Re: It's tempting to agree, but --

That's where the problem lies.

I agree that it's quite an oversimplification, whether we are talking about forced sex or even sex generally. I can see that both 'sides' in the Rape is about power! No, Rape is about sex! debate tend to be way too reductionist. Rape is about power, not sex and rape is about sex, not power are both false dichotomies. I can remember a lifestyle dominatrix in Skin Two saying that sex and power share an underlying essence. As long as we don't take the 'essence' part too far and get bogged down in what Robert Anton Wilson might have called Ideal Platonic Horseshit, I think she probably had a point.

And even within the realm of sex appeal there is much more involved than simple physical attractiveness. Insofar as I'm GL, I identify more as Girl-Luster than Girl-Lover. Even so, I find the promise that sex robots will replace real girls to be underwhelming and quite likely to be broken. Let's handwave away all the engineering problems and say that girlbots will be built which outwardly and physically will mimic girls quite convincingly. Yet no matter how superficially attractive they appear, they still wouldn't be living and breathing girls. Indeed, they wouldn't even know they existed or that I existed. I doubt I'd get past that.

Maybe I'm just not autistic enough. But I doubt that for most of us, empathy is just an illusion that can be faked with finality through programmed algorithms and servo-twitches.

That said it would take quite a leap of faith to say that physical attractiveness does not often play at least a substantial role.

Rapes of minors could be more common because (being kept ignorant and powerless in our society) they are easier victims and less likely to report the crime.

There's that, but arguably there are factors at least as strong but pushing in the opposite direction. For example, the social and legal penalties for raping minors are much higher.

Let's also take another look:

Only six percent were older than 29. When a woman gets past her mid twenties, in fact, her probability of being raped drops off like a continental shelf. If you histogram the figures, you get a peak around ages 12-14 which is precisely the age Lolita was at the time of her affair with Humbert Humbert.

Although the histogramic peak is ~12-14, the massive drop-off does not occur with the onset of legal age but rather in the mid-to-late twenties. So non-minors also have a heightened risk of being raped as long as they are still fairly young and fresh.

At the very least, though, the statistics show that young teens are not *un*attractive.

Im not big on hard and fast AoAs but the age ranges highlighted (relatively young, and especially late tweens to early teens) remind me of what I see in my minds eye when I picture the Ultimate Sex Harem.

As Ive said before, I tend to look at Expert Opinion with a skeptical eye and strongly value thinking for myself. I dont suddenly suspend my sense of skepticism when it comes to Experts who make their pronouncements in the name of science. At the same time, I strive to read scientific research and theory with an open mind.

To rapists. Which is probably not an entirely representative sample.

Well, expanding on the above re: empathy, one would never pick this up from watching Oprah but there is research indicating that sadistic serial rapists and killers tend to have empathy. And well-developed, finely-tuned empathy at that. That actually makes sense - there'd be little excitement in 'preying' on something that could feel absolutely nothing at all.

That said, I think the conclusion is probably accurate, if reached through other means.

Ironically though, one would never have to read even a single Evo Psych paper to notice that rape is about power, not sex is an idiotic false dichotomy or observe that rapists will most often pick young and pretty prey when able to do so!

For example, there is strong anthropological evidence that youthfulness and sex appeal are linked from society to society and era to era. The same is not true with regard to (say) big bewbs, but that doesn't keep people from saying pedos are perverted for not buying into breast feti$hism.