Critiquing the “consent-positive” movement
I see the word “consent” everywhere. There is The Consensual Project, which I believe was started by a man. Then there’s Keep It Consensual, which sees all sex, including “sex-as-work” to be valid, as long as there is…(hold on, I know I’m keeping you in suspense!)….consent. There are the constant t-shirts, “consent is sexy,” seen at anti-rape protests. And liberals, and radicals bombard their websites with the message that we should not judge the activities of “consenting” adults.
I just wonder how many people have stopped to think about what all this consent-talk means. It is mostly women sporting shirts such as the ones pictured below:
This shirt clearly gives the message that the woman wearing it is not taking the initiative to ASK for sexual relations, but instead has the obligation to “consent.” Thus, even in the ideal heterosexual relationship, women are not the ones taking initiative. If you still aren’t convinced that the “consent” message as framed today, is meant to impress men, take a look at the much more popular shirt below and tell me otherwise:
The way the consent message is framed is totally in-line with so-called “funfeminism.” In reality, consent is something people lower in the hierarchy give to people higher in the hierarchy all the time. For example, we may “consent” to the TSA screening system at the airports in Amerika, but that’s only because if we don’t go through them (or “consent” to be patted down by a stranger), we will not be able to fly.
Think about other times you have to give your consent. Just by being born in a specific location at a certain time, you are “consenting” to a specific legal system….one you did not create, and that may not have been created by anyone who resembled you in terms of sex, race, and/or ethnicity.
If you use a credit card or bank, you’re given an extreme amount of fine print to read over, saying you consent to this, that, and the other thing, AND that we may change the rules at any time. Did you know that? Sounds pretty sexy, yes?
The people who having their homes taken out from under them because of an inability to pay, “consented,” to pay a certain amount over a specific period. yet, I don’t hear too many progressives faulting them for “consenting” to payment and not being able to follow through with it. Guess consent isn’t so sexy when the ones being fucked over are men.
One of my favorite examples of how silly the concept of “consent” is, can be demonstrated by the stories of some people in the hospital with mental illness. According to one show on Madness Radio, a sufferer was in the psychiatric ward and could not recall how he got there. When he asked his doctor if he was there as a voluntary patient, the doctor said, “Yes, you are. But if you try to sign yourself out, you will be an involuntary patient.
So, why are women expected to bear the burden of “consent” when in so many other cases, we can see the unfairness of the social hierarchy under which we live? Perhaps this is because in third-wave discourses, male supremacy is hidden as the context under which all relationships between women and men take place. Instead of fighting for the end to women’s subordination, third-wavers are acting as though consent already takes place under conditions of equality. It doesn’t.
In general, women make less money than men for work of equal value. This is a well-known fact among even those with basic feminist knowledge. Money is just one form of coercion that women are likely to experience in a male-supremacist society. This is why feminists have offered critiques of surrogate motherhood and egg donations
The same goes for women in pornography. Supposedly, working in the porn industry is just like any other job; that it may pay more at first for women, or be easier for women without specific educational backgrounds to get into, is seldom mentioned by those promoting “sex work” as the same as just like any other form of employment. One problem lies in the fact that women can never revoke their consent to what was done to them while in a place of vulnerability. Instead, their photos and videos remain masturbatory aids for any man who finds them; as was recounted at a recent seminar I attended, one mentally stable, exited woman said she would be willing to live just one more year if every pornographic picture was removed from circulation. The concept of “consent” between two or more adults of age just doesn’t fit here. And if it doesn’t fit with the reality of women’s lives, it’s not feminist.
Like this:
Posted on August 15, 2011, in choice, consent, does consent have meaning?, exploitation and tagged Baby M, consent is sexy, heterosexual relationships, slutwalk. Bookmark the permalink. 13 Comments.
LOL! I did not ask to be born, people. “At your expense, I exist!” !!11!
Thanks to PIV-havers, I’m here now, trapped in this bullshit American legal system designed to serve male persons. Great.
I have never heard of this “movement” before but I am not surprised to hear of it. It’s so mind-boggling how so many people view “choice” to be a free thing, something that exists in an egalitarian, hierarchy-free society. I mean, i get the message – but the whole message sounds like women just “consent” they don’t, like you said, initiate the situation.
I don’t know that it’s a movement in itself, but “consent is sexy” is the basic idea behind <a href="Yes Means Yes
“>Yes Means Yes. And at major third-wave conferences, shirts like “Feminists are hot and bothered,” are worn, again to give the impression that feminism is a fetish, or at the very least, that feminism is totally non-threatening. So yeah, I suppose “consent is sexy” is not only really, really popular–and not critiqued–but part of the larger trend of making feminism sexy.
Indeed ‘consent’ is something females do not males. Because when was the last time a man was asked ‘did you consent to another male penetrating your body?’ What commonly occurs is the presumption male did not ‘consent’ to the male raping him. That is why men not women are afforded sexual and bodily autonomy because a man’s body and sexuality are his property whereas women’s bodies and their sexualities are men’s private and personal properties.
Asking a woman if she ‘consents’ places the male in a greater position of power than the woman. He is the one asking and she knows she can only say yes or no but she also knows she has to rely on male not ignoring her response, rather than acting on his pseudo right of sexual access to any woman’s or girl’s body because male supremacist system has taught him he has this pseudo right.
A man can just ignore the woman’s reply and continue using pressure or coercion and then he will claim ‘she consented.’ The woman will consider she is to blame for not preventing the man when in fact there was nothing she could do because male made the ‘choice’ (and yes it was a real choice since he had a number of options) to rape her. But the male rapist will believe the woman ‘consented’ because she didn’t say no! What the male conveniently forgets is the woman did express her agency (sic) but the male chose to ignore her demands. Therefore ‘consent’ becomes meaningless given we live in a male supremacy and one wherein men are taught as boys they have no responsibility for their sexual behaviour, because male sexuality is supposedly uncontrollable once aroused and it is women’s responsibility not men’s to gatekeep male sexual behaviour. This claim in itself is ludicrous because men are accorded greater individual and group power than women and yet despite women being denied social/economic power – women are expected to be responsible for gatekeeping male sexual behaviour.
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That is the meaning of male power over women – men’s right if they choose to ignore the woman’s right of sexual autonomy (because women are still not accorded their right of sexual autonomy and ownership of their bodies) because male supremacist system claims ‘a man is not a rapist if he reasonably believes the woman has ‘consented.’ Or this man acted in accordance with the male supremacist sex script and therefore he could not have raped the woman because she ‘consented’ – or rather she submitted.
Men are held not to ‘consent’ even when they ‘consent’ to other men subjecting them to sadistic male sexual violence. There was an infamous court case in the UK wherein a number of males were charged and convicted of raping and sodomising other men, even though the sodomised men said they had ‘consented’ to being sexually tortured by other men. Naturally male supremacist system couldn’t allow male on male sexual violence to occur even though the victims (sic) had ‘consented.’ UK law states a person (meaning male of course) cannot ‘consent’ to bodily assault but women continue to ‘consent’ to males subjecting them to rape and other forms of male sexual violence. Male supremacist system claims male sexual aggression and male sexual force/coercion against women is normal male/female sexual relations because men initiate and women ‘consent’ even when she knows her refusal will inevitably lead to male subjecting her to sexual violence.
http://www.spannertrust.org/documents/spannerhistory.asp
Wow, Hecuba, that last link you gave. I remember reading about that way back when, in a newspaper. I saved the clipping for years as “ammunition” when coming up against female-on-female sadomasochists.
It’s so obvious, and perfect common sense. But when females are the victims, common sense goes out the window.
*bookmarking* *saving to hard drive* Thanks!
Katha Pollitt rocks the house on the Baby M case. http://www.thenation.com/article/strange-case-baby-m?page=full
Another misuse of consent is trans people who say they were coercively assigned male at birth. Trollololol, hilarious, dudes. Seriously hilarious. Because as we all know women are like, “Fuck yesssssss, born a slave! I consent!”
Oh and another. Kinky people have this internal discussion all the time about kinky PDA and whether it’s okay or not because what if the onlookers “don’t consent”. What in the fucking christ. I hate bdsm as much as the next feminist but “consent” has gone the way of “privilege” because while I don’t “consent” to observing kinky PDA I’ve also never “consented” to observing non-kinky PDA and I know which of the two I’ve been “coerced” into observing more. I mean, if this is a thing, then watch out, because I do not consent to being around children.
The language of consent is individualism run amok.
Great point, RFC, I hadn’t thought of it that way.
“One problem lies in the fact that women can never revoke their consent to what was done to them while in a place of vulnerability. Instead, their photos and videos remain masturbatory aids for any man who finds them…”
Exactly. If you cannot revoke consent, the whole concept of consent ceases to be legitimate.
We need a single word for “enthusiastic, joyful, whole-hearted consent.” I wonder if the Germans have one?
Also, LOLOL awesome, radfemcrafts. If this is a thing, then watch out indeed…
As a rape victim and a mental health patient, I have had many internal dialogues about the true meaning(lessness) of “consent.” Under the law, if I voluntarily have myself put into a mental hospital, I have “consented” to treatment. It says it on the forms they make you sign. But of course that doesn’t mean I can leave when I want. I know that Hecuba said this before, but this renders voluntary consent meaningless.
It is the same in het relationships. Male supremacy means that in effect, “consent” is usually nothing more than submission in order to prevent further violence. I think that we need to have discourse on what “violence” and “sexual violence” really mean, to women. It includes psychological force, it includes the underlying threat of male violence, and it can include the very act of penetration even if “consent” is given since PIV causes female-specific harm.
I would go into the linguistics of the words violence, violable, inviolable, etc. and how that relates to male bodily autonomy and female lack thereof, but I’m exhausted.
Hecuba,
“Or this man acted in accordance with the male supremacist sex script and therefore he could not have raped the woman because she ‘consented’ – or rather she submitted.”
That was powerful for me. Submitted…
WOaJ, this is an excellent post. That top shirt is so creepy! It turns the woman into a carnival where only passengers with consent tickets get to ride. Ew.
So pithy and smart a critique of “consent.” thanks!
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