Picking up from yesterday –
So, for me, where is that line within coerced sex, between when it falls into assault territory and when it falls into just annoyingly bad behavior?
If I had to break it down into a sentence, I’d say it basically depends on whether you’re under threat.
– Whether some mix of his demeanor/his past/his words, etc. lead you to believe you’re in danger, and/or if he makes a threat to something/someone you care about and/or something/someone you need (e.g. your livelihood – such as threatening to take away your job).
I know we potentially spend a little too much in metaphor land when talking about sexual assault, but since it seems like that’s sometimes the easiest way, let’s take a trip there for a second.
If person A loves pizza, and is dying to get their friend (person B) to try a certain kind of pizza, but person B doesn’t want any (for any number of reasons(!)), and person A brings out pizza, puts it on the table, and they’re practically begging, “but come on. Come ON. Please. Pretty please? Pretty, pretty, pretty please?”
And the night fully becomes about pizza – but person B is in no way blocked from exiting, and is under no threat of any kind, and person B finally picks up a piece of pizza and shoves it in their own face, and in the middle of giant bites says, “Are you happy now?! Geez to goodness freaking gracious,” I find that to be a really unpleasant night, and not great behavior on the part of person A (especially depending how pushy they were/how frustrated they made person B).
Person B may have a fractured or non-existent relationship with person A after that, depending on how much the night affected them/how upset they are. Person A might be a jerk (or at the very least, may have been acting like one in the moment). But I think a really strong case can be made that person A didn’t really force person B to eat the pizza.
Whereas, if you’re like, “Hey, I’m sorry, but I’m not in the mood for pizza tonight,” and they just shove the pizza right in your mouth anyway – whether or not you officially said the “magic” word “no, and/or if you pull back and say things like, “Come on. Please. Hey! Come on, man!” as you try to keep the pizza out of your mouth – they’re quite literally trying to force you to eat that pizza. If you described that to me later as “they forced me to eat the pizza,” I think that would be an accurate description.
There are other things in life our friends or loved ones kind of wear us down to do sometimes. If, for instance, someone really didn’t… I dunno, let’s say, wanna go to a theme park, and person A, who wanted to go, was like, “come on! Pretty pretty pleeeeease? Please please please?” for hours, or days, or however long on end, and person B was finally just like, “FINE! Oh my gosh, just to shut you up, come on,” and person B grabbed their keys and drove them both to a theme park, I’d agree that person B did not want to go. But I also wouldn’t say person B was forced.
I know it’s kinda nuanced, but I’m trying my best on this tricky subject.
And this is where I’ll pick up tomorrow!