California's new rape law (and an announcement)

First the announcement: I'm making some big changes to my blogging soon. After putting up the excerpt to my novel, I realized the format was not best suited to reading a longer passage like that. White on gray looks pretty cool, but it's not the most readable text. (White on black looks cooler, but it's even less readable.) Moreover, transferring my writing from my ODF file manuscript to blogger was a headache. Then it occurred to me I could perhaps attract more readership by aiming for several niches rather than just a catch-all blog.

So, I've decided to use three blogs. One will be at Wordpress, and it will have stories, poetry, reviews, and discussions about writing and creativity in general. This will also include science, since SF is one of my reading and writing interests.  This one will be called, "Singing Stars and Shrieking Shadows." Or just "Stars and Shadows." It will have a format conducive to longer reading.

The second will be a political and social commentary blog, it's going to be called "Further Out Left." The title should say everything about its political orientation, and mine.

This blog will be both the personal one and the catch-all for any other subject. I might change the title of it, though I don't yet know to what else. I'm brainstorming.

After the jump, to my commentary about California's new affirmative consent rape law.
California Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill into law making "affirmative consent" the standard by which universities in the state investigating campus misconduct will judge whether rape or sexual assault took place, i.e.,

This means that during an investigation of an alleged sexual assault, university disciplinary committees will have to ask if the sexual encounter met a standard where both parties were consenting, with consent defined as "an affirmative, conscious and voluntary agreement to engage in sexual activity." Notice that the words "verbal" or "stone sober" are not included in that definition. The drafters understand, as most of us do when we're actually having sex, that sometimes sexual consent is nonverbal and that there's a difference between drunk, consensual sex and someone pushing himself on a woman who is too drunk to resist.  

 http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2014/09/29/affirmative_consent_in_california_gov_jerry_brown_signs_the_yes_means_yes.html

The problem of sexual assault on college campuses is nothing minor. Some criticize this as the government micromanaging student sexuality. I see that as Conservative cynicism. How are universities to proceed in investigations of sexual misconduct when consent is ill-defined, yet so central to modern sexual ethics? Historically, rape used to be a violation of some other male's property. Now that guilt an innocence is turning on the consent of the involved persons, society hasn't reached a point where that's even well-defined. But people who get away with rape on college campuses would obviously be inclined repeat. People complete their adolescence in college. A twisted experience and message about sexual consent is likely to have a lifetime effect on the people involved.

The law is rather limited. We could call it a trial balloon. It doesn't mandate positive consent as the standard in the legal system. No defendant in a sexual assault case will be judged criminal guilty by the standard. That would be radically different.   

Some people I respect very much, such as sex educator Laci Green, advocate a standard like this. The measure is so simple, if we don't try it--then in my opinion-- we actually haven't tried to address the issue. Since human social and sexual behavior is chaotic, it could have unforeseen consequences, of course.

But it might have some real benefits. First of all, it empowers women. It tells them that if they communicate their consent or non-consent, institutions will respect it. Second, it would solve the problem of trying to infer consent from a woman's previous behavior, by how much she drank, but how she was dressed; it takes all the tea-leaf reading and demeaning investigation out of it. "Did she consent?" Yes or no. The investigation is simplified.

Of course, it doesn't really solve the issue where he says she consented, she denies it, and there were no witnesses to verify one way or the other. If consent cannot be determined, however, then it defaults to the principle of innocent until proven guilty. Past behavior or style of dress, or anything else would have no bearing on whether consent was given. So, investigators should be disinclined to torment the woman with irrelevant questions.

This could be a turning point in for our society away from rape culture. You don't think it exists? I was skeptical, too, until I read about the Steubenville rape, and then other cases where the community closed ranks to keep possible suspects from even being investigated. Yes, it does exist, and it's very much alive and thriving.