tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8670812027273632828.post4798951921486109893..comments2023-11-02T06:50:42.777-07:00Comments on billierosie: RAPEbillierosiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00288997506566830393noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8670812027273632828.post-62190621421222939772010-02-07T13:36:14.618-08:002010-02-07T13:36:14.618-08:00What a great discussion -- thanks Janine and Oatme...What a great discussion -- thanks Janine and Oatmeal Girl. It's great to dig around and try to understand why the taboo excites us. <br /><br />Why mythology speaks to us -- I remember reading Pasiphae's story. I was around 10 or 11 and feeling very excited. Not only did she do it, but she liked it. And a friend excitedly telling us about the torture chambers at Warwick Castle -- we were about 8 I think.<br /><br />I used to think my masochistic fantasies, again I was very young -- I used to think they were all my own. And then I started reading about submissives' stories in Erotica anthologies. Other people had the same dark desires -- they were even turned on by the same imagery as me. Used the same language as me.<br /><br />Weird -- it's like there's a sort of collective unconscious, starting with the Greek myths that filters down. I know that's nonsense, but it's very strange.<br /><br />I'll have to read up on Jung -- see what he has to say.<br /><br />But, yes, they are powerful needs. Frightening too. So thank goodness for art and fantasy.billierosiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00288997506566830393noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8670812027273632828.post-60829783683437364482010-02-07T03:56:37.533-08:002010-02-07T03:56:37.533-08:00That's really interesting about what your clas...That's really interesting about what your classical classes said, OG - it makes a lot of sense. <br /><br />As for "it lives in a different section of my brain" and "the need to play out psychologically, artistically, or in a consensual setting an act which may speak to needs" - that sound so like Jung! Who of course had a ton to say about mythology, and why it still speaks to us and haunts us even in modern times. We have to give the archtypes their time in the spotlight, he would say - including the Persephone/Hades archetype - because they are a powerful part of us all. But we do it safely and sanely through art and fantasy.Janine Ashblesshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00840188081214225153noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8670812027273632828.post-79928525803348688152010-02-05T18:36:52.515-08:002010-02-05T18:36:52.515-08:00Both your post and this discussion have called up ...Both your post and this discussion have called up a number of thoughts. First, because I'm disgustingly picky, there are 2 details you left out in telling the story of Persephone which are completely irrelevant to the issue at hand but are important to the Explanation of How the World Works aspect of this myth. The first is that Demeter is the goddess of grain, harvest, fertility, all that sort of stuff. Actually, you can make some interesting deductions about the meaning of Death stealing the daughter of Fertility. But the other little detail is that Persephone ate 6 seeds. Exactly 6. Which is why the decision is that she has to stay down below for 6 months. And why those are the dark months, because Demeter is in mourning and a generally bad mood during that time - a really rotten case of Seasonal Affective Disorder, I suppose - and lets things go to pot the way I neglect my house during the dark months. Then Persephone is sprung and the world comes back to life.<br /><br />Rape in old stories. We had a really interesting series of classes at my he issue with rape, of course, never had much to do with the woman herself. It's about abusing hospitality. And about power. But not power over the woman, which is how it is seen now - not just politically but also psychologically. It's an issue of power over her owner.<br /><br />It was a great course. And of course, for someone like me who loves words and symbolism and metaphor and all that, delving into just a few words to find meaning is incredible fun.<br /><br />But now to the other part of it. I admit to being one of those with rape _fantasies_, dating back to before I even knew what rape was. I remember watching a tv show when I was around 8 (back in the '50s) - some police thing, I suppose - and then asking my mother if the man was going to rape the woman he had attacked. She said yes, but then wouldn't explain to me what it meant. I really had no idea, except that i knew it excited me. I looked it up in the dictionary but still didn't really understand. It WAS the '50s, after all...<br /><br />I very clearly know the difference between rape fantasies and the reality. But that doesn't stop the fantasies. They seem to live in a different section of my brain.<br /><br />This made me stop and think about the darker erotica I write. I'm trying to remember, but I don't think they include actual rape. There is some use by a number of men which is rather unwelcome, but it not actually forced. The rape, such as it is, has been of the mental sort, so that the always unnamed female character willingly submits to whatever the dominant male requires. This, and the D/s relationship I am in, are clearly a way to deal with some powerful need I have to cede power. <br /><br />To that extent, I think, the rape of rape fantasies may be symbolism as much as the seeds in the Persephone myth. I think we need to be careful to separate the real desire to commit what is, indeed, a heinous crime from the need to play out psychologically, artistically, or in a consensual situation an act which may speak to needs other than the actual sexual act. (Sorry, I got kind of last in writing that last section. I do hope it's clear. My street is disappearing in snow, and my mind with it, it seems.)<br /><br />o.g.oatmeal girlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12842608615972752000noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8670812027273632828.post-40955628245302782612010-01-29T05:37:28.350-08:002010-01-29T05:37:28.350-08:00I thought about Leda after I'd posted my comme...I thought about Leda after I'd posted my comment. I could never understand why Zeus had to take the form of a swan, to have her. He could have just dazzled her with his godliness.<br /><br />The Greek myths are mysogonistic. The only value a woman seemed to have was in her beauty. Even Penelope, who kept herself pure while Odysseus, was away rampaging, isn't praised for her wit and skill, but for her beauty.<br /><br />A bit like today really.billierosiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00288997506566830393noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8670812027273632828.post-50978128264795931982010-01-29T02:45:51.641-08:002010-01-29T02:45:51.641-08:00I'm sorry, you've misunderstood me - there...I'm sorry, you've misunderstood me - there are LOADS of Greek myths about rape or attempted rape. Apollo tries to rape Daphne. Poseidon rapes Demeter (to produce Persephone), and Medusa. Zeus rapes Leda and Callisto. Pan rapes Selene and tries to rape Syrinx. Hermes rapes Chione. That's just off the top of my head...<br /><br />The Greek myths are strikingly mysogynistic. And you're damn right the writers of the myths didn't regard rape with any particular horror.<br /><br />What I was trying to say is that the Persephone myth is one where the sex act gets glossed over. Not sure why.Janine Ashblesshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00840188081214225153noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8670812027273632828.post-31499759920952927722010-01-28T12:14:44.589-08:002010-01-28T12:14:44.589-08:00Yes, it is strange, Janine, how the writers of the...Yes, it is strange, Janine, how the writers of the Greek myths seem so hesitant about writing about rape. They take every other taboo, head on. Incest, bestiality, patricide, infanticide, cannibalism. They shy away from none of these. I wonder if maybe they didn’t regard rape, with the same horror that we do? Maybe they didn’t even have a word for non-consensual sex. They lived in different times. As you say, in archaic times, the word “rape” meant something different. And they’re telling stories about kings, princes and gods -- they can all have pretty much who they want anyway. <br /><br />But you’re right; there isn’t a Greek myth with rape as a theme. Persephone’s story; her abduction and eating the pomegranate seeds, is the closest they get. And she was taken against her will and, as I read it, starved into submission. So she was forced into a relationship with Hades. She became his Queen. So why don’t they just come out and say she was forced? Because Hades is a god? They don’t hesitate to criticise the gods in other stories. <br /><br />Posting the short essay is my way of dealing with my own horror of rape. The concept of rape, I mean. The complete abuse of strength and power of one human being over another. As you say, the injustice and betrayal. I recently read a couple of rape stories in erotica anthologies. In one, the woman is turned on by the word “rape”. In the other, a gay rape, the guy is seduced into sex, by the man who had started out raping him. Both stories left me feeling sick.<br /><br />Btw. I just re-read RUBY SEEDS. Excellently done; honestly done too. Made me smile.billierosiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00288997506566830393noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8670812027273632828.post-46237029476205893862010-01-28T02:37:41.447-08:002010-01-28T02:37:41.447-08:00Interesting.
You start by talking about "ra...Interesting. <br /><br />You start by talking about "rape" as we understand it - a violent sexual act. Then you use as illustration the Rape of Persephone, in which "rape" is being used in the archaic sense of "to carry off" (As in "The Rape of the Lock" which is a poem about <i>stealing</i> a lock of hair, not about having non-consensual sex with it). In the Persephone myth the one thing that is completely glossed over is the sex act (eating the seeds is substituted instead) - which is a bit odd really, given how much straight-up sexual violation there is in other Greek myths. <br /><br />So I'm afraid I think using the Persephone myth is rather skirting the issue. Which btw is exactly how I've used it in writng my own fiction. <br /><br />I don't write rape erotica. I do write stuff sometimes about situations that come really close - or <i>look</i> like they come really close. Why? Because rape really troubles me. I think it's a fundamental, irreducable problem between men and women. It is about power, and injustice, and betrayal. And because it bothers and vexes me, I want to write about it. Because there's no other way for me to deal with it.Janine Ashblesshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00840188081214225153noreply@blogger.com