Evolutionary Views of Rape and South Africa

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Throughout the years, several scientists have attempted to answer a question that seems to have no answer. The question being: why do men rape? Rape is defined as a form of sexual intercourse, where one of the parties does not consent to the action. There are many theories in regards to the evolutionary perspective of rape. The most common theories are that rape is a form of adaption, or raping as an evolutionary by-product. In two provinces of South Africa, Eastern Cape and KwaZula, thousands of rapes are reported every year. Studies have been conducted in hopes of figuring out what generates the need to rape.
In the case of rape as a form of adaption, it was brought forth in the belief that rape is a tactic to increase the male reproductive success when the gains outweigh the costs (Denno, 1999). Reproductive success is defined as genes that are passed on to their offspring that can potential be passed on to future generations. Rape as an adaption model declares that males who lack the resources to attract mates, have developed a strategy also known as rape, in which they force females to copulate in order to pass on their genes. This strategy was developed in belief that without rape, certain males would have a lesser chance of reproductive success (Palmer, 1991). Here the gains outweigh the cost. Males who rape have little to lose when committing this act of violence, but if successful they gain the opportunity of their genes being passed on to future generations if the offspring survive.
When discussing rape as a by-product we take a closer look into differences of the mating game plan between males and females. Such differences include but are not limited to the emotional, mental, physical, and behavior that make up a ma...

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... to rape under extreme circumstances to increase reproductive success. Rape is common in species other than humans, still it has not been proven that life will seize to end without i

Works Cited

Archer, J., & Vaughan, A. (2001, April). Evolutionary Theories of Rape. Psychology, Evolution & Gender , 95-101.
Denno, D. W. (1999). Evolutionary Biology and Rape. Jurimetrics J. , 243-254.
Jewkes, R., Sikweyiya, Y., Morrell, R., & Dunkle, K. (2012, December). Why,when, and how men rape, Understanding rape perpetration in South Africa. SA Crime Quarterly , 23-31.
Miller, A. S., & Kanazawa, S. (2007). Why beautiful people have more daughters. New York, New York: the Penguin Group.
Palmer, C. T. (1991). Human Rape: Adaption or By-Product? The Journal of Sex Research , 28 (3), 365-386.
Thornhill, R., & Palmer, C. (2000, January/February). Why Men Rape. The Sciences , 20-28.

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