Girls & Sex: Navigating the Complicated New Landscape

Affirmative consent policies include laws that require an active “yes” during a sexual encounter, whether verbally or through body language, to prove evidence of sexual consent. This is a different tactic from the previous need to prove that a person said “no.” Antioch University was the first to implement an affirmative consent rule. In 2014, California passed a “yes means yes” law for colleges and universities receiving state funds. The law states that an assailant must prove “an affirmative, unambiguous, and conscious decision by each participant to engage in mutually agreed-upon sexual activity” (199). New York passed affirmative consent legislation in 2015, and several other states are considering doing the same. As of Girls & Sex’s publication, all Ivy League colleges except Harvard had affirmative consent policies in place.

Affirmative consent policies changed the ways consent is discussed and understood. In particular, the laws move the discourse away from the notion that boys are aggressors and girls are victims, reframing the conversation toward what healthy sexual behavior looks like. The policies provide the opportunity to discuss what girls’ agency looks like when it comes to sex.