https://katrosenfield.substack.com/p/on-what-women-want
created by MileiMePioloABeluche on 19/01/2025 at 13:13 UTC
54 upvotes, 13 top-level comments (showing 13)
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1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
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Comment by horseradishstalker at 19/01/2025 at 18:05 UTC
46 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I've been following the Neil Gaimin debacle and it's apparent that childhood abuse may have warped him (I say may because I'm not qualified to make a therapuetic diagnosis). But that's a reason and does not excuse his choices in any way. What was even worse from my perspective was the damage being done to his child which everyone seemed to ignore. But on to the linked post.
While I found the author's reasoning in the linked post about the Gaimin debacle somewhat convoluted, I think that the meat of the post is the conclusion:
"I believe Pavlovich went through something awful that was not her fault; I also believe she made some choices that left her vulnerable to what happened, and some choices that made it
worse. As is the case with most awful experiences. And yes: if someone has sex with you that you didn't desire and didn't enjoy, I think it is better, all things considered, not to repeatedly tell him afterwards that it was wanted and wonderful you can't wait to do it again. Not just because it's important for people (and women are people, I must insist) to say what they mean, but because you should save those words to describe sex that is actually wonderful, and what you actually want. You
deserve nothing less."
I would add that the final sentence in this quote should probably apply to everyone regardless of gender.
Comment by MileiMePioloABeluche at 19/01/2025 at 13:17 UTC
48 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Submission statement: in the context of the Neil Gaiman scandal[1], the author reasons about some of the consequences of assuming adult women are too naïve or too immature to have agency and give consent, in particular in relationships with men.
1: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c247nnl71gdo
The thing is, if women can’t be trusted to assert their desires or boundaries because they'll invariably lie about what they want in order to please other people, it's not just sex they can't reasonably consent to. It's medical treatments. Car loans. Nuclear non-proliferation agreements. Our entire social contract operates on the premise that adults are strong enough to choose their choices, no matter the ambient pressure from horny men or sleazy used car salesmen or power-hungry ayatollahs. If half the world's adult population are actually just smol beans — hapless, helpless, fickle, fragile, and much too tender to perform even the most basic self-advocacy — everything starts to fall apart, including the entire feminist project. You can't have genuine equality for women while also letting them duck through the trap door of but I didn't mean it, like children, when their choices have unhappy outcomes.
Comment by turtlehabits at 20/01/2025 at 00:32 UTC
33 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I think what this article is ignoring is that Pavlovich was a vulnerable person: abuse survivor, homeless, essentially no social network.
In my view, the author of the exposé doesn't suggest that Pavlovich's "consent" wasn't really consent because she was a woman; rather that Pavlovich was a vulnerable person taken advantage of by a powerful person and as such it was impossible for her to freely consent. I read the texts from her to Gaiman and see someone who has learned that survival means saying and doing whatever keeps your abuser happy.
The article conveniently leaves out these paragraphs from the exposé:
“I said ‘no.’ I said, ‘I’m not confident with my body,’” Pavlovich recalls. “He said, ‘It’s okay — it’s only me. Just relax. Just have a chat.’” She didn’t move. He looked at her again and said, “Don’t ruin the moment.” She did as instructed, and he began to stroke her feet. At that point, she recalls, she felt “a subtle terror.”
Gaiman asked her to sit on his lap. Pavlovich stammered out a few sentences: She was gay, she’d never had sex, she had been sexually abused by a 45-year-old man when she was 15. Gaiman continued to press. “The next part is really amorphous,” Pavlovich tells me. “But I can tell you that he put his fingers straight into my ass and tried to put his penis in my ass. And I said, ‘No, no.’ Then he tried to rub his penis between my breasts, and I said ‘no’ as well. Then he asked if he could come on my face, and I said ‘no’ but he did anyway. He said, ‘Call me ‘master,’ and I’ll come.’ He said, ‘Be a good girl. You’re a good little girl.’”
I'm not sure how this event in particular could be construed as anything other than rape. She said no multiple times. He continued regardless. This isn't a "terrible-but-consensual sexual experience" that Pavlovich tried to redefine "as actually rape" - it *is* actually rape.
Comment by Hexatona at 20/01/2025 at 04:11 UTC
11 upvotes, 1 direct replies
This article dances around the topic so much it forgets to really make a point. All it boils down to is if you have sex you didn't ask for or enjoy, it would be a good idea not to say the opposite. Brillant. I did appreciate their point about trusting the words that come out of the mouths of adults. If we subtly begin treating women as if they can't reasonably be trusted to consent to *anything*, that has some serious consequences down the line. I just wish the author did more with this discussion and made an actual judgement.
Comment by Hexatona at 20/01/2025 at 04:25 UTC
4 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I feel like the question at the center of this whole debate really boils down to: When does society step in when two consenting adults make bad decisions?
Comment by BendicantMias at 19/01/2025 at 20:36 UTC
9 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Article kinda goes nowhere, although I suspect that's cos the author herself doesn't have answers (which is kinda refreshing to see nowadays, if so). It does identify a clear problem wherein others once more get to, and indeed have to, decide what women mean for women, as their own words can't be trusted. It highlighted the problems that leads to. It doesn't have any kind of solution though, even an intermediate one. The ending just kind of trails off with a note of support to victims, but nothing for the central issue it raises. We're left just hoping such cases are rare, but as the article itself notes the basic problem of not being able to trust womens' word could extend to all aspects of life and thus be very common. The only thing I'll add is that if others are going to decide, then we at least should ensure that they don't have an axe to grind of their own. So no activists, from either side. One day, for various reasons of which this is only one, society is going to have to rediscover the value of neutrality - instead of, as it often does nowadays, demonizing the very concept as appeasement or collusion. Alternately we just draw a hard line around consent and insist once more that peoples' words are their bonds, however they may have been feeling. Either is fine, but the worst 'solution' would be to let a bunch of agenda pushers decide.
Comment by hectorc82 at 19/01/2025 at 22:20 UTC
7 upvotes, 1 direct replies
She's right. If you don't verbally say "no" it's very hard to establish criminal intent.
Comment by thisusernameismeta at 19/01/2025 at 21:46 UTC
20 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I think the author of this article is missing a very key aspect of the relationship, and that's the power dynamic between Gaiman and his victims.
She wasn't in a position to be able to give a clear no because she was dependent on him for housing and employment.
Consent isn't just about saying yes. It's also about being able to say no without hurting yourself.
For a lot of men reading this article and discussing it, they simply are not going to be in a position with such a large gulf of power between them and the women they engage with.
It is unfortunate that, in the given text exchange, she ended up reassuring him that it was consensual. But there is more context to that conversation - Gaiman didn't check in with her about how she was feeling in that moment - he centered the conversation around his own feelings. Not on hers. Maybe a conversation that started "hey, I know we've been doing some pretty extreme stuff together recently. I want to check in and make sure that you're still ok with everything we've been doing," would have yielded different results.
Consent is about creating an environment in which your partner is comfortable saying yes or no without fear of consequences - emotional, material, or otherwise. If they know that their "no" is going to come with a side helping of "helping their partners process the feeling of rejection," then it cannot be a very enthusiastic example of consent.
Neil Gaiman failed to create that environment. This woman was dependent on him. And the times they did talk about consent, he centered his feelings of distress at the possibility that things were anything less than consensual.
Comment by LeeGhettos at 21/01/2025 at 16:53 UTC
2 upvotes, 0 direct replies
This is nonsense. The author cherry picks quotes from another article to make it seem like a rape accusation was a smear piece. Having actually read the other article, this author conveniently leaves out the direct accusations of sexual assault.
By making a meal of dissecting the victims text messages from later in the (allegedly-abusive) relationship, and sprinkling in random irrelevancies about bdsm, they paint a picture of a woman who got in over her head and had sexual regrets. According to this article, the only real evidence of wrongdoing is intellectual nonsense involving nebulous consent. Apparently, we should be more upset that he is a deviant, and we are sexually failing as a society?
Again, the woman directly accused this man of sexually assaulting her, while she asked him to stop. The entire story is written in the article this one keeps referencing. Writing an article about consent and women’s agency in relation to these events, while neglecting to acknowledge this basic fact of the case, is either intentionally dishonest or stupid.
Comment by ScreenTricky4257 at 19/01/2025 at 14:14 UTC
9 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Obviously, this paradigm imposes a very weird, circular trap on men (#BelieveWomen, except the ones who say they want to sleep with you, in which case you should commence a Poirot-style interrogation until she breaks down and confesses that she actually finds you repulsive.) But I'm more interested in what happens to women
OK. I'm more interested in how it affects men, and how it serves a larger agenda of treating whatever men want as wrong on its face, unless it's in service to others, especially women. You don't get to shame men for their kinks if you're not going to shame women for their kinks.
Comment by 00rb at 19/01/2025 at 19:27 UTC*
7 upvotes, 2 direct replies
This was a well written essay and I appreciate its contribution to the discourse, but it really feels like we're reinventing paternalism from first principles here.
Feminists will say this is a bad thing, and I used to consider myself one. Honestly, now when I'm on dates I go in with the assumption that women want what women have always traditionally wanted: a nice man to protect and take care of them. And who will commit to them (if THEY want that -- honestly I feel like women are the gatekeepers for long term relationships more than people acknowledge).
I don't begrudge them or society for that but I feel if you read the discourse you just walk away feeling more confused about gender stuff.
This is the kind of post people downvote because they disagree with it, but my dating life has improved dramatically since taking this attitude. Women want it so clearly.
Comment by morelikecrappydisco at 21/01/2025 at 02:46 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
He picked her as the object of his abuse because she had nothing, he pressured her and manipulated her into scenarios where she would be even more vulnerable, and made sure she would be too afraid to say no, either afraid of being hurt physically, afraid of being fired which for her would mean having no place to live, no money and no friends. She already had no family and nowhere else to turn for help. Then, when she "consented" to some mild sexual touching he escalated that sexual contact until eventually it turned into extreme brutal rape and sexual contact in front of a child which is so disturbing I can't even begin to imagine what the fuck is wrong with him. Then, because she needed him for a place to live, because he owed her money for nannying his kid, she was afraid to displease him. She needed him to at least pay her what he owed her before she could leave. If she left she wouldn't even have an address for him to mail her a check, it would be leaving to live on the street. He knew what he was doing when he texted her about their relationship being consensual that she could never deny it in a text, because he made sure she was completely reliant on him before raping her. The idea that it's anti feminism not to take her at her word when she texted him ignores all the ways that her abuser planned that too! He wants you to think he has every reason to think she consented because he planned it so that she wouldn't be able not to consent. If she can't say no, she can't say yes. Coerced consent is never consent.