Warning: This article gets into the subject of sexual assault. If this proves too much, please don’t read it. If not read with an open mind.
Fear. Everyone has it. No matter how brave you
might say you are, or how little fucks you claim to give, we are all afraid of something. Fear is an emotion just like happiness or anger, and occurs just as often. Just hearing the word itself has the menacing ability to invoke a variety of horrors. Clowns. Public speaking. Gary Busey’s face. No matter how old you are, you’ll probably never outgrow being afraid of something (especially Gary Busey’s face). We all react differently to fear. Some toughen up and put on a brave face. Some choose to simply run away from it. I, for one, get really upset stomachs and need to go to the bathroom.
One of my biggest fears is that one day I’ll accidentally rape a girl. Stay with me on this. I’m afraid that I’ll meet a girl, have sex with her, and later find out in a courtroom that I raped her because I didn’t ask the right questions; that I didn’t do enough to make sure she was completely comfortable and consenting to everything that I did. To me this is a very real possibility. Just the very thought of unknowingly violating a girl I was intimate with fills me with dread. A feeling in the pit of my stomach like I really need to poop even though I didn’t need to take one just a moment ago.
Now I know what you’re probably thinking, “Tony, you don’t just accidentally rape someone. You have to have sex with them, knowing that they don’t want it. Y’know. Like a rapist.” But to that I say au contraire! According to common sense, rape is non-consensual sex. Which means that you can rape someone even though your partner just said, “Yes, I would like you to have sex with me.”
Which brings me to my first point: Just because someone seems like they’re willing to have sex with you doesn’t necessarily mean that they want to have sex with you. We always hear the phrase “no means no” and it’s true. If a girl says no, guys should respect that and move on to something else like Parcheesi or a rousing game of Scrabble. But the fact of the matter is sometimes yes doesn’t always mean yes. The girl may just be saying yes because she doesn’t want to hurt the guy’s feelings, so she placates him and his actions. The guy has no idea what he’s doing isn’t okay, because she complied. She says, “yes, what you’re doing is okay.” But guess what? It’s not.
Secondly, when a guy and a girl begin to get intimate, ideally the guy should make sure the girl is comfortable with everything. However, it’s tough for the guy to ask the right questions. Guys always hear things like “make sure you get consent” and “consent is sexy”, however how much consent is enough consent? I never know what to ask. If I just said, “You should tell me if I go too far” to her, that might be too vague and she might not get it. But saying “I want to put my penis in your vagina” sounds like something you’d scream to a girl you’re keeping in a hole in the bottom of your basement.
Is anyone really at fault here? The answer is yes there is: the guy. It’s always the guy. If a girl goes to the police saying she was raped, she can have the guy arrested and thrown in jail no questions asked. This was the case with Brian Banks—a once promising 17-year-old football player—who, in the summer of 2002, was accused of rape by fellow classmate Wanetta Gibson. In less than a month, Banks was behind bars, serving out a six-year prison sentence. Throughout this whole process, Banks maintained his innocence, claiming that everything he did with Gibson was completely consensual. However, this was not enough to sway a jury of his peers and he was branded a rapist for what seemed would be the rest of his life. It would later turn out that he was telling the truth, when just this past year Gibson messaged Banks apologizing to him and admitting that the whole ordeal was simply a lie that went too far. Banks has since been acquitted from the charges and has had his record sponged. However, that doesn’t really do much for Banks who was THROWN IN JAIL BECAUSE OF HER.
Of course, this case is unique in that the girl in question was completely lying. However, it still goes to show that even if the guy says he thought that the sex was completely consensual, a courtroom might just be quick to assume that the guy had far more devious intentions.
Girls, I don’t want to rape you. Neither do a lot of guys. Rape is so unfathomably bad it’s truly difficult to put into words how awful it is. And it easily makes my list of most awful things ever, including but not limited to:
1. Rape
2. Genocide
3. The 2003 film From Justin to Kelly
I know a lot of it is on the guy. But in the end sex takes two to tango. So to all the girls out there, I implore you: TELL US WHEN YOU DON’T WANT TO DO SOMETHING OR IF WE GO TO FAR OR IF YOU WANT TO STOP OR WHATEVER! Please. Don’t be afraid. I know that’s easier said then done, but we would rather have you tell us that you’re uncomfortable than to find out later that what we did wasn’t consensual. Trust me. It won’t hurt our feelings if you want to stop. Not at all.
And if you ever get to the point where you think you might have to get physical to get the message across, I’ve included a diagram of a guy’s primary weak spots (see Fig. 1).
Use knowledge sparingly