Consent: Changing the Conversation

Rape and sexual assault can happen to anyone regardless of gender identity or gender presentation. Likewise, issues of consent can apply to anyone. One of the things that I struggled with as I was writing this is the very binary way in which everything I read and watched during my research fell into an either/or pattern, which positioned men as perpetrators and women as victims. I have tried to avoid doing this unless referring to specific research or programs that rely on those gender divisions. -Erika

What is Consent?

I’ve been thinking about consent and bodily autonomy for a long time. Since my own childhood, actually. One of the things I most respect about my mother is the way she handled my younger brother’s refusal to kiss my grandmother when he was about five years old. The refusal of affection hurt my grandmother, even though she knew my brother loved her. But instead of forcing the issue, my mother actually worked to figure out what the problem was and when she did find out, it was easy to solve it. He couldn’t stand the texture of her lipstick and so she would simply remove it before kissing him. It was such a simple thing. Using words to figure out what was going on, rather than taking away my brother’s bodily autonomy and forcing him to accept a gesture of affection from our grandmother. 

It must have been really difficult for my mom to stand up to her own mom that way. Accepting a kiss from your grandmother when it makes you uncomfortable is not a huge violation of personal space. But, especially at that age, it’s a lesson. It’s a lesson that when someone else wants to do something and you don’t, you have to accommodate them. What my mom taught my brother that day was that his comfort, his personal boundaries… they matter. And I witnessed the whole thing. So she taught me that my personal boundaries mattered, too.

Consent (or Lack thereof) and the ’90s

Fast forward to about eight years later, around the time I was getting ready to go to college. Consent became a hot topic in the early nineties. It was a time in between Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas and Monica Lewinsky/Bill Clinton. People started talking about what it meant to give consent. In 1991, Antioch College created a pioneering Sexual Asssault Prevention Policy focused on affirmative consent. All that meant was that if two people were engaged in a sexual act, both parties had to consent to participate in that specific act. And both parties had to make their consent clearly  known, usually through words. And the college became the butt of joke after joke. 

I was in my late teens when Antioch’s movement happened. By then I had firmly established my identity as a feminist. I’d also begun taking campus tours at different colleges. I was familiar with the Blue Light System on college campuses. And at that point, my own adolescence had its share of attention from creepy older guys. It also had its share of awkward experimentation. Times when I’d said “yes” and times when I’d said “no.” I was angry, and frustrated and confused at the way people were responding to these affirmative consent policies. 

People suggested it would remove romance from sex. They talked about how it would make sex transactional (because it isn’t already?) These things weren’t a joke to me. They made sense to me. Affirmative consent might not sound as sexy when you explained it, but it would take a lot of the anxiety and confusion out of situations, and would make everyone safer. 

The Lewinsky Scandal… or Rather the Clinton Scandal

In 1998, I watched, along with everyone else as Bill Clinton led us through a debate about the meaning of the word “is,” and told us, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms Lewinsky.” I watched the story unfold over months. Watched the media tear down Monica Lewinsky again and again for the way she looked. (Luscious, curvy, and like a thousand and one other Jewish women I knew.) I watched the media eviscerate her. They attacked her appearance. They blamed her for the actions of a powerful, older man. It was all about what she did to entice him, and not about how he took advantage of his power over her. 

I was fascinated by her. Some of her defenders made her out to be weak and helpless. Some tried to paint her as an object worthy of our pity. The poor girl who had been manipulated by the bad, bad man. I saw in her a woman who understood that her sexuality had power and who wanted to own that power… Only to have someone more powerful and more experienced manipulate and misuse that desire for his own thrills.

Pity, Anger, Understanding…

I didn’t pity her. I was angry. Angry that she had been abused by both a person in power and by the systems that supported that power. By a culture that held her responsible for the actions of someone else, by a system that was aimed at propping up those structures of power and by the media who couldn’t seem to figure out how to be anything but cruel or make a joke out of a young woman who had the audacity to want to control her own sexuality and who might actually like sex while simultaneously condemning a president who had used and manipulated people and situations so that he coud get what he wanted. 

What it was Like for Us to Grow Up Amidst all of that.

Reading and thinking about Monica Lewinsky as I began writing this brought up a lot of strong feelings and intense memories for me. I called my friend K. to talk about that. K. is just about the same age as I am and has a child the same age as my youngest. We talked for a long time, recalling what it had been like to be a college-aged feminist in the 90s. It was a time when there was an explosion of Girl Power in popular music–Alanis Morrisette’s first album, Jagged Little Pill came out in the summer of 1995, and it seemed that the voices of young women were taking a tremendous leap forward. The world was changing. Widening access to the internet meant we were able to connect in new ways. We were suddenly finding our power. And that included access to our own sexuality.

K. and I were living in different parts of the country at that time. She was in the midwest, I was shuttling back and forth between Washington DC and New York. But we both recalled similar feelings. We felt badly for Monica Lewinsky. That she’d been caught up in the powerful White House culture and was still taken advantage of by a man in power, and then she was fucked over by a work-friend who she thought it was safe to confide in. 

I said to K. that I remembered someone calling her “Monica Blew-Clinski.” And who can forget the cigar jokes? Or the navy blue dress jokes? We talked about the air of power and confidence she gave off. How we could absolutely see how she had been a victim, but that she didn’t have the same meekness or passivity that the word “victim” implies. 

Binders full of Women

We didn’t stop with Monica Lewinsky. Then we talked about Mitt Romney and his “binders full of women,” and some other things that were said during the 2012 election season. I mentioned Todd Aiken and his remark about “legitimate rape,”and how the body could “shut those things down,” to prevent pregnancy resulting from rape. Todd Aiken was only one of many that season. Some other stellar moments we talked about from 2012’s election cycle: 

-Pennsylvania’s Tom Smith telling us that pregnancy from rape and pregnancy out of wedlock are comparable.

Indiana’s Richard Mourdock calling pregnancy resulting from rape something that God intended to happen.

-Wisconsin’s Roger Rivard talking about how his father told him “Some girls rape easy” and trying to explain it away saying that it might be consensual the night before but morning after regrets change it to rape.

-Washington’s John Koster commenting on rape, pregnancy and abortion and saying, “Incest is so rare, I mean, it’s so rare … But the rape thing—you know, I know a woman who was raped and kept the child, gave it up for adoption, and she doesn’t regret it.“

Legitimate rape. 

The rape thing

Intended to happen. 

Brock Turner, Brett Kavanaugh…

That was ten years ago. Before we knew the name Brock Turner. (And as angry that case made people, how many of us remember the name Chanel Miller?) It was also before most people had any thoughts about Brett Kavanaugh being nominated to the Supreme Court. Or about Christine Blasey Ford would tell us what a danger he is. Or about how the FBI mishandled some of the more than 4,500 tips about his behavior. Before #MeToo.

It’s now 2022. Ten years since we heard about binders full of women, heard about “legitimate rape” and how “some girls rape easy.” Am I naïve for thinking things should be different? Well, in 2022 Robert “RJ” Regan told us that he tells his three daughters: “If rape is inevitable, you should just lie back and enjoy it.”

Lie back and enjoy it. Advice given by a father to his own daughters. (For the record, two of his daughters have been speaking up since 2020 to encourage people to vote against him.)

Legitimate rape.

Intended to happen.
If rape is inevitable. 

Inevitable.

Inevitable?

I don’t typically describe the specific details of my own sexual assault. Even when I write about it. While morbid curiosity prompts some people to ask (and probably a few more want to know and are polite enough to not ask,) the specifics are rarely relevant to the conversation. But that word, “inevitable” has me on edge. 

Was it “inevitable” when it happened to me? When the fight I was putting up switched from trying to stop him from raping me to making sure that I made it through the night? That moment was an explosion. In spite of the room being dark, for just one moment, it seemed as though everything was lit up brightly. I can see what his face looked like in front of me in that moment, remember how I felt, taste the fear in my mouth. As I sit and write this, my heart is racing, I can feel my breathing speed up, feel tears coming up in my eyes. I want to stop what I’m doing and reach out for a friendly, calming voice. But it’s the middle of the night and I need to finish putting these thoughts into writing. 

There was nothing inevitable about what happened to me. It was a choice… His choice. He could have made the choice to stop at any time. Each and every time I said “no,” or “stop.” Each and every time I tried to push him away. When I scratched and fought and cried. He chose to keep going.

Conversations about Rape and Consent

And that’s just it. Our conversations about rape are framed around “rape is something that happens to people,” and not focused on “What does it actually mean to commit an act of sexual violence or sexual assault.” Not on “don’t rape people.” We talk about in a way that’s antithetical to the active, affirmative, enthusiastic consent that should be a part of intimacy with another person. “I was raped” vs. “Someone raped me,” It happened to me vs. someone did it, and I was the person they did it to. 

The conversations matter. 

Reframing the Conversations to be about Agency and Consent

That’s the thing about talking about sexual violence the way we do–talking about the perpetrators not the victims, not the survivors. Softening the language to make it comfortable for other people. The reaction I get when I talk about what happened to me is different when I replace the phrase “sexual assault” with “rape.” That replacement, that one tiny world takes away the shadows and forces people to confront the experience with me. Softening our language is like pixelating genitalia on our TV screens. We know what’s under there, but we don’t have to see it or think about it. We can imply that it’s there without actually seeing it. 

As a survivor, I’m allowed to talk about what happened. But I’m supposed to keep it comfortable enough so that other people only feel a little bit uncomfortable. Because whoever I’m talking to needs to be able to distance themselves from it. As if it couldn’t happen to them just as easily as it happened to me. As if I deserved it and the person I’m talking to doesn’t. Or as if anyone deserves it. . The result is that we acknowledge that someone committed an act of sexual violence… Without actually bringing up the scope of what that really means.

For years there have been programs and efforts to teach women how to respond clearly, firmly and in a boundary-setting or -enforcing way when we’re receiving unwanted attention. But what have we done to talk about or teach ways to handle that rejection in respectful, boundary-honoring ways? What are we doing to teach ways to maintain self-respect, self-esteem when you’re on the receiving end of rejection? 

In Movies, Consent is an Inconvenience

It doesn’t help that we romanticize threatening behaviors. The cue cards in Love, Actually? (Also, Keira Knightly was seventeen when that scene was shot, but that’s a different story.) Lloyd Dobbler and his boombox in Say Anything? The idea that, when your crush rejects you, their “no” isn’t sufficient. It’s not a real “no.” You have to keep going, again and again, until your crush just gives in. That’s not sexy. That’s predatory. And dangerous. And scary. 

Once more, with feeling: Submission is not consent. 

Study after study confirms that words matter. And words even suggest a way forward.

Teaching Enthusiastic Consent for All Aspects of a Relationship

For instance, studies of college men have taught us that, for most people, the word “rape” fits a very specific definition, involving penetration, and involving harm to the victim. We know that’s not the entire scope of rape. Nor of sexual assault. These same studies tell us that college-aged men don’t enter situations intending to commit acts of sexual violence or rape. But that they don’t necessarily understand consent in matters other than forced penetration. Teaching the need to obtain the exact same enthusiastic consent for all activities is essential. 

We’re afraid of that step. It takes the romance away. It takes the spontaneity away. I think we heard those same arguments about condom use in the early days of the AIDS epidemic, too. People got over it then and there. They’ll do that here and now. 

“But that will Make Sex Feel like a Transaction”

It makes sex transactional? Okay. Fine. Like it or not, negotiating the early stages of an intimate relationship with someone often feels a little bit transactional. And a one-night stand is twice as transactional. 

As you learn about limits, boundaries, preferences and dislikes. As people get to know each other, they’ll be aware of things like a person’s non-verbal cues. So they’ll know when to ask and when it’s an absolutely terrible idea to ask. When, instead of asking for sex, the moment calls for you to bring your partners a brand new pair of super fluffy socks and a pint of Ben and Jerry’s Cherry Garcia. And they’ll also learn when it’s ok to just start kissing and tearing off each other’s clothes without a word exchanged in either direction. 

The sexual relationship won’t always be about negotiation. At least, it won’t always be a verbal one. But because you’ve gone step by step through consent together you have now developed trust and developed communication skills that are important to a healthy relationship both in and out of the bedroom. 

Avoiding Conversations about Consent

Avoiding these conversations doesn’t make them go away. Exactly the opposite. Not calling it “rape” doesn’t change the impact it has on survivors. It doesn’t make it less violent or less traumatic. The people being protected by our fear of honest conversations about sex and consent are the rapists, not the potential victims, not the survivors. Our silence doesn’t prevent assault or violence. Our silence promotes more silence. It keeps victims and survivors from speaking up, it keeps intimate partners from open conversations and it shuts down opportunities to learn–to work towards changing the way people learn to talk to each other about sex and consent and other difficult topics. 

Starting these conversations might be the most difficult part. That doesn’t mean it’s okay not to do it. And it’s okay if that conversation is weird or awkward or uncomfortable. Acknowledge that as part of the discussion but don’t let it keep you from talking. 

My Journey towards these Conversations

I’ve had more conversations than I can count about my experience as a survivor. It’s been a long journey–nearly 30 years to get where I am. In the last year and half though, I came to understand that the only way I could move forward with my own healing was to change the conversation. For me, that meant that it was important to stop softening the edges and focusing on making other people less uncomfortable when I talked about my experience with acquaintance rape or date rape. My attacker was known to me–someone I considered a friend, someone I trusted.

When I talked about being sexually assaulted, it left a lot of room for people to imagine a much gentler and less violent experience. They didn’t have to think about what really happened. And so I’ve been working to transition my language. To use the word “rape” to talk about what happened to me.

Changing the conversation is powerful. When we move the conversation away from “it happens to someone” and focus on “a perpetrator does it to a victim,” we put the responsibility for not assaulting someone onto the person who should be responsible for that choice. It’s a small step from using passive language to imagining that the rape was, in some sense, passive. That it was inevitable. That the victim lay back and enjoyed it. Changing the language means acknowledging that we survivors often emerge with someone else’s blood under our fingernails. So changing the language means giving control and agency back to the perpetrators and the survivors alike.

Sources

See this page for sources.

Part of a series on rape and sexual assault-to read more, follow the links below:

Part 1: I’m Going to use The R Word (& it’s okay if you do, too.)
Part 3:“Rape” is Just a Four Letter Word
Part 4: The Nice Guy Fallacy
Part 5: Rape Reporting Requirements are Dangerous