against whites, but they are the vast majority of victims of racism.

Both rape and racism are vulgar displays of power, so I think the comparison is legitimate.

Actually, I said it was implied. I should have been clearer. I don't think you personally imply it. I meant that in terms of this thread, that the difference is implying that we should be only concerned with male oriented games. If there is to be action, which I don't have an opinion on either way, all I am saying is there if no relevant difference exists such action should be unilateral. If there is, it should be explained, and explained well, in detail.


Bad word choice. I didn't mean it with a negative connotation. I meant that it is simply a standard with two acceptable levels. It literally is a double-standard. I never said I disagreed with it. Or that I agreed with it. I was simply stating a fact.


That depends largely on your view of choice of whether or not I had "the power to leave at the drop of a dime." Although not germane here, I brought it up, so I will say one of the reasons the situation was so enlightening was that I did not feel I could leave. Not without severe consequences at least. Sometimes it was frustrating, sometimes it was outright frightening. There were several times I feared for my safety. I will grant you that after graduation I was free to leave that situation, but I would rather vehemently argue that I would not have the quality of life I have today if I did not see it through to the end. I would ask you not to probe deeper, however.

I am also a minority all of the time, but I also decline to go into details about that. I would ask you to merely take my word on that.

Nope. I have no such agenda. No agenda besides making sure that the former was considered along with the latter.

Historically and institutionally, I would agree. On a personal level? My jury is still out. The fact that I have several black friends who agree with me that, at the very least, African-American racism towards whites (and other races) is on the rise, makes me pause on claiming that the vast majority of individual victims of racism are black. If it is still true, the ratios are definitely evening out.

Okay. That's all I wanted.

I am not calling for any action, Tsuwabuki, so I cannot fully resolve the grey-zone I feel about woman-on-man rape except to say, rape is rape, and it is wrong.

If a man rapes a woman or a woman rapes a man, I think they deserve the same punishment, and if I implied otherwise, let me revise that here.

Because of power issues I think the dynamics of the fantasies may be different, but I can't say much more than that.

In the end it sounds like we are pretty close to the same page.

I'm not suggesting. I am explicitly demanding that a relevant difference be shown.

Let's take your above example. In that case, that the factor inherent in the acceptance of rape as an acceptable behavior in an individual is due to the combination of two factors: 1) the player is playing a rape game 2) the player is male, and that therefore when a female is playing a rape game, she is not at all more likely to accept rape as an acceptable behavior, AS SHOWN via accepted standards of psychiatric evaluation.

I think we are, yes. I just wanted to introduce some philosophical issues I felt germane.

In my opinion, I think the double-standard vis men-raping-women versus women-raping-men stems probably from the fact that the majority of rapists are men. Moreover, the majority of sufferers of violent psychiatric disorders are male, as coincidently is the majority of those who have committed crimes based off of media. Put together, you can see how it would seem that men who like rape fantasy can put forth a somewhat more disturbing profile than women who like rape fantasy. It's also more difficult for a woman to put such a fantasy into realistic operation vis physical differences between perpetrator and target victim and a need therefore to organize and prepare in advance. A man would find it easier to spontaneously commit rape than a woman, is my point, rape games aside. Admittedly you could apply the man-stalking-11-year-old-girl formula onto woman-stalking-11-year-old-boy, but then you still have to get past the fact that pedophilia amongst women is also rarer than pedophilia amongst men.

I want numbers. I want studies. I want research literature. When dealing with policy changes what we "know" at our common epistemic level is no longer tolerable, as we have entered a higher epistemic level requiring much stricter standards of evidence for any of our "knowledge" to be epistemically justifiable, and therefore defendable.

In the lower epistemic context, I think we can all claim to know what you say above. However, for the purposes of policy, I do not think we can make that same claim at all.

"Common sense" is not good enough in higher epistemic contexts, such as national political, legal, or economic policy decision making processes.

This is essentially what I said above.

Let's not forget the categories.

'Rape with consent'

'Rape without consent'

The later is obviously wrong.

Whilst it's nice to see someone who likes solid evidence, frankly foot-stamping and 'I want-I want' is a little rude for an internet forum debate. I'm expressing my opinion, not making a written legal case against these games; in fact I don't believe I have said anything regarding the ban other than that I can see why it might come into affect and the potential flaws of these games in comparison to similar media.

But as you are foot-stamping; allow me to elucidate.

I said "the majority of rapists are men"; RTS | Statistics Rape Trauma Services Statistics say: "According to the U.S. Department of Justice, an estimated 91% of the victims of rape and sexual assault are female and 9% are male.

Nearly 99% of the offenders they described in single-victim incidents are male.
Lawrence A. Greenfield. 1997. Sex Offenses and Offenders: An Analysis of Data on Rape and Sexual Assault. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, Office of Justice Programs, US Department of Justice."

I said; "the majority of sufferers of violent psychiatric disorders are male" and if you want some figures on neuro-pathology, Pinel has written an excellent introduction to neurobiology with full statistics of various psychiatric disorders relating to gender. I haven't memorized them, I'm sorry, nor do I have the text to hand or I would indeed try to satisfy your offense against my "unjustifiable epistemic level". The World Health Organization, however states "Men are also more than three times more likely to be diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder than women." and this report http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/224028.pdf states: "Although there appear to be no gender differences in the overall rates of mental disorder,
men and women do differ in the type of disorder experienced (Dohrenwend & Dohrenwend 1976; Kessler & McLeod 1984; Hankin 1990; Aneshensel et al. 1991; Rosenfield 1999). With respect to gender differences for specific diagnoses, women have higher rates of depression and anxiety disorder (referred to as “internalizing” disorders), while men have higher rates of substance abuse and antisocial disorders (also called “externalizing” disorders) (Robins et al. 1991; Potts et al. 1991; Kessler & Shanyang 1999; Rosenfield 1999).

Current explanations for these gender differences (internalizing versus externalizing) refer to divisions in power and responsibilities—women earn less than men, tend to have jobs with less power and autonomy, and are more responsive to the problems of people in their social networks—all of which contribute to psychological distress on the part of women (Kessler & McLeod 1984; Brown & Harris 1989; Rosenfield 1989; Aneshensel et al. 1991; Horwitz et al. 1998; Rosenfield 1999; Thoits 1999; Turner & Lloyd 1999). Although women are encouraged to act out their distress in an emotional or dependent manner, men are socialized into acting out, or externalizing their distress, through substance abuse or antisocial behavior.
Though complicated, there does appear to be a relationship between gender, crime, depression, and substance use. Available research makes it clear that women are more likely to be depressed than men (Mirowsky 1996); in contrast, men are significantly more likely than women to be involved in substance abuse and crime (Steffensmeier & Allan 1996; Rosenfield
1999)."

I said, "the majority of those who have committed crimes based off of media" and this is I think the only one I cannot substantiate at the moment as firstly I've lost patience with journal digging and secondly I'm not sure there is much research in this area at the moment. Go through news paper articles and count. I can only think of examples reported where men committed the crime, vis GTA inspired crime (6 teenage males), aid's blackmailer inspired by TV Crime series, Allan Menzies, the Clockwork Orange murders in spain (three teenage males), Allan Bentley, Mark McKeefrey and Graham Neary who commited a Reservoir Dogs killing, Ted Bundy (fancination with violent porn), Miyazaki (ditto), this site The link between media and crime - mediamarch mentions more.

Finally I said "more men are pedophiles than women"; the National Centre on Child Abuse Prevention Research states: "In 90% of child sexual abuse cases, the offenders are male".

But at least in GTA, it's obviouis what you're doing is wrong. Don't the cops chase you in that game because of it, and then the army and FBI, etc., if you continue to cause trouble? I'm under the impression that this isn't the case with those rape games.I'm not all that surprised, to be honest. This is the same country that has Rapeman manga/films/OVA. The premise of that series is terrible to me. I forgot where I even first found out about that series.

Mind explaining rape with consent? That's new to me. Rape is when one forcefully have sex with a person against that person's will...how can anyone "consent" to it...unless the person is just kinky or something. ^^;

You answered your own question in the last sentence, although contradicts your third sentence.

The last part of what I wrote was pretty much an afterthought. I just thought about it, and just figured that's the only way "rape" can be consensual. Role-play junk.

I think you misunderstood my intent.

While it's absolutely wonderful that this information is readily available, I was being hypothetical, not "foot stamping." I was saying such information as you have been provided should be offered by any agent, government or non, such as the industry regulatory agency mentioned in the original article as evidence of its policy changes. When I say "I want" I am being proverbial. I am speaking as the public demanding that policy decisions be backed up. I am not talking to you or anyone else individually, nor am I talking as myself. I was being dramatic for emphasis.

I am well aware of the above statistics. I am, after all, a gender rights activist. This does not absolve agents from providing this information when making policy decisions. In addition, such information highlights the way we fail boys, then fail young men. If you chase these statistics to their origin, you will see that there are issues begining in early childhood that are far more relevant than eroge games featuring rape. However, this is not my point. Again, my sole point was to avoid "witchhunts." Which is a very real fear when the agencies do not explain reasoning, or worse, the public does not demand it.

One more quick note here: pedophilia != pedorasty. Your statistics are quite right for sex offenders, but say nothing of internal proclivities.

I HATE THIS KEYBOARD!

But that is irrelevant.

For example, how many blacks/Jews frequent concerts of bands like Screwdriver, or other Nazi functions? I'm guessing zero, literally.

The main driving force behind banning these things is to do with the discrimination of women (or one of the main forces). But this isn't exclusive to just men, as Nazi gatherings are to whites. It may have more appeal to men, but so dfoes car racing, boxing, and there are female things, too. The point is, females are welcome to part take. Probably overly welcomed, actually.

If you are considering something else to be a valid reason why it should be banned aside lowering women, then please say it. But if this isn't the case, and no one is getting hurt, there should not be a problem with it.

Banning something that has absolutley no negative impact on anyone whatsoever just because you don't like it isn't really supporting any concept of freedom.

This is entirly theoratical, however.

I havn't seen any evidence that this causes rape or anything else negative. Of course, the possibility exists that it does; this is why the police use psychologists to find out every detail about a criminal in cases such as rape, serial killing, pedophilia. You can find the results of what they find, things like "a pedophiles favorite sport to watch is womens gymnastics" LOL.

I'm sure if they were finding rapist facts such as "most rapists collect rape media" then there would be grounds for a serious inquiry. But I don't think this is so.

Even so, if several rapists did claim they liked these things, you'd have to seriously consider if it was just a psychological problem or not, or if these things litterlly are the cause of this.

I mean, you can't ban Doom just coz a couple of kids decided to shoot up their school. It just isn't logical. You'd need proof that Doom effected a seriously large portion of people who played it in this way.

For example, it is easy to ban weed, coz the vast majority of long term smokers suffer serious mental problems after a dozen years or so.

I think you need find another reason.

I'm surprised this is only a recent thing. To show rape in a way that means its acceptable for anyone is a disgusting form of media, and it isn't needed in modern society.

I don't believe taking such things away from people will cause them to actually rape someone.

The ban is a step in the right direction to show that people don't tolerate rape or simulated rape. No, no-one is hurt, but the very idea is pretty digusting to the majority of people.

There is freedom is this world, but there are things that are clearly wrong. Rape, for example, should never be endorsed in any way.

I do have conflicts in my own mind about it though. Murder games are on the shelves left right and center, so I'm not sure how to feel about that since it's obviously wrong too. I suppose my concern with this is that 99% of the time it tends to degrade one demographic (females) which is possibly more damaging.

This thred is becoming rather silly!

I think the point in question.

Rape clubs anywhere, in this case Japan send the wrong message and it would appear that the activities went overboard within the forementioned Japanese club.

Rape computer games are just wrong as they can be accessed by minors and they should be banned. Younger people without kids obviously are not agreeing with that here with a few "exceptions".

Public rape of an unbeknown citizen is I'm sure illegal in Japan and should not be tolerated by either sex as it is a violation of one's personal body.

Rape by mutual agreement is obviously a private matter and if the parties agree, then the sky is the limit and none of anybodies business if all are above the legal age and all consenting.

But unless you can come up with a decent reason as to why, other than you dislike it, you should not be allowed to make any proggress.

Have something "disgusting" is a lot better than having someone tell you what you can and cannot do just because it is their own personal preference, even if you never wanted to do that in the first place.

That is not the topic at hand. It is unrelated.

Names, please.

If you think all my philosophical back and forth seems to never reach a conclusion, I think my main concern can be summed up in a very famous poem by Martin Niemöller:

In many, many ways I am a liberal. In many, many ways, I am a conservative, but my views are very consistent when thought of in this way. Much like Ben Franklin in the quote a posted earlier, I worry about where it will end once we start accepting limitations on the freedom of the majority, when it is but one minority preying on another minority, when there are clearly other issues causing the former minority to use said freedom in a way detrimental to the latter minority.

I guess what I am saying is, keep your morality out of my legality.

No time to scroll through posts..

Internet shopping time:)

The reason is that simulated rape would generally give an incorrect message about rape, especially if a younger audience is subjected to it (with the rise of the availability of such media and the internet, this is entirely possible.) It's better if such media doesn't exist. It's more than just the fact that I dislike it. I don't like pornography, but the parties (generally) consent to such practices and whether or not it is a violation of man or woman is questionable. Though I still worry about it's availability to children. (I know children aren't innocent little people who haven't got a clue, but they are more easily influenced.)

Don't get me wrong, people can make their own decisions about the world. But this is just too far. Rape is a horrible thing and shouldn't ever be represented as pleasurable and positive. It gives vunerable people the wrong idea about it.

I question how far you're willing to go to police this, and how you suggest going about it. Since rape is a fantasy for all genders, all orientations, and all positions (rapist, rape victim), and is therefore represented as positive and pleasurable at the very least in the minds of individuals, you can see my concern that we are on a slippery slope towards the Mental Health Police, of which there are actual examples in human history, and plenty of fictional versions to be found in host of SF and dystopian novels/comics/movies etc.

Well, then I'm sorry for getting carried away. Admittedly you didn't quote my post, but then again, it's somewhat impossible to tell from your post that you ARE being hypothetical, and apologies if I seem slow, but it still doesn't read that way on the first look, even with your explanation. Also what's 'proverbial' about it- did you mean 'irony'?. Please be clearer in future. Your words are tagged under YOUR name, not with a sock puppet marked " voice of general public". A small intro wouldn't have gone amiss.

But yes, I think there is a lot of unfounded opinion that comes up when these sorts of issues get grist to the mill. I mentioned Miyazaki earlier, the serial killer. His capture led to the first crackdown on pornography and some general regulations put in effect for the first time. Unfortunately it also lead to witch-hunting of Otaku. At the end of the day though, this issue is being decided in Japan. We don't know that the relevant information isn't being provided to the relevant people, or by 'agent' did you mean the government to the public. Well, it is, mostly. You just have to be able to search government websites, but suicide statistics are publicly available, and i'm sure other crime data is as well.

I do agree through that there are some bad failures in the system. Particularly concerning mental health. The Japanese mental health system is slowly improving, and it does have the most productive psychological association in asia, however research and general practice seem to be worlds apart, the latter being years behind the former.

Anyway, we are digressing. My original argument was that, as a niche market, these games seem to appeal to only a very specific characters, eg individuals who find descriptions of rape a turn on. Those characteristics then have a certain disquieting degree of overlap with characteristics of rapists, ie, rapists also find descriptions of rape a turn on. So whilst i'm not saying that every rape game player is therefore a rapist or indeed will become them, i'm saying in the rape game player population there is a strong probability that the percentage of players who are also rapists, or will also become rapist is much much higher than for players of other commercial games.

I didn't use the word pederast as that is specifically men and young boys where as pedophilia doesn't imply gender for either perp or victim, that and these games tend to revolve around men victimizing women. I assume under most general statistics pederasty is simply incorporated into the pedophile data, nonetheless, more girls than boys get sexually abused.

What people get up to in their own time is up to them. People are allowed to enjoy what they want, and think what they want. It's nothing to do with peoples thoughts. The problem is the distribution of media portraying a crime as something pleasurable.

I don't know how they are going to enforce such a ban, but I agree with it. It is likely that people are still going to be able to come across such media. But it will be more difficult for people who aren't supposed to be viewing it (minors) to view it, which is the main issue.

My tone is scholastic and neutral, just as it would be in any philosophical discussion between philosophers I would have via journals, panels, or online forums. There is no need to read any emotional color into my posts. If there should come a time when I have an emotional response to offer, I will say so, "Such and such upsets me, such and such angers me" etc. There will be an explicit statement of emotional content.

You're getting carried away now. I never accused you of being slow. I don't see why you are implying I did. Furthermore I have often said today that in this issue I have no opinion (in all honestly I do, but that opinion is, in fact, a third opinion), and that my goal is merely to make sure that certain epistemic standards are met.

Proverbial in that I does not represent me, but is rather a metaphor for the fact that "I, the public" deserve for those epistemic standards to be met. In the same way proverbial "you" does not represent the actual person that you happen to be, but rather a metaphorical you encompassing all individuals covered by a certain set of conditions currently in discussion. I always endeavor to be as precise as possible, I need not be told to do so, as I will adjust as it becomes clear to me that I have been misunderstood.

I most certainly did not mean "irony" and have no idea how you would come to suggest that as an alternative. I cannot follow your logic as how it would even be considered remotely relevant.

The earlier posts, I hoped, offered the context that would amount to your "small intro."

By agent I meant any organisation making policy changes to the public. In this case the regulatory agency for this industry.

Also, I live in Japan. I pay taxes in Japan. I am politically active in Japan. I cannot vote, as I am not a citizen, but that does not mean I am not part of the public.

Indeed, it is quite horrid.

And until a positive, cause and effect correlation is found between non-rapists becoming rapists and playing these games, I see only one more step towards fascism. A tiny step. An very, very, very tiny step, but that's where it starts. If such a correlation exists, that's another issue entirely.

Actually, in this case, I meant pederasty as the ACT of, regardless of gender/sex of the participants. While typically associated with men and young boys, here I wanted to clarify that one who is a pedophile need not ever act out their desires.

Furthermore, calling someone who molests a child a pedophile may, in fact, be incorrect. If the victim is a victim of convenience, which does compromise a sizable portion of the victim statistics, then the correlation between desire and act becomes much fuzzier. Sex offender statistics do not (often) tell us why or how a victim was chosen, when it most certainly does matter. Or even if the victim was a victim. A recent case in Georgia shows what happens when a male teen is convicted of being a sex offender for having consensual sex with a female teen.

We must disassociate thoughts with actions, or that leads back to what I mentioned in the post above: the Mental Health Police.

Would you allow manufacture and possession of said media, but not distribution?

Quite relevant to the current discussion, in Japan manufacture and distribution of child pornography is a crime. However, possession, unlike in other countries, is completely legal.

The UN has been trying for years to get the Diet to change that. So far, it hasn't happened, unless I missed some pretty big news (and I read a Japanese newspaper at least once a week).

Yes, Japanese laws need a HUGE review.

I'm meeting a chap tomorrow whose wife dissapeared back to Japan with his two kids.

Their is now an Australian warrant out for her arrest for child abduction!

Unfortunately, like many Japanese Hentai laws, they also don't have a law outside for child abduction and that includes the Hague convention.

But so many things in the media are illegal things to do in real life, yet still exist. If people were to act them out in real life, it would all be disasterous.

In order to stop things being avaliable to children, both sex and violent products, there are ratings placed on things, or on the internet, credit cards are used. Of course, accidents happen with poor distribution or careless people, but parents have a job to monitor their children, it should not be an issue.

In the end, I'd much rather someone to walk around acting out some sick rape game than someone going around acting out the movie Saw. I think we all would. There is media out there designed to give you a rush other than sexual which is equally as bad, and as equally as inapproriate for children to view. You only dislike this one due to your own personal preference as to what you think is "going too far". Others have tried to do the same with different things already. Eminem got a serving, but served it right back, because it is innocent. People simply disliked the taste. Harmless things should not be discarded due to a single parties preference.

But these games are pretty much justifying that rape is okay. I think that's pretty much where Misa was going with this. Junk like GTA, though bad, does constantly remind you that what you're doing is wrong. I'm not getting that impression with rape games.

I don't think they are explicitly saying, "go rape someone in real life." If they are, then you might be able to lay an incitement charge. Most of these games, especially the loli ones, if I recall correctly, already carry warnings, in Japanese, that tell you not to take any of this as reality.

Related news, Minori has now shut itself off from non-Japanese IPs because of this issue, and non-Japanese fans are none too pleased. They say this is only being done because of complaints from overseas countries, so essentially, "screw y'all if you're not from Japan."

Noted for future reference, but nonetheless, still awkward to spot in a forum stuffed with other posters who as a rule of thumb operate on the opposite end of the spectrum. Especially on a first time encounter- must have missed your "I'm not forming an opinion" bit.

Secondly, and... this is getting convoluted; I wasn't accusing you of accusing me of being slow. I was saying "Here I am, about to say something which might be another misinterpretation of what you said, but I'm going to offer it up anyway, if only to find out." Clearly wires got crossed again.

Vis 'proverbial', to me this word does not mean what you think it means. "Proverbial" means "relating to a word/phrase/situation directly referred to in a proverb or idiom". That's why your use of it confused me. As far as my experience goes, "the proverbial I' or "the proverbial you' makes almost zero sense. There isn't an obvious idiom to relate 'I' or 'you' to. That's why I asked if you perhaps meant it ironically, but in retrospect, perhaps you mean 'metaphor' or 'representative'.

Enough nit-picking, however, let's get back on to the topic.

A fair point, but not one I entirely agree with. There is much mixed research into such correlations, and depending on the study the results seem to go either way. Still, the fact that the population is a vulnerable one, is a culture that possibly would appeal to rapists makes it worth paying attention and giving some risk assessment. I'm not exactly saying the games necessarily make non-rapists into rapists. Look at it the other way around, maybe the rapists or those individuals who would rape (even if they knew it was wrong but just didn't care) would be led to play the games. In which case, the producer should be thinking, "should I really be catering for this? Is this encouraging? Does it send a message to rapists that what they do is, on some level, accepted by society regardless of what the law says. Could it be viewed a subtle flag of support? how does my fanbase operate? Is there a chance the fans who are mere fetishists could be incited by more dangerous fans into committing crime?"

Hmmm, ok, I think I see where you're coming from. I didn't use 'pederast' as pedophile seemed to be a better umbrella term, but it's true that the one term denotes an actual act and the other a mental condition. I can also appreciate what you mean about correlations between desire and act, however I was simply trying to back up the point I made that there are more male sex offenders than female sex offenders and in general the same trend is evident for child sex abuse cases.