Hal's short!! operationalization of assault and love

NEW WORLD ORDER DIARY
                              Hal Pepinsky
                            September 9, 1993

OPERATIONALIZING SEXUAL VIOLENCE AND LOVING

Serendipity has given me to think about sexual violence and loving in two
contexts at once--that of the acquaintance rapist and that of the child
molester. My dialogue in both classes has led me to sharpen my
operational distinction between violence and love, in the context of sex.

Loving sex can only occur only when partners BOTH contemplate continuing
to attend to one another's expressions of want and need before, during and
after the act, AND contemplate the partner talking with others about the
experience as well. Two kinds of imbalance underlie sexual violence. In
hit-and-run cases where the survivor is abandoned after the act, the
violator has contemplated talking with his or her own kind of people
INCONSISTENTLY WITH how one talks with one's partner. The very thought of
facing the partner the day after becomes repulsive. In incest with
children on the other hand, the premium is put on keeping secrets between
partners--to remove discourse about the relationship from discussion with
one's friends and confidants.

If there are "secrets only two can share" about a loving sexual
relationship, it is not because the sex implies danger or embarrassment,
but simply that the sex rests on a depth of interpersonal experience that
is too complex to express fully to others--because the intimacy has its
own life that cannot and need not be fully detailed in public discourse.

In brief, when I see a parent for instance who is keeping a child from
seeing others about problems the child presents, I worry that the veil of
secrecy laid over the parent-child relationship itself represents
violence, which could as well be in how people touch each other as in what
they say. When I see that guys are more concerned to brag to one another
the next day about their exploits than to spend time with the woman they
are talking about, I worry likewise.

When there is an imbalance between public and private discourse, it
signifies that people are being talked about or treated as objects, as
members of categories presumed to want, need or deserve less than the
person bent on talking about the relationship two incompatible ways in two
settings. When you don't ask before you presume to give others what they
want, need, or deserve without checking it out with them and letting them
check it out with others, you purely and simply, as I have put it, violate
the Golden Rule. The result is that you expect that you or your partner
will engage in private discourse inconsistent with public discourse. We
relate violently to those we objectify by relegating our discourse with
them to a realm distinct from our outside discourse.

This seems a pretty simple, powerful way to distinguish violent from
peaceful relations to me. Now how did it take me all these years to see
the distinction?