A California Title IX coordinator admitted that there are several fundamental flaws with the “affirmative consent” policies that are sweeping college campuses.
Belinda Guthrie, the Title IX coordinator at Santa Clara University, was the defender of affirmative consent laws – such as the one that passed in California last year – for a Dallas Morning News debate column with the Independent Institute’s Samuel R. Staley.
Guthrie listed the benefits of affirmative consent policies, including how they have “increased awareness and discussion about what constitutes consent,” and said she ultimately believes that more states should pass campus sexual violence legislation that include affirmative consent standards.
However, Guthrie also used a good part of her statement to establish the argument of the other side.
From the Dallas Morning News:
“Critics of affirmative consent argue it places an undue burden on the initiator of the sexual activity to prove that he or she had consent and violates the due process rights of the accused.
They argue that such policies will lead to an increase of false reporting of sexual assault after incidents that are, in truth, regretted sexual encounters but nonetheless consensual.
Critics also argue that affirmative consent policies are impractical and impossible to enforce and do nothing to improve the resolution of cases involving ‘he said, she said’ arguments and cases in which one or both parties were intoxicated or under the influence of drugs.”
Guthrie did not present solutions to the problems she identified with affirmative consent policies, but said, “a comprehensive and equitable approach to responding to sexual violence on college campuses is necessary, or the critics of affirmative consent will be proven right.”
On the other side, Samuel Staley dedicated his argument to the reasons why affirmative consent laws are “both unreasonable and unworkable,” how they criminalize actions that do not lead to rape or assault, and do little to help in actual cases of campus sexual assault.
Staley suggested more targeted sexual violence prevention programs currently employed by some universities that increase student’s awareness and teach empowerment strategies such as self-defense skills.
Read the full column here.
h/t The College Fix
