You are on page 1of 20

Res Publica (2016) 22:173192

DOI 10.1007/s11158-015-9291-0

Aggressive Hook Ups: Modeling Aggressive Casual Sex


on BDSM for Moral Permissibility
James Rocha1

Published online: 9 September 2015


Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Abstract Aggressive techniques within casual sex encounters, such as taking


sexual liberties without permission or ignoring rejection, can, perhaps unintentionally, complicate consent. Passive recipients may acquiesce out of fear, which
aggressors may not realize. Some philosophers argue that social norms are sufficiently well known to make this misunderstanding unlikely. However, the chance of
aggression leading to non-consensual sex, even if not great, is high enough that
aggressors should work diligently to avoid this potentially grave result. I consider
how this problem plays out in the common mating ritual of hooking up. I argue that
aggressive hook ups can only be permissible if they are modeled on BDSM
encounters: the participants must obtain prior consent and prepare safe words for
voiding that consent during the hook up. While this solution removes the spontaneity of aggressive sex, I argue that spontaneously aggressive hook ups with
strangers cannot be permissible.
Keywords

Aggressive sex  BDSM  Casual sex  Consent  Hooking up

Introduction
The aggressive male/passive female sexual narrative, as typically found in romance
novels, is, of course, well known, and various objections have been raised to it
(ONeill 1985; MacKinnon 1989; Haslanger 1993; Remick 1993; Kramer 1994;
Boswell and Spade 1996; Pineau 1996; Schulhofer 1998). The narrative implies that
it is romantic for a bold personalmost always a manto overcome the resistance
& James Rocha
Rocha@lsu.edu
1

Philosophy and Religious Studies Department, Louisiana State University, 102 Coates Hall,
Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA

123

174

J. Rocha

of a reluctant personalmost always a womanto obtain sex. The bold man


exhibits confidence that no one would intentionally refuse sex with him, and thus
any resistance would have to be feigned. He proclaims his value by seizing sex from
a succumbing woman. While there are clear moral problems with this narrative,
many people, of both genders, enjoy enacting it. The goal of this paper is to provide
a moral analysis of aggressive casual sex that critiques the practice while
acknowledging that it is routinely enjoyed without anyone being harmed. In the end,
I will argue that aggressive casual sex can be morally permissible, but only with
substantial changes to the practice.
In fiction, aggressive casual sex usually results in romantic relationships. Since
this fictionalized version of the narrative misleadingly implies a result that is rare in
real life (Paul et al. 2000, p. 81; Bogle 2008, p. 29), my analysis will assess
aggressive sexual encounters that do not lead to relationships. Instead of the overly
romanticized narrative, I will analyze the casual sex practice that many social
scientists consider to be the most common mating ritual among young people who
are not in committed relationships: hooking up (Glenn and Marquardt 2001; Paul
et al. 2000; Lambert et al. 2002; Bogle 2008; Gardner and Choate 2008).
Roughly, we can define hooking up as any sexual activity, intended to be
consensual (nonconsensual hook ups are by definition problematic), between two
people who are not in a committed relationship. The term is ambiguous with respect
to both the type of sexual activity (ranging from making out to intercourse) and the
relationship of the participants (ranging from strangers to close friends). Most hook
ups are between people who do not know each other well, but have enough
connection that they are not complete strangers (Paul et al. 2000, p. 76; Bogle 2008,
pp. 3031). I will call them, near strangers.
Before setting up my critique, it is important to note that various feminists have
already cogently criticized this aggression narrative. Legal theorist Lani Anne
Remick notes the pervasiveness of the narrative when she says that, our maledominated society accepts a certain amount of coercion, aggression or violence
against women as a normal, even desirable, part of sexual encounters (Remick
1993, p. 1104). Then she adds, Thus, both men and women are socialized to accept
coercive sexuality as the norm in sexual behavior. In many ways society sends the
message that sexual violence is sexy. As a result, men often see extreme forms of
aggressive sexual behavior as seduction, rather than rape (Remick 1993, p. 1145).
Remick not only sees this narrative as tying coerciveness into socially accepted
seduction methods, but also sees the narrative as blurring the lines between
seduction and rape by praising men for obtaining sex aggressively.
Philosopher Sally Haslanger argues that it is partially through adherence to this
narrative that we define genders: One is a man by virtue of standing in a position of
eroticized dominance over others; one is a woman by virtue of standing in a position
of eroticized submission to others (Haslanger 1993, p. 99). The social power of the
narrative is seen in how what it means to be a man in our society involves the
aggressive sexual conquest of womenwhich in turn entails that an essential norm
for being a woman involves submission to masculine acts of aggression, conquest,
and dominance. Just as aggressive sexual behavior is associated with being a
goodor realman, a mythical refusal to give in becomes key to being a good

123

Aggressive Hook Ups

175

woman. It must remain mythical since women are expected to eventually give in.
Female resistance is assumed to be feigned: women must pretend not to want the sex
that men aggressively force upon them, but women also need to acquiesce insofar as
the narrative requires that masculine aggression be rewarded.
This aggression narrative necessarily skews our picture of sexual consent. We set
lower standards for sexual consent due to a social expectation that men will
aggressively overcome womens supposedly feigned resistance. As philosopher
Lois Pineau points out, The reasoning that underlies the present criterion of consent
is entangled in a number of mutually supportive mythologies which see sexual
assault as masterful seduction, and silent submission as sexual enjoyment (Pineau
1996, p. 6). Pineau adds that this complicates consent since, if sexual aggression is
a part of ordinary seduction, then it cannot be inconsistent with the legitimate
consent of the person allegedly seduced by this means. And if it is normal for a
woman to be reluctant, then this reluctance must be consistent with her consent as
well (Pineau 1996, p. 9). In this narrative, the usual indicators of dissent (including
explicit refusal) can be ignored. Just by having the narrative, consent standards are
lowered. As legal theorist Karen Kramer says, Believing that women tend to lie
about their sexual desires and merely feign reluctance renders sexual aggression
acceptable by making the womans consent irrelevant (Kramer 1994, p. 118).
When hooking up with near strangers, aggressive sex techniques are problematic
since such techniques can create fears that could lead someone to hook up
unwillingly, even while appearing to act willingly. The moral assessment must
begin with the question of whether aggressive techniques lead to nonconsensual
hook ups.
In response to this worry, some philosophers, such as Alan Wertheimer, Douglas
Husak, and George Thomas, argue that the aggression narrative is so well known
that participants are not likely to become confused (Wertheimer 2003, pp. 152155;
Husak and Thomas 2001, pp. 88, 9394, and 98). These philosophers argue that our
moral judgments must be tempered by social conventions since we should not
disapprove of a practice based on consequences that are unlikely in our society.
In agreement with the earlier feminist position, I will argue that the aggression
narrative is morally problematic. First, I will provide empirical evidence to show
that while misunderstandings may not be very common, they occur often enough to
be relevant for moral appraisal. Second, I will argue that when these misunderstandings do occur, they result in aggressive individuals engaging in grave moral
wrongsmaking individuals hook up unwillinglywithout realizing they are doing
so. The negative argument of this paper will be that, as currently practiced,
aggressive sex techniques are immoral because aggressors cannot ensure that they
are avoiding grave moral wrongs.
While this point suffices to condemn aggressive techniques as they typically
occur, we should also consider whether there could be an atypical way to
permissibly engage in aggressive hook ups. After all, there is a legitimate claim that
people ought to be allowed to engage in sex in whatever ways please them as long
as they are not harming others. Aggressive techniques are problematic because it is
difficult to know that you are not harming someone. The moral problem derives

123

176

J. Rocha

from an epistemic problem, which could conceivably be solved. It is worth seeking


changes that could circumvent this epistemic difficulty.
The positive argument of this paper will be that aggressive hook ups could be
morally permissible if modeled on contemporary Bondage and Discipline/
Sadomasochism and Masochism (BDSM) practices: the aggressive hook up would
require a prior and independent conversation over limits and methods, and there
would need to be safe words for ending a hook up where aggressive techniques go
too far. These additions would greatly alter the aggressive hook up, in large part by
eliminating the spontaneity that people might feel characterize an aggressive hook
up. I will neither consider nor challenge views over what constitutes an authentic
aggressive hook up. If requiring a prior conversation makes it a mere fantasy of an
aggressive hook up, then I would be arguing that authentic aggressive hook ups are
impermissible, but they can be replaced with fantasy aggressive hook ups that are
actually permissible. In the end, I will provide a position that allows for a different
sort of aggressive hook up (whether it be fantasy) that is morally permissible
because the hook up partners work to ensure they both consent beforehand and
maintain that consent during the hook up. Aggressive sex techniques are
salvageable, but only at a cost that could alter the very nature of hooking up.

The Aggressive Hook Up


As weve seen, a hook up involves two people, whose relation can range anywhere
from complete strangers to close friends, but excludes committed partners, engaging
in some kind of sexual activity, which can range from making out to sexual
intercourse. People use hook up in purposely ambiguous ways so that they can
avoid negative judgments for excessive coital hook ups (Glenn and Marquardt 2001,
pp. 5, 13, and 22; Bogle 2008, pp. 2829 and 8588).
There are certain norms commonly associated with hooking up, though they are
not necessarily essential to the activity. The goal in the following is to locate and
discuss typical practices as documented by social scientists, but, as will be made
clear by my later critical discussion, describing these practices as they typically
occur is not in any sense a normative endorsement. For example, hook up decisions
(including whether to hook up, where to do it, and what type of sexual activity to
perform) are largely communicated nonverbally (Bogle 2008, pp. 3339). Alcohol
is often key here: it enables individuals to do something (hook up with near
strangers) that they may be unable to do while sober, and it gives the courage
necessary to discuss such risky activity nonverbally (Paul et al. 2000, pp. 77 and
8385; Glenn and Marquardt 2001, pp. 1516; Gardner and Choate 2008,
pp. 126127; Bogle 2008, pp. 30, 47, 6364, and 166168). The typical hook up
involves individuals drinking excessively, communicating nonverbally, and engaging in sexual activity with people they barely know.
Aggressive techniques may also be fairly typical. To get clearer on aggression, it
will be useful to distinguish it from similar techniques: force and coercion. I will say
that someone uses force if he physically makes another person act against her will,
which may include harming her in the process. A person is forced to hook up if she

123

Aggressive Hook Ups

177

is physically made to engage in sexual activity against her will, such as by being
held down or physically abused. A forced hook up is rape.
I will use coercion to refer to the use of a threat to make another person choose
to meet a demand. A coercive hook up involves a person using threats to get another
person to hook up. In the law, some threats may not be considered sufficiently
violent to warrant rape charges (Schulhofer 1998, pp. 114136; Primoratz 2001,
pp. 211212). We should, however, be morally concerned whenever anyone uses a
threat to hook up. Coercive hook ups may be legally allowed if the threat is not
overwhelmingly frightening, but they are never morally permissible.1
To define aggression, I will use aggressor and passive person as technical
terms: the aggressor is whoever uses aggressive techniques and the passive person is
whoever is on the receiving end of aggression. These terms are consistent with a
person being, at the same time, the aggressor and the passive person, depending on
looking at the interaction from different perspectives in a case of mutual aggression.
I will also, because it represents the usual trend in our society, refer to the aggressor
as male and the passive person as female.
Aggression consists neither in a person forcibly taking what he chooses nor using
a threat to achieve his goal. Instead, aggression consists in one person (the
aggressor) doing to another (the passive person) what he chooses based on an
assumption that the passive person also wishes for him to act in this fashion. The
aggressor is neither attempting to force nor coerce the passive person into something
that the passive person would not independently choose, but instead assumes the
passive person would independently choose to acquiesce. The aggressor neither
waits for nor seeks evidence that this assumption is correct. He simply works from
that assumption and performs whatever act he chooses regardless of whether the
passive person has indicated any prior willingness to go along with the aggressors
actions.
The aggressor can be wrong about the passive persons willingness, but, unlike a
coercer, the aggressor will neither harm the passive person nor continue on if the
passive person sufficiently establishes to the aggressor that she is not a willing
partner. In the end, the aggressor desires and even counts on the passive persons
willingness. The fact that the aggressor does not check for that willingness does not
mean he does not want itthe failure to check, instead, is a part of the aggressive
hook up game. The aggressors failure to ask what the passive person wants shows
his dominance: he is in charge and will act without asking. Of course, unlike a
forceful or coercive rapist, he isnt just acting no matter what; his aggression
establishes dominance, but he hopes the passive person wants to be dominated. The
aggressors refuge is that if he truly did overstep his bounds, the passive person, at
least in theory, would let him know, ask him to stop, and/or refuse to continue.
Thus, he gets evidence of willingness from the passive persons failure to
effectively stop him.
This last point, though, can be tricky, since the aggressor may feel that signals of
unwillingness are feigned, and so the aggressor may ignore them. Aggressors act on
their beliefs of whether the passive person is willing. If the aggressor genuinely
1

For a contrary position, see Primoratz (2001, p. 212).

123

178

J. Rocha

believes the passive person is going along willingly, then the aggressor will
continue regardless of contrary signals. If the aggressor genuinely believes the
passive person is not going along willingly, then he will stop. The aggressor
believes he is acting with a willing partner; he simply neither has nor seeks out
sufficient evidence to warrant that belief.
I will use non-aggressive hook up to refer to a hook up where both parties seek
out signals of permission prior to continuing. In such cases, when someone refuses
to continue, the other person would either stop entirely or stop until clear signals
established that the prior refusal was feigned. Non-aggressive partners do not
proceed on assumptions, but instead seek out clear evidence of the other persons
willingness, which can include non-verbal communication provided that the nonverbal signals are overt. Each hook up partner can take his or her own clothes off
without saying a word. Removing ones own clothes clearly signals a willingness to
be nude, and indicates some willingness to engage in nude sexual activity. A person
could also move her partners hands onto her body, thus signalingwithout a
wordthat touching is allowed. Kissing can occur with both persons moving their
heads and lips together. With each of these signals, there is some vagueness in what
is being communicated, but each party in a non-aggressive hook up waits for and
receives overt signals prior to moving forward.
Aggressors do not wait for such signals. The aggressor would take off the passive
persons clothes without waiting for any indication that she is willing to be nude.
The aggressor would touch, kiss, and initiate sexual activity without signals that the
other person wanted to be touched, kissed, or have sexual activity. Of course, the
aggressor usually obtains signals after he actshis partner smiles, helps with the
removal of her clothes, or just generally shows engagement with and enjoyment of
their hook upbut an aggressor never waits for such signals prior to acting. The
aggressor, as is fitting to his name, just does what he chooses based on the mere
assumption that the other person wants him to act.
As stated, the aggressor would also ignore refusals that he believes are feigned,
and he will likely believe that the first set of refusals are feigned. Although current
research suggests that around 60 % of women do not engage in token resistance,
around 40 % at least sometimes do (Muehlenhard and Hollabaugh 1988). Men seem
to engage in token resistance at slightly higher ratesthough these studies
concentrate on men in relationships (Sprecher et al. 1994; Husak and Thomas 2001,
p. 96). This ratio (60/40) suggests that token resistance is real, but there is also a lot
of room for dangerous confusion (Schulhofer 1998, p. 65; Husak and Thomas 2001,
p. 96). Political scientist Alan Wertheimer points out that the person who says no
always means it at the moment at which it is said (Wertheimer 2003, p. 159), but a
lot of people want their refusals to be overcome. Thus, a person who hears no may
be uncertain whether it is a demand to stop or a request to keep trying (Schulhofer
1998, p. 64). Part of being aggressive includes ignoring initial refusals on the
assumption that they are merely requests to keep trying.
In addition to ignoring initial refusals, there are two other places where
aggression fits into hook ups. First, there aggression can be used in overcoming a
refusal. The aggressor can aggressively respond to an initial refusal by touching the
passive person in a sexual way, insulting the person for refusing, or by using overly

123

Aggressive Hook Ups

179

strong sexual language. These actions convey the impression that the aggressor does
not care that the passive person has refused. Second, the aggressor can also be
aggressive in the sexual activity. The aggressor could do what he wants during the
sexual activity without checking for signals of the other persons desires and
pleasures. Since hooking up is ambiguous over how far the sexual activity will go,
this type of aggression includes pushing the sexual action further without being sure
the other person is willing to go further.
We can now turn to why aggressive hook ups are morally problematic. From the
passive persons perspective, it may be quite difficult, and sometimes impossible, to
distinguish whether the other person is being aggressive or forceful, with the latter
amounting to rape. After all, the difference between aggressive techniques and
forcible ones may come down to a counterfactual issue. Both the aggressor and the
rapist take what they want without checking for signals of willingness. What makes
the aggressor different is that he would stop if he were convinced that the passive
persons unwillingness was genuine. Of course, the fact of what the aggressor would
do in a certain scenario is a counterfactual one, to which the passive person may
have no epistemic access. It is then completely reasonable for the passive person to
be fearful because she is unsure whether she is engaged in an aggressive hook up or
a rape. She may, reasonably, acquiesce just to protect herself.
From the aggressors perspective, it can be quite difficult, and sometimes
impossible, to distinguish whether the passive person is acting out of fear or
willingness. Aggressors act in ways that can make their partners unwilling to
continue, and the partners may provide no any clear signals of this unwillingness.
The passive person may even send the wrong signals (signals of giving in) to mask
fear. An epistemic problem (that the aggressor cannot always know whether the
passive person is willing) turns into a grave moral problem (that the aggressor may
make someone engage in sexual activity against her will).
Even where both parties desire an aggressive hook up, the aggressor will have a
difficult time knowing that. Thus, when the aggressor acts, he cannot know that his
act is morally permitted. But it cannot be morally permitted to act if you lack a
reasonable basis to believe that your act will not turn out to be gravely immoral.
Aggressive hook ups are morally problematic since aggressors act in ways that
could lead to grave moral wrongs and they do nothing to ensure those grave wrongs
will not happen (how could they since, by definition, they do not wait for signals of
willingness?).

The Social Argument for Aggressive Hook Up Permissibility


In response to this problem, some theorists argue that aggressive techniques can still
be morally permissible, while others accept the impermissibility of the techniques
and either condemn aggressive techniques or try to find a way for aggressive hook
ups, in some altered form, to be permissible. In this section, I will consider and
reject accounts where theorists argue that aggressive techniques can be morally
permissible within certain societies, including our own. Later, I will consider

123

180

J. Rocha

condemnations and attempts to alter the practice, with my own view offering a
substantial alteration.
Alan Wertheimer argues that silence should suffice for consent as long as there is
a social understanding that silence implies consent (Wertheimer 2003,
pp. 152155). Wertheimer notes that whether tokens of consent accurately convey
intentions depends largely on how widely known the relevant social conventions
are. Where intended meaning is well understood, agents can freely rely on any
consent token, provided that there are no contrary signals that indicate dissent.
While Wertheimer is clear that relying on these tokens may not always successfully
capture the other persons true intention, for Wertheimer that problem is separate
from whether someone acts permissibly in the face of a socially established token
(Wertheimer 2003, p. 153). If someone receives such a token, and there is no
indicator of dissent, Wertheimer believes the person acts permissibly. Therefore,
aggressors, who read silence and the lack of signals of dissent as sufficient for
consent, would act permissibly for Wertheimer as long as they are in a society, such
as ours, where it is well known that agents often silently consent.
Here is a case. One night, Caitlin explicitly refuses when Dennis asks for sex. As
the night continues, Dennis just begins removing Caitlins clothes. To use a token of
consent that Wertheimer counts as valid in our society: after her blouse is off,
Caitlin smiles (Wertheimer 2003, p. 153). Dennis has acted aggressively both by
continuing past Caitlins explicit refusal and by taking Caitlins clothes off without
a prior signal that she desires to be nude in front of him. Yet, Dennis now has an
affirmative signthe smilethat his aggression is well received. Caitlin and
Dennis live in a society where various sexual rituals are well known, such as that
women sometimes feign resistance, it is sometimes considered romantic for men to
overcome that resistance, and when women smile, they are likely consenting.
The studies do show that only 40 % of women engage in the feigned resistance
ritual, and that 40 % only does so on occasion. But we do not need the majority to
engage in an activity for it to count as a social ritual. 40 % seems to be high enough
that most people would have heard of the ritual. A large majority of people either
partake in the ritual or know enough about it to be prepared to indicate their dissent
from it. Token resistance probably is a social norm.
Dennis aggression is consistent with his societys norms for hooking up. For
Wertheimer, that is enough to make Dennis actions permissible since Dennis has a
reasonable expectation that Caitlin at least knows about the norms. If Caitlin
genuinely wants to refuse, she should know that a simple no is unlikely to deter
Dennis aggression. If she does nothing to convince him that her no is fully
intended, and she later gives a smile, then Dennis acts reasonably within their
society, and his actions are morally permissible for Wertheimer.
For any given social norm, there are some people who do not know or forget the
norm. Caitlin could be one of them. She may smile out of fear if she does not know
what else to do when Dennis undresses her, without her permission, after her
explicit refusal. Smiles can be involuntary, and people behave unpredictably when
having to deal with frightening people in close quarters. Wertheimer seems open to
this possibility since he acknowledges that tokens of consent do not guarantee

123

Aggressive Hook Ups

181

consent. Wertheimer would think Dennis acts permissibly since the exception cases
happen rarely, and so Dennis has a good faith belief that he has consent.
In agreement with Wertheimer, Husak and Thomas (2001) argue that social
generalizations must provide some guidance for what is reasonable to infer from
others behavior. We should base assessments of the reasonableness of aggressors
beliefs in part on whether their beliefs fit with standard operating procedures for
casual sex in their society (Husak and Thomas 2001, pp. 100102). An agent who
follows accepted and well known social norms for aggressive casual sex seems to
act reasonably in proceeding as if he has consent (Husak and Thomas 2001,
pp. 9294 and 100103).
Husak and Thomas agree that agents can dismiss some evidence of dissent since
in our society people both feign resistance and have undesired sex (Husak and
Thomas 2001, p. 102). They support the latter point through empirical studies that
indicate that people of both genders regularly have sex that is consensual but
undesired, for the sake of extrinsic reasons, such as to make another person happy,
make money, or fit in with peers (Husak and Thomas 2001, p. 97; OSullivan and
Allgeier 1998). Husak and Thomas argue that we judge (especially when looking at
it from the perspective of a jurorthough the moral question has clear overlap here)
the reasonableness of inferring consent from the totality of circumstances, and that
we not, privilege or exclude any material evidence of consent (Husak and Thomas
2001, p. 102).
The Husak and Thomas approach ignores key differences between aggressive
hook ups and aggressive sex within committed relationships. The latter involves
people who know each other sufficiently well to draw safe conclusions based on
established nonverbal signals, including silence. Without knowing the other person,
it is much harder to reasonably believe the other person is consenting when it is
clear that sex is not desired. While there are plenty of reasons to have undesired sex
in relationships (show loyalty, sympathy, companionship, etc.), hook ups revolve
around having fun. Sexual desire is fairly essential for hooking up. If a person sees
signs that a potential hook up partner does not desire sex, it is not reasonable to
assume that the hook up is consensual.
In spite of these initial worries, there is good empirical evidence in favor of
Wertheimer, Husak, and Thomas. Aggressive hook ups are common enough to
establish social norms. They probably work out fine for both parties in a significant
number of cases. Their premise, that there is a social convention for aggressive
casual sex, is true. The question is whether such a social convention justifies agents
relying on it when that means risking harm to others.
For agents to justifiably rely on such a social convention, it would either need to
have an insignificant failure rate or have failures that are not serious. Since the
failures involve people having nonconsensual hook ups out of fear, they are serious.
The issue then is whether the failure rate is significant. While there are no studies
that specifically look at aggressive hook ups as I have defined the practice, there are
studies on pressured hook ups and rape that may shed light on these issues. Since
these studies cover cases where agents have applied too much pressure, ignored
refusals because they were believed to be feigned, or otherwise used aggressive
techniques, these studies will be relevant to judging the approach offered by

123

182

J. Rocha

Wertheimer, Husak, and Thomas. In fact, these studies provide good empirical
evidence that the rate of hook ups going poorly is significant enough that we can
assume neither that people are able to regularly rely on common social conventions
without problems nor that the failure rate can be ignored in moral analysis because it
is so low.
According to one study, 42 % of women had terrible hook up experiences, which
almost half described in terms of being pressured into going further than they were
willing (Lambert et al. 2002, p. 130). According to another study, 16 % of people,
male and female, had hook ups where they felt pressured (Paul et al. 2000, p. 81).
About one out of every five or six individuals (about 20 % by the first study or 16 %
by the second), at some time, has had a pressured hook up. Rape studies further
support this point. In one study, 27 % of women who had been raped according to
the legal definition, did not describe their sexual encounter as rape (Jensen 2007,
pp. 4849). In other studies, a shocking and disturbing 88 % of men who had
committed rape, according to the legal definition, insisted that they had not, and
47 % of men who had committed rape said they would do so again in the future
(Jensen 2007, p. 49). Unfortunately, the failure cases are much more frequent than is
assumed.
In our example, when Dennis wants to hook up with a woman he barely knows,
he has to make a judgment about whether to proceed based on Caitlins words and
nonverbal cues. Remember that she initially turned him down but later smiled as he
removed her clothes. Dennis knows that in most cases like this one in his society,
the woman intends to give consent. He also knows that there are some cases, albeit
smaller in number, where Caitlin is afraid and he may be about to violate her in a
heinous way.
Even if Dennis acts on a generalization that represents the majority of cases, that
would not suffice for moral permissibility. We saw that about one in every five or
six people have a terrible hook up experience where they felt overly pressured. That
means there is a non-negligible chance that Dennis could be in such a failure case. If
he hooks up regularly with aggressive techniques, the odds that he would eventually
end up in a case where he pressures someone are certainly sizeable. Further, these
failure cases involve serious harms. A failure would involve Caitlin hooking up with
Dennis against her will; it could amount to rape. At the least, it would amount to
Dennis disrespecting Caitlin and her right to sexual autonomy, which includes her
right to determine for herself with whom she hooks up and how far she goes. Dennis
is making sexual decisions for Caitlin based on a generalization of what other
women would want in her situation. Dennis cannot respect Caitlins sexual
autonomy by making decisions for her based on what most other women want.
Since there is a significant chance of failure, and the failure would be at least serious
(disrespect) and could be quite grave (rape), it is certainly not a morally acceptable
risk for Dennis to impose on Caitlin.
For these reasons, we should dismiss any approach that argues that the aggressive
casual sex failure cases are too rare to matter. Such an approach conflates the
numbers needed to establish social norms with the numbers needed to permissibly
impose serious risks onto others. There are certainly enough relevant failure cases,
including very grave ones, for a moral agent to refrain from operating on the mere

123

Aggressive Hook Ups

183

assumption that the person before him is just like the majority. Having established
that aggressive hook ups pose a moral problem, the next question is how to respond
to that problem.

Pinpointing the Wrong of Aggressive Hook Ups


One common response to the aggression narrative is to demand a change from the
no means no slogan to a yes means yes slogan (Remick 1993; Friedman and
Valenti 2008). The no slogan has a couple of problems. First, it can be somewhat
misleading since no does not always amount to an unquestionable refusal
(Sprecher et al. 1994, pp. 125126; Kramer 1994, p. 119; Schulhofer 1998,
pp. 5960, 6465, and 264; Husak and Thomas 2001, p. 96; Wertheimer 2003,
p. 158). A bigger problem is that the no slogan is not useful when there is neither an
explicit no nor yes. Some theorists believe that the no slogan implies that silence
counts as consent (Remick 1993, pp. 11051106 and 11101116; Millar 2008,
p. 29), which is worrisome since a terrified person may be unable to express dissent.
Thus, a new slogan has been offered to replace the no slogan: yes means yes. If a
person waits for a verbal yes prior to sexual activity, then chances are lower that
the hook up will be nonconsensual. If we want to minimize moral wrongs, adopting
a social rule that requires an explicit yes makes sense (Archard 1998, p. 146).
This response appears to rule out aggressive hook ups almost by definition. An
aggressor does not seek clear signals; he moves ahead on the assumption that the
passive person is willing. A person who seeks out an explicit yes before continuing
is not aggressive, by definition. It may be possible to be aggressive while following
this slogans requirement if the aggressor starts acting without signals of
willingness, but he would not actually initiate sexual intercourse until he receives
a verbal yes. Of course, this would be a rare aggressor, and for the most part,
accepting the moral necessity of an explicit yes involves condemning aggressive
hook ups. Since a total rejection of aggressive hook ups could be warranted, this is
not yet an objection to the yes slogan.
A more worrisome problem for the yes slogan approach is that it provides no help
in cases where an intended no changes to a fearful and nonconsensual yes.
Aggression in sexual contexts with near strangers can cause people to become
reasonably afraid. A frightened person can respond in many different ways to
aggressive techniques, including silence, a forced smile, or even a forced yes. We
all respond to fear differently; it can be just as reasonable for terrified persons to go
along with their seeming tormentors with verbal affirmations as it is for them to
smile or remain silent. The yes slogan does not help when an aggressor makes
someone so afraid that she says yes just to be safe.
Instead of demanding a single word, whether it be no or yes, it is important to
delineate acceptable methods for turning a refusal into an acceptance. It would be
preferable for a person, who is faced with a putatively feigned refusal, to have a
method for permissibly changing that refusal into an acceptance. We need standards
for judging acceptable methods for overcoming refusals. Legal scholar Stephen

123

184

J. Rocha

Schulhofer, discussing the problems of the no slogan, states, But a no means no


rule does not help us sort out whether the things he does in response to her initial
no are legitimate or abusive. To separate appropriate emotional interaction from
abusive pressure, we need substantive standards of permissible conduct (Schulhofer 1998, p. 74).
Schulhofer, however, does not recommend what to do as much as he points out
what is unacceptable. He argues that it is impermissible to turn a no into a yes
through violence, physical coercion, or non-physical coercion, including coercion
through implicit threats (Schulhofer 1998, pp. 7476). Clearly violence and physical
coercion undermine consent. Schulhofers response goes further by ruling out all
coercion: physical, non-physical, and implicit. Schulhofer recognizes the practical
difficulty of pinpointing implicit threats, which must be inferred from circumstances
(Schulhofer 1998, pp. 7678). Schulhofer also notes that his answer is vague, and he
leaves precision up to the courts to decide for particular rape charges (Schulhofer
1998, p. 78).
It is not helpful to leave these issues up to courts since the moral question
precedes the legal question in two ways. First, aggressors must determine whether
their actions are morally permissible even if they will not end up in court or do not
know whether they will. Second, the moral question is fundamentally prior since we
may not think that aggressive techniques should be illegal if they were morally
permissible. Schulhofers standards get us started, but they do not provide sufficient
direction for permissibly changing someones mind.
Lois Pineau starts with an empirically contentious presumption that initial
refusals indicate lack of interest, but her points are still useful. Based on that
assumption, she argues:
Then it would be prima facie unreasonable for her to agree to have sex
unreasonable, that is, unless she were offered some payoff for her stoic
endurance, money perhaps, or tickets to the opera. The reason is that in sexual
matters agreement is closely connected to attraction. Thus, where the
presumption is that she was not attracted, we should at the same time
presume that she did not consent. Hence, the burden of proof should be on her
alleged assailant to show that she had good reasons for consenting to an
unattractive proposition (Pineau 1996, p. 8).
A positive method of changing someones mind is usually preferable to aggression.
We expect positive methods in almost every other area of life. When someone does
not agree at first, the burden is on the offer maker to sweeten the deal. If the offer
maker instead turns to aggression, then we will likely judge her poorlyin any
other area of life, at least.
We view negotiations this way even when initial rejections hide true interest. In
any other context, if Dennis makes an offer and Caitlin refuses because she wants a
better deal, we do not think Dennis has the right to become aggressive. Dennis can
either refuse to give a second offer or he can augment his first one. It is an oddity of
sexual exchanges that, socially speaking, we think a proper response to an initial
refusal involves becoming aggressive.

123

Aggressive Hook Ups

185

Although a positive approach is normal for other persuasion attempts, it may not
make sense in hook ups. Pineau suggests offering money or opera tickets to change
the womans mind (Pineau 1996, p. 8). In real life, it can be offensive to offer
money or concert tickets to someone who has refused to hook up. Positive
incentives in a standard hook up could amount to implying someone is a type of
person who is willing to sell sex, which calls to attention numerous social stigmas in
our prudish society. This positive approach, while it makes sense in other contexts,
comes off as offensive, given current social mores, in sexual contexts.
Unfortunately, neither Schulholfer nor Pineau offer guidance on aggressive hook
ups. Even if we put force and coercion squarely on the side of illegal assault, that
leaves out morally troubling aggressive techniques. These techniques are not
worrisome simply because they lack positive enticements. Other than the sex itself,
hook ups do not have much room for positive enticements, and so they cannot be
regularly expected. Schulhofer and Pineau do not offer enough practical guidance to
help with aggressive hook ups.

Modeling Aggressive Hook Ups on BDSM Encounters


The moral problem of aggressive hook ups largely derives from an epistemic
problem. Aggressive hook ups are immoral because the aggressor cannot know for
sure that the passive person is submitting willingly. If this epistemic problem could
be solved, aggressive hook ups could be morally permissible. After all, there are
people who enjoy the aggressive and passive roles. As long as people are well
paired, their choices to hook up are consensual on all sides, and nothing goes wrong
during the hook up, an aggressive hook up can be enjoyable in an unproblematic
fashion. The possibility of moral permissibility depends on solving the epistemic
problem around mutual consent.
I will propose a solution that requires some substantial changes in current hook
up practices, but that could allow permissible aggressive hook ups in an altered
form. The solution involves treating aggressive hook ups similarly to contemporary
BDSM practices. The moral analogy is that both aggressive hook ups and BDSM
involve sexual activities that can be enjoyable if all participants consent, but that
can also include troubling confusion over consent, which could lead to serious
harms to any non-consenting participant. The need to avoid unintentionally harming
others due to misunderstandings over consent leads to heightened moral requirements. Thus, in BDSM, participants must have a prior conversation before the start
of the sexual activity where they discuss their intentions, limits, and plans on how to
deal with any unintentional boundary crossing. This conversation ensures that
agents not only go into the BDSM activity after having given adequately informed
consent, but also that, were they no longer willing to continue, they would have
plans to effectively convey this reluctancesuch as using safe words that indicate
unwillingness.
The idea is that insofar as aggressive hook ups present similar moral problems as
BDSM, there could be a similar solution. Prior to aggressively hooking up with a
near or complete stranger, agents ought to have a sober discussion about their

123

186

J. Rocha

intentions, limits, and plans for dealing with any accidental boundary crossing.
Aggressive hook up participants, like with BDSM, should make sure that they have
informed consent and a method for withdrawing consent. Were aggressive hook up
participants to have this conversation, they may be able to be aggressive during the
hook up without worry that the other person may not be consenting.
That aggressors are obligated to have this conversation simply falls out of the fact
that they cannot ensure they have consent were they to act without it. We are
morally obligated to obtain consent whenever we are about to do something that
would be morally wrong if we acted without consent. The strength of this obligation
is determined by the likelihood that there would be harm in acting without consent,
combined with the possible severity of the harm. It can be a grave harm to hook up
with someone without her consent, so that suggests the obligation here is fairly
strong. Since roughly one in five or six persons eventually has a hook up that goes
too far and creates undesired pressure, persons who regularly use aggressive
techniques on near strangers face a significant chance of eventually hooking up with
someone non-consensually. Since the chances of acting wrongly are not negligible
and the consequences are potentially severe, there is a strong moral obligation to
only hook up with someone if you are certain she is consenting. While in other
circumstances, nonverbal and behavioral cues (including silence and the lack of
resistance) may be sufficient to signal consent, in the face of a strong moral
obligation to verify consent, the sober conversation is necessary.
The goal is to discuss matters sufficiently so as to minimize the chance of a
misunderstanding that results in a nonconsensual hook up. That discussion must
include at least two main issues: the aggressors intentions and the passive persons
exit options. In terms of the former, the aggressor must give the passive person an
adequate sense of his aggressive intentions so that the passive person can ensure she
is going along willingly. Adequacy is determined by what the passive person needs
to know to be able to consent. The conversation could be brief if the passive person
wants to say, Do whatever you want; I am prepared. They could then just discuss
opt out options. The conversation could be much longer if the passive person has
limits or fears. It is the passive person who is at risk, and so the prior discussion
needs to go as long as necessary to ensure the passive person knows what she is
getting into and feels comfortable with it.
The exit option, likewise, may involve something as simple as deciding on safe
words, or something more complex if the passive person is worried that safe words
may be insufficient. Maintaining consent is just as important here as obtaining
consent. With both BDSM and aggressive hook ups, the activity can begin
consensually, but a line may be unintentionally crossed where one person suddenly
becomes afraid and is no longer willing to continue. In that case, the moral problem
is not that the activity did not have consent to begin with, but that consent was lost.
Of course, it is just as wrong to start sexual activity without consent as it is to
continue sexual activity with someone who is no longer consenting. Thus, safe
words and any other opt out procedures must be established in the prior
conversation to ensure that each participant knows what to do if consent goes
away. As long as the passive person feels she is adequately informed and they agree

123

Aggressive Hook Ups

187

upon exit procedures, the conversation will serve its purpose of minimizing the
chances of misunderstanding.
While it is severely important that BDSM participants remain sober as they
transition into their sexual activity, it is worth wondering whether the entire
aggressive hook up must likewise be sober. An aggressive hook up would more
likely be morally permissible were both participants to refrain from intoxicating
substances. At the same time, consenting adults sometimes prefer aggressive sex
while inebriated. The issue then is whether any alcohol can be imbibed during a
planned aggressive hook up, or whether only sober aggressive hook ups could be
morally permissible.
The problem with intoxicated BDSM is twofold: the alcohol may inhibit the
ability to administer pain safely and it may inhibit the ability to recognize and
respond quickly to attempts to withdraw consent. The former point is sufficient to
justify morally forbidding all alcohol in BDSM encounters. The line between the
administering of safe, freely chosen pain and dangerous pain is extremely important
to observe as soon as it comes up, and can be difficult to keep track of. Participants
should be entirely sober to ensure they remain observant of that lines relevance,
where it could be crossed, and the need to respond immediately to any potential
crossing.
It is the second problem, concerning the withdrawal of consent, that is mainly
relevant to aggressive hook ups. And while this problem is of serious moral
importance, it is less clear that alcohol must be entirely prohibited to ensure the
observance of this line. It is clear that participants cannot be so intoxicated that they
would not remember and/or recognize safe words, or that they couldnt react to
verbal stimuli easily. This problem certainly sets an upper limit to the amount of
acceptable alcohol intake, but it is not ultimately about retaining complete control in
the face of risking serious physical harm to another person, as it is with BDSM.
While alcoholic intake can increase the risk of things going wrong in any area of
life, we generally think that competent adults can reasonably choose to take on that
risk for their own personal enjoyment. So, perhaps some level of consensual, joint
inebriation can be permitted for aggressive hook ups, provided that it is within a
range where individuals remain responsible and sufficiently competent to respond to
opt outs.
Of course, numerous issues come up once we recognize the subjective variance
involved in determining acceptable intoxication levels. The requirement is that
agents remain sufficiently sober to ensure that their consent, which was established
in the prior conversation, is maintained throughout the hook up. The standard of
sufficiently sober is certain to vary. Some individuals cannot have any alcohol,
while others can have a few drinks and be fine. The law, of course, would have to
draw a bright-line standard to be applied across cases, as it does with drinking and
driving. Yet, this paper is questioning the morality of aggressive hook ups, and
morality can adapt to differences across persons. There is, though, a particular moral
worry here: while one individual may know his or her own limits, the hook up
partner may not be able to discern the limits of a near stranger. This problem is
especially acute when the aggressive person is imbibing alcohol. If the aggressive
person is too drunk to recognize signs of any newly developed unwillingness, the

123

188

J. Rocha

hook up could become non-consensual without the aggressor realizing it. The
problem with even somewhat inebriated aggressive hook ups thus recreates the
general problem put forward in this paper. It is perfectly conceivable that, with a
suitable prior conversation, two individuals could consent to hook up in an
aggressive manner while drinking a limited amount of alcohol and face no
problems. Such individuals have achieved a pleasurable, consensual, inebriated, and
aggressive hook up. Yet, the epistemic problem reappears: the partners cannot know
the other person is not drinking too much since they dont know each other well.
While it seems the alcohol-based problems facing BDSM are sufficient to
eliminate alcohol, the problems here would seem to indicate alcohol must be limited
to such an extent that the partners can feel confident no reasonable person would
become overly intoxicated. Morality may require a sort of drink maximum (with the
number of drinks likely being a low number) to ensure that each partner can trust
that the other partner is not intoxicated even without knowing that person well.
What about the person who gets intoxicated much more easily than the reasonable
person? Well, such a person surely would have to know that about himself or
herself. If they do not share that information, they have been deceitful in the
preceding conversation and that deceit, not alcohol, undermined consent. Thus,
some alcohol can be imbibed prior to an aggressive hook up, but it would likely be a
very limited amount, and it must be discussed beforehand.
At this point, it is important to remember that we have been using gendered
pronouns for the sake of simplicity, but the obligation in question will apply to
aggressors of either gender. Some theorists object to giving men stronger
obligations for casual sex since they claim that doing so treats women like they
cannot protect themselves from their own choices (Strossen 1993, pp. 11471151;
Roiphe 1993). However, these objectors are the ones assuming we ought to treat
men and women differently by working from the implicit assumption that giving a
moral obligation to aggressors entails giving an extra obligation to men. The moral
obligation argued for here is not on men because they are men. It is on aggressors,
who in our society tend to be men. It is the same obligation on women whenever
they act as aggressors. The obligation itself is not gendered. Its application happens
to often be gendered due to empirical patterns, but that does not speak against the
nature of the obligation.
All aggressors have a strong moral obligation to ensure they obtain and maintain
consent to hook up. The best way to meet this obligation is to have a prior
conversation over intentions and exit procedures, similarly to how it is done prior to
people engaging in BDSM. While there should be no alcohol at any time within
BDSM, some limited alcohol could be chosen provided that it is not enough to
intoxicate any reasonable person. The pre-aggressive hook up conversation, along
with a limit on potential alcohol intake, may seem to alter the conditions of
aggressive hooking up so much that it amounts to a different practice. My solution
seems to run into the same problem as the yes slogan or Pineaus enticement
standards: it seems to require too much change.
While modeling aggressive hook ups on BDSM requires substantial changes, in
an important way, the practice can be mostly the same during the sexual activity
itself. During the prior conversation, the participants must be sober and they will

123

Aggressive Hook Ups

189

need to discuss their desires, limits, and how to deal with boundaries being
accidentally crossed. While they have the conversation, they ought to proceed not
based on the social norms that currently govern the hook up practice (which allow
agents to already be inebriated and to converse non-verbally), but on norms that
govern obtaining consent in matters where consent is necessary for avoiding grave
moral wrongs. This prior conversation would certainly be a substantial change to
current hook up practices. After the conversation, the participants would have given
their consent to engage in a practice where one person (the aggressor) makes all the
decisions and does not seek signs of willingness from the other person. Thus, after
the conversation, they can engage in an aggressive hook up that is very similar to
aggressive hook ups as they exist today. The conversation ensures the moral
permissibility of the activity, but, like with BDSM, it allows the activity to occur
within a fantasy where the agents can pretend the conversation never happened.
Of course, the conversation will be difficult to have, but obviously no more
difficult than being forced to hook up non-consensually because of someones
overly aggressive techniques. The conversation also prevents the aggression from
occurring spontaneously and genuinely. After all, the aggressor cannot actually be
aggressive as if overpowered by passion if the aggressor had to telegraph his moves
in a prior conversation. Further, his aggression is necessarily less genuine:
aggression is defined in terms of not seeking out the other persons willingness, but
the prior conversation establishes that very willingness. To add to this worry,
participants cannot become so intoxicated that they cannot control themselves,
further limiting the authenticity of the aggression. One might object that with the
conversation, the aggressive hook up becomes a mere fantasy without any genuine
aggression.
These costs can be very real from the perspective of subjective sexual enjoyment,
yet they are necessary losses since those aspects of the aggressive hook up are
causally related to the central moral problem: it is when a hook up is so spontaneous
and genuinely aggressive that the passive person cannot be certain that it is not a
sexual assault. One way to understand this papers position is that genuine
aggressive hook ups with complete or near strangers are morally impermissible, but
fantasy aggressive hook ups with prior conversations and at most limited alcohol
can be acceptable. Genuine aggressive hook ups cannot be saved, but fantasy
aggressive hook ups provide much of the enjoyment without the substantial risks. I
would be willing to accept the view that my conclusion only established the
permissibility of fantasy aggressive hook ups. In a way, this point may come down
to semantics, but we can either say that aggressive hook ups need not include
genuine aggression, or say that only fantasy aggressive hook ups are permissible.
The important point is that BDSMwhether we ought to refer to it as fantasy
BDSMinvolves the same type of prior conversation and lack of genuineness.
People regularly enjoy BDSM in spite of the fact that no one expects their BDSM
encounters to occur spontaneously among strangers or to involve genuine desires to
harm submissive persons regardless of whether the submissive persons can give
prior expression of their limits or exit plans. Instead, BDSM allows for prior
conversations and an amount of fantasy, yet, nevertheless, individuals enjoy it.

123

190

J. Rocha

To maintain the fantasy of aggressive hook ups while making the activity morally
permissible, aggressors simply have to work harder to ensure that they only interact
with consenting passive persons. Just as there are BDSM clubs and websites, there
could be methods for people interested in morally permissible aggressive hook ups
to find like-minded individuals. It could be that they go to aggression-friendly bars
and clubs, or they could go to standard bars and clubs and make sure to have a full
conversation about the aggressive hook up before starting. The idea is that the
fantasy can be maintained while acting in ways that obtain and maintain meaningful
consent.
Since the aggressor injects aggression into the exchange, it is his burden to ensure
that the aggression does not undermine the passive persons consent. It is his burden
to initiate the conversation rather than make the other person have to potentially
face a frightening hook up. This is just how consent works: if you want to do
something that would be wrong without consent, such as using aggressive
techniques, then you morally need to obtain and maintain consent for that action.
Aggressors are in the moral wrong if there is no conversation. So, aggressors are
responsible for having this conversation to ensure their hook ups are morally
permissible.

Morally Permissible Aggressive Hook Ups


We have seen that aggression endangers consent since it can make people so afraid
that they reasonably could silently acquiesce or say yes without meaning it. A fear
based decision to yield to aggression does not count as consensual, and so
aggressors must work to avoid this moral danger.
We considered approaches that argued that there is no real problem here because
this kind of sexual aggression is socially accepted. There is enough support for these
practices to ground a social norm, but not enough to make the amount of failure
cases negligible. Aggressors who regularly hook up with near strangers will be
blameworthy if they ignore the significant chance of wronging someone in a
possibly severe way.
One response to this problem requires hook up participants to seek an explicit
yes. This response required almost completely eliminating aggressive hook ups,
which is not ideal since people often can genuinely enjoy them consensually and
without causing any harms to each other. Since the practice is often unproblematic,
it would be preferable to maintain it and allow the freedom to engage in it, provided
that it can be structured so that no ones moral rights are endangered. Further, this
response does not help with situations where people say yes out of fear. The yes
slogan does not tell us how to acceptably turn a refusal into an acceptance. Thus, we
turned next to standards for turning refusals into acceptances. Unfortunately, those
attempts also did not help enough with the crucial cases where consensual
aggressive hook ups look like nonconsensual hook ups.
Aggressive hook ups can be salvageable with a pre-hook up conversation
modeled on what is required for BDSM encounters to be morally permissible. This
conversation needs to establish the aggressors intentions, the passive persons

123

Aggressive Hook Ups

191

limits, and the various ways the passive person can opt out if she changes her mind
or has one of her boundaries unintentionally crossed. How lengthy and involved this
conversation must be depends on what is necessary for the passive person to feel her
consent is being meaningfully given. And this issue should be left up to the passive
person because whatever standard she wants is the right one since it is her consent
that is in danger of being unintentionally voided. If she wants to set very high
standards to ensure her consent is maintained throughout the hook up, then those are
the correct standards for that hook up since that is what is required to ensure her
consent is in fact maintained.
Once this conversation has occurred, the participants can engage in an aggressive
hook up that is mostly governed by the norms that currently govern aggressive hook
ups: they can drink a limited amount of alcohol, mostly stop communicating, and
have one person take complete control during the hook up (unless the passive person
utters the safe word). Thus, while the conversation is a substantial change to current
practices, it allows for the activity itself to occur in a way that is mostly consistent
with current practices and our commitment to the importance of consent to the
moral permissibility of sexual practices.
It may be that having the conversation is a significant enough change to imply
that the resulting hook up is more of a fantasy than a genuine aggressive hook up. If
that is so, it is only because genuine aggressive hook ups cannot be morally
permissible. I prefer to think of the resulting hook up, after the conversation, as an
aggressive hook up that just happens to have included a prior conversation that
ensured the aggression was morally permissible. But, it is sufficient that, in the end,
I have shown the moral impermissibility of aggressive hook ups without prior
consent, and the permissibility of aggressive hook ups (or at least a fantasy version
of them) that occur after a conversation ensured that consent was obtained and
would be maintained.
Acknowledgments I would like to thank Jon Cogburn, Mona Rocha, this journals editor, Philip Cook,
and the blind reviewers for their comments and suggestions.

References
Archard, David. 1998. Sexual consent. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Bogle, Kathleen. 2008. Hooking up: Sex, dating, and relationships on campus. New York, NY: New York
University Press.
Boswell, Ayres A., and Joan Z. Spade. 1996. Fraternities and collegiate rape culture: Why are some
fraternities more dangerous places for women? Gender and Society 10: 133147.
Friedman, Jaclyn, and Jessica Valenti (eds.). 2008. Yes means yes: Visions of female sexual power and a
world without rape. Berkeley, CA: Seal Press.
Gardner, Susan, and Laura Choate. 2008. The college experience for women: Progress and paradox. In
Girls and womens wellness, ed. Laura Choate, 117141. Alexandria, VA: American Counseling
Association.
Glenn, Norval and Elizabeth Marquardt. 2001. Hooking up, hanging out, and hoping for Mr. Right:
College women on dating and mating today. An Institute for American Values report to the
Independent Womens Forum. New York, NY: Institute for American Values.
Haslanger, Sally. 1993. On being objective and being objectified. In A mind of ones own: Feminist essays
on reason and objectivity, ed. Louise Anthony, and Charlotte Witt, 85125. Boulder, CO: Westview
Press.

123

192

J. Rocha

Husak, Douglas N., and George C. Thomas. 2001. Rapes without rapists: Consent and reasonable
mistake. Philosophical Issues: Social, Political, and Legal Philosophy 11: 86117.
Jensen, Robert. 2007. Getting off: Pornography and the end of masculinity. Cambridge, MA: South End
Press.
Kramer, Karen. 1994. Rule by myth: The social and legal dynamics governing alcohol-related
acquaintance rapes. Stanford Law Review 47: 115160.
Lambert, Tracy A., Arnold S. Kahn, and Kevin J. Apple. 2002. Pluralistic ignorance and hooking up. The
Journal of Sex Research 40: 129133.
MacKinnon, Catherine A. 1989. Toward a feminist theory of the state. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press.
Millar, Thomas M. 2008. Towards a performance model of sex. In Yes means yes: Visions of female
sexual power and a world without rape, ed. Jaclyn Friedman, and Jessica Valenti, 2942. Berkeley,
CA: Seal Press.
Muehlenhard, Charlene L., and Lisa C. Hollabaugh. 1988. Do women sometimes say no when they mean
yes? The prevalence and correlates of womens token resistance to sex. Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology 54: 872879.
ONeill, Onora. 1985. Between consenting adults. Philosophy and Public Affairs 14: 252277.
OSullivan, Lucia F., and Elizabeth R. Allgeier. 1998. Feigning sexual desire: Consenting to unwanted
sexual activity in heterosexual dating relationships. The Journal of Sex Research 36: 234243.
Paul, Elizabeth L., Brian McManus, and Allison Hayes. 2000. Hookups: Characteristics and correlates
of college students spontaneous and anonymous sexual experiences. The Journal of Sex Research
37: 7688.
Pineau, Lois. 1996. Date rape: A feminist analysis. In Date rape: Feminism, philosophy, and the law, ed.
Leslie Francis, 126. University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press.
Primoratz, Igor. 2001. Sexual morality: Is consent enough? Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 4:
201218.
Remick, Lani A. 1993. Read her lips: An argument for a verbal consent standard in rape. University of
Pennsylvania Law Review 141: 11031151.
Roiphe, Katie. 1993. The morning after: Sex, fear, and feminism on campus. Boston, MA: Little, Brown,
and Company.
Schulhofer, Stephen J. 1998. Unwanted sex: The culture of intimidation and the failure of law.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Sprecher, Susan, Elaine Hatfield, Anthony Cortese, Elena Potapova, and Anna Levitskaya. 1994. Token
resistance to sexual intercourse and consent to unwanted sexual intercourse: College students
dating experience in three counties. The Journal of Sex Research 31: 125132.
Strossen, Nadine. 1993. A feminist critique of the feminist critique of pornography. Virginia Law
Review 79: 10991190.
Wertheimer, Alan. 2003. Consent to sexual relations. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.

123

You might also like