Reply To: Am I being too pushy on dates? I could use some advice.
So I read the next article involving the word regret, some quotes:
On the nature of regret and its coexistence with consent:
“But what about those encounters where both people consented, but one or both of them later regrets what happened? This is more common than we would want it to be and can get really messy and even hurtful if we don’t manage it well.”
On the nature of regret and consent and the coexistence:
“We all do things that we regret afterwards, despite giving full consent at the time—like, when you gladly ate another slice of pizza and then felt sick afterwards. This is a problem of regret, not consent, and a painful lesson to hopefully make different choices next time. Knowing yourself well and being in a position to remember how you will feel later (that is, not under the influence) makes regret less likely—whether it’s pizza or hook-ups.”
On risk and safety:
“We all have to decide how we handle risk and safety—and therefore whether we tend to regret what we did versus what we missed out on. If you choose a generally safer path, then you need to accept that you will have fewer wild adventures. ”
On the consequences of sex:
“People tend to have strong feelings about sex—what happened or didn’t, how it happened, and what it all means. This makes sex both really tempting, but also fraught with potentially negative feelings afterwards. ”
Now this is something that I think I’ll mull over longer to be fair to Anonymousse:
“Don’t Enable Someone Else’s Regret
Just as we should be considerate of how we will feel about a sexual encounter afterwards, we should also be considerate of how the other person will feel. If the goal is a positive experience that both people will feel good about, then it’s important to not be an enabler to someone else doing something that you know they will probably regret later. For example, if someone is drunk and hooks up with you when you’re pretty sure that they wouldn’t have done it sober, then you are complicit in their bad decision.” The key part is “pretty sure” and there really is not certainty here. I literally came here… uncertain. And now I understand a bit better about why it could come off that way. I think that’s a plus.
The Vox article sure is about college students… but I don’t think that invalidates the issues here. I trust a classroom of students more than 3 people on an internet forum any day. Some quotes:
On the nature of asking (which I did):
“but several did not disguise how puzzled they felt…whoever initiates things to another level has to ask…”
A literal header:
“There is still a lot of confusion over consent”
On legal definitions (which tbh, I don’t buy… but they highlight the confusion over consent. Again, I asked, had a follow up conversation about what’s fun, what the person liked in bed, and if this my partner was having fun:
“And laws around consent are changing. Two years ago, California became the first state to mandate a “yes means yes” rule, meaning that sexual consent is defined by the presence of a “yes,” not the absence of a “no”
Here, have a NYtimes article on the nature of consent and confusion around it:
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/15/us/california-high-schools-sexual-consent-classes.html
On the confusing nature of consent:
“They sat in groups to brainstorm ways to ask for affirmative consent. They crossed off a list of options: “Can I touch you there?” Too clinical. “Do you want to do this?” Too tentative. “Do you like that?” Not direct enough.”
From a women, talking about confusion:
“Students will ask, “Can I have sex when we are both drunk?” she said. “I get this one a lot: If I hook up with a girl and the next day she decides she didn’t want to do it, then what do I do?…Ms. Zaloom will typically use such questions as a way to begin talking about the benefits of sexual partners’ knowing each other. But sometimes, there are no straightforward answers,”
All of these articles are pretty clear… that the conversation about consent is ever going and unclear. I’m glad I read those instead of listening to the forum… which tbh feels like a real echo chamber (I’ve never actually believed these existed) of what is Right and Wrong, and what’s the right way to think, as deemed by the members in it. I feel a lot more at ease. Good luck to you all.
