Beyond “Yes” and “No” — Exploring The Playfield of Consent
Arabella recalls the previous night’s encounter after discovering a new podcast. Her eyes stare into the void while she feels juxtaposed about what happened with Zain, her literary advisor who became her one-night stand. She, like us, is introduced to a whole new area when we think about consent. She is forced to think beyond binaries that confine our perspective of consent and violation of consent. We, like her, are introduced to a “grey area” in the ethical playfield of consent. I would like to believe that, rather than a moral line there is an ethical playfield, where, instead of a defined boundary that differentiates right from wrong, there is a playfield where beliefs, ideas, views about oneself and others fluctuate and get manipulated which then translates to right or wrong objectively. Here, we learn about a new form of sexual assault termed as “stealthing”, or in simpler words, non-consensual condom removal, which according to U.K. Law is a criminal offence, but in India, it isn’t even acknowledged by the masses or by the law, which fascinates me, because, the problem is, laws pertaining to sexual assault vary when you jump from continent to continent, so what is considered full rape in one country might be just a little rapey in another country, or not even considered as rape at all in another country, for example, in the Indian Constitution, there is no provision for male rape victims, or female victims raped by a female perpetrator, (for more, read Section 375 [9] of the IPC) but that doesn’t mean that such actions can be condoned.
Reina Gattuso, a writer, states that women( I would like to include men as well) have sexual “experiences that feel violating yet ambiguous”, which challenge us to think of violence as a spectrum of power and coercion, rather than a simple dichotomy between “good sex” and “rape”. Whenever conversations revolving around consent and assault arise, we tend to bifurcate life to exist in neat binaries, victim/rapist, avenger/target, good sex/rape. But if I May Destroy You(the TV show from which the stealthing example was taken) has demonstrated anything in its efforts to eke out nuance from every scenario, it’s that life doesn’t work so neatly. If anything, such boundaries dissipate the moment you try to grab hold of them. The show made us reinterpret past experiences and think deeply about ways to be in more control in the future. We added more consent equations into the formula: What happens if a partner is dishonest about their relationship status? What happens if your partner is dishonest about their sexual history or a past partner? What happens if your partner does not reveal their criminal history? What happens if someone does not reveal they may have an STI? What happens if your female partner lies about being on the birth pill? What do you do if you realise, after the fact, that someone violated your consent? Do you owe forgiveness to someone who apologises after violating your consent?
Should we learn and dare to find a brother in our enemy?
What if details are purposely hidden from you so that you consent? These questions continued at the back of our mind and we realised that whenever consent is procured under false pretences — that is, if specific details were withheld — consent is called into question and is likely violated. This concept was introduced by Michaela Coel, the creator of I May Destroy You, and she termed this concept as, “theft of consent”, she calls it theft of consent because for many people, when you’re involved in a sexual situation under any kind of false pretence, your consent was stolen. To cite more diverse scenarios to illustrate this concept, let us consider four situations from the show.
First, at the beginning of the show where Arabella gets raped by a stranger. He roofies her (mixing drugs in your drinks to make you weak, confused and forgetful so that you become easier to be taken advantage of) and then rapes her in the bathroom stall. Arabella was already intoxicated as she had already consumed enough alcohol and drugs such as LSD and Cocaine, which made her more vulnerable to be preyed on. Now, if her raper ( Arabella uses the word raper instead of rapist, there is something about her use of it, which pointedly makes the word feel like an action rather than identity, something continuously in the present sense.) approached her and gave her full disclosure that “Hey, I’m a total stranger but will you have this drink offered by me which is already mixed with drugs so that I can take you to the bathroom stall and rape you, and you won’t be able to remember anything from this night except fragments of this night in the form of flashbacks. Up for it?”
Would she consent? Mind you, she is intoxicated, so she is already in no place to consent. Even if she was sober, she would’ve never given consent, hence, details are hidden from her so that she can consent. Your consent only counts if you’re in the right state of mind and sober.
Sober consent is given, Intoxicated consent is negotiated.
Second, the stealthing scene, where Zain removes his condom mid-sex, without informing Arabella, because if he provided full disclosure about what he had done, would Arabella still give him consent to continue? Or consent to even remove the condom? In such cases, people like Zain usually proceed to say things like, “I thought you knew”, “I thought you were into that”, “It was just a condom removal, stop acting crazy”.
Consent given once does not mean consent given twice. Consent to sex with a condom does not mean consent to sex without a condom. Consent given in the past doesn’t make assumption of the notion that consent will be given in the future. Consent can be revoked at any time.
Third, Terry, Arabella’s best friend, meets two strangers in a party in Italy and proceeds to have a threesome with them. Prior to the scene we see that these two men approached her individually, giving her the pretence that they didn’t know each other, but post threesome, as Terry watches down from her window in shock and disbelief, she finds out the two men knew each other and this was all a pre-planned arrangement to lure her in. So, in this case, if they had approached her in the beginning, giving her disclosure that they were two men looking for a threesome with a total stranger they just met at a club, would she consent?
Consent to a threesome does not mean consent to a preplanned threesome.
Fourth, Kwame, Arabella and Terry’s friend, a gay man, proceeds to have sex with a straight woman under false pretences, not disclosing his sexuality to her until after the intercourse. If he confessed to her that he is a gay man who just wants to use her for figuring out his sexuality, would she still consent?
Theft of consent is a microcosm of the grey area in sexual consent. Usually, in these grey areas( “grey sex” or the grey area in sex can be defined as “sex that feels violating even when it’s not criminal”), the aggressors/violators go exploring to see for themselves what boundaries and violations the victims might be banging on about, because they’re thorough and they probably think you’re crazy for feeling this way. And on their explorations they found the line that separated them from everything else. Rather than crossing it, they tiptoed on it and they experienced this feeling of being on the boundary…on the border….right on the line of being neither in one place or another, and saw how, this grey area, where nothing was quite clear, no-one could BE clear. (An excerpt from Arabella’s powerful monologue in the show)
So, before you sleep with someone, make sure to know them properly and ensure that all relevant details are fully disclosed. Even if it is a hook-up, make sure you know who you’re sharing your body with. Always trust your gut in case of a red flag. I May Destroy You moralizes this depiction of hook-up culture, which presents the experience as a means to escape pain, rather than a worthwhile pursuit of pleasure. Arabella’s social and digital life, forces us to challenge this idea of giving consent as always being positive. The drama also communicates how sometimes we consent to that which may be bad for us and decline that which may be good. Ensure practising active and enthusiastic consent, rather than perfunctory passive consent. Enthusiastic consent, simply put, means looking for the presence of a “yes” rather than absence of a “no”. As seen in the Aziz Ansari case, consent might look different for different people, so make sure it is presented in a way that is fully understood by all people involved.
I May Destroy You also highlights sexual abuse in the LGBT community, in this case when Kwame, who goes through frotteurism, or non consensual humping by a hookup, learns that it is a sexual assault, obviously. But once is someone put in such situations, we start doubting ourselves. Talking about different types of assault, there are other many other forms of assault we might not be aware of, such as corrective rape — rape done to LGBT people to “correct their sexuality”, or custodial rape — rape done by people in custodial positions such as police officer, public servant or jail or hospital employee. Date rape, as i’ve mentioned before in the Arabella case. Most of the times when one’s consent and boundaries get violated, people might not always report it, mostly when power dynamics come to play, or feelings of fear, shame and guilt instilled due to societal stigma, but once someone’s consent is violated, it is never fine at any level.
If and when lines get blurred, we must make sure our vision is clearer than ever.
Violation of consent and boundaries needn’t always be in sexual contexts. For example, in typical circumstances, a stranger unloading the depths of their trauma would be considered a violation of boundaries, or spreading rumours, disclosing private information without consent, blackmailing or anything along those lines, anything which is done without your permission and makes you uncomfortable to a questionable extent and triggers you in a violation of boundaries. In such cases, the only ways to avoid such horrors again is to address the situation in a tête-à-tête or to inform trusted adults/authorities.
And lastly, we must also remember we are full humans. We have flaws. There are capabilities of badness we all carry as humans. Moreover, it would be dangerous for me to take on any view of myself that is not mindful of the fact that I have the potential to cause harm, as well as to cause good. And if we sit back and realise that we might have done bad to someone, all we need to do is acknowledge, accept, reach out, learn and grow.
1. Let’s Talk About That I May Destroy You Ending
2. I May Destroy You Changed the Way My Friends and I Talk About Consent
3. What Consent Looks Like, RAINN
