A character is attacked by a villain in the most painful non-physical way possible: their mind and soul are assaulted with painful, horrifying visions, sensations, and/or memories, and their will and sanity broken until afterward they're powerless, hopeless and numb, but not dead, although they may wish they were. Minimal to no sexual contact actually occurs, but as the name indicates, everything else is there to resemble a rape — the ultimate violation of privacy and consent, extreme humiliation that annihilates all sense of self-esteem, near-absolute helplessness even against your very own mind and body, and the corrupt perversion of what could otherwise be a source of identity and joy.
The physical attacks are just icing on the cake; most of the focus of the agony is inflicted mentally and emotionally, and it's chilling to see a villain be that cruel. The traumatized victim suffers all of the side-effects afterward almost immediately (such as Despair Event Horizon and Rape Leads to Insanity). May include further sexual symbolism for good measure, such as severe and unfunny Clothing Damage and sinister Double Entendres.
Comes in two variations: one is a completely "mundane" but no less horrifying brand of torture that nonetheless breaks a character's mind. The other is the above done via Mind Probe, Psychic Powers, Brown Note, illusions, your worst nightmares, or something Man Was Not Meant to Know that will cause permanent damage to your sanity. Of course, Mind Rape can also involve forced exposure to Mind Screws.
Just as Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil, a character indulging in the Mind Rape of another character primarily for their own pleasure or enjoyment is a good sign they have crossed the Moral Event Horizon. Doubly so if the sexual symbolism is present. A Well-Intentioned Extremist, Anti-Villain, or even the heroes may resort to Mind Rape if circumstances force them to (and will probably regret it with all grief for the rest of their existence), but only the most disgusting lowest of the low get a sick enjoyment out of it.
The less said of the things that are created when this trope meets Rule 34, the better.
Can be a possible cause of I'm Having Soul Pains, and can function as a Stupidity-Inducing Attack. It can also lead to a Mental Shutdown if pushed to its natural conclusion. Heroes will try to protect themselves from these by entering Heroic Safe Mode or trying out some Brain Bleach.
See also Room 101, 2 + Torture = 5, Fate Worse than Death, Gaslighting and Psychological Torment Zone. Contrast with the Care-Bear Stare, which assaults the target with happy thoughts, like rainbows and stuff.
Not to Be Confused with More than Mind Control (though Mind Rape can have some elements of this). Also not to be confused with Mind Screw, although sometimes a Mind Screw might leave the audience feeling this way. And for a literal rape by mind, see Fantastic Arousal.
No Real Life Examples, Please!
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Examples of Psychic Assaults:
- BIONICLE:
- Tren Krom tends to inflict this when he searches someone's mind for information, as it also gives the victim glimpses into Tren Krom's mind. The fact that he tends to assault his victims with his long, red, fleshy appendages while doing this only adds to the disturbing subtext.
- Toa of Psionics are also capable of doing this, and it's implied that they can cause permanent brain damage with their powers.
- The Makuta species has many mental powers, too, and where a Toa of Psionics may stop, they will gladly push further. When Teridax unleashed his full powers on Karzahni's mind, it reduced the latter into a vegetable on two legs. Yet Karzahni was the one most famous for his soul and mind-crushing visions. Makuta evidently like beating others at their own game.
- Speaking of Karzahni, he liked to do this with his Mask of Alternate Futures when he was feeling particularly sadistic, even managing to get one over on Teridax by showing him a vision of a future where he lost and Mata Nui awoke none too pleased. The result was actually enough to get Teridax to scream in horror... until he recovered and decided in a rage to pay Karzahni back with interest.
- Onewa once managed to do this with his Mask of Power, which normally only gives him Mind Control, after he was pushed into Unstoppable Rage when Nokama was dying after saving his life. The narration explicitly describes the act as him focusing the mental energies of the mask into a spear to ram right into his opponent's mind.
- Hakann of the Piraka has this as his special third power in the form of "mental blasts", and he loves using them on his enemies to make them writhe in pain before slipping into unconsciousness. After he temporarily stole half of Brutaka's power, he was capable of frying a person's mind and killing them with it. Of course, once his leader Zaktan showed him the inherent weakness of said power when he dropped a large boulder on him...and Hakann, having been blasting Zaktan with them at the time and acting on instinct when the attack came at him, remembered too late a mental blast doesn't work against an opponent with no mind to blast and gets crushed by it.
- Gali Nuva experienced one after being hit by Dalu's Sensory Overload-inducing weapons. Her sight became so advanced that she actually peered into other universes, all of which she just couldn't take in at once, and eventually broke into a furious craze, attacking her partners and running off into the wilderness. Thankfully, Axonn was there to cleanse her mind with his healing powers.
- Carapar used to be smart, but isn't anymore thanks to years of being repeatedly hypnotized by Takadox.
- In The Mechanisms' concept album "The Bifrost Incident" whatever Odin did to Loki instead of executing her "messed her head up something awful". The effects include Identity Amnesia and intrusive thoughts of her past life.
Flashes like camera bulbs fire in my brainIs this truly me, am I going insane?In faint bloody flashes I watch people dieAnd if that was me, then who am I?
- A creepy, somewhat sexual variant: the PV for "AGITATED SCREAMS OF MAGGOTS" by Dir en grey does this to the protagonist and also the viewer for effect. It is a Mind Screw, which the maggot monster is forcing on the protagonist and then, as the video continues, moving from Mind Rape to attempting physical rape of the protagonist to Mind Rape the viewer.
- Oingo Boingo's "Insanity" has progressively creepier Stalker with a Crush lyrics that lead to this:
I'd love to see inside your mind and tear it all apartTo cut you open with a knife and find your sacred heart
- The Magnus Archives: One of Elias Bouchard’s powers as a Avatar of the Eye is that he can see people’s worst memories and fears and project knowledge into their minds. He demonstrates this in Season Three:
- In “A Matter Of Perspective”, Elias shows Melanie King visions of how her father suffered a Cruel and Unusual Death in Ivy Meadows Care Home when it was attacked by The Corruption.
- In “Stranger and Stranger”, Elias shows Martin Blackwood proof that his mother always hated and resented him for resembling her deadbeat husband.
- Demons in Christianity can inflict devastating mental assaults (see also Demonic Possession). There's also the interpretative depiction of Hell as a place of Mind Rape is an alternative to the rather-cartoonish Fire and Brimstone Hell. Specifically, this Mind Rape effect is reasoned to be self-inflicted and caused by eternal separation from God, resulting to loss of sense of purpose, sanity and even the ability to comprehend love and "everlasting happiness".
- One interpretation popular in the Mormon Church is that when you stand before God you will have total recall of all you have done (except those offenses of which you've repented, i.e. confessed and forsaken) and be acutely aware of how every action you took affected those around you (meaning that, in the end, God won't judge you, you will judge yourself), thus it will be one big Mind Probe of your deepest memories. Which would be a pretty tortuous thing if you made many mistakes in life, thus hell is a self-imposed state of mind brought on by knowing just how much of a terrible person you are.
- Another interpretation is that the true form of God can do this to you, hence why Islam forbids any depiction of God's true form, and why Judaism forbids saying God's true name (which is The Unpronounceable, while "Yahweh" and "Jehovah" are just approximations).
- Numerous beings in Shinto mythology can do this to you. Kitsune, and to a smaller extent, Nekomata , to name a couple examples.
- In Yu-Gi-Oh! East Academy, Gol'gar does this to one of the cultists on Marcus's orders.
- WAAPT has mainly the psychic assault variety, with the result of an unrestrained assault being brain death. Though the "mundane" variant is used from time to time.
- Chaos;Head,
- The final battle goes from Takumi and Norose dueling to Norose using Noah II to assault his mind with images and delusions to try and break his will and shatter his mind. This ranges from him forcing Takumi to believe he's being impaled on a giant spike from underneath for 3 days straight as he sinks into it, to slicing him in half, to making him nearly rape Rimi who he's trying to save, and so on. Takumi manages to eventually turn this around on Norose by creating the delusion that his body isn't organic and can regenerate, which makes him basically invincible.
- Route B of Chaos;Head takes this one step further, Suwa manages to mentally shatter Takumi by making him mentally endure the deaths of every one of the people that died in the New Gen incidents, and the brutality and horrifying pain of the deaths breaks him. Thankfully this is non canon.
- In a similar fashion to Chaos;Head, Chaos;Child has the final battle focus on Takuru being forced to witness the death of his sister Nono repeatedly, and then he's dropped into an abyss where he can't feel or touch anything which slowly drives him insane over the course of what he feels to be a month. It takes him re-creating his imaginary friend Serika in his mind to shake him out of this, and he turns the delusion back around on Sakuma who inadvertently lets him free of the delusion as a result.
- "Psychic" may not be the right term, but in Doki Doki Literature Club! Monika tampers with the other girls' character files so their worst personality traits are amplified, as a form of in-universe Flanderization. This leads to Sayori going from someone who uses a Genki Girl appearance as an attempt to cope with her depression to someone who is full-blown suicidal; Yuri, a Shrinking Violet with odd interests, developing into a Yandere prone to Self-Harm; and Natsuki, the game's resident Tsundere, becoming prone to full-on verbal abuse instead of just being defensive. Eventually, it leads to Sayori committing suicide at the end of Act 1, and Yuri doing the same in Act 2.
- In Sable's Grimoire: Man and Elf, mind destruction magic is a forbidden type of magic which does exactly what its name implies. Sable is secretly studying it for theoretical purposes at the start of the game. He can use a mind destruction spell to kill the Big Bad, but doing so leads to a bad ending.
- Slay the Princess: If you get on the wrong side of the Nightmare, she might decide to take off her mask, leading to the Hero seeing into her innermost thoughts... which leads to a series of horrifying vignettes describing the Princess's state of being imprisoned in an endless cycle of death and rebirth. Even the Narrator is overwhelmed, and the experience leads to a (thankfully unseen) cycle of torture that culminates in "The Moment of Clarity".
- Red vs. Blue Revelation has Tex state that part of Alpha's torture was being placed in scenarios where he was forced to try and fail to save his loved ones, and being forced to watch them die. Repeatedly.
- Further, it was tortured this way by facets of its own personality (Gamma and Omega) on the order of the human it was based on. Which would add that it would believe itself capable of inflicting this sort of agony on others.
- In season 10, it's implied that the third Tex underwent a similar process as the Alpha; when Epsilon finds her, she's as broken as the Alpha was just after his Mind Rape.
- In RWBY there are a lot of different abilities afforded to the characters, one of which and the most prominent (before the introduction of Magic) are Semblances. Among them, some can boost one's strength and then some can mess with the minds of others, whether this is direct or indirect. And in the later volumes, whether psychic or mundane, this happens...a lot.
- Before Emerald Sustrai turned good, or at least decided not to be involved in Remnant's destruction when things were said and done, she did a lot to different characters due to her Semblance, Hallucinations. First, jumpstarting the Fall of Beacon, she used this on Pyrrha Nikos, who at the time wasn't in the best condition due to the fact she might have ended up becoming the next Fall Maiden (or at least a Semi-Maiden), making her believe the adorable Robot Girl, Penny summoned a multitude of swords, causing her to panic and unleash her Semblance, Polarity. Not being aware that Penny herself was a robot, Pyrrha's magnetism ended up violently affecting her and causing her blades' wires to tear her apart, resulting in her first "death".
- Compared to Emerald, who often uses her Semblance for "mischief", Neopolitan real name: Trivia Vanille has used her Semblance, Overactive Imagination to outright torture people, physically and mentally. Lie Ren to a lesser extent, assumes the likeness of Nora Valkyrie to keep him from attacking her. In the Ever After, she uses this to commit the worst Mind Rape in the series thus far, causing Ruby, whom she blamed for Roman's death to encounter her deceased friends and allies until that point. Neo then proceeded to use them to torment and attack the Huntress, who wasn't in the most stable mindset, reminding her of their deaths and placing the blame for them on her, the most recent being Penny, who Ruby failed the save, reaching the point where she made her believe she killed Oscar, pushing her to the point of suicide.
- In the second I'm a Marvel... And I'm a DC story "Happy Hour", The Joker's plan essentially involves using a mind-controlling cyborg to rewrite the memories of all the superheroes to make them Darker and Edgier by putting them under the delusion that everyone they ever loved had been brutally murdered right in front of their eyes. He also uses that android to psychically torment Green Goblin by forcing him to learn the entire Portuguese language... all at once.
- Atop the Fourth Wall: In the story arc "A Story of Magic", Mechakara and Lord Vyce mentally torture Linkara into thinking that he was the father of a girl sacrificed to create his magic gun, and almost drive him to suicide. Fortunately, the girl's spirit convinces him not to go through with it.
- Happens again in "Ghost in the Machine" with NIMUE. At first, it seemed like she was losing her mind because her A.I. Is a Crapshoot, but it turned out her insanity was caused by Lord Vyce forcing her out of Comicron-One's computer. Once she was back in control, she promptly erased Vyce from the system.
- On this page
of the SCP Foundation wiki, Dr. Alto Clef explains that he is Satan, has just gotten God put in a coma, and that Heaven is empty and waiting for his legions to invade. He then reveals that this isn't true. Then that he is a notorious liar, and he could be lying on any or all of these points. Dr. Clef then falls against the table, managing to hit his head nine times.
- There's plenty of SCP artifacts that will do this to anybody unfortunate enough to encounter them. For instance, SCP-1127
is a collection of films which all permanently alter the personalities of the people who watch them; one film will change your sense of humour so you'll find things like autopsy logs, graphic war footage and videos of public suicide hilarious; one makes you a dangerous psychopath who will hurt others out of "curiousity" (people exposed to this one have to be terminated as they pose such a great danger to others); one leaves you with a crippling phobia of practically anything technological or man-made; the worst one is a film which leaves you with all sorts of weird sexual paraphernalia ranging from the relatively benign (voyeurism, klismaphilia) to the dangerously criminal (paedophilia, necrophilia, biastophilia).
- There's plenty of SCP artifacts that will do this to anybody unfortunate enough to encounter them. For instance, SCP-1127
- Given that Mortasheen is a horror take on the standard Mon setting, you could probably guess that this trope pops up a lot. It is most notable in the Devilbirds, most of the Vampires (who have some level of hypnosis to lure their prey to them), and about half the creatures in the Unknown category.
- 1/0: Ghanny is forced to enact Corporal Punishment on Junior despite being a ghost, so Ghanny possesses Junior and gives him a "mind wedgie" that leaves him a gibbering wreck for six hours.
- A possible explanation of whatever this
is in 8-Bit Theater.
- What's truly creepy is that Garland, the seemingly most harmless member of the four, was the only one left standing afterwards, and he only seemed confused, rather than mind raped. Then again, he's had to deal with FOREST IMPS for so long...
- Okay, quick review of a part of Read or Die canon you'll need for context: along with the abilities that person had, an I-Jin also has some special ability. Now. In And Shine Heaven Now, the I-Jin of Reginald Jeeves has the ability to do this to someone by directly altering a person's mind. Which is what he does to Walter to turn him evil (as opposed to the reason in canon).
- Archipelago: Vaniji does this at first in brainwashing people (accompanied by pseudo-soothing words), until he encounters a mind that had experienced so much trauma and despair that it turned it back on him.
- Also when Snow does this to Credenza
.
- Also when Snow does this to Credenza
- In Concession Joel tends to enslave or attempt to kill people by bringing them into the astral plane, where he and his sister's ghost have tentacles that wrap around their victims astral forms and invade orifices. One of the cleaner examples
.
- Failed in Dragon Ball Multiverse. Syd hoped to win against U13 Vegeta by swapping genders with him and hoping the "psychological impact" would leave him with his guard down. His response?
- El Goonish Shive: The "Hope" arc reveals that a decade ago, Pandora rescued a younger Jay from an old enemy of her grandfather Arthur's, who was trying to brainwash her into killing him
with visions of him turning into a monster and repeatedly killing her.
- Shockamancy in Erfworld appears to work by planting horrible images in the victims' minds, if one judges from the names used in this Shockamancy-scroll incantation
.
- At the end of the prequel comic, as part of a deal Jillian goes under a magical procedure to cure an addiction. Part of the deal is that the contractor or healer Charlie or Betsy may tamper with her memories and personality as they see fit, but the latter assures her the former can't do anything without her consent. But it turns out Charlie doesn't really care about anything except removing one very specific part of her personality. Betsy, on the other hand, tears apart Jillian's brain and turns her into a completely different person. Trustworthy, huh?
- Maggie describes what Charlie does to Lilith's mind as obscene. It is apparently so monstrous that even the observing Wanda is paralyzed with horror and she has seen and done a lot. He breaks Lilith's mind piece by piece and converts the pieces into manifestations of himself. He comes to the brink of destroying her mind entirely until Wanda and Maggie intervene. While Wanda is able to restore some of Lilith's mind, much remains lost.
- The Great Minds are the leaders of all Thinkamancers and keep the true power of Thinkamancy a strict secret. When one of their own is excommunicated to Baddie status, they are put under a Geas. If said Baddie violates the Geas's terms, it will grab their reasons for doing so to report to the Great Minds and rip their mind into shreds in the process.
- A hero-on-villain (or at least Jerkass) version in this episode here
of FreakAngels, when Arkady makes Luke experience the memory of her drug overdose.
- Homestuck:
- Feferi's lusus, Gl'bgolyb, is a several cities-sized monstrosity that she has to feed other lusus, or else it would raise its "voice" above a whisper. Doesn't sound too bad? It would result in the death of every troll, starting with the lowbloods on Alternia, the lowbloods off Alternia, and slowly working its way up the hemospectrum until Feferi herself dies. It eventually happens, and Sollux — the third lowest troll on the spectrum — dies a very, very grisly death. He gets better.
- A more classic example occurs late into Act 6, where Aranea uses powers on Jake to invade his mind in order to — allegedly — "help" him realize his potential as a Page of Hope. Jake is shown to find this experience torturous and terrifying.
- Both The Last Days of FOXHOUND and The Cobra Days interpret The Sorrow's ability to make a person "experience the sorrow of those they have killed" as this. Whereas in the game it's fairly straightforward (Snake is confronted with the ghosts of everyone he's killed in the game so far, who shout accusations at him, and he has to struggle past them) the former shows The Sorrow as dragging a person's mind to the other side and letting their victims have their way with them, and the latter shows it as him gripping a person and forcing them to experience the dying feelings of everybody they have killed at once.
- The Sorrow in The Last Days of FOXHOUND only did the former on Mantis, however: Liquid and Octopus were tested in the same way as Snake. Of course, he does run into the snag that the three people he tries it on are a Sociopathic Hero, a Blood Knight with Laser-Guided Amnesia and a Technical Pacifist: Mantis quickly realizes that all the people he's killed is ultimately water under the bridge, Liquid can't remember any of it and just takes all the carnage as a sign of how badass he is, and Octopus' test is completely empty because he's never killed a person in his life.'
Sorrow: This test clearly does not work anymore. - In The Life of Nob T. Mouse, it is heavily implied that Grandfather Time did this to Frederick, which is why he is now a total nutcase, and causes Frederick's Punctuated! For! Emphasis! moment on their second meeting
.
- Outsider: Shortly after awakening aboard the Loroi ship, Stillstorm has Fireblade and two other Unsheathed forcefully mind-probe Jardin for information when he doesn't answer questions to her satisfaction. Fortunately, a combination of him blacking out and the apparent unique human trait of telepathic immunity spare him from anything nasty, although he finds the experience itself to be torturous and eventually blacks out.
- In Roommates the Shadow Child's main weapons are "I'm Not Afraid of You" declarations and “The Reason You Suck” Speech, which cause the target to relive his darkest memories about despair, hopelessness, etc.. The kid is an Anthropomorphic Personification of Disbelief, who weaponizes his very nature and is terrifying. You know what's the worst? He never goes away.
- In Sarilho, the Lusitanians are known to have psychic abilities they use in a number of different situations... Which include complementing physical torture and alienating their enemies in battle by piercing them with suicidal thoughts.
- Sluggy Freelance:
- The "Wayang Kulit" arc combines this with a Vision Quest, forcing Torg to kill all the women he's ever loved (or who have ever loved him) and gradually transform into a demon. It all ends up for the best, teaching him not to blame himself so much, but it's done in the most sadistic way possible.
- Unholy Blood: The ability to violate the mind is the special ability of the vampire Sahan. Sahan torments his victims using visions of figures personal to them to mess with them psychologically.
- unOrdinary: One of the authority figures runs a “school” in which he “rehabilitates” students acting out of line by using his ability to make people relive their worst memories. John has been subjected to this in the past after obliterating half his class in a fight, and his experience in those classes were apparently scarring enough to make him turn his life around completely. It’s implied that he suffers from PTSD as a result of those incredibly traumatic months.
- Unsounded: Efheby venom tears apart the human mind and sorts through their memories allowing the efheby to consume them. Ruck has learned how to weaponize it to try and learn the secrets of the Aldish dammakhert at the behest of Queen Sonorie. Poor Roger Foi-Hellick.
- Zebra Girl: Jack is the subject of one when he is hit by the bullet goblin. The insect is feeding on his fluids and magic, and we have a chilling representation of it attacking Jack's inner psyche.
"Mundane" Torture
- "MK Ultra" by Muse, with a title inspired by a US torture and mind-control program Project MKUltra at
The Other Wiki, is about Mind Rape:
How much deception can you takeHow many lies will you createHow much longer till you breakYour mind's about to fall
- In The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1978), Zaphod Beeblebrox is abducted and forced into the Total Perspective Vortex. As the guide notes, this is a fiendish torture device designed to strip away every shred of illusion and reveal to the individual exactly how small and insignificant and inconsequential they are to the Universe as a whole. The shock normally annhilates the brain. But the infinite majesty and grandeur of the Universe is outclassed when confronted with an ego the size of that possessed by Zaphod Beeblebrox. it simply cannot compete.
- Dino Attack RPG:
- A more mundane example without use of supernatural abilities or brainwashing: Dust plays with Lutsky's mind to such a degree that he turns him into a paranoid psychopath. Eventually, that comes back to bite him.
- This is more or less what Loop did to Katerina Schattenberg just before he died.
- Danganronpa
- Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair has Junko doing this to the entire cast of the game in the real world (the game primarily takes place inside a simulation of the character's lives before she did this.) She transforms them from generally decent and friendly high schoolers to self-mutilating sadists with no intentions in life except to cause as much pain and despair as possible. The Ultimate Despairs are barely seen onscreen, but what we do see and know about them is rather unnerving.
- Chapter 6 Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony has Tsumugi, Monokuma, and the entire audience verbally abusing Shuichi, Maki, and Himiko, after they reveal that the game is an actual reality show based off the now in-universe Danganronpa franchise, and currently in its 53rd season (or 50th, since it had to have started with Danganronpa 4 at the earliest). The cast (barring Keebo) were given fake memories to disguise this fact, and once they discover the truth, their reactions were so disturbing and traumatizing.
- In Tsukihime, after the extremely violent awakening of Tohno SHIKI's (the real one) demon blood, he is "taken care of" by Synchronizer Kohaku. Meaning, in his insane state, he rapes her for the life energy that will help calm the demon blood. Kohaku responds by using drugs, lies, and turning him against his father to make him her puppet who has absolute zero chance of ever recovering from his insanity and demonic blood. In Hisui's True End, this all finishes with Kohaku manipulating SHIKI into killing his sister, and having the fake Tohno Shiki (he's adopted) finish off the heavily wounded, thoroughly broken, and completely insane SHIKI, ending the Tohno line completely.
- This is basically how the story of Broken Saints treats Shandala. She suffers one horrible thing after another in her life, eventually resulting in becoming an empathic weapon designed to do this to millions of people across the world, employed by the Big Bad in his plan to all but restart human civilization.
- The Curious Cat in RWBY, who grew insane from being abandoned by his creators attempted to leave for Remnant to discover the reason. To accomplish this, he set his sights on Ruby Rose, who he knew was reaching her emotional breaking point from her failures, then sought to "assist" their group. But, in actuality, the Curious Cat planned on further breaking her and pushing her to an emotional breakdown so that he could possess her and leave to their homeland using the Huntress as the vessel.
- In Endstone, Cole does this to get the knowledge from Lord Quandal
, turning him into a vegetable. To cap it all — he doesn't know.
- Left POOR Dead: Tippy after invoking the mushrooms. He seems to enjoy it though.

