Men’s Magazine Desires World Without Meaningful Consent

This image, of a scantily clad woman attached to a video game controller with the caption “Keep on dreaming of a better world,” was posted without comment at Sociological Images.

First of all, it seems pretty obvious to me what the man targeted in this ad (by a men’s magazine) is supposed to use the controller for, and I don’t think it’s making the woman in question do the Chicken Dance for a giggle. The question I keep coming back to is whether this is supposed to be a “real” woman who has somehow been modified and turned into an all submissive sex toy (read: rape victim), or if it’s supposed to be a highly realistic fembot that looks like a real woman for a man’s sexually assaulting pleasure.

Clearly, the former is the worse option, but I’m not sure how much better I would feel about the latter still being upheld as a part of a “better world.”

Of course, I realize that this image is supposed to be lighthearted.  It’s a “joke.”  But that doesn’t make it funny.

I think that images and “jokes” like this really do point out the deeply destructive and misogynistic rape culture we live under, when “sex” is so regularly portrayed in this way.  Few, I imagine, would consider this image to be promoting rape.  But personally, it’s all I can see.  After all, if the woman was willing and truly consenting, a remote control would not be necessary for her to perform the desired acts.  The idea of a completely sexually controlled woman, however tongue-in-cheek, is still promoting as a false-ideal a woman who cannot say no.  And a woman who quite literally cannot say no due to control from outside forces is in fact a woman who cannot give a meaningful yes.

Funny, my idea of a “better world” is one where women are sexually empowered and respected, not enslaved.

cross-posted at The Curvature

Remedial Lessons in Consent

I’m reading Subject to Debate by Katha Pollitt, which is an old collection of her columns from the 90s. It’s an interesting history lesson on what was going on in progressive politics back when I was too young to care. I love Katha. But in one column (Precious Bodily Fluids) about a guy who accused his girlfriend of lying to him about using birth control and becoming pregnant by “intentionally acquiring and misusing his semen,” she made a really disturbing comment.

In Slate, Scott Shuger opined, “A woman’s promise to take charge of birth control and then not do so remains the only form of monetary fraud . . . that is not only not punished but in fact regularly rewarded.” If this is fraud, then should we call a man’s insincere promise to “put it in for just a minute” assault?

Let’s be very clear: this is no “if, then” situation here. The answer is “yes,” plain and simple.

And this should be obvious.

Any person has the right to revoke consent, and also to place conditions on their consent. For example, consenting to oral sex is not the same as consenting to vaginal intercourse — if you consent to one, and your partner forces you to do the other, it is rape regardless of your previous and differing consent. This is unclear to some people, but really should be clear to everyone. If you tell your partner to stop during intercourse (or any other type of sexual activity) and they do not, that is rape, regardless of your previous consent.

And if you say “just a couple of seconds” and your partner knowingly and intentionally goes on for significantly longer than that? Yes! That is assault!

But the placement of Polllitt’s words seems to me to be a clear indication that the idea is laughable. Particularly considering that the column is used to call the guy filing the lawsuit a jackass, the question answers itself with “of course not — see, this idea is preposterous, just like the previous notion put forth by Shuger.”

Except the idea is not preposterous. You might have a lot of difficulty getting an attempted prosecution on the matter, let alone a successful one, but since when has that been the feminist measure of sexual assault? And what’s going on when even feminists are in need of this kind of remedial lesson in consent?

cross-posted at The Curvature