Gory Details
The gory details I want to share are not personal stories - its the technical structure of the disease of sexual assault.
I might as well tell you what it is I'm really thinking. It is my opinion that child sexual abuse (CSA), and other early childhood maltreatment, is the social template underlying most of what is wrong with humanity. It is the upstream phenomena that supplies all the other sexual assault scenarios with players later in life. It is my belief that stranger-rape and other single-incident rapes are a spin-off of the original problem, which is best understood as a disease, not a crime. The chronic situation of CSA is the petri-dish that grows later rapists.
CSA is not just a disease of invasive sex-related behavior. It is a disease of information - and misinformation. The ultimate misinformation is selective unconsciousness (repression, denial) and it is my position that the information-distorting aspect is really the central meaning of the whole disease. This is a disease that creates the mind-body split that is so pervasive in our lives, its the water we swim in, its so ubiquitous we barely identify that it is there.
Becoming secure in the idea that there is a cure gives me the willingness to look squarely at the structure of the disease. It becomes possible to even marvel at the clever effectiveness and complexity of the disease that is CSA - how it fools people, in so many ways.
For instance; some of the very behavior that most of us now think of as acting against CSA, actually strengthens the disease. Trying to attack the problem is like tugging on a knot - it gets tighter rather than loosened. That strong push of anger in a survivor, which is a natural impulse to clear one's space, could be thought of as an immune system response.
But the disease takes that "war on rape" orientation and makes it an asset for itself, the disease. The hysterical attacks on people discovered to be child-rapists, inside prison and out, are phenomenally useful to the disease. Because that is when the information-phase really kicks in. Every other minor or major offender within hearing range becomes appropriately alerted to the real dangers of being found out, and then they turn to their habitual child-victim with an intensified volley of threats and persuasions, to convince them that they really must never ever tell what is happening to them. The offenders' would-be healthy impulse to self-preserve becomes the fuel for the efficiency of the disease.
Our cultural hatred of child-rapists says one thing, yet does another. It says "we do not condone child-rape!" yet the hatred-behavior causes CSA to further flourish. This is an expression of the mind/body split. CSA is a disease, not a crime.
We not only have to, we get to give up the ways we unconsciously promote the success of the illness. There is another gory detail I can show you, that I think is noteworthy.
I might as well tell you what it is I'm really thinking. It is my opinion that child sexual abuse (CSA), and other early childhood maltreatment, is the social template underlying most of what is wrong with humanity. It is the upstream phenomena that supplies all the other sexual assault scenarios with players later in life. It is my belief that stranger-rape and other single-incident rapes are a spin-off of the original problem, which is best understood as a disease, not a crime. The chronic situation of CSA is the petri-dish that grows later rapists.
CSA is not just a disease of invasive sex-related behavior. It is a disease of information - and misinformation. The ultimate misinformation is selective unconsciousness (repression, denial) and it is my position that the information-distorting aspect is really the central meaning of the whole disease. This is a disease that creates the mind-body split that is so pervasive in our lives, its the water we swim in, its so ubiquitous we barely identify that it is there.
Becoming secure in the idea that there is a cure gives me the willingness to look squarely at the structure of the disease. It becomes possible to even marvel at the clever effectiveness and complexity of the disease that is CSA - how it fools people, in so many ways.
For instance; some of the very behavior that most of us now think of as acting against CSA, actually strengthens the disease. Trying to attack the problem is like tugging on a knot - it gets tighter rather than loosened. That strong push of anger in a survivor, which is a natural impulse to clear one's space, could be thought of as an immune system response.
But the disease takes that "war on rape" orientation and makes it an asset for itself, the disease. The hysterical attacks on people discovered to be child-rapists, inside prison and out, are phenomenally useful to the disease. Because that is when the information-phase really kicks in. Every other minor or major offender within hearing range becomes appropriately alerted to the real dangers of being found out, and then they turn to their habitual child-victim with an intensified volley of threats and persuasions, to convince them that they really must never ever tell what is happening to them. The offenders' would-be healthy impulse to self-preserve becomes the fuel for the efficiency of the disease.
Our cultural hatred of child-rapists says one thing, yet does another. It says "we do not condone child-rape!" yet the hatred-behavior causes CSA to further flourish. This is an expression of the mind/body split. CSA is a disease, not a crime.
We not only have to, we get to give up the ways we unconsciously promote the success of the illness. There is another gory detail I can show you, that I think is noteworthy.
NEXT:
