What is it about?
While consent is useful in understanding what is a sexual offence, we should also understand that there remain problems with using consent as a standard to judge appropriate sexual behaviours.
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Why is it important?
This is important because while consent is a vast improvement over other understandings of what is and is not a sexual offence, there remain concerns with how the standard is used. In particular it can be manipulated due to its close association with a binary understanding of right and/or wrong. As such we should be prepared in some circumstances to ask the question... is the act in question really consensual/non-consenusal?
Perspectives
The topic is one that needs discussing. The piece attempts to balance the improvements made in responding to sexual offending, while noting that there is a need to continue to improve responses. Conversely, a number of potential issues with 'consent' are raised to highlight awareness that consent needs to be further interrogated and understood when we are seeking to address such harmful and damaging behaviour as found in sexual offences.
Associate Professor James A Roffee
Monash University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: When Yes Actually Means Yes, January 2015, Springer Science + Business Media,
DOI: 10.1057/9781137476159_5.
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