She should of just gotten up from the bar. From how the story reads, I don't think she was laying down at that point so she had the opportunity to walk away. 4 separate acts happened and by her account 3 were unwanted. How many does it take for someone to just remove themselves from the situation? How many?
Exactly, I does not look to be a vile act but still a bad decision on Joe's part. If someone said no by referencing wife and kids, that would "imply" they actual would do it but that have a moral objection to the person's relationship status. NO MEANS NO when you say NO or STOP. Many of you are being self-righteous by vilifying this person and then when anyone brings up reasonable doubt, you attack the person or worse then addressing reasonable questions like why didn't she just walk away or clearly say STOP or NO. Instead I see people absolving Justine from any PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY for her ACTIONS or LACK THEREOF.
I don't see why it should matter what justification she gives for why he should stop, someone saying "stop" is clearly unhappy and uncomfortable with the situation. Saying that it's ok that he 'misunderstood' her because she gave a reason that meant nothing to him denies her agency.
Ignoring that she was clearly uncomfortable with everything about the situation, even if she were merely uncomfortable with making out with a married man this would be more than enough reason for her to say stop and expect him to not continue.
The fundamental problem with this kind of equivocation, though, is that in a scary as fuck situation people do what they can to get out and sometimes they can't figure out the right thing to do in the split second between someone kissing them and shoving their finger in their genitals.
Can someone tell me how you put your hand down to grab someone's butt while they are laying on their back on a bar? That seems kind of difficult. I just tried it and it took me rolling someone on their side then doing it and then rolling them back to put my hand down their pants. I am just recounting the information presented to fairly run through this situation. We need to be fair to both parties if were are going to be passing judgement on people we don't know and were not at this event. We are only hearing one side of the story so that means we need to scrutinize it even more.
Why did she not pull away after the kiss and be done with it. It takes some time to kiss someone, reach around grab their butt then go down the pants which were likely tight fitting jeans. Just time it yourself and ask yourself if there is enough time for someone to pull away. I am not sure how you "jam" you tongue down someones throat and not have them pull away if they did not want that from you. Check your emotions for a second and read through and document all the facts and weigh them before you start making judgements.
Two words: Personal Responsibility. The fact she admit she froze up would in my mind maybe give the person the benefit of the doubt that he was not trying to be purposely malicious. That is the real issue here when we want to throw around terms like "sexual assault". What matters is the intent of the person when they commit these acts not that technical some sexual contact was made that was not invited when two adults in a bar that are drunk are engaging in personal contact. Nothing in this article tells us the Joe intended to assault her, only that he made a very bad decision in making a move like that before being invited to. Maybe he felt that was were it was leading from the fact that she never pulled away during 3 personal contacts that were progressive. Maybe she froze or maybe she was just too drunk to be fully aware. You have to evaluate both sides to see if the evidence points to specific motives. That is the real issue here.
What was Joe's personal responsibility? Why do people insist on bringing Justine's personal responsibility into this equation but not Joe's?
He was in a position of power over her which most firms with an HR department are very specific about.
Two words: Rape Culture. Rape culture exists when we continue to question the motives of the victim. The fact that many of you continue to excuse his behavior and question hers, leads me to believe that we're going to see way too many cases of this in our lifetimes. It's no fucking wonder these things continue to happen. The sexual assault apologists in this thread is really disheartening and frankly, appalling.
Not to mention there seems to be this ridiculous misconception that if you didn't know you were assaulting someone it's not sexual assault.
That's so very, very wrong. Anyone who argues this in court has a bad lawyer, or isn't listening to their good lawyer. Sexual assault can occur even if you don't know you are doing it. It is your responsibility, as the initiator, to know whether consent has been given or not!
Groping someone in a drunken stupor is very likely to get you into a LOT of trouble. The sooner this misconception is cleared up, the better. Both for those poor unfortunates that encounter the one with the misconception, and for the person with the misconception themselves, otherwise they might find themselves in jail!
So now Joe is responsible? For her? When did she shift from being a strong independent woman who needs no man to having someone be responsible for her? I thought she was a grown up woman able to make her own choices and stand for her own actions but now she isn't responsible? I know her writing doesn't really lie about the quality of that responsibility (pouring yourself drunk in a work week, que) but she IS responsible for her own actions and everything which is achieved by this blog post is due to her own actions.
Please don't tell me that her not ever able to obtain a job is Joe's fault. Look at what she writes and smears on the Internet for the public view. Unless she goes to work at some feminist induced Ruby startup where this is accepted and even stimulated, this trail of shit smearing will haunt the search engine index pages for years.
Yeah, as the boss he does have some responsibility. And he sure as hell is responsible for his own actions.
You just don't get it, do you? If you don't ask for explicit consent, and rely on mixed signals to evaluate consent, if you get I wrong then you are still responsible. That's the personal responsibilty of the one initiating the unwanted sexual advances.
I don't care if she stripped down naked and paraded up and down the bar. This doe s not give any man the right to engage in unwanted sexual activity. Full stop. A court of law would find the same, and in fact there are quite a few surprised men who have found this out, to their cost.
Please read "After the shot" again. If im not mistaken kissing forheads and rubbing is commen place with your male friends. You mention multiple coworkers. He hand grabs your butt and you dont immediatly pull away????? Why not take responsibility for your actions as well. Ive been to bars and seen drunken mistakes but to vilify the person like this and not take any resposibilty for your actions is pathetic and immature. Yes he crossed the line but maybe we should hear that from you too.
She had opportunity to stop things before it progressed to "down the front of the pants."
Do people not understand what's involved in putting a hand down a girl's front? It's actually not that easy to do... it can't be done "casually" in a public bar without both parties allowing it to happen.
Not to mention "forcibly kissing me with his tongue"... How is that even possible unless the other person opens their mouth and lets your tongue in?
If a girl doesn't want your tongue in her mouth at a public bar, guess what? Your tongue is not going in her mouth! That's how kissing works in case any readers here are rusty on the subject! :-)
Go ahead, downvote. But please don't kid yourself that this girl isn't playing the "victim of alcohol-fueled tech industry sleaze" game.
I wonder if part of it isn't the "landmine mode" that minorities have to be in to succeed in the workplace. As a woman you have to be hypervigilant about how you are perceived amongst your coworkers. There are very small runways of acceptable behavior between pushover and bitch, between slut and ice queen, etc. There is the pressure to fit in and "go with the flow" but then there you know that when shit hits the fan (as it did here) your every move will be scrutinized and every opportunity to blame you for your misfortune will be taken.
As a result, I think minorities in the work place have a constant running double, triple, quadruple-checking loop for their behavior. Everything they want to say need to be run by a bunch of checks to make sure it meets the "safe for a male-dominated workplace" test.
As a result you're much slower to react to thing. As a majority member it's much easier to just blurt out your first thought, or to act out your first reaction... since you're the norm, it's reasonable to assume that your first instinct will be acceptable to the group.
But as a minority, you learn to second-guess yourself. Therefore even as someone is forcibly kissing you, you are second guessing what your options really are.
What rights should be given just because people work in a corporation? Flawed argument. Personhood is quite important in our Republic. Only living and breathing humans that are American citizens should be allowed to take part in our politics. Giving corporations a seat at the table is just reinforcing a class-based system like you have in Britain but without hereditary titles. Wealth is power in a market based society. The other is influence and military might. Corporatons have two inhierently because there first use was to concentrate capital (wealth) and limit liability.
Corporations should be economic engines only. People can and should be forced to organize independently of a corporation. That preserves the balance in a democracy. I would also add that liability protection for the officers should be recinded. These two changes would have a profoundly postive effect on society.
