What She Won’t Remember

We were at Julian’s party, and it was fine until the predictable thing happened. Girl drank too much, ended up in a corner basically unconscious, and one of those guys with no other moves decided it was his opening. Hands on her, her just sitting there not really registering anything.

I mentioned it to my best friend today and she didn’t see the issue. Seriously. Girl won’t remember, won’t know it happened, so what’s the harm? I tried the decency angle, the honor angle, the basic respect angle—all these concepts that apparently only I’m still holding onto—and she just wasn’t buying it.

Then she went for the mirror argument. What if a girl was groping a drunk guy instead? Wouldn’t he be fine with that? Wouldn’t he probably be into it, waking up knowing some attractive girl had her hands on him while he was passed out?

That’s where I saw the disconnect. In her mind they’re the same action, just swapped. Two equivalent scenarios we can debate like it’s a neutral question. She’s not even seeing that power is different when you’re the one who’s completely gone. That consent is not some symmetrical thing. You can’t flip it around and get the same equation.

We didn’t resolve it. We just kind of sat with the realization that someone you’ve known forever thinks about this stuff in a completely different way—not a fun different, not a taste thing, but a fundamental I don’t know who you are kind of different.