The #metoo campaign has brought back into the public discourse issues around consent—what it is and what it’s not.
I am a psychotherapist, working a great deal with the aftermath of trauma of all sorts.
Today, in the era of social media, I have heard dozens of stories where young women fear that their refusal of unwanted sexual advances will be misrepresented. Social media erodes our boundaries. Countless others always seem to be watching, potentially sharing and distorting one’s story.
I also see my own clients’ agonizing over what might be their own culpability or contribution in their experience of abuse.
I want to share some of my reflections with you here.
In the early to mid-1980s, while working in an acute psychiatric admissions unit, I argued with colleagues that adult incest survivors were not ‘just’ schizophrenic/delusional or psychotic—as they were routinely diagnosed. I pushed to have their experience recognized for what it was — PTSD — which shifted their suffering from being something wrong with them, to an acknowledgement that it was a reaction to something appalling that had been done to them.
In my time working with sexual assault, be that child or adult targets, the issue of ‘consent’ has always been central. I have sat in courtrooms and heard comments about how my client, a child or young person, ‘invited’ or ‘collaborated’ in their abuse. I have sat with adult rape victims in courtrooms where the rapist claimed ‘consent’ was given — despite toxicology reports showing the target had been given Rohypnol (the ‘date rape drug’) or when she had been physically assaulted and threatened.
To this day, I hear about many situations where a ‘yes’ is given, or assumed, and later I hear a whole lot of pain and distress suggesting that the ‘yes’ was not really that at all.
Let’s start with a few basics. Consent means the choice to say ‘yes’ to something. A meaningful YES requires the capacity to choose to say NO and to have that NO heard and respected.
For ‘yes’ to mean anything, a few preconditions apply.
- The person saying ‘yes’ has to be able to conceive of the possibility of saying ‘no’ first—that things could be stopped. It may not occur to a child being groomed into a sexual abuse situation, a woman whose drink has been spiked, or a person who has been brought up in a cult that they can say no.
- If the person knows that saying ‘no’ is an option, they then need to be able to make that choice. While a young women coerced into entering into a child marriage, for instance, may know that other young women elsewhere do not have to endure this, she might not be able to say ‘no’ on her own behalf.
- In the domain of intimate and social relationships, targets of unwanted requests/demands need to be confident that their refusal will not damage that relationship. If ‘no’ comes with a threat of the withdrawal of love, of support, of freedom, then the price may be too steep.
- Once the person knows that choosing to say ‘no’ is an option and knows that they have a right to say ‘no’, then they need to be able to act on that knowledge. Saying ‘no’ is a skill that needs to be learned. They may still be unable to do so. Perhaps they’ve never seen it in a context they understand; they’ve never done it or have been conditioned into living a life where they never say it; or they’ve experienced or witnessed negative consequences befalling anyone who has said ‘no’.
- If the person says ‘no’, they need to be confident that they will be safe, and/or that whomever or whatever they hold dear will be safe too. The person saying ‘no’ needs to be able to know they can safely walk away, particularly if there is a threat of violence or harm to one’s interests or others. Many perpetrators of sexual violence and other exploitation leverage their targets’ fears for their own safety, and others they care for, or they withhold access to resources. Harvey Weinstein’s actions of threatening women’s career chances is a case in point: do what I want or say goodbye to your career.
- Once the person says ‘no’, they need to have the power and means to enforce that boundary, and be able to hold that boundary when others around them pressure them, insisting they agree.
- This condition requires both institutional and personal power — strength, resilience and determination in the face of potential increasing risk. This capacity to back oneself up requires courage and if it is not supported by society (e.g. where women’s right to self-determination is severely restricted or absent), or where a person’s resistance has been eroded in the past, the pressure to conform may increase.
- If the person saying ‘no’ is dependent on others to live, they need to be able to support themselves if that support is withheld as a consequence of their stand. In many cultures, the threat of ostracism is enough to curb many peoples’ efforts to say ‘no’.
When I look at the list above, I am struck by how dangerous, complex and difficult saying ‘no’ is.
The level of personal power required of a woman choosing to say ‘no’ and holding to her position in the face of pressure is significant. Many women who are targets of unwanted sexual advances have never possessed that kind of personal power. Combined with their lack of institutional power (Weinstein again), their lack of equality will have an enormous impact on their ability to exert their will.
We need to be respectful that saying no is not just a case of ‘just say no’—it is precisely because it’s not straightforward that so many women say ‘yes.’ For me, this requires that whomever is doing the asking (if male) must do as many of the following as possible:
- Actively acknowledge the imbalance of power and to commit to not exploiting an unequal power balance.
- Openly commit to wanting both parties to make good choices.
- Remind the other person that they can say ‘no’ and they will be safe, heard and respected.
- Remind the other person that it will not damage the relationship or their access to resources.
- Actively track for, name, and be willing to listen to any possible signal of anything less than enthusiastic consent.
- Finally, if all else fails, to apply the motto: If it’s not a clear YES, it’s a NO and you need to walk away.
Start with making room for ‘no’ and then see if the Other wants something else. When the Other knows they can freely walk away, we can be sure that they are choosing us for who we are and what we offer them.
Only then can we talk about and enjoy ‘enthusiastic consent.’
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Photo: Getty Images
