This is kind of where I was going with the question I asked about the sense of horror in Lovecraft. Moore is aiming for inducing horror too (ostensibly), and he weaves in sex and sexual assault very commonly in his work; Lovecraft was also going for horror obviously, and he avoids anything sexual. Which is more effective?
For me, Lovecraft is more effective, and it may be due (at least in part) to his avoiding sexual content, and certainly avoiding using sex in his writing as a way to convey “this is horrific/this person is horrific”. I have sometimes felt with Moore that he too easily trades horror for degradation. The idea of “violation” is prevalent is both their work, but with Lovecraft it is not a sexual one, it is a violation of the mind or psyche that cannot be undone or erased.
To refer to a classic example where sex could have easily been used to somehow magnify the horror of the situation, Poe does not go into incest in Fall of the House of Usher (though it is alluded to in cinema treatments), though he very easily could have. The horror in the story (IMO) is more effective without this being a focal point–instead, Roderick’s increasing insanity is the focus, putting the narrator in danger and suggesting that the House itself is evil (a very Lovecraftian thing to do).
At the same time, I know how often people attribute Lovecraft’s avoidance of sexual content to who he was as a person, and I don’t want to reflexively do the reverse to Moore and assign his seeming interest in including rape in his work as some indication of his nature as a person/creator. It’s hard to keep from doing so, though, when it feels at times so unnecessary and almost as though it is being included so as to satisfy what might be an audience’s expectation from his work at this point.
Would Providence still be horrific without the scene @OhBollox referenced? Certainly. By including it, does Moore somehow make the horror more believable because it crosses a cultural boundary? I’m not sure.
