Scarleteen

I'm sorry... It's just, I'll probably never have this opportunity again, and so I wanted to make my 17th post on my 17th birthday. I don't really have anything relevant to this site to say though. Um, I had a nice time laughing and messing around with my boyfriend today? That's kind of relevant. Okay, well, you can go back to whatever you were doing before now.

Oh, here's something, actually. There's lots of things that I could ask about, actually. One of my best friends (let's call her Jill!) just started dating one of my boyfriend's friends (let's call him Water Bottle!), we're all friends really. Well, Jill and I have talked a few times about how we think it would be hot if Water Bottle and my boyfriend (let's call him Banana!) kissed. Today it was just the four of us, and Jill and I were jokingly pressuring them to kiss, until they pretended to. I know they don't want to kiss, and our insistence seemed to make them annoyed and possibly uncomfortable. I know if things were reversed, and they were trying to get Jill and I to kiss each other, we would be like, "No way!" and possibly even disgusted, just because it's a sort of classic male fantasy. So, what with "treat others the way you want to be treated" we should definitely just drop the idea of trying to get them to kiss, right? And possibly apologize to both of them? I did apologize or check to see how how banana was after it happens (I can't remember which...), but I didn't really feel sorry, I just knew it was wrong... What do you think about this whole situation?

I just knew it was wrong

Yep.

It's wrong because you're describing pressuring someone to do some kind of sexual behaviour. It doesn't matter whether that's with you or with someone else, it's still sexual pressure. It doesn't matter whether you had some earnest wish or intent for that sexual behaviour or you intended it as a joke, it's still sexual pressure. The word for sexual pressure is coercion.

I know that's pretty blunt, but that's where we are with this, really.

Having it be a joke doesn't really help or make it lighter in this situation. For a start, you're familiar with "it's a joke only if everyone's having fun"? Your boyfriend and Jill's boyfriend - and right there, can we have some different names for these people? They're owed more respect while we're on this topic, especially when you and Jill have more serious names - weren't having fun, so it was no longer a joke.

To illustrate how joking doesn't make pressure lighter, let's step into the shoes of a person in your boyfriend's position for a moment.

When we like someone, want to please them, want them to like us - and those are usually pretty strong about a boyfriend or girlfriend - it often feels difficult to say no to them. It feels uncomfortable and wrong, and we get an inner conflict because we want to say yes to them, we just don't want to do that thing they asked. So now we're battling with ourself as well as with our partner. And they're joking: that must mean it's no big deal, so that must mean there's something wrong with us for feeling so strongly that we don't want to do the thing. We want to say "No; and finally, no. Stop keeping asking: uncool, and knock it off" but they're joking, so what we think and fear we would actually be saying, if we said those words, is "I have no sense of humour and I am a giant wet blanket and boring and overly harsh and I am being Dramatic and Hugely Over-Reacting and am the least chill and least agreeable person ever". And we are confused that somehow we feel so bad and confused with this person we like so much. And we don't know what to do, and sometimes we're not able to think clearly about what to do any more. We just want it to be over.

That's how that kind of pressure and coercion function. You see how, if that person does the thing, they were not consenting, because they weren't able to freely choose whether or not they did it?

Why would you want people to kiss each other when those people don't want to?

I do also want to acknowledge the gender dynamics here and say that because of (bullshit) cultural messaging about guys being more in control, guys can have a particularly difficult time if they're on the receiving end of sexual pressuring, because they may not have known or understood that that's even a thing that can happen to them, and they may think that it shouldn't be any trouble for them, and other people may not see it as a big deal. No matter anyone's gender, sexual pressuring is rough and hard to deal with.

(Just a note: I recognise there may be some celebrating going on, so I'm asking that you reply here only when you know you're in the right headspace and capability to do so, so we treat this topic in the way it deserves. Too, I see what you opened this post with, and I'm genuinely very sorry that I'm not able to celebrate with you as this stands in the here-and-now; you're a valued member of our community, and I want very much that we can work through this part so I can get (belated!) party streamers out for you elsewhere.)

Thank you for putting this into words and explaining it more. It was blunt, but I'm glad you didn't just tell me that I did an awful thing or something like that and instead actually tried to help me understand it so I don't do it again. We wanted to see them kiss if they wanted to be kissing each other, so I'm not really sure why we were trying to get them to kiss yesterday when they didn't want to in the first place. Maybe just to see if they would do it?
I talked to everyone today, and although I won't do anything like this again and my friend won't either, it might not have been as (I don't know how to phrase this... big of a deal? Bad? Those sound like I'm trying to minimize it and I don't want to) as I perceived it to be. Jill's boyfriend (new name: robert (I'm sorry about the names and the whole way that was written last night, it's really cringey and careless)) took my hand and said it was fine, and he really seemed to mean it, he wasn't upset at all. And my boyfriend (new name: Curtis) said he knew we were joking, it was amusing and he doesn't want me to be sorry anymore. We were still pressuring them, and that's not good, but they might not have been as uncomfortable as I thought. Do you think it makes that much of a difference in how wrong this was, what they said/how they were when they apologized? I know it seems like I'm just trying to get rid of my own guilt, which I partially am. I'm worried about this, because I don't want to hurt people and I don't want to be a person who hurts people. Do you think, from knowing about this incident, that my friend or I am likely to do things like this in the future more, like pressuring people or acting controlling? I have worried that I am controlling or I will be in the future lately, so this kind of added to that. Is there anything I can or should do beyond apologizing and not doing it again?

I think that regardless of how they feel about this today, it's still a pretty serious thing to be sexually coercive or disregard consent at all. Maybe think about this the way someone might think about a traffic incident in which no one's hurt - that's great but it doesn't negate the fact that you ran a red light in the first place. And it's not always easy to immediately see, or talk about, how you're impacted by an accident, or by someone being coercive.
Their feelings don't change how wrong this was, no.

I wonder if it would help to go beyond thinking "I won't do it again" and think specifically about what you want to keep in mind and how you want to approach issues of consent moving forward from here. If you're concerned about this being a pattern - and I think it's a good idea to make sure you're being extra considerate in this area right now - then taking some time to really think about what active consent looks like and how you want to practice it will help you avoid these issues moving forward.

If you haven't read it, we have a great article about consent that I think will be a helpful resource: Driver's Ed for the Sexual Superhighway: Navigating Consent

Well, I have you guys, who on one hand (I really really hope and am assuming) are all adults, and know a lot more about something like this than my teenage friends, and on the other hand, I have my friends, who were there, and know me, and say it's okay. I'm having trouble figuring out exactly how I feel about this, so I might need a few days. I know this is the most ridiculous, selfish thing, that I shouldn't be asking, but do you hate me?
I read the article, and I will try and think more about what consent looks/sounds like, and possibly write some things down to make them official. Thank you for your input and help.

Hey there,

I can't speak for anybody else of course, but I really don't think anybody on here hates you and I certainly don't.
There's a big difference between disapproving of something a person did and disapproving of the person themselves.

As for your friends saying what you did was okay and staff members here telling you it was wrong, I think that's best explained by Mo's traffic accident analogy: nobody got hurt this time ("it was okay"), but you "ran a red light" all the same ("it was wrong"). Makes sense?

Sorry for barging in when you said you needed a bit to process things, I just wanted to reply to the hate question and offer a bit of reassurance there.

capablehippy, I know you said you need a few days to figure some things out, so please take whatever time you need. I don't want to swamp you, so I'm not putting a bunch more things in here, just small bits that might help where you're at.

No-one hates anyone here.

Your boyfriend and friend are absolutely the authority on their own experience. I'm very glad - first and foremost for them, but for you too - that they feel okay about this.

The reason I was raising concerns is because some situations like this don't turn out okay, and some people don't feel fine, and which is which usually involves a whole lot of luck and isn't very predictable from the outside.

I do want to commend you for being open to listening and considering. For any of us - and we've all been there, multiple times, about something - it's very uncomfortable to feel that we may have done something wrong. And this conversation here, although you're anonymous, it's still a great deal more visible than most of us would like for the times it happens to us! So, y'know, this learning experience here, it's a bit full-on, and I do recognise that, and it's okay if you're having some extra feelings about that.

Too, it's often very hard to wrangle with boundaries and consent in the general culture around us. In relation to many things - foods, drinking alcohol, doing leisure activities, and much more - it can be very normalised and very common for people to blow right past other people's stated boundaries about their own bodies. When we start seeing and realising that, it can get a bit, well, turtles all the way down (to draw from Pratchett!), and confounding.

Mo and I are adults, yes, but that in itself isn't the slightest reason why anyone should pay any attention to us I know our culture is very strong on the whole "older people know better" thing, but Scarleteen doesn't sign on to that at all - heavens, I know people 20, 30 years older than me who give terrible "advice" about sex/relationship -related things. What makes staff/volunteer and peer education input on Scarleteen worthwhile is that we have useful skills and knowledge for sex and relationship things, and that'd be true of a colleague here of any age, from 13 up.

I've been thinking more about consent between my boyfriend and I this week, like you suggested It's been more than a few days, sorry about that. I feel like my personal upsets are removed from the situation now though, so that's good. Thank you for your reassurance. I have not had any discussions with him this, so I cannot speak for him, but I know in the past I have preferred non-verbal consent, not for any good reasons (awkwardness, fear of rejection, as a way of circumlocuting the fact that we shouldn't be doing what we wanted to do where we were anyway (school)) and he seems more comfortable that way too. I don't think that that is actually better for us though, based on that incident last week and past not fun sexual experiences that I know had to do with poor communication. Also, this week I have been trying to be a better communicator, and it has felt better to be more direct, and, of course, it has been more effective. For example, if I want to give him a kiss, if I can just get used to saying that instead of trying to ask in a bunch of other ways without words, and the process would be much less stressful for everyone involved. Sometimes we don't know what we want, and I think better communication would help us a lot at those times especially. In my health class (which is pretty inclusive and comprehensive, yay) the phrase "enthusiastic consent" came up, and that creates a good image confer with in the moment. I could definitely work on how I feel when I am rejected, I think taking a second away from the person I am with to try and process how I'm feeling and where to go from there is a good idea. I think I should talk to him more a little bit about this, and see what he has to say about consent and communication too. Thank you all for your guidance.

No worries at all about the time! This conversation is here whenever it's useful to you, and it's good to take the time you need to think about things.

That's some really big and meaningful stuff you're digging into. It speaks very well of you that you're able - and willing - to use something like this to think very profoundly about yourself and your relationship, including some things that probably don't feel good and are very challenging, and start making changes where you identify they're needed.

There's nothing wrong with non-verbal consent in itself, but I'd agree that any time anyone's choosing it to try to be less direct, it's going to hinder rather help anything. By its nature, I'd think that non-verbal consent - certainly when we're using the enthusiastic consent model (which is definitely the benchmark to go for, yay good-quality health class!) - will be more direct, not less. And of course, simply trying to avoid talking about sticky things tends to be a way of keeping them sticky rather than dealing with them. Dealing with them often requires some bravery, for sure! - but avoidance tends not to get us solutions, as much as we wish it might.

I'm really glad you're already feeling positive about the changes you're making. A lot of us - especially women, but not just women - absorb a lot from the world around us that we're not "supposed" to be direct, particularly about sex, but regularly too about other wishes, desires, needs. Changing what we're used to and identifying, and then speaking out, what we want is a big deal, and often not easy.

There's a great deal of smarts and self-knowledge in what you wrote just above; I'm mostly just head-nodding my way through it, really There's a bunch of different threads and challenges there - if you'd like to talk particularly about any of them with us or get any extra support for any of it, do say.

One thing I'd like to pick up on and offer a bit on just now is where you're talking about struggling with rejection. For sure, feeling rejected is rubbish for anyone, and any of us probably needs to gather some fortitude to manage our way through it. What's in a No?, if you haven't read it recently, is probably super-helpful to you, including for some re-framing. Might it help to look a bit at why, if/when your boyfriend turns down some kind of sex or intimacy, you're experiencing that as rejection? Maybe that seems an odd question at first! But turning someone down - for anything - can come from many different places than a rejection. For example, if you've turned other people down for something, what different reasons have you had?