Cathy Young on the Vague, Problematic Rules of 'Affirmative Consent'
Efforts to legislate "affirmative consent" as the standard for college disciplinary proceedings on sexual assault continue to advance. The California bill requiring colleges and universities to adopt such a standard to qualify for state student aid, S.B. 967, was overwhelmingly approved by the State Assembly's Committee on Higher Education on June 24. Now, similar measures may be coming on a federal level. What is affirmative consent, exactly? Cathy Young says that the arguments of its proponents boil down to this: rules so murky that even its advocates aren't sure exactly what it means or how it will work, and which allows virtually any sexual encounter to be reclassified as a violation after the fact, is not a problem because people can be trusted not to abuse it. What could possibly go wrong?