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Vaidah Mashangwa
Psychiatry has dominated the literature on rapists and murderers since this was introduced as one of the causes of rape or murder. Could it be that the psychiatric disorder only surfaces when one commits murder or rape? Research has actually revealed that fewer than five percent of rapists or murderers were psychotic at the time of their rape or murder. It has been noted by sociologists that there is no single rapist or murderer who fails to defend his actions. The rapist or murderer always engages various techniques to disavow their actions so that they identify non-deviant identity. A good example is in the case of Oscar Pistorius’s trial of his alleged murder  of his girlfriend in South Africa. Reasons were cited for his actions though no one really knows what will be the outcome of his case.

At times the perpetrators attempt to present the act in terms that are actually appropriate and acceptable yet the Domestic Violence Act is clear in terms of the negative cultural harmful practices such as pledging girls to appease spirits, child marriages, virginity testing and so on.

The techniques used by perpetrators usually include excuses, justifications and linguistic accounts that explain and remove culpability for the wrong act. Excuses imply that the perpetrator accepts the act was bad but deny full responsibility. In terms of justification the perpetrator accepts responsibility for the act but deny that it was wrong. Accounts are socially approved vocabularies that neutralise the act or its consequences so that deviant behaviour is legitimised.

In one study, of 114 incarcerated rapists, 85 percent of them viewed themselves as non-rapists hence there were admitters of the rape and deniers. In most cases the deniers use justifications while the admitters use excuses.

In most of the cases examined, admitters claimed that women enjoyed being raped. Deniers on the other hand excused their behaviour by referring to alcohol or drug abuse. In most countries the ages of most rapists ranges between 18 to 60 years. What is surprising was that among the sample used in the study, 42 percent were either married or cohabiting at the time of their offence.
Only 20 percent had a school education or better and 85 percent came from working class backgrounds. Only 26 percent of the 114 rapists had a history of emotional problems. Society fails then to understand how a married, educated man can go about raping women.

The deniers attempted to justify their behaviour by presenting the victim in a light that made her appear culpable regardless of their own actions. Four areas were used to justify rape namely: women are generally seductive; women mean “yes” when they say “no”; most women eventually relax and enjoy being raped and lastly the women’s sexual reputation and background all contribute to rape cases.

Most of the perpetrators pointed out that women are raped as victims of their own seduction. The perpetrators argued that there is a lot of illicit intercourse, flirtation and provocative conduct going on in our society today so much that it is bad to blame the perpetrators.

Some of the convicts interviewed tried to demonstrate that their victims were willing and in some cases, enthusiastic participants. They pointed out that in the end rape became more dependent upon the victim’s behaviour than their own actions. Actually 25 percent of the perpetrators claimed that the victims were willing and had made some sexual advances.
However, considering that most of the perpetrators used weapons during their attack, there is no way they can point out that most victims will be willing. Considering the fact that young babies and children are raped, there is no way rapists can defend themselves in such a manner.

Secondly, 64 percent of the perpetrators justified their behaviour by arguing that other victims had not resisted enough or that their “no” really meant “yes”. One denier who was serving time for a previous rape was subsequently convicted of attempting to rape a prison hospital nurse. He insisted that he completed the second rape because the victim semi-struggled, never cried and had no injuries. In this instance it is high time men accept “no” as a “no” and “yes” as a “yes”.

The third issue raised by the convicts was that many women eventually relax and enjoy themselves to an immense degree. Several of the convicts interviewed in the study suggested that they had
fulfilled their victim’s dreams. One denier had posed as a salesman to gain entry to his victim’s house but he claimed he had had a previous relationship with the victim and that she agreed to have sex for drugs. In the strongest sense, I do not believe there is any way women can enjoy sex with strangers or their relatives at knife point.

Apart from that, rape convicts pointed out that the victim’s reputation as well characteristics or behaviour forced them to rape the victim. They claimed that in some instances, the victim was known to have been a prostitute or loose women or to have had a lot of affairs or to have given birth to a child out of wedlock. All these are attempts by rapists to evoke stereotypes that women provoke rape by the way they dress, behave, act and this cannot be justified.

Some of the convicts went to extremes to paint a tarnished picture of the victim, describing her as dressed in tight black clothes and without a bra. In another case, a denier claimed he picked up his under-age victim at a party and that she voluntarily went with him to a hotel. All this is unacceptable and a violation of women and children’s rights.

Several of the admitters however expressed the view that rape was an act of such moral outrage and that it was unforgiveable. Several of such admitters broke into tears at intervals during interviews. Some actually maintained that rape was worse than murder.
A number of studies noted a high incidence of alcohol and drug consumption by convicted rapists prior to their crime.

However, more recent research has tentatively concluded that the connection between substance use and crime is not as direct as previously thought. Most rapists apply alcohol consumption as a vocabulary of a motive. Most rapists and murderers therefore use alcohol as an excuse for their behaviour and to discredit the victim.

Admitters further attributed their acts to emotional problems. They claim that they had an unhappy, unstable childhood or had a marital-domestic problem. These are ordinary problems, the type of upsetting events that everyone experiences at some point in life and therefore cannot be used as justification for rape.
In the majority of cases the rapists or murderers were not clinically defined as mentally ill in court-ordered psychiatric examination prior to their trials. Only five percent of the rapists were psychotic at the time of their offense.

Vaidah Mashangwa is the Provincial Development Officer, Ministry of Women Affairs, Gender and Community Development, Bulawayo. She can be contacted on 0772111592 email vmashangwa @gmail.com