Quickies: The Further Destruction Of Language

     Were you aware that ”yes” can actually mean “no?”

Why Yes Can Mean No

     It started with “consent is sexy.” But, of course, there was no point in that—it was like saying rape is just bad sex, instead of a felony. Then there was “consent is mandatory.” It was much better, reminding us that sex is consensual, and everything else is rape. But then there was me, after a party, in a man’s dorm room. And there was “is this ok?” If we are being legal about this, I said ‘yes’ — no coercion, no imminent threat of violence, no inebriation (well, not a lot, anyway). But what I want to talk about is what happened before I said yes, who taught me to say yes, why I thought it was better to say yes, and why I really meant ‘no.’

     ....For me, and many others like me, consent isn’t easy. Yes doesn’t always mean yes, and we misplaced ‘no’ several years ago. This experience isn’t random, but disproportionately affects oppressed communities. Consent is a privilege, and it was built for wealthy, heterosexual, cis, white, western, able-bodied masculinity. When society has taught some of us to take up as little space as possible, to take all attention as flattery, and to be truly grateful that anyone at all could want our bodies or love, it isn’t always our choice to say yes.

     Consent as a privilege doesn’t just happen in sex. It happens for those of us who give too much in friendships without knowing how to ask for reciprocation, who let doctors touch us in ways that are triggering because we don’t want to make trouble, who dance with handsy strangers because our friends already left the party, who stick around in toxic relationships because we don’t know if we’re allowed to expect better. When you’re poor, disabled, queer, non-white, trans, or feminine, ‘no’ isn’t for you. I don’t mean to insist that every person oppressed in these systems of power can’t have empowering consensual experiences, and I know many who do. What I do mean to say is that for me, finding ‘no’ is a process, consent is elusive, and sometimes, even when people don’t mean to—they hurt me.

     (Link courtesy of The Other McCain.) Gee, if I interpret this in the fashion of a person taught by “society” to believe women are the equals of men in all things, it means they’re inveterate liars who should never, ever be taken at their word.

     BONUS! Jordan Bosiljevac, the author of the quoted diatribe, wants the privilege of “yes meaning no” to apply to all “oppressed” communities! So we white Christian heterosexual men must withdraw all trust from any member of any group, however defined, that claims to be “oppressed!”

     You know, I find an article like this refreshing. The writer has no idea just how much she’s given away. She has no idea what it implies – and would surely disavow all knowledge of its implications. Those are for us white capitalist patriarchs who reason according to the oppressive norms of logic.

     If this seems harsh, just imagine how harsh we would find a regime in which a white man could not trust the word of:

• A woman;
• A Negro or Amerind;
• A person of a different religion;
• A person of a different ethnic background;
• A person of a different sexual orientation.

     All the above claim to be “oppressed.” Therefore, any consent they may seem to offer is really “coerced” by “society.” Slavery isn’t dead; it’s just been resting!

     You can thank your local neighborhood victimist activists – of whatever stripe – for this. It’s the end they’ve aimed for from the beginning, whether they knew it or not. And it never had but one terminus.