BY: KATE ANGUS ’20 AND SERENA THORN ’19

For many, the #metoo movement has been difficult. It’s hard to see people you once admired exposed as sexual predators, and it’s even harder to face the reality of the prevalence of sexual assault in society. With difficult movements come difficult conversations: specifically, about the complexity of #metoo. We would like to have one of those conversations now, regarding the piece titled “Aziz Ansari is Not Harvey Weinstein” from last week’s opinion section.

On “emotionally gratifying platitudes”: It is concerning that the statement “all unwanted sexual contact is wrong” is considered a banal, emotional response. Clearly, with the prevalence of sexual assault on college campuses, this statement still needs to be said. And who’s to say the feminist community isn’t discussing the nuances of consent, sexual assault, and harassment? As feminists living in a community of other powerful, intelligent feminists, we have had countless conversations regarding the nuances of sexual assault and harassment. The Women’s Resource even devoted much of a Dub Club conversation to the topic of Aziz Ansari’s behavior and the different contexts of sexual assault, harassment, and consent. It is a gross generalization of the #metoo movement and feminist conversation to suggest our community is glossing over the complexity of both consent and this movement.

On “abandon[ing] due process for mob mentality”: We whole-heartedly agree that in legal proceedings, the accused is innocent until proven guilty. This is a hallmark of our modern judicial system. However, the punishment of many people exposed through the #metoo movement and beyond has been social backlash or damage to their career, not legal action. Many of the people exposed recently have even fully admitted and apologized for their behavior, and you can’t tell us to impose “due process” when deciding which movie to watch based on whether the star has been caught in a sexual assault scandal. The way in which we consume media and form opinions should in no way be regulated by a court of law.

On the five percent of false reports: Yes, it is unjust to imprison innocent people. We agree that we should always strive towards a more perfect judicial process. However, the majority of any reports of rape do not result in legal action. One can argue that the majority of the five percent of false accusations also do not result in legal action either. While it is unfortunate that these false reports happen, they are also damaging to the goals of feminists and the #metoo movement, as they delegitimize the true reports, since some seem to find it more important to focus on the false reporting. Also, false accusations are not false imprisonments; clearly, due process was followed for many of those cases because they were found to be false.

In addition, false reporting and false imprisonment happen in almost all crimes, and a record number of people were exonerated for crimes they did not commit in 2015. Where is the outrage there? It is telling that much mainstream conversation of sexual assault allegations focus on the small percent of false allegations than the larger problem at hand.

On the “false dichotomies” of supporting due process or supporting the survivor: this statement is once again grossly generalizing the #metoo movement and the conversations of feminists and beyond regarding sexual assault. We are members of the Dub, proud and aggressive feminists. We are also strong believers in justice. However, neither of us think we ever actually heard the exact conversation laid out in the original piece. While our two experiences do not prove that these conversations do not exist, we think they are much less prevalent than you imply them to be. We agree with due process, and we agree with the notion of innocent until proven guilty. However, as women who are fighting to reduce sexual violence against other women, we will always believe the survivor first.

This is not meant to be a vicious personal attack; this is simply the beginning of a complex and difficult conversation that is necessary in the fight against sexual assault. This moment is critical to the advancement of gender equality, but with critical moments come complexity, nuance, and most, importantly, conversation.