Rape or Murder which is worse?

Posted: Fri Oct 23, 2009 8:51 am

Just to clarify, I was referring to myself with the off-topic sign. Just in case thats what any of you thought.

Posted: Fri Oct 23, 2009 9:18 am

No need to clarify pac mate, it was a good point and not off topic as it happens. We are too used to being told what to think these days basicaly because thinking involves to much work. We have all become lazy IMO. This has given the advantage to others with agendas to force their extreme and biased view points on us to the extent that those views have become the norm.

How mant times have you got to a door behind a woman only to have it slammed in your face as they dont even turn to check if anyone else is there? Middle aged woman are by far and away the worst for this. They should all be fitted with wing mirrors!!

I blame that rudeness on feminism. I also think the males attitude here to rape has been shaped and cemented by feminists. For decades all men have been forced by these militants to share a collective blame for rape amongst other things and most people today have fallen for it.

The fact that murder, that is the killing of a human being, has been relegated by some to the same status as sexual assault (or that sexual assault has been elevated to the same as murder) is testimony to this.

Posted: Sat Oct 24, 2009 3:59 pm

Rape or Murder? What a choice!

I've never really been able to meaningfully post in this thread because I don't understand the underlying complexities of rape. Despite my line of work, I have never met anyone who was raped. And if I did I don't know that I would care to raise the subject. I much prefer to base my arguments on experiences in the real world. I have had ample opportunity to interact with those who do work with rape victims, though.

I believe the possibility of recovery from rape is something that comes down to individuals. Their personal strength and determination to carry on and make a better life for themselves. The kind of people they are surrounded by and the support they provide could make a vital difference I should think. The existence of a reason that makes them want to continue. A driving purpose in life, love, children, something anything.

But these are things not given to everyone. What of the many families who are ashamed of having a daughter who was raped? Of the fact that in certain countries they will never be able to marry or have children. That even their peers are not able to meet their eye. They are more likely to go into severe depression and lead a half life, at best. As they go further into their shells, they will be ignored and shunned even more. It will get harder and harder to recover. It is unfortunate not all societies are so well equipped to deal with rape.

Murder does not carry nearly the same social stigma as rape. A murderer and a rapist are not viewed in the same light at all. A murder (though barbaric it is) may well be considered right but what rape can ever be justified? To equate their crimes as being equally bad seems to me to be a refusal to examine the matter at any length.

It would appear, therefore, that I believe rape is the worse crime of the two. This doesn't mean that I would prefer to see people dead rather than raped. I would rather see my loved ones alive. But that's my perspective and I cannot help feeling that it is somewhat selfish of me.

What if my sister, despite everything, failed to recover. That she had to relive that heinous crime every night in her dreams and wake up screaming. That she would be afraid to go anywhere on her own. To be left unable to fulfill her full potential. The very thought fills me with anguish. Despite the fact that all my sisters are cousins, though they are quite close to me. A real sister must be a different matter altogether. What can one say of a twin. After many years might I not be forced to concede that I was infact selfish in choosing life (assuming that I had the choice if only in the context of the thread).

And what of a daughter, if such be the emotions for a sibling or a cousin. I cannot even begin to imagine.....

In the case of murder, it is only I who has to deal with the pain of her loss. Not her as well or rather primarily, as in the first case. We all die one day. Some are less fortunate than others. I have never believed that the dead should be mourned except in their happiest memories and in the good that they did. That really doesn't amount to mourning though.

So what I'm really saying is that there isn't one straightforward answer to this question. In those cases where the person is strong enough there is no doubt that being alive would be a most fortunate turn of events. But one is forced to acknowledge that it is possible in cases where the mental trauma reaches unbearable levels and shows no signs of dissipating and there are regular spells of regression, well lets just say that it would alleviate a lot of suffering.

I don't think that this is ever the case in the immediate aftermath of such a tragedy. No one ever thinks,"She isn't strong enough to make it. She's going to suffer for the rest of her life." The optimistic part in every human always holds out that hope. It is only years later with the benefit of hindsight that you can judge otherwise. Even then would it be possible to think, "I wish she had died then" I don't think so. Perhaps a gentler, " Perhaps it would have been better for her if she had died." Perhaps just maybe.

Rape is worse because it has the potential to cause far greater suffering than murder. To destroy a life to point where it is not worth living. There is a difference in living and simply existing, if you will but see it. Murder maybe final but if you believe in an afterlife and rebirth like I do, then it really is not as permanent as all that.

Finally I too would like to applaud this thread. This is one of the great threads of the hunt. If for no other reason than because of the sheer diversity of the responses to the same questions. So many different reasons why one or the other is worse. It was a learning experience.

Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 7:35 am

WhiteViper wrote:

Rape or Murder? What a choice!

Finally I too would like to applaud this thread. This is one of the great threads of the hunt. If for no other reason than because of the sheer diversity of the responses to the same questions. So many different reasons why one or the other is worse. It was a learning experience.

Thanx white viper, I dont know where my head was when i made this thread, maybe i saw somthing on the news, I dont remember now but I would like to thank all posters in this thread who have kept on topic and not flamed and have made this thread a serious discussion barring the one idiot who seemed to get himself barred for being a prick but yeah good points raised on all sides of this debate thanx again fellow hunters!

Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 9:13 am

You are very welcome mrywe . Thanks for the thread. Very Happy

Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 9:33 am

Nicely put Viper.

One thing i noticed reading that was everyone is focusing solely on the aftermath of the crime not so much on the act itself. If it were solely on the psychological and physical repercussions of the crime then shouldnt drug dealers be dealt with as severely? Dont they cause untold amounts of grief and suffering on whole families, sisters, daughters?

Look my point is killing is wrong. It is the ultimate crime. Nothing should equate to it. It is never justified. It is never a good thing. Never. To kill even a convicted murderer is a failing on society's part.

I'm not saying that most of that shouldnt be said of rape too, of course it should, but i just dont believe rape can be a worse crime than killing another human being.

Some of us are quite proud to say in the other rape thread that they would happily shoot these kids with no trial and no representation at all. I think that is crazy redneck talk if i'm honest and it pains me to read it. That it would be a good thing to go around vigilante style. What scares me about all this is how cheap human life is becoming considered. More people think it's less wrong to kill than to rape.

Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 6:59 am

The aftermath of the crime of rape is what makes it so horrific to the individual who has been raped, if you are killed you have a few moments of suffering and then either nothing or the afterlife depending on what you believe so in terms of the victims suffering being murdered is the lesser evil as it is over quickly you die then nothing as oppose to being raped where you suffer and suffer and suffer and suffer if you are dead you dont have any feelings at all.

Certainly having your life cut short is a terrible thing though, all the things you could have experienced but never will, but you dont miss what you never had

I think it depends on the strength of the victim as to which is the worst for truely a rape victim could come to terms with his/her violation but it terms of the amount of time you will suffer as a result the rape victim will suffer more and for longer than the murder victim would

I dont think drug dealing can be comparable although i have seen first hand the devestaion to lives and family that heroin adiction can cause but at the end of the day the drug user makes the choice to partake of such a vice or not thus not all the fault can be placed upon the drug dealer but in terms of the suffering of people who love the heroin addicted person certainly drug dealing is just as bad if not worse than either rape or murder but from the victims point of view unlike rape or murder it is self inflicted

Purely in terms of the amount of suffering the victim will go through I think rape is the greater evil as the suffering of the victim is prolonged as oppose to being murdered where u get killed you die, end of story but there are powerful arguments on both sides of this debate and as it is such a subjective subject no difinitive answer will be found anytime soon i think

Killing can never be justified certainly (unless it is in self defence) but then to my mind neither can rape and purely from my own perspective, given the choice between being violently raped and a bullet to the head id take the bullet for the arguments stated above, basically id suffer less if i was shot than i would if i was raped but everyones different and i wouldnt wish for my argument to be construed as me believing all rape victims would be better off dead as im not saying that at all although it may come across that way thats not the intention, i can only make this decision based on how i personally would feel and would not want to speak for the rest of the populace

Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 7:51 am

SoDaSeeD wrote:

Nicely put Viper.

One thing i noticed reading that was everyone is focusing solely on the aftermath of the crime not so much on the act itself. If it were solely on the psychological and physical repercussions of the crime then shouldnt drug dealers be dealt with as severely? Dont they cause untold amounts of grief and suffering on whole families, sisters, daughters?

Thanks Soda.

If the measuring scale of a crime is it's potential to cause suffering even then drug dealers should not be dealt with quite as harshly as rapists. I don't think they cause the same amount of trauma as rape. There is the question of choice, as mrywe, aptly pointed out. You can choose not to. When it comes to rape the choice is not yours.

Even after the fact a person may recover from the most severe addiction. It's not going to happen often and it's not going to be easy. But it is possible. The individual in question then will always have as an inexhaustible source of confidence the fact that he/she beat the addiction and had the strength to choose a better life. A rape victim, even if she manages to come to terms with the fact and is able to get on with life, will always have the memory of that one act. How it may affect her ability in day to day life, one cannot guess at. But it is quite irrevocable.

So on the same scale drug dealers measure quite low as compared to a rapist.

SoDaSeeD wrote:

Look my point is killing is wrong. It is the ultimate crime. Nothing should equate to it. It is never justified. It is never a good thing. Never. To kill even a convicted murderer is a failing on society's part.

I'm not saying that most of that shouldnt be said of rape too, of course it should, but i just dont believe rape can be a worse crime than killing another human being.

I understand your point of view and cannot help but respect it. My point is that there are worse things than death.

You contradict yourself. If indeed the law (moral or legal) is so absolute on the taking of life, how do you support Euthanasia, as you certainly most fervently did in a thread not so long ago. In point of fact it is not so absolute. You would permit it in self defense, would you not? To defend the life of another? In war? To prevent rape (if there was no other way)?

SoDaSeeD wrote:

Some of us are quite proud to say in the other rape thread that they would happily shoot these kids with no trial and no representation at all. I think that is crazy redneck talk if i'm honest and it pains me to read it. That it would be a good thing to go around vigilante style. What scares me about all this is how cheap human life is becoming considered. More people think it's less wrong to kill than to rape.

If you notice, I am not one of them.

In order to truly attempt an answer to your question, I must ask an even more fundamental question. What is the true measure of a human life? What do we mean when we use the term the value of a human life ? We must examine this before we can conclude that we hold it cheap. Or perhaps there are circumstances where even though we do not hold it cheap we may find exceptions. Not an easy matter resolve.

With reference to your last sentence, that is exactly why it is impossible to compare two crimes. Still the question has been asked and that is my considered opinion. That while murder is an unforgivable offense there are situations where it may be the lesser evil when confronted with the aftermath of rape.

You must understand that this does not automatically mean that I think any person who was raped was also better off dead. No. Never. Infact if it ever fell to my lot to make that decision, I would choose life every single time no matter the odds. I would bring to bear every single positive thing in me in healing the person so affected. I have unassailable confidence that I will succeed, if by the sheer dent of effort and determined force of my personality. And yet, and yet I have heard tell of the sternest spirits broken before the helpless task before them. How much worse is it for the victim to endure then? You see I believe there is nothing worse than a broken spirit, not even death. There is no cure for that. Only a vague hope. This I have witnessed.

Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 8:22 am

I already said that I wouldn't shoot the kids unless they were threatning her life or my own, but to say you should not be a vigilante by stopping it at all is just crazy. Being a vigilante doesn't mean you go around killin people, thats the movies. When I grabbed the guy and held him till police got there, thats vigilante. I took the persuit of justice into my own hands and I would do it a thousand times over. I think people are just as capable of protecting themselves and loved ones as the police are, and a little more due to fact I can get there when it counts.

I absolutely believe in the death penalty because you have to have severe punishment for crimes or they will grow as people weigh in the goods they can get from a crime as oppossed to what punishment it holds if caught. Which is why I say death to most convicted killers and life for people who participated with the murder. By most I mean the people who juries find they killed in cold blood or planned the death, not manslaughter or self protection.
After reading what you guys said about equal punishment meaning more people would be killed after a rape since the punishment would be the same as murder, I have agreed but feel sexual crimes should be dealt with more firmly then we do now because most sexual offenders will repeat the crime if not get worse. We have to make decisions like this based on the majority rule, if most do this then we have to make laws according to what the majority does and thats repeat the crime.

Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 2:10 pm

mrywe wrote:

The aftermath of the crime of rape is what makes it so horrific to the individual who has been raped, if you are killed you have a few moments of suffering and then either nothing or the afterlife depending on what you believe so in terms of the victims suffering being murdered is the lesser evil as it is over quickly you die then nothing as oppose to being raped where you suffer and suffer and suffer and suffer if you are dead you dont have any feelings at all.

So being dead is a good thing? The woman fighting for her life may disagree with you.
Again you are looking at the consequences, not the act or the crime, itself. When you go to court for any crime it is the crime...the act on which you have been accused of that you stand trial for and are punished. Not every permutation of cause and effect thereafter. If it were trials would go on forever.

mrywe wrote:

Certainly having your life cut short is a terrible thing though, all the things you could have experienced but never will, but you dont miss what you never had

Missing it or not is irrelevant. No trial centers on what you may or may not have done with your life afterwards. Not with murder not with rape not with any crime. It is purely about the unlawful act and that alone. You are not simply cutting something short as you put it, you are killing a living being.

mrywe wrote:

I think it depends on the strength of the victim as to which is the worst for truly a rape victim could come to terms with his/her violation but it terms of the amount of time you will suffer as a result the rape victim will suffer more and for longer than the murder victim would

True, but the same trauma a rape victim suffers can be suffered by a victim of mugging or assault. Are those crimes as bad as murder?
Should it be a death sentence for rape, 25 years for assault and 250 hrs community service for murder seeing that the victim only suffered for a coupla moments anyway?

mrywe wrote:

I dont think drug dealing can be comparable although i have seen first hand the devestaion to lives and family that heroin adiction can cause but at the end of the day the drug user makes the choice to partake of such a vice or not thus not all the fault can be placed upon the drug dealer but in terms of the suffering of people who love the heroin addicted person certainly drug dealing is just as bad if not worse than either rape or murder but from the victims point of view unlike rape or murder it is self inflicted

Ok, not the best analogy but lots of things that are done to people have long lasting effects, life changing and debilitating effects.... are they too to be treated with more disdain than murder just because of the suffering of the victim?

mrywe wrote:

Purely in terms of the amount of suffering the victim will go through I think rape is the greater evil as the suffering of the victim is prolonged as oppose to being murdered where u get killed you die, end of story but there are powerful arguments on both sides of this debate and as it is such a subjective subject no difinitive answer will be found anytime soon i think

Ok, greater evil but not greater crime? The greater evil in my opinion is the blase attitude towards killing. Rape is repugnant, vile, cowardly, offensive, barbaric....i could go on and i mean every word but murder is altogether more inhuman. At least for me it is. I dont go in for all that macho bullshit where death is glorified and glamorized in everything from cartoons to music and movies. Repercussions?? I would rather live with the repercussions of being raped than the torment of being a murderer....for whatever reason i took that life for.

mrywe wrote:

Killing can never be justified certainly (unless it is in self defence) but then to my mind neither can rape and purely from my own perspective, given the choice between being violently raped and a bullet to the head id take the bullet for the arguments stated above, basically id suffer less if i was shot than i would if i was raped but everyones different and i wouldnt wish for my argument to be construed as me believing all rape victims would be better off dead as im not saying that at all although it may come across that way thats not the intention, i can only make this decision based on how i personally would feel and would not want to speak for the rest of the populace

And i would say i'd rather be raped than shot in the head (as i dont have to prove my masculinity here) and leave my wife a widow and my daughter without her daddy.

If i may reply to you, Viper at a later date, it's been a long day man and i'm hittin' the hay.

Peace.

Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 2:25 pm

I believe rape is worse than murder. Obviously niether of them are good but given a choice, I'd choose death over being raped. When you are murdered you wouldn't feel anymore emotional or physical damage. Family and friends would feel an emotional pain, assuming one has some kind of relationship with family or others, but in time they will heal. Rape on the other hand will stay with you, yes in time you an others around you may heal emotionally, but if there was any kind of physical damage done durring the rape then that will be a constant reminder of that night/day and will be a lot harder to get over. Also family and friends won't heal emotionally as fast because they will want to try to talk to you about it and help you in your time of need. Fact of the matter is niether is good but rape will have longer percussion and , more likely, a greater deal of emotional damage.

Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 7:51 pm

A bit of both is worse.

If your going to get murdered, fair enough.. hopefully beforehand you could have a nice thought, or do something you like.

But Rape + Murder means you have a horrible experience, then you die.

Rape on its own is bad, but you can recover from it, its not the same, but think of it like going to a club, getting completely bladdered... hooking up with a guy, having a one night stand.

You wont remember much of it, and you will want to forget it.

Like Rape.

Not supporting it lol, but it is just sex.

p.s. I'm not a rapist. xD

Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 7:58 pm

FreaK367 wrote:

Not supporting it lol, but it is just sex.

I think I understand what you were trying to say, but that is a very poor choice of words.
It isnt just sex. Somebody has been degraded, violated and traumatized for life. They may never get over it.
Sex is a consentual act between 2 people.
Rape and sex are NOT the same thing. One is for pleasure, the other is about opression and domination.

Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 8:07 pm

Sorry for my choice of words,

But it is an act, that these days is not private.

Sex or whatever you want to call it is displayed all over schools, the internet, TV... its no longer an Event of love to produce offspring.

Its Just There, it has no respect anymore, its too In your face.

And i know Rape is one of the worst things that could happen to someone, but i dont know how i can relate it back to my other points without sounding bad...

Its not like Stealing away someones Privacy as such, and if on the news, its common and frowned upon, instead of being what it would be if Sex was secluded.. a Massive event that would be punished with death.

If someone comes away from a conflict having been raped, i would hope they could get over the pain it has caused them mentally, and be thankful they still have their body, their health (in most cases), and are able to see their family and friends again.

I agree with all of your points though, i know its terrible, but compared to how bad it would be many years ago before porn and such, it is.. not as big of an issue if possible to say.

Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 9:10 pm

if the mental pain and anguish from being raped is too much for a victim
then they could always opt out and commit suicide

kinda hard for one to recover from being murdered