\u201cTwenty-four hours ago \u2026 Aziz Ansari was a man whom many people admired and whose work, although very well paid, also performed a social good,\u201d Caitlin Flanagan, a contributing editor for The Atlantic stated in an article. \u201cNow he has been \u2014 in a professional sense \u2014 assassinated, on the basis of one woman\u2019s anonymous account.\u201d<\/p>\n
The event to which Flanagan refers occurred last month, when a 23-year-old woman told a staff writer from the feminist website, Babe.net, the story of \u201cthe worst night of her life.\u201d It began as a date with the comedian and actor and ended with her holding back tears \u201cin the hallway, outside his place, pressing the down button on the elevator.\u201d<\/p>\n
The woman said, \u201cI cried the whole ride home. \u2026 I felt violated.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to her report, she met Ansari at a party a few weeks before, and eventually the two went on a date \u2014 one which very quickly moved to Ansari\u2019s apartment.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn a second, his hand was on my breast,\u201d the woman said.<\/p>\n
According to her account, Ansari continued \u201caggressively kissing\u201d her and attempting to engage in intercourse for the rest of the evening.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou ignored clear, non-verbal cues; you kept going with advances,\u201d the woman texted Ansari the following day. She later admitted that she never asked him to stop. \u201cI know I was physically giving off cues that I wasn\u2019t interested,\u201d she told Babe. \u201cI don\u2019t think that was noticed at all.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m so sad to hear this,\u201d Ansari responded. \u201cClearly, I misread things in the moment and I\u2019m truly sorry.\u201d<\/p>\n
This story has been publicized as another regrettable #MeToo story, but I see a problem here. Ansari\u2019s behavior is not at all the same as those alongside whom he has been shamed. More succinctly, Ansari is not a predator.<\/p>\n
Sexual assault is no small issue. According to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, an average of 321,500 sexual assaults occur each year in the U.S. alone. That\u2019s an outrage. Sexual assault is a violation of one\u2019s most sacred space, a blatant undermining of intimacy and trust.<\/p>\n
Sexual harassment is a thoughtless, inappropriate move in the same direction and is no less undermining.<\/p>\n
\u201cSexual misconduct,\u201d Ansari\u2019s indictment, is the umbrella term referring to any sexual offense that involves a disregard of consent. But is it right to consider Ansari\u2019s case one of sexual misconduct? Or was it, rather, a bad date? \u201cBad sex,\u201d as Bari Weiss of\u00a0 The New York Times termed it.<\/p>\n
\u201cLumping him in with the same movement that brought down men who ran movie studios and forced themselves on actresses, or the factory-floor supervisors who demanded sex from female workers, trivializes what #MeToo first stood for,\u201d Weiss said.<\/p>\n
Harvey Weinstein, George H.W. Bush, Louis C.K., Kevin Spacey: these men have been accused of sexual misconduct, some by five women, some by more than 80. They might be termed \u201csexual predators.\u201d But it\u2019s important to make a distinction between a \u201csexual predator\u201d and \u201cbad sex.\u201d Ansari is absolutely a product of our culture \u2014 our over-sexualized and desensitized culture. He was aggressive, obnoxious and selfish all throughout the encounter.<\/p>\n
But he is not a sexual predator.<\/p>\n
Assume for a moment that Ansari is telling the truth, that their sexual activity was, as he said, \u201cby all indications completely consensual.\u201d If this is true, then the fact that the anonymous woman would disagree represents an issue not of sexual assault, harassment or misconduct, but of miscommunication.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s worth noting again that the woman never voiced that she did not want to do the things she did. Thus, our conversation should not be about the #MeToo movement. It should be about sex.<\/p>\n
People need to make their language exact in every situation. Society needs to understand what is and isn\u2019t sexual misconduct. Outcast who deserves to be outcast, but no further. And when it comes to sex, people should know what they want, know exactly what they don\u2019t want and protect those boundaries.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe feminist answer is to push for a culture in which boys and young men are taught that sex does not have to be pursued as if they\u2019re in a pornographic film,\u201d Weiss said, \u201cone in which girls and young women are empowered to be bolder, braver and louder about what they want.\u201d<\/p>\n
#MeToo empowers victims to tell their stories, to step out of the shadows and advocate for themselves. The case of Aziz Ansari, however, concerns the pursuit of safe, trusting and healthy relationships. It concerns communication, it concerns confidence. But we won\u2019t go anywhere until we understand these issues before us and address them accordingly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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