Sexual assault and sports: Reframing the Derrick Rose conversation

The sports arena, particularly men’s sports, is a great container to discuss many social issues as it relates to masculinity and gender-based violence with men. The “off the field” situations that professional athletes constantly bring onto themselves is magnified by the incredible cultural and capitalistic machine of sports media. This gives us many opportunities to discuss important issues like men’s violence against women. The Derrick Rose situation is no different.

In short, a woman has anonymously come forward with a lawsuit stating that Rose and 2 of his friends drugged and raped her in August of 2013. More details can be found by simply googling Derrick Rose. (More details here, here, and here.)

This isn’t the first (and unfortunately, won’t be the last) time that a high profile male athlete is accused of rape. We have some evidence of what conversations around these stories are like, so I would like to take a moment to respond to some of the common responses that I hear.

Man Spreading: What is it and what’s the big deal?

When we use the phrase Rape Supportive Culture, it can sometimes be difficult to know exactly what this means and what it looks like. Sometimes, men will get defensive because it implicates us as part of the problem (and we are part of the problem in a lot of ways and are trying to work against this. Either way, men benefit from Rape Supportive Culture. But that’s a discussion for another day…). Sometimes we can feel helpless when we gain a better understanding of Rape Supportive Culture. Because it’s a lot. And it can be difficult to know where to start. Ultimately, if we want to reduce rates of rape and sexual assault in our culture, particularly against women, children and trans-identified people,

Halloween! Have fun AND do work

Men. I know we’re action oriented. I know how you feel when you just want to DO something about the injustices and inequities stacked against women. Well it’s Halloween tonight and you have the opportunity to do just that. Tonight is typically a street harassment fest. You will hear men (and your friends) say

The Effects of Accountability: Illuminating the Dark Corner of Male Entitlement

A recent article in The Chronicle of Higher Education (trigger warning) tells a story of something we as Men in the Movement have to be prepared to engage in conversation. The title is “Presumed Guilty: College men accused of rape say the scales are tipped against them” and I have no doubt that the recent spotlight on how Universities “handle” sexual assault cases will get students to talk about it. Which is good. And it doesn’t hurt to be prepared for when this happens with your friends.

It’s a lengthy article, but I highly suggest reading to at least the third picture. It has a lot of information that would be tough to summarize here. But one of the biggest take-aways is

Everyday Violations of Consent: The Theft (not “leak”) of Personal Pictures

Recent internet buzz is surrounding pictures of celebrities that were taken without consent. A typical headline looks like this:

“Nude photos of Jennifer Lawrence and other female celebrities leaked online”

First and foremost, they weren't leaked, they were stolen. We’ll get to that later.

I want to highlight some of the things that other writers/bloggers have said. Both Jessica Valenti and this man (I assume it’s a man…) have named that the allure of these particular nude photos is specifically that they were obtained without consent. Valenti and Erin Gloria Ryan talk about how deeply victim blaming the reaction has been.

I have to admit, the high school me would have rushed