NOTE FROM MARY: Given the continuing stir from A Manifesto For Conscious Women, this piece from Robert August Masters is timely.
DO ALL MEN HAVE AN INNER RAPIST?
Do all men (and women) have an inner child, a capacity or place within that is vulnerable, prerational, far from adult or adolescent, a dimension of self that thinks, acts, and feels like a child? Yes. However we treat the child within, it is still there, more verb than noun, but still there.
Do all men have an inner rapist? No.
Let me explain.
One of our key challenges is to cultivate intimacy with all that we are and all that is, excluding nothing from our being. Such radical inclusion is not a mental game or philosophical position, but rather a great undertaking that we at some point must take on fully if we are to truly heal and awaken.
But to be intimate with it all, however, is not to be overrun or possessed by it all! We can authentically say about anything “That too am I” without actually possessing its particular traits and qualities; we can relate, and relate quite intimately, to such traits and qualities, knowing them very well, even though we don’t literally have them.
So it is crucial that we not confuse the inclusion of something with actually having that particular something.
We may include it all, but we do not have it all!
For example, we can include in our being — or expand our being to include — those with eating disorders, but we may never have had an eating disorder, and will very likely not have one due to such inclusion.
And yet, we can still be intimate with those suffering from an eating disorder, if we will but take them into our heart.
I fully include Diane (my wife and beloved and partner in all things) in myself, so I am quite intimate with, for example, her great passion for gardening, but I do not have this passion; I like aspects of gardening, but I am definitely not passionate about gardening. It’s just not something I have.
So expanding the circle of my being to include you — which in part is intimacy incarnate — does not necessarily mean that I then have all of the qualities and capacities that characterize you. That is, including you in my being does not give me your traits! I may cultivate considerable intimacy with your traits, but they still do not necessarily become mine. Even if I nonconceptually recognize myself as including you to the point of even being you, I am nonetheless still individuated, with my own unique traits and capacities.
So do all men have an inner rapist? No. When we are ready to do so, we can include the rapist (or capacity for rape) in our being without having that one manifest or exist as an actual aspect of us. Its presence then is not that of an endogenous piece of our psyche, but that of a endarkened guest whose heart does not yet see.
Some might claim that we all have an inner rapist, but do they actually experience having an inner rapist, or do they simply believe this to be so, because of a misreading of the radical truth that we each, as we truly are, include everything? Those who are merely adopting a theoretical position regarding us all having an inner rapist are overlooking something very basic: our individuality.
Some men who deny having an inner rapist may in fact have one, well-hidden or not, but other men who deny having an inner rapist do so because they simply don’t have one. A man who has significantly awakened from his conditioning and who has never fantasized about rape, never considered it, never felt aroused watching it in a film or in pornographic depiction, very likely does not have an inner rapist, and to categorically state that he must indeed have an inner rapist demonstrates a misunderstanding of our true nature.
Every man has the ingredients for rape — the capacities for violence, dehumanization, sexual arousal — but not every man has the critical mix of these and related factors that constitutes the desire to rape.
It’s important here not to get stuck in postmodern relativism and to remember that there are universals with regard to our interiority, such as the “inner child.” Everyone was once a child, so everyone carries a child-side in their psyche, which, given the right conditions, shows up in and even dominates our behavior, regardless of our age. Another universal is the capacity for force, along with the capacity to misuse that force. We all also have a capacity to dehumanize others.
It may not be easy to admit that we have a capacity for violence, but under certain conditions it shows up; just about every parent knows this when they imagine walking in on their child being brutalized by a rapist, and without a thought killing that person if necessary to save their child. But this violence, this entirely understandable violence, is not necessarily itself depraved, sadistic, or otherwise aberrated. I would classify it as what the Dalai Lama calls “virtuous violence.”
But when our capacities for violence, dehumanization, and sexual arousal get sufficiently intertwined and and are allowed to pornographically reinforce each other, we have entered the domain of rape, whether we act it out or not. If the thought or depiction of rape turns us on, we need to do more than just acknowledge that we have an inner rapist, for the very energy and attention we put into it places us, however mildly, on a continuum with actual rapists.
For those who still insist that we all have an inner rapist, I suggest they take a more than just intellectual look at what rape actually is, letting themselves unguardedly feel it, from both the perspective of the rapist and the victim. If this doesn’t get them out of their head, then I suggest that they take a similar look at the darkest extremes of rape, letting themselves feel it, again from both perspectives.
When the concept of “inner rapist” is used indiscriminately, there is a danger of trivializing rape, of bypassing the raw reality of it. It’s crucial to only use the term “inner rapist” for those who actually have some sort of desire to rape or who are aroused by the thought or depiction of it, and to also know what we actually are speaking of when we use the word “rape.” Using the word “rape” to describe activities other than actual rape lessens the impact that such violation should have on us, straying dangerously close to normalizing it.
So we include it all, but in different ways, each of us having our own unique set of traits, even as we cultivate intimacy not just with our own traits, but also with our collective traits. I may include the heroin addict in my being, but this does not necessarily mean that I therefore have an inner heroin addict! Intimacy with the heroin addict does not mean fusion or union with that one, but rather a relational closeness that permits as much clear focus as compassion. Turning toward the heroin addict does not mean that we approve of or condone that one’s behavior, but that we are refusing to exclude that one from our being. Such inclusion does not mean an abandoning or collapsing of our personal boundaries, but rather a discerning expansion of them.
A mature man does not have an inner rapist (and this is also true of some immature men). He has within himself the ingredients for rape, but no mixing bowl or beaters or baking pan or catalytic agent for them. At the same time, he knowingly includes in himself every sort of man, holding them all with resolute compassion, allowing none to assume the throne of self other than his true nature.
ROBERT AUGUSTUS MASTERS, a critically acclaimed author (of 11 books), teacher of spiritual deepening, and highly experienced psychotherapist (and trainer of psychotherapists) with a doctorate in Psychology, has innovatively integrated mind, body, emotion, and spirituality in his work for the past 30 years. For more information on his work and writings (and to subscribe to his free newsletter), visit www.RobertMasters.com.
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