Objectifying women as sex is mostly a male phenomenon. There are pornographic materials that depict women in crude scenarios of being raped that are unbefitting a civil society. Sadomasochistic materials depict women in a subservient manner and imply that women enjoy being dominated, not only in the bedroom but in life. This is obviously an erroneous generalization and represents a harmful precedent for erotic materials and projects an ugly image into society. Rape fantasies are a type of pornography that humiliate women and possibly contribute to a male-dominant culture that uses violent rape for sexual gratification. These types of eroticism are particularly onerous from a feminist perspective. Feminist Perspectives on Sadomasochism in …show more content…
Todd Akin, the Republican challenger to Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill in 2012, actually told a TV interviewer that the odds of a woman becoming pregnant from “legitimate rape” are vanishingly small. “If it's a legitimate rape,” Akin said, “the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.” In the 1990 Texas gubernatorial election Clayton Williams told a nasty joke about rape to reporters at his ranch. He compared the cold, foggy weather spoiling an event at his ranch to a rape, telling ranch hands, campaign workers and reporters around a campfire, “If it’s inevitable, just relax and enjoy it.” And the idiocy is not limited to the male patriarchy of the party as Sharon Angle, a candidate for the Nevada Senate seat, called pregnancy resulting from a rape part of “God’s plan,” and advised women who may become pregnant from rape to “...have a little faith.” (Redden, 2012) There is no end to the idiocy surrounding the concept of rape as a sexual preference in the national mostly-male patriarchy in our society.
Pornography in general is an extension of a male-dominated culture that exploits and degrades women. While some liberal feminists assume the position that pornography is governed under principles of freedom of speech and a woman’s right to do whatever she wishes with her own body, the depiction of rape even in a fictional setting is inappropriate. Liberal feminists who may feel animosity toward pornography are often reluctant to express their true feelings and may be intimidated into silence. (McElroy,