A lot of sex happens in gray areas. That is, sex happens without the safety of a solid “yes.” Consent is a lot easier to determine when one partner asks directly for permission — and though that should always be encouraged, in reality it does not always occur. As a result, it is important to supplement movements encouraging men to ask for explicit consent with efforts to encourage women to actively say no when they are uncomfortable.
Sex education about consent focuses on two messages: asking for consent and teaching that no means no. People are increasingly receptive to both messages, but the second has in general gained more traction. But without the dual influence of asking for consent, “no means no” has also changed how people interact with their partners. Men who would immediately stop if asked might take silence as a yes or use hesitancy as an opportunity to convince.
One method for avoiding this problem is for men to ask for consent. But if that doesn’t happen, silence and hesitancy can be dangerous. Sometimes the male figure in this situation might know that he is doing something wrong, but in a few of these cases, he might not even have a full recognition of the consequences of his actions. That alone is dangerous because it allows for repetition. Sex becomes more common and more expected, and though most girls know that they can say no, not all of them actually do when they might want to. This again only makes the problem more persistent. On college campuses especially, this is one of the most common scenarios for rape: a man violating a woman due to silence.
There are two leading theories on the cause of rape: predator theory and rape culture theory. Rape culture theory indicates that rape is so normalized in our society that even a man who would never identify as a rapist has those desires and can’t tell when rape is wrong. Predator theory identifies rapists as a small subset of our culture and says that most rapes are committed by a small number of serial rapists who target acquaintances and people that they know.
Both theories explain why the myth of the hooded rapist hiding behind a tree and leaping out from the darkness is not real — either everyone you know is a potential rapist, or you have the potential to know one of the rare rapists. Either way, rapists are the kind of people you know in real life, who sit next to you in class and in the library. That familiarity makes it all too easy to give in to pressure. Just the act of knowing someone can make something you would otherwise not desire feel like a friendly obligation or feel safe when it is not. It’s this pressure that can contribute to the reluctance to just say no.
Whether we like it or not, sex is often emotional, and it is all too easy to get hurt by staying silent. Part of the solution is to promote a culture where silence is not consent, where sexual action of any kind requires an explicit yes. The other half of the solution, though, is a safety net — a simultaneous narrative where we empower women and tell them not just that saying no means something, but that it is okay to say it.
While men should always ask for consent, they do not always do so. This sort of education should continue, but nuance is needed. The more we rely solely on men to guarantee our sexual safety, the more the narrative of female victimization is going to become ineffective. It is a call for men to protect us, to catch us when we faint and always ask if we are okay. When conversations about sexual violence are always framed around females as victims, they cast women as helpless figures in a world full of predators. In reality, a message of female strength could supplement that of male responsibility and help teach women that they have not just a right but a responsibility to stand up and insist — for whatever reason — on what they do or do not want.
There’s an influx of feel-good messages out there for young girls talking about individuality and self-advocacy. The core of any of these is the ability for girls to speak up and ask for what they want — Sheryl Sandberg-style. This is not just a lesson for business meetings.
Unfortunately, the other part of Sandberg’s message is that saying no can be difficult. And even teaching women to say it — difficult as that in itself would be — is not a complete solution. Many cases of abuse occur after a women has refused sex, or while she is under conditions that would make refusal impossible. Not all sexual abuse occurs heterosexually, and even when it does, the male figure is not always the perpetrator. These are just some of the significant variations that can occur. In these cases, teaching women to say no might not even be a helpful suggestion, much less a solution. The other problem with this argument is that it focuses on the victims, not the perpetrators. Education for men is extremely important, and it is crucial to remember that it is never the victim’s fault and that silence is not consent, even if it can be misinterpreted. Nevertheless, this philosophy is a precaution, an attempt — maybe in vain — to deal with the unfortunate realities of the status quo.
So I say this to women who may find themselves approaching that situation: Say no. And if necessary, say it again. The only guarantee is self-advocacy. I wish I could say that doing so were easy, but I cannot. I wish I could say that if all women said no when they were not sure, it would solve the problem of rape. But this is a step in the right direction, not a solution. Men will not always listen, and saying no is not even always an option. But the idea that sex should be expected or required is symptomatic of a culture of silence, and reemphasizing a responsibility for women to advocate individually for themselves — at least while we wait for men to catch up to standards of decency — is always good policy.
Lauren Sukin ’16 is a literary arts and political science concentrator.
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