How can women feel comfortable saying no when they are told they can not say yes? It sounds confusing does not it?

The #MeToo movement has demonstrated enormous success in raising awareness about sexual harassment and assault. This effort has faced violent reactions, such as the recent tweets from Donald Trump that claim that the accusations have ruined lives and that there is no recovery for the accused falsely.

While such black-and-white denunciations can stifle constructive dialogue, other narratives can highlight gray areas that inspire important questions about gender and unwanted sex.

One example is the public grievance of a woman who, using the pseudonym "Grace", describes an unwanted sexual encounter with actor Aziz Ansari. In an article published in the online magazine Babe, Grace recounts a date that she has seen retrospectively as a rape. Grace says she performed oral sex in Ansari after repeated requests for sex, which she found unwanted. Critics have accused Grace of undermining the #MeToo movement's credibility by portraying herself as a victim after lamenting her consensual participation in unwanted sexual activity.

Grace's story inspires the question: "Why would a young woman voluntarily participate in a sexual activity she does not want personally?"

Sexual consent and desire are not the same

It is important to understand that consensual sex and the desired sex are not always synonymous. Both young women and young men can agree to participate in sexual activities they do not want personally. However, the cultural scripts surrounding heterosexual relationships can make this a reality for women more often than for men.

Cultural representations of heterosexual sexuality often show that young men have a stronger sexual desire than young women. Men are expected to make sexual advances towards women, and women are expected to simply respond to these advances. The sexual desire and pleasure of young women are considered secondary to the wishes of young men. This can cause young women to accept unwanted advances and engage in unwanted sexual relationships for the purpose of pleasing a male partner.

As psychologist Deborah Tolman has argued, cultural messages portraying young women as objects of desire of young men, rather than subjects possessing their own desires, can make women vulnerable to the needs of others.
The danger of not recognizing the desire

It is unlikely that young women who do not see their own sexual desires and desires as an adequate reason to participate in sexual activity interpret their lack of desire in a given scenario as a reason to reject sexual activity. They can change their justification for sexual activity away from exploring their own desires and fulfilling those of a male partner.

As a sociologist studying power and sexuality, I tested this hypothesis with data from a sample of more than 7,000 heterosexual university women who reported their most recent connection.

I discovered that almost a third of the young women in the sample reported that they prioritized their partner's sexual pleasure over theirs. These women believed that it was more important to satisfy their partners than their partners to satisfy them.

Approximately half of the women in the sample reported that it was important for sex to be pleasurable for both their partner and themselves.

When comparing these two groups of women, I found that women who valued their partner's pleasure equally were 35 percent less likely to engage in unwanted sexual acts to please their partner. They were less likely to report that they performed oral or manual stimulation because they were not interested in sex, but they felt that they should sexually satisfy their partner.

Regarding sexual advances, I discovered that more than 60 percent of the women in the sample reported that their partner initiated most of the sexual activity during their most recent connection. About 10 percent of women reported that they were the ones who initiated most of the sexual activity. My comparison of these two groups of women revealed that those who initiated most of the sexual activity in their most recent connection were 34 percent less likely to perform unwanted sexual acts to please their partner, and 63 percent less likely to succumb to verbal pressure to have sex. .

Changing discussions about sexual consent and desire

Today, young adults are shaping their sexual relationships at a unique time when conversations about sex, power and violence change significantly.

Universities in the United States are moving away from a "no mean no" approach to a "yes, yes, yes" to the prevention of sexual assault. The emphasis here is on consent as a green light instead of a rejection as a red light for sexual activity. Such programs should be alert to the complicated nature of sexual consent among young adults in a way that distinguishes consent from desire.

Recognizing young women as sexual subjects with their own desires can safeguard young women from indulging in unwanted sexual activity for the purpose of pleasing a partner.