Sex, Power, and Violence: What Do the Rape Incidents in Susan Brownmiller's Against Our Will Actually Show?

Abstract

Susan Brownmiller's groundbreaking book, Against Our Will: Men, Women, and Rape, brought much-needed attention to a tremendously understudied crime and exposed many dangerous misconceptions. However, it also inspired a massive debate about whether sexual violence is primarily driven by desires for sex or power, and that argument persists today. For this study, we treated the book's incidents ( N = 245) as data, instead of as a narrative, and systematically analyzed them. Overall, our findings suggest many perpetrators identified by Brownmiller may have been sexually frustrated, and multiple aspects of their behavior indicate they were seeking sexual relief. At the same time, many also seemed to be seeking increased sexual power to fulfill their desires, and a small subset may have specifically sought revenge against women. Together, these results suggest a potential middle ground exists amidst a polarized debate between scholars with adversarial perspectives.