It seems that in spite of myself, I can't stop hopping on the hippest controversies in town. That's consistent, because today's theme is the result of ideology that messes with its own ends.
We now return to: Dr. Ted Everett's paper "Against 'Sexual' 'Assault' 'Awareness'": now with a link to the full presentation! http://www.geneseo.edu/philosophy/ted_everett
For those who haven't heard: last week my college went into an uproar anticipating this paper as the focus of a small Philosophy Department colloquium. Students protested and petitioned, the event was moved to the gymnasium to accommodate angry supporters of women's rights, and everybody got bad press. To be equally fair, I'll rag on both Dr. Everett and his antagonists, since everybody has been tripping up. And don't worry: more book reviews are coming soon.
We'll start with the man himself. My biggest complaint, probably as a slave to infotainment, is that this paper was not worth the hullabaloo it got. None of his points is particularly striking, and together they add up to a rather inconsistent whole. After all, as stated in its preface, the thing is a philosophy paper, not a lambent speech. The content itself reveals problems with both sides. While he's quite right in saying that the goal is to prevent sexual assault rather than correctly determine whose fault it is, nothing should obscure the secondary goal of letting people know what's crossing the line and what isn't. And while that analogy about a kiss from grandma is worth a giggle (if you've already had a beer every time he's said "roaring drunk"), it's a key misleading point. Where I come from, your grandma is probably not going to the same parties that have SAA worried. And even if you're just going to kiss somebody, absolutely make sure it will be wanted. We don't live in Pirates of the Caribbean (if you do, let me know). Whether or not you define an unwelcome result as sexual assault, it's still the wrong thing to do for emotional reasons, if not those of sanitation, personal space, etc.
Then come the enlightened students. What has me most frustrated is the fact that I'm not allowed to talk to my friends about it unless I say certain exact things. In some circles, I must chant, "They don't know what he said!" In others, it's "It doesn't matter what he said; sexual assault is still wrong." Whether I agree, or whether I see both of these as changing the subject, I tend to miss my cue. This makes every detail I offer an object of suspicion, forcing me to return to my position before the event: if we can't talk about sexual assault, how aware are we? I'd certainly flunk that test, having skipped the colloquium entirely to avoid hearing possible shouting matches. All I ask is to do what will be written on my diploma, and analyze the pieces of what I can read of Everett's paper and of my friends' opinions, as fairly as I can. Unless I can do this, I might as well not listen to anyone.
Here's all you can do. Learn from it if it works for you. You can refuse to cross any interpersonal boundaries, sexual or otherwise, unless you have reason to believe you may. You can keep in mind the common sense to make this distinction. It comes from listening, the aural version of awareness, which is what everybody thinks they want nowadays, but which is still frightfully scarce. Awareness is a result of thinking for yourself. In combination with respect, there's nothing it can't do.
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