Rape is one of the problems which is not so easy to decide and judge; there are so many complexities. But first, just for argument’s sake, let us accept that it is certain that he committed the rape. The question arises: why did he have to go to such lengths to fulfill such a simple desire? Sex is such a simple phenomenon. There is no lack of men or women, there is no necessity for anybody to rape.
But the way the society has been against sex, they have made it a serious problem. It should be simple playfulness – and that’s exactly what it is. Two people are playing tennis, there is no problem. Nobody ever hears that somebody raped… there is no question of raping in tennis. You can play; there is no need to rape. When two people are playing tennis they are using their bodies, their minds. What are they doing when they are making love? – it is just there is not a net in between. And all the contraceptives are nothing but the net! The contraceptives make it really a game, with the net.
The net was missing. God did not supply it to Adam and Eve. Perhaps out of anger he simply kept the net to himself; otherwise, in throwing those two poor people out of the garden of Eden he should at least have given them all the provisions for life.
The society goes on making you very serious about sex. It goes on making you repress your energies. There is a limit to repression; after that limit, the energy takes over. Whenever a man commits rape, he is not in his senses, for the simple reason that the rape cannot help him to solve his problem. The rape cannot give him the joy that his whole physiology is asking for. Rape cannot give him the warmth, the love, the receptivity that he needs. It is simply not the answer to his need.
But the way the society has been against sex, they have made it a serious problem. It should be simple playfulness – and that’s exactly what it is. Two people are playing tennis, there is no problem. Nobody ever hears that somebody raped… there is no question of raping in tennis. You can play; there is no need to rape. When two people are playing tennis they are using their bodies, their minds. What are they doing when they are making love? – it is just there is not a net in between. And all the contraceptives are nothing but the net! The contraceptives make it really a game, with the net.
The net was missing. God did not supply it to Adam and Eve. Perhaps out of anger he simply kept the net to himself; otherwise, in throwing those two poor people out of the garden of Eden he should at least have given them all the provisions for life.
The society goes on making you very serious about sex. It goes on making you repress your energies. There is a limit to repression; after that limit, the energy takes over. Whenever a man commits rape, he is not in his senses, for the simple reason that the rape cannot help him to solve his problem. The rape cannot give him the joy that his whole physiology is asking for. Rape cannot give him the warmth, the love, the receptivity that he needs. It is simply not the answer to his need.
But you have left no other ways. You have forced the man into such a condition that he simply explodes like a volcano. Seeing a woman in a lonely spot he forgets the consequences. He forgets hell, God, The Bible, church, court, constitution; he forgets everything. He is not in his real self, he is not himself; he becomes almost like an animal.
And this is not a way of making love: the woman is screaming, she is shouting and trying to escape. You can call it a fight, you cannot call it love. And he forces himself upon the woman by sheer physical violence. He interferes with the independence of another human being and he gets nothing out of it – he gets castration, or fifty years of imprisonment. This is the orgasm that he gets. And the society is responsible for the whole thing: the court and the judge and the law – they all represent the society.
This is a very cunning way of destroying individuals. On one hand you force them to be criminals, on the other hand you are ready to punish them. But your punishment does not seem to be compassionate; your punishment seems to be a kind of revenge.
If the man has raped, and that is a crime, then the judge who orders his castration – in what category are you going to put that judge? He is not in any way different from a rapist. The society is taking revenge. The society is not being fair, it has not looked into the whole phenomenon.
Osho,
And this is not a way of making love: the woman is screaming, she is shouting and trying to escape. You can call it a fight, you cannot call it love. And he forces himself upon the woman by sheer physical violence. He interferes with the independence of another human being and he gets nothing out of it – he gets castration, or fifty years of imprisonment. This is the orgasm that he gets. And the society is responsible for the whole thing: the court and the judge and the law – they all represent the society.
This is a very cunning way of destroying individuals. On one hand you force them to be criminals, on the other hand you are ready to punish them. But your punishment does not seem to be compassionate; your punishment seems to be a kind of revenge.
If the man has raped, and that is a crime, then the judge who orders his castration – in what category are you going to put that judge? He is not in any way different from a rapist. The society is taking revenge. The society is not being fair, it has not looked into the whole phenomenon.
Osho,
From Misery to Enlightenment, Ch 26, q#1
