Harvey Weinstein is a monster. And what campus victims are talking about has a lot more gray in it - many more complexities.
Vanessa GrigoriadisRegarding punishment, we've learned from the downfall of Harvey Weinstein and other famous men not only that times have changed, but also that ostracism is an efficient tool. It reminds me of the tradition of bathroom lists of sexual assaulters at Brown beginning in 1990. Back then the administrators called the students who wrote them "magic marker terrorists" and threatened them with expulsion if caught. Now a Shitty Media Men list can dominate the news for days as HR departments across the coasts hastily assess their employees and their liability.
Vanessa GrigoriadisI finally stopped fretting and tried to think of Donald Trump's election as an opportunity. I didn't shift my thesis but I added some lines, in the Blurred Lines introduction, to my description of the progressive awakening that has happened in this country over the last five years - "Trump's presidency is a macroaggression". I wanted Trump to be a specter from the book's outset.
Vanessa GrigoriadisStudents at residential universities often live together and spend time on activities that aren't connected with the university. Then, should the university's rules about sexual consent extend to students' private lives? In my book, I argue that these narrow rules should extend to students' private lives no matter what or where they happen to be conducting those lives. The logic is that sexual assault is a form of discrimination and denies the victim an equal education. The point of university life is to get that diploma and nothing should stand in the way.
Vanessa GrigoriadisLet's reach the students who will abide by a "yes means yes" standard in sexual behavior and reeducate them to use it. And as more and more of them use it, others will adopt it too. We're on our way to a new social norm and that's a beautiful thing.
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 Grigoriadis