Unfortunately, the clear-cut “only a clear verbal yes means yes” definition of consent doesn’t quite mesh well with how humans actually interact. Women have a general tendency to want men to be able to read their minds, and so outright asking “do you want to have sex right now” often carries a penalty in the likelihood of sex actually occurring. The actual reality of human courtship is that men push boundaries until they meet a “wait, stop”, at which point they stop, retract a few steps and try again. The usual dance is that women get to see the men actually stop their advances when she says “stop” for the first time, and this builds confidence that the man will actually honor a request to stop, maybe the man touches her breast while they’re kissing, she says “slow down”, and the man listens and actually slows down, which provides evidence that she can actually stop the interaction at any further point. So the actual practice of consent is “Is she saying stop? And has she demonstrated that she trusts me enough to believe that I’ll respect her ‘stop’? ”. Any attempt from a man to abide by a different definition will lead to him having lower amounts of sex… and that’s a rather unlikely price for men to pay.
You of course have the right to feel however you want about your experience, but that you were raped by the federal definition doesn’t make Alex a “rapist”, with all the baggage that such a term carries. It just makes him a normal guy going by the actual practice of consent, who misread the situation and assumed that you’d trust him enough to stop if you said “stop”. The strict definition of consent would define an overwhelming fraction of all sexual acts as being rape. In this particular case, you were both naked on the beach, and I think a large fraction of men would at least try to escalate the situation. Though going directly to sex without foreplay is pretty bad, and the retreat mind-state is weird enough that the alcohol rules should apply, really intensive retreat can give much more of an altered state than just being drunk.
First, your description of the process of consent is not universal; it doesn’t describe any relationship I’ve been in going all the way back to when I was a teenager. At the very least this should tell you that this series of events wasn’t acceptable because it’s “just the way humans interact.” Many men, including myself, actually talk to the women we want to have sex with, and “having lower amounts of sex” is far from an adequate reason to resort to the boundary-pushing and manipulation you describe.
Second, “the fact that you were raped doesn’t make Alex a rapist” is a patently absurd position to hold, not to mention an incredible red flag for anyone who might consider being at all vulnerable around you in the future. The mental gymnastics required are mind-boggling. It appears the case you’re making by saying “you were both naked on the beach, and I think a large fraction of men would at least try to escalate the situation” is something like “you were standing in traffic, you shouldn’t be surprised you got hit by a car”. This is textbook victim-blaming and completely ignores the perpetrator’s agency in the matter. I would say it’s akin to saying “you were eating a sandwich in public, and I think a large fraction of men are so hungry they would at least try to punch you and steal it.” If “retreat mind-state” is the defense here then I guess those retreats should probably not be happening. If I took the series of actions described in the open letter on my own fiancee I would think she would be disturbed and traumatized by the experience, to say nothing of the more ambiguous context described above.
Third and lastly; regardless of what views you may hold in private, it’s incredibly hostile behavior to make this case on a self-described assault victim’s post about the incident. The whole comments serves to demean OP’s perspective and you then condescend that “she can feel however she wants” as if you haven’t just described at length why you think she’s foolish and misguided.
Thank you for this response and for so clearly pointing out these issues. I also found this comment offensive and hostile—and do not think I could have better or more concisely articulated these points as you have or that they would have been as well-received coming from myself. I appreciate the clarity, awareness, and directness in your response.
Ah, I think you’re right, it was very unkind to post this here, and I regret it. Though I think from your reply and the downvotes that I didn’t properly articulate my view, but I don’t think that a debate would be especially useful here.
Razied, what you have written here and in Alex’s comments is indicative of rape culture—and the reality of “human courtship” is that women are tired of being sexually assaulted. Almost every single woman and probably most men will recognize this as a straightforward description of sexual assault or rape. What you are describing may be a common approach people take but also often leads to situations in which people, usually women get hurt. Even the scenario you described in your comment does not at all fit my experience with Alex. One should never go from 0 to 100 in a sexual encounter—and in this case, there was “zero” opportunity to say “slow down” or “stop”—and he did break my trust, clearly I could NOT trust him to respect the boundaries we had set, or to take a walk or to go swimming with him.
Without both parties’ consent and without freewill any sexual encounter IS sexual assault. What you have written grossly ignores the reality in which there are many circumstances and reasons for which a person—usually a woman may not feel safe enough to say No and that does not mean she is a willing participant. This could be anything from the sheer size and physical dominance of the assailant to the assailant is her boss and she has two children at home depending on her pay to previous experiences of sexual violence to she already set a boundary and said no but he has continued to push her boundaries anyways.
“Alex is a normal guy going by the actual practice of consent” ← This is the whole problem right here. So much misunderstanding and sexual violence stems from this kind of thinking.
First of all, that’s bullshit. You weren’t there and you are not the one living with the impact of Alex’s actions. Secondly, “Normal guys” who engage in the behaviors you described can and do sexually assault women both intentionally and unintentionally—which is why I am now advocating for and am now requiring a “yes means yes” approach in my own personal life. There are also as the above response indicates many men who can and do understand the importance of talking to the women they engage with and affirming that there is consent. “Normal guys” need to educate themselves about consent, to behave in sexually responsible ways, to understand the impact they have, and to make amends when they cause harm. In this case, this is known as a “non-violent” assault. I do not think violent and nonviolent sexual assaults are the same- and I think that the stigma and “baggage” you’ve mentioned is exactly what makes it difficult for many men (and women) to be honest about and to have difficulty discussing issues of sexual violence.
Please educate yourself about what sexual violence and consent “actually” are- because what you are sharing shows that you may not understand how to navigate consent in a healthy way which can be detrimental to both the people you interact with AND to yourself. I am not saying you are a bad person but what you are saying here is a clear indicator that you are unsafe to the women you interact with within a sexual context (not to mention your distinct lack of compassion towards myself or general social awareness.)
I also want to point to the fact that Alex was in an explicit position of power in which he had a responsibility to hold the retreat container. These are rhetorical questions but I say these because it sounds like you are a meditator. Can you imagine going to a silent meditation retreat—a place you have been told was safe, trustworthy, and a place for meditation, reflection, and growth—and then being sexually assaulted by the director? Can you imagine having your first really powerful awakening experience and being in such a vulnerable state—and being mistreated by not only that person but also by other leadership members and then being sent away from the sangha unexpectedly for a sexual act that you had no choice in and which went against your explicitly stated wishes? Can you imagine what it would be like to know that someone you loved had betrayed you because his “spiritual teacher” told him to? Can you imagine struggling through waves of anxiety and aversion for months every time you sat down to meditate—when before it had been a deeply healing, calming, transformative, and beneficial awakening practice?
Nowhere in my writing have I labeled Alex or said this man is a bad person, I have simply described the events in question and why I feel that sexual assault is an accurate characterization. In fact, on the contrary, I have stated publicly in my open letter that I wish for Alex to have real support and accountability, increased awareness and education, have a healthy community and be cared for, and be able to heal. Still, what Alex did and the way he has treated me since then is not ok. I will not be silenced as Alex and others have attempted to do in the past. I will speak frankly about my experiences which exist within a much larger social and cultural context in which sexual violence needs to be examined and addressed and within the context of an organization that is still causing harm to vulnerable people.
Well, I can already see that nothing productive would come out of a discussion between us, I suspect we’d be talking past each other too much. In any case, I apologize for posting that comment here. I wish you a happy life, and hope you’ll continue intensive meditation, its effects on moral improvement are greatly overstated, but those on happiness improvements are not.
Unfortunately, the clear-cut “only a clear verbal yes means yes” definition of consent doesn’t quite mesh well with how humans actually interact. Women have a general tendency to want men to be able to read their minds, and so outright asking “do you want to have sex right now” often carries a penalty in the likelihood of sex actually occurring. The actual reality of human courtship is that men push boundaries until they meet a “wait, stop”, at which point they stop, retract a few steps and try again. The usual dance is that women get to see the men actually stop their advances when she says “stop” for the first time, and this builds confidence that the man will actually honor a request to stop, maybe the man touches her breast while they’re kissing, she says “slow down”, and the man listens and actually slows down, which provides evidence that she can actually stop the interaction at any further point. So the actual practice of consent is “Is she saying stop? And has she demonstrated that she trusts me enough to believe that I’ll respect her ‘stop’? ”. Any attempt from a man to abide by a different definition will lead to him having lower amounts of sex… and that’s a rather unlikely price for men to pay.
You of course have the right to feel however you want about your experience, but that you were raped by the federal definition doesn’t make Alex a “rapist”, with all the baggage that such a term carries. It just makes him a normal guy going by the actual practice of consent, who misread the situation and assumed that you’d trust him enough to stop if you said “stop”. The strict definition of consent would define an overwhelming fraction of all sexual acts as being rape. In this particular case, you were both naked on the beach, and I think a large fraction of men would at least try to escalate the situation. Though going directly to sex without foreplay is pretty bad, and the retreat mind-state is weird enough that the alcohol rules should apply, really intensive retreat can give much more of an altered state than just being drunk.
I find this comment offensive.
First, your description of the process of consent is not universal; it doesn’t describe any relationship I’ve been in going all the way back to when I was a teenager. At the very least this should tell you that this series of events wasn’t acceptable because it’s “just the way humans interact.” Many men, including myself, actually talk to the women we want to have sex with, and “having lower amounts of sex” is far from an adequate reason to resort to the boundary-pushing and manipulation you describe.
Second, “the fact that you were raped doesn’t make Alex a rapist” is a patently absurd position to hold, not to mention an incredible red flag for anyone who might consider being at all vulnerable around you in the future. The mental gymnastics required are mind-boggling. It appears the case you’re making by saying “you were both naked on the beach, and I think a large fraction of men would at least try to escalate the situation” is something like “you were standing in traffic, you shouldn’t be surprised you got hit by a car”. This is textbook victim-blaming and completely ignores the perpetrator’s agency in the matter. I would say it’s akin to saying “you were eating a sandwich in public, and I think a large fraction of men are so hungry they would at least try to punch you and steal it.” If “retreat mind-state” is the defense here then I guess those retreats should probably not be happening. If I took the series of actions described in the open letter on my own fiancee I would think she would be disturbed and traumatized by the experience, to say nothing of the more ambiguous context described above.
Third and lastly; regardless of what views you may hold in private, it’s incredibly hostile behavior to make this case on a self-described assault victim’s post about the incident. The whole comments serves to demean OP’s perspective and you then condescend that “she can feel however she wants” as if you haven’t just described at length why you think she’s foolish and misguided.
Thank you for this response and for so clearly pointing out these issues. I also found this comment offensive and hostile—and do not think I could have better or more concisely articulated these points as you have or that they would have been as well-received coming from myself. I appreciate the clarity, awareness, and directness in your response.
Ah, I think you’re right, it was very unkind to post this here, and I regret it. Though I think from your reply and the downvotes that I didn’t properly articulate my view, but I don’t think that a debate would be especially useful here.
Razied, what you have written here and in Alex’s comments is indicative of rape culture—and the reality of “human courtship” is that women are tired of being sexually assaulted. Almost every single woman and probably most men will recognize this as a straightforward description of sexual assault or rape. What you are describing may be a common approach people take but also often leads to situations in which people, usually women get hurt. Even the scenario you described in your comment does not at all fit my experience with Alex. One should never go from 0 to 100 in a sexual encounter—and in this case, there was “zero” opportunity to say “slow down” or “stop”—and he did break my trust, clearly I could NOT trust him to respect the boundaries we had set, or to take a walk or to go swimming with him.
Without both parties’ consent and without freewill any sexual encounter IS sexual assault. What you have written grossly ignores the reality in which there are many circumstances and reasons for which a person—usually a woman may not feel safe enough to say No and that does not mean she is a willing participant. This could be anything from the sheer size and physical dominance of the assailant to the assailant is her boss and she has two children at home depending on her pay to previous experiences of sexual violence to she already set a boundary and said no but he has continued to push her boundaries anyways.
“Alex is a normal guy going by the actual practice of consent” ← This is the whole problem right here. So much misunderstanding and sexual violence stems from this kind of thinking.
First of all, that’s bullshit. You weren’t there and you are not the one living with the impact of Alex’s actions. Secondly, “Normal guys” who engage in the behaviors you described can and do sexually assault women both intentionally and unintentionally—which is why I am now advocating for and am now requiring a “yes means yes” approach in my own personal life. There are also as the above response indicates many men who can and do understand the importance of talking to the women they engage with and affirming that there is consent. “Normal guys” need to educate themselves about consent, to behave in sexually responsible ways, to understand the impact they have, and to make amends when they cause harm. In this case, this is known as a “non-violent” assault. I do not think violent and nonviolent sexual assaults are the same- and I think that the stigma and “baggage” you’ve mentioned is exactly what makes it difficult for many men (and women) to be honest about and to have difficulty discussing issues of sexual violence.
Please educate yourself about what sexual violence and consent “actually” are- because what you are sharing shows that you may not understand how to navigate consent in a healthy way which can be detrimental to both the people you interact with AND to yourself. I am not saying you are a bad person but what you are saying here is a clear indicator that you are unsafe to the women you interact with within a sexual context (not to mention your distinct lack of compassion towards myself or general social awareness.)
I also want to point to the fact that Alex was in an explicit position of power in which he had a responsibility to hold the retreat container. These are rhetorical questions but I say these because it sounds like you are a meditator. Can you imagine going to a silent meditation retreat—a place you have been told was safe, trustworthy, and a place for meditation, reflection, and growth—and then being sexually assaulted by the director? Can you imagine having your first really powerful awakening experience and being in such a vulnerable state—and being mistreated by not only that person but also by other leadership members and then being sent away from the sangha unexpectedly for a sexual act that you had no choice in and which went against your explicitly stated wishes? Can you imagine what it would be like to know that someone you loved had betrayed you because his “spiritual teacher” told him to? Can you imagine struggling through waves of anxiety and aversion for months every time you sat down to meditate—when before it had been a deeply healing, calming, transformative, and beneficial awakening practice?
Nowhere in my writing have I labeled Alex or said this man is a bad person, I have simply described the events in question and why I feel that sexual assault is an accurate characterization. In fact, on the contrary, I have stated publicly in my open letter that I wish for Alex to have real support and accountability, increased awareness and education, have a healthy community and be cared for, and be able to heal. Still, what Alex did and the way he has treated me since then is not ok. I will not be silenced as Alex and others have attempted to do in the past. I will speak frankly about my experiences which exist within a much larger social and cultural context in which sexual violence needs to be examined and addressed and within the context of an organization that is still causing harm to vulnerable people.
Well, I can already see that nothing productive would come out of a discussion between us, I suspect we’d be talking past each other too much. In any case, I apologize for posting that comment here. I wish you a happy life, and hope you’ll continue intensive meditation, its effects on moral improvement are greatly overstated, but those on happiness improvements are not.