Penn State begins bystander intervention training program (sexual harassment)
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"The first phase of the bystander intervention initiative will train the instructors by providing a group of Penn State faculty and staff with the skills and understanding to know when it is appropriate to intervene and how to do it."
The intentions behind this "program" may be all well and good (or maybe not).....but in either event, who can't see this coming - the first time a "trained" individual gets involved in a situation that turns south:
And Penn State now has a Bystander Intervention Initiative? Really?
Better ramp up the staffing for the Internal Counsel office too.....a dozen in-house attorneys ain't gonna' be enough.
I am certainly alert to your concerns in this, especially given that the leadership at our University is so poor. However, Bystander Intervention is the ONLY way out of societal problems like bullying, sexual abuse, sexual harassment, etc. In NYC, they say, "if you see something, say something." Often people take the term Intervention to mean physical intervention, and that is not the only way you can intervene. This training will focus on situations you might encounter and what you should do SHORT OF PHYSICAL intervention. If it is a good program it will simultaneously focus on how to protect yourself as a University employee by documenting your interactions if you are reporting something that could result in embarrassment to your employer and therefore threaten your job somehow."The first phase of the bystander intervention initiative will train the instructors by providing a group of Penn State faculty and staff with the skills and understanding to know when it is appropriate to intervene and how to do it."
The intentions behind this "program" may be all well and good (or maybe not).....but in either event, who can't see this coming - the first time a "trained" individual gets involved in a situation that turns south:
And Penn State now has a Bystander Intervention Initiative? Really?
Better ramp up the staffing for the Internal Counsel office too.....a dozen in-house attorneys ain't gonna' be enough.
Whether people get abused or harassed on the PSU campus is the business of every person on that campus, PSU employee, student, or not. It is our flagship University. If you tolerate abuse or harassment because you think it is none of your business, you will get more of it. If your workplace or your school or your town becomes know thereafter as a place where abuse is tolerated, you should not complain. You tolerated it.
We use the term "innocent bystander" all the time, but a bystander who witnesses an injustice and does nothing is not innocent, especially if there is physical danger or fear being used.
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Not if the training is properly done. Suppose the soldier who lit this candle had a legit concern. He simply asks the guy who he is, whether he served, and maybe why he has that unusual belt buckle or other non-uniform seeming item of dress. Remember, it is not necessary to investigate the case and get justice in the first 5 minutes. What the soldier, and if you believe the reports, the Marine veteran cop did was bystander judge jury and executioner, not proper bystander intervention.
My concerns (I won't say fears....because it's not like it's my dog in the fight) is this "training program". I suppose I would have fewer concerns if it was an "awareness program".
Agreed - of course - that decent human beings should behave decently.....and that includes standing up to injustices. That said, this "program" states that they are going to "train" a handful of folks - then have those folks go out and "train" others. That - to me - sounds like a recipe for trouble.
When a person goes through "training" I would assume that connotes some degree of authority and expertise.....and potential LIABILITY if things go poorly. Liability to the "trained" individual, and liability to the organization (PSU) that bestowed the credential.
Maybe I am reading it wrong, and I certainly don't have any legal expertise, but if I am someone who's situation is mishandled, I think I might look at things differently if the catalyst for the mishandling was some random "folk" who took it upon themselves to step in when they thought they were encountering a legit problem, vs someone who was "trained" (authorized?) to take certain actions. Again, maybe I am looking at it incorrectly.....but it sounds to me like something equivalent to some half-assed deputization - which I would, personally, want no part of (ie, I certainly wouldn't want to be "deputized" via some 12 hour seminar)
They should probably start with the administrator who purportedly refused to investigate KDR.
Here's some stuff about the Green Dot Program:
Dozens of schools in a number of states are now implementing the MVP program, and similar initiatives are popping up across the country. The Green Dot program, launched at the University of Kentucky three years ago, has “spread like wildfire” to more than 20 states, according to Edwards. Green Dot encourages students to think of the “3Ds” (direct action, delegation, or distraction) when witnessing violence. While socially confident students might be able to address the problem directly, shy bystanders could make an anonymous phone call, send a text to a friend, or divert the perpetrator. “You can be just as effective by delegating," Edwards says.
For teenagers, who are often particularly concerned about social acceptance from their peers, Green Dot promotes distracting the perpetrator(s) as another option. One student who completed the Green Dot bystander training later prevented one of his friends from taking advantage of an intoxicated girl at a party by telling him that the police were towing his car outside, Edwards recalls. The friend, who had been in the process of persuading the girl to accompany him upstairs, stopped what he was doing and ran outside to check on his car. By the time he came back, the girl’s friends had taken her home. “Most people want to do the right thing,” Edwards says. “You can’t just say to teenagers that it shouldn’t have mattered if they were afraid to stand up in front of their friends—because it does matter. We need to give people a broader tool chest that takes into account their obstacles.”
Research is still needed to determine the effectiveness of bystander-awareness programs in schools, but the initial results are promising. One study found that after the Sioux City School District in Iowa implemented the MVP program, the number of freshman boys who said they could help prevent violence against women and girls increased by 50 percent. The number of ninth-grade boys who indicated that their peers would listen to them about respecting women and girls increased by 30 percent. The Centers for Disease Control recently gave $2 million to Green Dot as part of a long-term study to see if the bystander-education program does in fact diminish violence in high-school populations. The study will involve about 28,000 students in 26 Kentucky high schools. Half the schools will receive Green Dot training, and the other half will serve as a control group. The study’s hypothesis is that students who receive Green Dot training will show improved bystander skills, allowing them to recognize and reduce tolerance for violence among their peers.
BJF,I think this partly addresses your concerns about the "training." A good bit of the training is thinking about alternatives to direct action. This would seemingly allay your fears about creating a campus full of self-help Rambos. (Full disclosure: I received two days of training from Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP) a similar program to Green Dot, and I have trained others, including HS students. In the first two years at the one small HS where we started the program, the incidence of fighting and bullying reports to the principal dropped by over a third.) These programs work.
Imagine a redhaired grad assistant on the PSU FB staff sees something which seems inappropriate going on between a coach in his sixties and a kid who seems to be a preteen, naked in the shower. What do we want that guy to do? Are we fine with the way MM handled it, or would we like him to have some training about what to do? Do we want him to go home and not tell anyone but his family anything about it until tomorrow, then have him report it to an 84 yo football coach? Or are we saying we want him to beat the snot out of Jerry and ask questions later? Those are NOT the only two choices. Training would have taught big red that much.
Dozens of schools in a number of states are now implementing the MVP program, and similar initiatives are popping up across the country. The Green Dot program, launched at the University of Kentucky three years ago, has “spread like wildfire” to more than 20 states, according to Edwards. Green Dot encourages students to think of the “3Ds” (direct action, delegation, or distraction) when witnessing violence. While socially confident students might be able to address the problem directly, shy bystanders could make an anonymous phone call, send a text to a friend, or divert the perpetrator. “You can be just as effective by delegating," Edwards says.
For teenagers, who are often particularly concerned about social acceptance from their peers, Green Dot promotes distracting the perpetrator(s) as another option. One student who completed the Green Dot bystander training later prevented one of his friends from taking advantage of an intoxicated girl at a party by telling him that the police were towing his car outside, Edwards recalls. The friend, who had been in the process of persuading the girl to accompany him upstairs, stopped what he was doing and ran outside to check on his car. By the time he came back, the girl’s friends had taken her home. “Most people want to do the right thing,” Edwards says. “You can’t just say to teenagers that it shouldn’t have mattered if they were afraid to stand up in front of their friends—because it does matter. We need to give people a broader tool chest that takes into account their obstacles.”
Research is still needed to determine the effectiveness of bystander-awareness programs in schools, but the initial results are promising. One study found that after the Sioux City School District in Iowa implemented the MVP program, the number of freshman boys who said they could help prevent violence against women and girls increased by 50 percent. The number of ninth-grade boys who indicated that their peers would listen to them about respecting women and girls increased by 30 percent. The Centers for Disease Control recently gave $2 million to Green Dot as part of a long-term study to see if the bystander-education program does in fact diminish violence in high-school populations. The study will involve about 28,000 students in 26 Kentucky high schools. Half the schools will receive Green Dot training, and the other half will serve as a control group. The study’s hypothesis is that students who receive Green Dot training will show improved bystander skills, allowing them to recognize and reduce tolerance for violence among their peers.
BJF,I think this partly addresses your concerns about the "training." A good bit of the training is thinking about alternatives to direct action. This would seemingly allay your fears about creating a campus full of self-help Rambos. (Full disclosure: I received two days of training from Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP) a similar program to Green Dot, and I have trained others, including HS students. In the first two years at the one small HS where we started the program, the incidence of fighting and bullying reports to the principal dropped by over a third.) These programs work.
Imagine a redhaired grad assistant on the PSU FB staff sees something which seems inappropriate going on between a coach in his sixties and a kid who seems to be a preteen, naked in the shower. What do we want that guy to do? Are we fine with the way MM handled it, or would we like him to have some training about what to do? Do we want him to go home and not tell anyone but his family anything about it until tomorrow, then have him report it to an 84 yo football coach? Or are we saying we want him to beat the snot out of Jerry and ask questions later? Those are NOT the only two choices. Training would have taught big red that much.
Not only that but it seems like such a system is rife for abuse in the opposite direction - arrogant, self-absorbed parties sticking their nose into a private matter where neither involved party is being "abused", asking for help or IN REALITY in need of help. Have you ever noticed how it is the worst parents who feel that their kids can do no wrong, are entitled to do, and act, however they please in public places (including extremely rudely), should not be publicly admonished, are "entitled" to act however they please (diametric opposite of considerate), etc... ALWAYS believe the are "super parents", enamoured with their own sensibilities and ALWAYS the first to inject themselves and their opinions upon others who have not asked for their advice or opinions?
The make-up of local PTAs is a classic example... How's this one, my 11-Year old son is at a school field trip, I notice some kid who is not even playing with my son or his friend's repeatedly yelling at them, giving them instructions, odering them as to what they can do it, etc... My son and his friends just ignore this beyond-obnoxious kid, but that only makes it continue to happen. Finally, I go over and tell the kid to take a breath, go find his friends, stop worrying about my son & his friends, go have some fun and let the teachers worry about the kids. Kid says to me, "My Mom is President of the PTA so you better leave me alone or I'm going to report you.". And I kid you not, this is exactly what he said and my son told me later what he routinely says to kids at school to justify his "entitlement" to harass his classmates. As if I care, or should care, about the "opinions" of an overly-involved, self-impressed adult who views the PTA as some kind of political/social status barometer given the way they have raised their own child who is a textbook example of a zero-authority tyrant, e.g., "bully", enamoured with themselves and a sense of "entitlement" which is the root problem of all "bullies".
I would hope. Nice to hear from a "real" situation where this yielded "real" benefits.
As with most stuff like this...the devil is in the details. If it has the intended result....I'm all for it!
I hope this bystander intervention addresses an admin's inability to tell the difference between rolled up tape and a joint
I would hope. Nice to hear from a "real" situation where this yielded "real" benefits.
As with most stuff like this...the devil is in the details. If it has the intended result....I'm all for it!
There are some moving parts here--specifically the employee has to feel they have the authority to act if only in a non-direct way, though diversion or delegation. That means management has to PROTECT the person when they do the right thing, not fire them claiming a failure of leadership.
It also means you cannot be placing handcuffs on employees who would call a cop by making them keep it "in-house." I concede that Joe Paterno had no legal duty to call the police, but boy would his life have turned out better if he had called the PA state police and documented that in an email to his bosses.
Just saying if you knew how to intervene appropriately you might be able to shut that little big mouth down.
No offense here, but there are a couple people posting here who literally don't have a clue what they are talking about. These bystander interventions are taking place everywhere and there is millions of government research dollars being thrown at developing and implementing more programs nationwide. I'm actually part of one of those studies at a state university related to sexual assault and we are also developing a similar intervention for high schools that will begin phase 1 this fall.
The "intervention" is simply about educating people about the issues, providing factual knowledge about it, and providing guidelines for intervening. The hallmark for this training first and foremost is to not put yourself in danger or try to take things into your own hands. That is ALWAYS explicitly stated in the material and covered extensively.
With regard to sexual assault, we have targeted men on campus who are at elevated risk for sexual assault AND high levels of alcohol consumption. We do a single individual session with these men as a direct intervention, but also have a large bystander intervention nested within the project. That aspect involves 2 group workshops where we provide facts and figures related to sexual assault on college campuses, discuss how alcohol plays a role, define sexual assault in legal terms and also discuss moral issues that might not cross the threshold for a crime, and then discuss both how to identify warning signs and how to intervene if needed.
Again, this is absolutely, positively NOT a case where they are training some type of pseudo police force to monitor parties or anything like that. This is a VERY good thing and I'm glad to see PSU being a leader in an area that is going to start happening everywhere. It's already been taking place (I've been doing this at other universities for nearly 2 years) so this isn't something PSU dreamed up and implemented on their own or even in direct response to the sandusky issues.
If people have specific questions, I'm glad to speak generally about bystander interventions. I'm not privy to the exact format of this Green Dot program, but I'm sure it follows the standard, established guidelines. Either way, after reading some of the posts here, it is clear that some people are really misunderstanding the nature of these programs and wanted to set the record straight. This is nothing but a good thing for PSU (and every other university doing similar programs).
The "intervention" is simply about educating people about the issues, providing factual knowledge about it, and providing guidelines for intervening. The hallmark for this training first and foremost is to not put yourself in danger or try to take things into your own hands. That is ALWAYS explicitly stated in the material and covered extensively.
With regard to sexual assault, we have targeted men on campus who are at elevated risk for sexual assault AND high levels of alcohol consumption. We do a single individual session with these men as a direct intervention, but also have a large bystander intervention nested within the project. That aspect involves 2 group workshops where we provide facts and figures related to sexual assault on college campuses, discuss how alcohol plays a role, define sexual assault in legal terms and also discuss moral issues that might not cross the threshold for a crime, and then discuss both how to identify warning signs and how to intervene if needed.
Again, this is absolutely, positively NOT a case where they are training some type of pseudo police force to monitor parties or anything like that. This is a VERY good thing and I'm glad to see PSU being a leader in an area that is going to start happening everywhere. It's already been taking place (I've been doing this at other universities for nearly 2 years) so this isn't something PSU dreamed up and implemented on their own or even in direct response to the sandusky issues.
If people have specific questions, I'm glad to speak generally about bystander interventions. I'm not privy to the exact format of this Green Dot program, but I'm sure it follows the standard, established guidelines. Either way, after reading some of the posts here, it is clear that some people are really misunderstanding the nature of these programs and wanted to set the record straight. This is nothing but a good thing for PSU (and every other university doing similar programs).
Given the sorry state of PSU's leadership, this is the most important thing you could have said. We have been trained by experience to think, if PSU is doing it, it must be some sneaky, F'ed up BS. thanks.
Complete BS. The "class" would be better named "PSU Begin Lawsuit Exposure Mitigation and Lowered Insurance Costs Training"
I hear that for sure. Rest assured, this is a nationwide movement that has been happening for years. The theory stems the belief that 5% of perpetrators are "immune" to standard prevention attempts. The only way to stop those perpetrators is by putting them in a "culture" (I know, I know... another bad word around here) where that behavior is not acceptable and where they will be called out for their actions. These programs are as much about changing a culture as they are about directly intervening.
I can tell you after meeting with many college males, it's astounding how many don't realize that having sex with someone who is extremely intoxicated can be sexual assault even if they don't say no. The culture on college campuses regarding sex has reveled some very concerning beliefs about what people think is "normal" and acceptable. These programs are aimed at educating people on the actual facts and how to disseminate that to the entire community.
The fundamental building block is the phenomenon where there can be one person in a group bragging about hooking up with a drunk girl while everyone else is thinking to themselves, "that's not cool, man". However, everyone in the group assumes that they are the only one thinking that way and everyone else is on board. The desire to fit in and be "masculine" is so strong that many guys sit back and let things they don;t agree with morally slide without comment or even join in!
Our main consultant on the project has been doing work with college sports teams, professional teams, and the US military for nearly a decade.
I certainly don't think that it's right for a guy to get a girl drunk so she'll have sex with him. And it should certainly be considered rape to roofie a girl or feed her punch that is spiked with grain alcohol to incapacitate her.
I do have some concerns, however, about what we're teaching young women about personal responsibility when we allow them to cry "rape" when they willingly get drunk and then have sex (willingly) with a guy. Are we going to allow the same young woman to say it's not her fault when she gets drunk and then runs over someone with a car? That somehow she "couldn't give consent" to be driving because she was drunk? Are we really going to teach young women that they are not responsible for the things they decide to do when they're drunk?
Again, I want to draw a bright line between a cases where the woman is clearly not a willing participant (either says "no" or struggles or is passed out) or where someone has acted to deliberate incapacitate her without her knowledge (both clearly wrong) and a case where she has willingly gotten drunk (or stoned) and willingly participated in sex. Say that both partners are drunk or stoned. Who's to say who was raping who? Why is the drunk male any more responsible for the drunk female for sex that one party or the other regrets the day after?
This is one aspect of this latest crusade that I just don't get... Maybe you can help...
I have to agree. If more people would just say something, it would have impact. It is amazing how many people either are afraid, or just don't want to get involved.
This program is important.
Another important intervention program already started is Alumni Intervention for BOT and AA Council cronyism.
No one is "crying rape" in those situations...because it is still very likely a sexual assault occurred. You seem to think we are teaching them to "cry rape" for regretted sex, which is absolutely not the case. The waters get pretty murky when one or both parties are extremely intoxicated, but I can tell you that I have worked with males who have been convicted or plead down sexual assault charges for having sex with a female that was extremely intoxicated (I have also worked with male on male and have seen cases of female on male and female on female).
This is EXACTLY what this training is about. Males (and females for that matter) who have sex with an intoxicated person are taking a BIG risk because if they are too drunk to give consent, even if they willing put themselves in that situation, they very possibly have a legitimate claim of being assaulted. Even if the accused wins the case, they should be questioning whether it was really worth it to have to get a lawyer, defend claims and their good name, and spend thousands of dollars to do so just to have sex one night with someone clearly intoxicated.
Sexual assault is not like hitting someone with a car for obvious reasons. What you are talking about is an extreme subset of cases that almost never happens. People wrongly and drastically over estimate how much that happens, but it is almost never does. In fact, the cases of legitimate sexual assault that go unreported are literally 100x more common that cases of regretted sex reported as an assault.
At the end of the day however, in most states, if you have sex with someone too intoxicated to give consent, you are putting yourself at risk for being accused of assault. The question is, is it really with it? The responsibility is on both parties to make sure that they are both willing participants and sober enough to make that decision. One thing you should know however is that not saying no and not struggling are very, very common. In fact, many victims of sexual assault freeze up and do nothing. This is another major aspect of the training... correcting misconceptions of what sexual assault looks like. It's not what you see on TV with a stranger, a weapon, a victim screaming and fighting, etc. The actual statistics show that those cases are actually a distinct minority. It's far more common for a victim to lay there in silence out of fear, which is why obtaining clear consent is so vital.
As for your specific question, it's not always the guy. It's whoever initiates sex, which just happens to be the guy more times than not. If a girl is wasted and jumps a guys bones, it's highly, highly unlikely that she is going to wake up and claim assault. People think that happens all the time, but it almost never does. If she does, its unfortunate and hopefully there is enough witness showing that she was the aggressor. Again though, at the end of the day, both parties should be asking themselves.... is this worth the risk? Drunk sex is not inherently illegal, but it certainly can be a giant can of worms. Some people have had to learn that the hard way.
If you get really drunk and stumble down a dark alley in a bad part of town, that's really, really stupid and shame on you for putting yourself in that situation. However, if someone beats you up and steals your wallet, they are still committing a crime. This is the same thing in most cases. The subset you are asking about is not the intent nor the practice of these laws and are extremely, extremely rare. No one is telling young women (or males) that they can get drunk and not be held accountable. What they laws states is that even when you are fall down drunk, no one has a right to touch you sexually without your explicit consent. In many cases, consent becomes a gray area and victims will almost never make assault accusations if the sex was wanted and will far too often not report it even if it was unwanted. The question is always, do you want to open that can of worms. Besides, many men think it is morally wrong to obtain consent from someone in an altered state who might not be of sound mind. Most guys in our program feel that way and I think it's concerning when guys don't.
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If it was obvious to me, I wouldn't have asked the question.
Case A:
20 year old woman goes to party, drinks a ton of beer, gets drunk, freely has sex with 20-year old male she meets at party.
Rape? Not rape?
Case B:
20 year old woman goes to party, drinks a ton of beer, gets drunk, drives home, runs over someone.
Vehicular homicide? Not vehicular homicide?
Spell it out for me. Why is the 20-year old woman responsible for her decision in Case B but not Case A?
The difference is inherent in the word "freely." Was she so intoxicated she was incapable of consent? We know what the limit is fro driving a car: .08 in most states. My guess is at .08 she can still consent to sex, which takes less skill than driving a car.
Huh?
Let's try again.
Case A:
20 year old woman goes to party, drinks a ton of beer, gets drunk, has a BAC of .12, freely has sex with 20-year old male she meets at party.
Rape? Not rape?
Case B:
20 year old woman goes to party, drinks a ton of beer, gets drunk, has a BAC of .12, drives home, runs over someone.
Vehicular homicide? Not vehicular homicide?
Why is the 20-year old woman responsible for her decision to drive in Case B but not her decision to have sex in Case A?
What is not clear? What matters in consent to sex is not the absolute scientific limit of alcohol she has consumed and her BAC. What matters is whether from all the evidence she has the capacity to grant her consent. As the poster pointed out, it is a pretty slippery standard and NOT one you should, as a male, be taking any chances with.
Granting consent is not a physical act like driving a car. Intoxication erodes your driving skills to the point that you are dangerous. It also erodes your ability to give consent, but since giving consent is not a physical skillset, it is hard to say how, and the variation among people is quite large. Certainly when she is passed out we both agree she cannot consent. If she is capable of giving consent when she gives consent, conscious and able to act of her own volition, then it is not rape. Guys need to understand this will be judged in hindsight, not by breath test, and through the testimony of the others who were there. Along with HIV and warts and syphilis, it is one of the things which comes along with sleeping with strangers you pick up at random. Good luck out there! And don't forget to wrap that rascal!
Thus when a "too intoxicated to consent" case comes up, defendants win a fair bit of the time, but of course, "I was charged with rape but acquitted" is hardly a resume` builder.
What is not clear? What matters in consent to sex is not the absolute scientific limit of alcohol she has consumed and her BAC. What matters is whether from all the evidence she has the capacity to grant her consent. As the poster pointed out, it is a pretty slippery standard and NOT one you should, as a male, be taking any chances with.
Granting consent is not a physical act like driving a car. Intoxication erodes your driving skills to the point that you are dangerous. It also erodes your ability to give consent, but since giving consent is not a physical skillset, it is hard to say how, and the variation among people is quite large. Certainly when she is passed out we both agree she cannot consent. If she is capable of giving consent when she gives consent, conscious and able to act of her own volition, then it is not rape. Guys need to understand this will be judged in hindsight, not by breath test, and through the testimony of the others who were there. Along with HIV and warts and syphilis, it is one of the things which comes along with sleeping with strangers you pick up at random. Good luck out there! And don't forget to wrap that rascal!
Thus when a "too intoxicated to consent" case comes up, defendants win a fair bit of the time, but of course, "I was charged with rape but acquitted" is hardly a resume` builder.
You're not answering the question that I asked.
Why is the 20-year old woman responsible for her decision to drive in Case B but not her decision to have sex in Case A?
You do understand that you are equating committing a crime with being raped? Whether the guy is charged or convicted or not, she still had a terrible experience. But the STANDARDS applied by society are different because they are different situations. This is the third time I have provided this same answer in one way or another. The. Standards. Are. Different.
For good reason I might add. The situations are different. Suppose instead of raping her he strangles her, still think that compares? Does she give up her right to be safe if she is intoxicated? does he get to murder her if she's intoxicated? And walk? You want to put the burden on her, but it is and always will remain on the sexual aggressor. he must have consent. if he does not have it, or its equivocal, he may get charged. the whole point of the training the poster was talking about is to make sure men understand this so THEY can act in accord with their own interests.
If she does not have the capacity for consent, then she did not "freely " do anything.
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Why are you assuming she had a "terrible experience?" From the beginning I specifically said that I am drawing a bright line between my hypothetical case and cases in which the woman did not want to have sex or in which someone had deliberately (and maliciously) incapacitated her. What's being taught today is that even if the woman says "yes, yes, yes" and is having a grand old time, she can call it rape if she was drunk. In my hypothetical case I'm saying she was a little drunk and happily had sex with a guy. She wanted to have sex with him and she enjoyed it. So who's the "sexual aggressor" if they both wanted to have sex? We are teaching young women that they can call this "rape" three months later. We're saying that a 20-year-old tipsy woman has precisely the same inability to give "consent" as an 8 year old girl. This infantilizes women and is a giant step back for feminism. If this tipsy 20 year old is responsible for her decision to drive a car, she is responsible for her decision to climb into bed with someone. I think that teaching young women that they are not responsible for what they do when they are drunk is a bad, bad idea and completely anti-feminist.
Find me a case where she said "yes, yes, yes" and the guy was found guilty of rape. If she was a little drunk and happily had sex with him then she consented. NO CASE.
You are creating a class of cases which does not exist. Only you said she could claim rape if she was drunk. She can only claim to have been raped if she did not consent. No idea what your agenda is with this, but I think approximately no feminists would argue that the criminal justice system has gone too far in favor of rape victims.
You are creating a scenario where the female gives consent, albeit intoxicated, and then claims to have been raped. As I noted, that is some super extreme example and you would be hard pressed to find a conviction in a case like that. The message we provide in trainings is that your partner has every ability to claim they were raped, even if they consented but don't remember. The chances of that happening are so slim that anyone would do that... but it could happen. By choosing to have sex with someone who is potentially black out drunk you open yourself to the risk of such an accusation. Chances are very good that such a case would never lead to a conviction, but really.... it is worth the risk? Are you THAT desperate for some action that you are willing to take advantage of someone who is in a compromised state of mind? Do you honestly not have any moral issue with having sex with someone so drunk they might not even remember it?
The obvious difference I'm discussing is that sexual assault is someone committing a crime against the drunk individual. Drunk driving is the drunk individual committing a crime. I'm not sure why this has to be explained.... The piece you are missing is that the responsibility with regard to sex falls on both parties to ensure that their partner is a willing participant and of sound mind to provide consent. For your strange hypothetical to be accurate, the person the DD hit would also have to be drunk and give them permission to hit them....
Bottom line, your hypothetical of a female being extremely drunk and providing consent in some manner and then claiming to have been assaulted after the fact is extremely, extremely rare. You almost NEVER see cases like that, but when you do, it's resides in a very big grey area. If guys have no moral issues with sleeping with someone in a compromised state, are willing to take the risks that come along with it, I'm not sure I can feel sorry for them. They can have their day in court to explain their actions. Point being, these cases are so extremely rare that in absolutely no way, shape, or form are we "teaching young females" that they are not held accountable for their actions when intoxicated. Even in in these cases, you think going through the process is fun for them? You think there aren't a number of people who will rip them to shreds for their actions? There is a reason that so many legitimately raped victims don't ever come forward. When someone is so drunk they aren't even sure what happened... no one is putting themselves through that unless they have some type of mental health issue.
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I think that you're blissfully unaware of what's going on with this issue. You should read spud's post, because he is arguing exactly this, and he is apparently involved in this kind of training.
He says, "Males (and females for that matter) who have sex with an intoxicated person are taking a BIG risk because if they are too drunk to give consent, even if they willing put themselves in that situation, they very possibly have a legitimate claim of being assaulted."
Ask him what he considers "too drunk to give consent." I'm pretty sure he doesn't mean falling-down, unconscious drunk. He means that if your son has sex with a girl who's had four beers, he can be called a rapist (even if he is equally drunk and she is just as keen to have sex).
And there have indeed been a number of lawsuits over this issue.
This is a tragedy in the making on a number of fronts:
- Reinforces the sexist notion that men are always the "sexual aggressors"
- Infantilizes women by saying they are not responsible for their own actions/decisions
- By calling "regretted sex" "rape" (which is what we are doing, notwithstanding spud's protestations) we undermine true rape victims
You say this despite his post immediately before yours which says your scenario almost never happens. O---kay.
"Almost never" is going to become more and more frequent as this "training" becomes the norm. We're already seeing it.
The focus should be on preventing real rape, and not on turning "oopsie, I got drunk and had sex with someone I didn't mean to" into rape.
I don't set myself up as arbiter of what is "real rape" or as Rep. Todd Akin called it, "legitimate rape." http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/21/u...itimate-rape-statement-and-reaction.html?_r=0
The training which I am familiar with is not asking that laws be changed. It is training to encourage people to conform their behavior to the existing law.
How is training people to conform to the law as it is going to increase the number of rape claims?
This training isn't about criminal law. It's about Title IX and campus discipline. And it's a mess because they are calling actions that would not be considered "rape" under the law (ie drunk consensual sex) "rape" for the purposes of expelling students. The fundamental problem is that the Department of Education is redefining "sexual assault" and "rape" and it's also forcing universities to set up kangaroo courts to handle matters that ought to be handled through the criminal justice system. I have always been a huge fan of Title IX but things are really going off the rails.
Truly, you ought to read up on this issue if you want to have a discussion about it.
I don't care what Universities do, and this training has to do with bystander effectiveness, not with changing the rules on college campuses. I can assure you I know quite a bit about bystander intervention AND about the sort of counseling that shows people how to avoid getting themselves in a jam. If you want to have a go at changing the rules on college campuses, go ahead. Not my issue.
There are some moving parts here--specifically the employee has to feel they have the authority to act if only in a non-direct way, though diversion or delegation. That means management has to PROTECT the person when they do the right thing, not fire them claiming a failure of leadership.
under the policy in effect at the time, JVP would have been fired for violating university policy. Remember JVP did the maximum allowed under law and policy.
No--pretty standard for this kind of thing. I've had a little training in the area. MM is a different story, of course.
