I have been reading a lot of articles about consent recently. I have been thinking a lot about what it means to say “yes” and what it means to say “no.” A binary approach to rape sentencing can certainly be helpful: it provides absolutely no get-out clause for rapists. They either raped or they didn’t.
However, sentencing aside, in the events leading up to a rape the idea that someone can simply state a definite ‘yes’ or a definite ‘no’ seems oversimplified. There are so many reasons why a ‘yes’ might mean ‘no’ and vice versa. I want to explore this idea – the difficulties of saying ‘yes’ – by sharing an experience of my own. I am going to outline the experience, and then consider why it suggests a complexity in a ‘yes.’