If we agree that universities need to monitor sexual violence in various locations, and that they will require students to hew to a narrower set of rules than the wider world, how do we deal with putting these ideas into the brains of teenagers who have been schooled in the disgusting gender norms of our American culture for the previous eighteen years? This is the essential conundrum. Can we teach these relatively young dogs new tricks? I believe that we can.
Vanessa GrigoriadisHarvey Weinstein is a monster. And what campus victims are talking about has a lot more gray in it - many more complexities.
Vanessa GrigoriadisIt's true that a dangerous combination of certainty and ignorance often shows up around sex and consent on campus. People on all sides of the issue have such strong feelings about it that they're blinded to the facts.
Vanessa GrigoriadisColleges are a unique space in our culture. They're a temporary constellation of humans, like a workplace. And the rules about sexual assault and harassment in a workplace are narrow rules. They're stricter than what's considered criminal on a city street. By this logic, the same rules should exist at universities too.
Vanessa GrigoriadisWe need new cultural scripts. Women don't say what we want, and we don't say what we don't want. Unless we're reacting to a stranger, we generally aren't great at turning down someone's advance.
Vanessa GrigoriadisI also believe that upending ingrained ideas about what assault is a gun to the head, a stranger, a parking lot and what consent looks like a woman who gives a no really means yes is very messy. And part of the messiness is some students - and yes, usually these are liberal students - over-determining the definition of assault.
Vanessa Grigoriadis