1. People are not addicted to violence, they are addicted to strong emotions - and horror and violence are the easiest way to achieve strong emotions within visual media, so they are the most common.
2. Most games which depict criminal behaviour as entertaining and cool have been criticised, it is only the war violence that gets almost no criticism.
3. Rape is different because it is more common, and so often excused away. It's a crime that is already too common and glamorous to be encouraged or made sexy in any way
We have a rape culture, where it is often excused, underreported, underpunished and often blamed on the victim. This does not happen with other kinds of crime and violence.
You probably interact on a daily basis with women to which it has happened, and who might never have reported it, or have. Either way, they know to hide it because, after all, society has decreed that rape is not the fault of the rapist but of the victim.
In that context making a game out of it *is* a problem. It contributes to the rape culture around.
And I am totally clear that a game is not likely to make someone buy a gun and blow someone up, it would take a lot more than that, but with rape, there's a lot less inhibition to overcome
We live in a legal system where there is a lot excusing rape (in part simply because it is controlled by men, and all men can imagine being accused of rape), a culture a implying men are entitled to sex, a lot even making rape a cool/powerful thing for a man to do in arts of culture, that I think the barrier to overcome to go from thought to action is much lower - and I am not so sure that in these cases the game cannot give that little bit of unihibition that will make a guy go from "hmm, she's a bit too drunk let's play it safe" to "hey, she's a bit drunk, get her another drink, lucky score!!!" - especially in a group
Honestly if I think about myself I would not want to be alone anywhere with someone who gets their kicks off from a game like this - and even if you are a man, think about your daughter, sister, friends - would you be comfortable letting them get a lift home one evening from someone you know likes playing this? or who has spent 6 months creating that game?
and also
The point is “oh my god, this game is going to make rapists think that people are on their side.” Which, of course, too many people actually are already, through their rape apologist jokes and excuses. The premise of the game reinforces the idea of rape as okay and not a big deal. It reinforces the idea that women exist for the sexual pleasure and abuse of men. And the preview of the game Boing Boing, which does not include any actual rapes but only attempted rapes, also ends up reinforcing the dangerous and stereotypical idea of your “real” rape victim who always cries, calls out in distress and overall completely breaks down at actual violence or threats of it.
So yes, partly there is a hypocrisy in our society that is more sensitive to sex than violence - but there is also a hypocrisy around rape that blames the victim far too often... and in that context, the game is just about every kind of wrong
