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PROPENSITY TO RAPE COULD BE CLASSIFIED AS A MENTAL DISORDER
Posted by Gill on November 23, 2009
Tags: feminism, Law, Mental Health, Psychology, Violence Against Women, Women
The number one guide to mental health disorders, the DSM or Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, is being revised for its fifth edition – to be published in 2012.
As part of the review a special work group has been set up to look at sexual disorders. This is relevant because the DSM is used in law enforcement both in USA and the UK as a guide to mental disorders that can prove reduced capacity, or merit hospitalisation on conviction rather than imprisonment.
Coercive Paraphilic Disorder is a mental ‘disorder’ being considered for DSM-V, used to describe a disorder some think is connected with propensity to rape.
Karen Franklin, Ph.D., of the forensic science blog In the News explains:
“Currently, the propensity to rape is not considered a mental illness. Proponents of adding a rapist diagnosis to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) claim it was only excluded the last time around due to pesky feminists’ objections that it would excuse rapists from criminal consequences. However, that turns out to be something of a myth. The main reason it was excluded, says psychologist and lawyer Thomas Zander, who conducted primary research into the history, was because it was not scientifically supportable. And, according to [Raymond] Knight’s* article, it is even less supportable now than it was back then.”
Feminists have long claimed that men who rape are not ‘different’ or mentally ill but normal men (friends, partners, fathers, colleagues) who do bad things – and evidence supports this. In her blog post Franklin refers to Knight’s review of evidence from a long line of research that suggests “there is not a separate category of men with a propensity to rape. Rather than being a distinct “taxon,” rape propensity exists along a continuum.”
I’m with Karen in hoping that good science defeats these pseudoscientific categories, which she describes as “weak at best”; and this ‘rape mental illness’ is kept out of DSM-V in this review, as it was last time around.
*Knight is considered to be a premiere researcher into the etiology of rape. His article ‘Is a diagnostic category for Paraphilic Coercive Disorder defensible?’ Archives of Sexual Behavior is available online, but requires a subscription. You can view the abstract here.
Hat tip to Karen Franklin Ph.D. and her blog, In the News
Tags for this post:feminism, Law, Mental Health, Psychology, Violence Against Women, Women
November 29th, 2009 at 4:08 am
Most psychopathologies exist along a continuum. If you think mental disorders (or indeed any diagnostic categories) are discrete “taxons”, then you have a very misguided and naiive view of medical diagnosis, and of categorisation in general.
Regardless, I have to say, I think treating them would be better all round than leaving them to rot in jail (if they get that far, which most don’t) and then come out and do it again.
This proposal also places responsibility for protecting the public onto the medical profession, who seem to take their responsibilities a little bit more seriously than the criminal justice system does.
It also isn’t clear what the thrust of your argument is. If the category was not scientifically defensible before, and it was rejected, and it’s even less defensible now, then it’ll be rejected again. So it’s hard to see what’s to object to here. It’s academic. Though I agree with the notion that you’d have to be sick to want to rape someone, and I suspect it’d be easier to get a diagnosis than a guilty verdict, so it’s all to the good.
The mad-bad dichotomy is not a new one. The former philosophy would advocate treatment and containment, whereas the latter leads to a punitive attitude which, as science has proven decades ago is not that effective in modifying behaviour. And in any case, the potential of a custodial sentence has not proven to be a deterrent, not least because of the low likelihood of being convicted.
It also means that men who find themselves edging along the continuum can seek preventative help, which at present is very sparse. If a would-be rapist were to talk about where their head is at at present, it is more likely to result in police intervention than medical. Which is not an incentive.
And then again, what about Ian Brady, one of our very worst sex-murderous criminals? He may be bad, but he’s also a mentalist. Did that get him a lenient sentence, being detained for life in high-security? I think not. It’s also worth giving a bit of thought to the Mental Health Act 1983 and its later additions, before deciding whether the proposal is a good or a bad thing.
Of course, the next step would be to make misogyny a mental illness. I’m well up for that.
November 29th, 2009 at 11:45 am
Dandelion, Derren Brown is a mentalist whereas Ian Brady has been diagnosed with a mental illness. I don’t know Brady’s exact legal & psychiatric status, but my guess is that his prolonged detention is due to the extreme & horrific nature of his crimes and not primarily due to his mental health.
I am not sure what you mean by your reference to the Mental Health Act. Are you saying that since it provides powers of detention that rapists would be locked up either way whether they are convicted or diagnosed with this proposed rapist disorder, and therefore feminists should not be too concerned about the outcome of this issue?
Most people who are “sectioned” under the Mental Health Act are detained because they are a danger to themselves and can’t look after themselves, and/or cannot freely consent to treatment because of their mental condition. A few may be dangerous to others. Either way, the harm they inadvertently or deliberately may cause to self or others is commonly a result of the delusions or hallucinations they are experiencing – e.g. they feel a huge threat when there is none; they may not perceive a dangerous situation. Or they may have broken down under life stresses or the aftermath of a traumatic experience.
In short it seems strongly as if your comment is based on a mistaken perception of mentally ill people as inherently dangerous.
Also, you appear to believe that rapists are extreme cases, murderers like Brady, or the classic stereotype predator who attacks in the street.
Most rape victims were assaulted by someone they knew and may have liked/trusted. (The rapist who attacks a stranger is also a reality). Many rapes are in the context of relationships or social situations, when the rapist disregards the other person’s refusal or reluctance to have sex, or their incapacity to consent to sex – they do not decide “I am going to rape someone” and they will not identify their actions as rape. They are not mentally ill, they are operating under self-serving attitudes about women and sex that are fostered by the gender inequality that our society is steeped in.
The low conviction rate is due to the victim-blaming, perpetrator-excusing, rape-minimising attitudes that are prevalent throughout society. People rush to declare how heinous rape is, but then equivocate over why this or that incident isn’t actually rape.
A report this week showed that women are less likely to be believed for a variety of circumstances, and that victims are deterred by the scepticism they can be shown even at the earliest stages of the criminal justice process.
Classifying rapists as having something medically “wrong” is a step backward. If so few accused rapists are convicted, why should we think that any more of them will be diagnosed as rapists? We need to be looking honestly at why rape-enabling attitudes are so widespread, and challenge them.
November 29th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
You knew perfectly well what I meant about Ian Brady’s mental health. Come on!
The mental health act has provision for detaining people who are a danger to themselves or to others. It makes no specification that their threat to others must be premised upon delusions or hallucinations. A high propensity to rape by definition means that the person is a danger to others. QED.
How you extrapolate that I believe all mentally ill people are inherently dangerous, from the fact that I suggest that all with a high propensity to rape are dangerous, I do not know.
You make too many unfounded assumptions about my beliefs. If you could address the points I raised, instead of refuting assumptions I do not make, then perhaps we could have a helpful discussion.
The fact remains that every single argument in Karen Franklin’s post for not including P to R in DSM actually already applies to existing DSM categories. The continuum, the failure to inhibit arousal, the disorder-NOS. They’re all there.
On top of which, the outcome of including P to R in DSM would arguably give better results in terms of prevention, rehabilitation, and protection of women. I don’t really see how a feminist could argue against it, either on theoretical or pragmatic grounds. It doesn’t imply a denial of the seriousness or objectionable-ness of rape, it doesn’t imply a misogyny of any kind. Quite the contrary.
On a cursory reading of Knight’s paper, it looks as though he is the one pushing a misogynist, rape-perpetuating agenda. Like him, Karen Franklin appears to prefer to let rapists continue raping, in favour of the opportunity to bay to for their blood when they do. Utterly counter-productive, utterly non-scientific, and utterly non-feminist.
November 29th, 2009 at 4:04 pm
We should think that more rapists will be diagnosed than convicted, because once you remove the punitive aspect and offer help, they will be more likely to come forward for treatment. It will stop being excusable as a corrollory of masculinity, and start being seen for what it is, a pathological perversion. In addition to which, diagnosing them as mentally ill will undermine the reliability of their legal testimony, so it will be harder for them to push defensive lies, and it will also be harder for juries to believe in rape myths. People will stop blaming the victim, once the cause of rape is positioned squarely where it belongs, with the rapist. In court the argument will not just be the victim’s word against the rapist’s, but psychiatric evidence of the defendent’s mental condition will become extremely relevant. I could go on.
I suggested looking at the mental health act, because I’m not sure what the burden of proof is for diagnosis, relative to a criminal trial. Either way, a diagnosis of propensity to rape does not appear to require evidence of having committed a rape.
What you don’t seem to be considering is that the reclassification of rapists as mad rather than bad will result in a change of thinking across the board. Which will benefit everyone.
December 25th, 2009 at 10:39 am
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