We're all hating humanity now, right? No? Some spark of hope for the species yet lingers?
Crimebusters in Japan's major cities are currently being plagued by a new type of criminal, according to Asahi Geino -- the rachiya. Literally translated into English as kidnappers, the rachiya are believed to be male members of secret associations that engage in simulated rapes. But there's nothing simulated about what they're apparently prepared to do for a price, picking up women off the streets and violating them for a yen."Recently, there've been rumors about rachiya in big cities like Tokyo and Osaka, but nobody really knows where they are," a reporter tells Asahi Geino. But an adult industry source tells the weekly that the rachiya are actually members of exclusive clubs formed to carry out simulated rapes on consenting women.
"One big difference is that for a price they will carry out a real rape for their members. There's no acting like there is in some clubs. It's the real thing. They'll kidnap an ordinary woman and let club members rape her. Put simply, they're groups of criminals.
"If a member tells his club the type of women he'd like to rape, the club will arrange it for him. Market rates are about 100,000 yen a rape. If the member designates a specific individual, the fee can go over 1 million yen in some cases. Designating an individual usually involves putting the guy together with somebody who knows him, making it more likely they can be reported to the cops, so the greater cost arises from the greater risk factor," the source tells Asahi Geino.
[. . .] "They say the easiest pick-ups are women who've been out drinking and missed their last train. The guys head to a train station where some services end and look out for the women. If they find any, they'll offer them a lift home. The woman almost invariably accepts." From there, the rachiya need only to hand the woman over to the client. And the evil rachiya play on the woman's shame to make sure she doesn't reveal what happened to her.
"What they do is once they have got her in their clutches, they take photos of her ID and the place where she was violated," the adult industry source tells Asahi Geino. "That way, the threat of being publicly exposed always exists if she ever opens her mouth about what happened."
From Mainichi Daily News, by way of die puny humans.
This isn't an occasion for attacking the barbaric ways of foriegners, by the bye. Glass houses and all that.
Don't click that last link.
One out of twelve male students surveyed had committed acts that met the legal definition of rape or attempted rape.In 1996, only 31% of rapes and sexual assaults were reported to law enforcement officials--less than one in every three.
2% of rapes are falsely reported; 8% of reported rapes are considered "unfounded." This is similar to rates for other felony crimes.
More than 4 out of 5 women that are raped know their assailant.
In 95% of rapes the perpetrator and victim share the same socio-economic status and race.
I'd hate to kill that last little spark, after all.
*nyah nyah nyah*
I can't hear you.
I'm waving my American Flag.
If I read about rape, the terrorists have won.
Don't worry, our servicemen are out there fighting the terrorists.
You know. The servicemen with a tendency to rape women and girls while stationed in Japan.
Sorry, sorry. . .
Nah- you're still just riffing off the Bitch issue- this time about that New York artist that stages kidnappings. [I think that's where I read that.]
I refuse to check. This would mean exposing myself to the magazine again, and obviously it has way too much influence on my tiny mind.
But you're probably right.
Just in case we need more glass on that house:
"In 1963, Marilyn and I, returning at dawn to our apartment on East Fifth Street, found a young woman asleep on a schoolyard bench on West Fourth. She had been the manager of a coffee house where I occasionally played guitar and sang for what Greenwich Village tourists would leave in the wicker basket -- it was 'seeded' with a dollar bill, but we were happy if there were quarters. We took her back to our second-floor apartment at the end of our dead-end street, and a complicated and harrowing story followed to explain why she was sleeping on a schoolyard bench in the first place: the only detail I remember was that, among other sordidnesses, someone had hired three men to rape the woman friend she had been staying with; and, indeed, such hirings, in certain circles, were common.
"Once, I spent a boozy evening at a Clancy's on Twenty-third Street, listening to a man regale me till closing with a tale, verging on psychotic incoherence, of the years he had spent as a 'rape artist,' when he had been paid to sexually molest women -- usually strangers to him. His account was punctuated by unfathomable statements like: 'But I never killed none of 'em. Not one -- at least not on purpose' -- a sort of line frequently used to lend ironic poignance to certain romantic fictions but which, when encountered in life, somehow says more about fiction than about the incidents under discussion."
- Samuel R. Delany, writing about the start of his novel, _Hogg_
George asked if I'd ever read that or _The Mad Man_, and I'd forgotten why I'd been avoiding them. Because they'd make me even more misanthropic than normal. Thanks.
Should I try either of those, or look for some (comparatively) nice, relaxing Marilyn Hacker instead?
"Hogg" and "The Mad Man" are both for, um, discerning tastes....
Me, I always recommend "The Motion of Light in Water" as a first Delany. It kind of positions all the other work. But you couldn't go wrong with "Atlantis" or "Dhalgren", or (if you like manga) his early "Babel-17"-to-"Nova" stuff, or (if you're a Stupid White Guy or just want to think like one) "Trouble on Triton."
Heck, he's a good writer, so I'm pleased to have it all.
Think I read one of the Neveryon books first. And not even the first of those.
Still haven't read "Atlantis" or "The Motion of Light in Water" for some reason. Did he have a story in Last Dangerous Visions? Know Octavia Butler did. . . yes, I engage in Harlan Ellison bashing for fun. All the cool kids do.
I have an odd affection for "Trouble on Triton." Keep meaning to transcribe The Spike's "Dear John" letter, which really reminded me of a conversation I once had, but laziness gets the better of me.
And "Dhalgren" is strictly for the hardcore.
I did it backwards, back in '97 - The Mad Man first, then Hogg, two, er...tough acts to follow. Couldn't get through the first few pages of anything else I tried. Gave up trying sometime in '98.