Love, Lust and Rape

What is love? Is it mere lust for someone or is it something altogether different? Can you rape someone you love? These are the questions I want to ponder over in this piece and I would like my readers to give their views on this topic. The third question might seem a little odd to people but let me tackle the first two and then I will give the context on which my third question is based.

I believe that love is much more than lust. For me it is not a physical longing for anyone. In fact it is platonic and does not encompass lust at all. I don’t think that both, love and lust can co-exist. Many have claimed to have experienced the feeling of love. Alas, it is a mere illusion for most of them! For what most of these people have experienced is not love but lust or infatuation.

I have heard of the phrase ‘love at first sight’ and have often wondered as to how can can someone fall in love with someone just by looking at them. It’s a fantastical phrase and sounds good only in movies. All those who claim to have experienced the above phenomena have just put up a façade to cover lust. One can fall in love and experience physical attraction towards the other and vice versa but the two are not substitutes. Thus, love is not lust.

Before I come to the third question, read this small story. David is a young street punk and is head over heels in love with Deborah. He secretly watches her while she practices dance. Deborah has high ambitions and wants to become an actor. She too likes David and knows that he watches her while she practices but doesn’t say anything to him. Things take a wrong turn for David and he is impirsoned. He comes out of jail after a decade and meets Deborah who is on her way to success. He joins his old friends and becomes a gangster. One day he takes Deborah out for a lavish dinner. During their conversation she tells him that she has higher plans for her career and David wouldn’t allow her to pursue them. He nods in acknowledgement and realises the fact that Deborah wouldn’t accept him as her life partner in spite of the fact that she loves him. While on their way back he rapes her in the car!

This story is from a movie called ‘Once Upon a Time in America’. I was horrified when I saw David raping Deborah. My heart cried when I saw it. I have since been asking myself the question ‘Was David ever in love with Deborah?’ I can’t believe that anyone who is in love with someone can go to the extent of raping her! People who might have seen the movie will agree with me that the events before and after the rape point in the direction that David was in love with Deborah. Yet he couldn’t control his lust and went on to do the heinous act described above! I can’t ever imagine myself doing what David did in spite of the fact that I know that the love of my love will never be reciprocated…