Project Dinah’s definition of rape puzzling, shocking

TO THE EDITOR:

I was somewhat shocked to read the letter to the editor from Project Dinah’s co-chairwomen in The Daily Tar Heel (“Tucker Max’s movie should not be shown here at UNC,” Aug. 23).

Not because they were displeased with Tucker Max, who is a pretty unpleasant person, but instead because of the bizarre logic they used to support their argument.

Edens and Isaacson’s letter hinges around the syllogism that if Tucker had sex with intoxicated people, and intoxicated people can’t give consent, he committed rape.

This argument seems to overlook the pretty obvious fact that Tucker was also drinking, and thus also couldn’t give consent. So why do Isaacson and Eden insist on portraying the women as victims, instead of allowing them some degree of their own sexual autonomy?

Furthermore, if Project Dinah wants to villainize every film (or even every time) in which someone drinks and then has sex as “rape,” they’ve got their work cut out for them.

Perhaps most troubling is that with their letter, Isaacson and Edens have given Tucker, a fairly unsavory individual, precisely the sort of publicity he wants.

It’s quite likely that his stories were made up for attention; why feed into that? If you want to criticize the sexist attitude of the film, fine; deal with the way he objectifies women. But don’t try to disempower any woman who meets a man she’s attracted to in a bar and takes him home.

That’s a step in the wrong direction for progressive gender relations.


Jake Fraser
Senior
Economics