Connecticut could soon become the fourth state to adopt an affirmative consent or “yes means yes” policy for sexual conduct at its colleges and universities.
So far, California, Hawaii and New York have made affirmative consent the standard on college campuses. Affirmative consent requires each student involved in sexual activity to request ongoing consent for every action in the encounter. It essentially turns sex into a question-and-answer session dictated by the government, and if you deviate from that at all, then you’re a rapist.
Affirmative consent is unnatural in passionate moments such as sexual activity. While nonverbal communication is allowed under the policy, it is often more difficult to determine someone’s intent with just a moan or a head movement. In this way, affirmative consent leans more toward actually asking someone: “May I touch you here?” “May I kiss you here?” etc.
People don’t have sex that way, and they damn sure don’t want the government telling them how to have sex.
Another wrinkle with respect to these laws is that any apparent consent is negated if an accuser claims they were intoxicated. On college campuses, an accuser doesn’t have to prove they were intoxicated, they merely have to say they were, and then the accused must prove their innocence.
A judge in Tennessee ruled that it was unfair to shift the burden of proof onto the accused, and even ruled that “absent the tape recording of a verbal consent or other independent means to demonstrate that consent was given, the ability of an accused to prove the complaining party’s consent strains credulity and is illusory.”
Also, as we’ve seen on college campuses, the person initiating sexual contact — and thus responsible for obtaining consent — is whoever gets accused of sexual assault, meaning the burden of obtaining consent is placed retroactively. Because even if an accuser’s story makes it clear they didn’t obtain consent (especially from an intoxicated person), affirmative consent policies make it clear that an accuser is absolved from their actions whereas an accused student is not.
Further, affirmative consent does nothing to make it easier to prove a sexual assault actually occurred, as it still produces a “he said/she said” situation unless someone records the encounter. As the Tennessee judge ruled, the only way still to prove one’s innocence is a video tape, as college campuses are pressured by the federal government to take the accuser’s story at face value and find the accused responsible.
There have been some cases where accused students said they did explicitly ask the eventual accuser for consent, and they were still accused. This means that following affirmative consent is no guarantee one will not be accused. In that regard, affirmative consent rules just make accusations more likely, as what is now considered sexual assault has been broadened to include basically all sex.
Connecticut’s House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed the bill 138-7. It will now head to the Senate and, if passed there, the governor. In the article from the Connecticut Mirror announcing the bill’s passage, authors Keith Phaneuf and Jacqueline Rabe Thomas push the debunked claim that one in five women will be assaulted while in college.
Male students in Connecticut must be made aware of this bill, because it makes it a lot easier for a questionable accusation to ruin their education and career prospects permanently.
Ashe Schow is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
