“It doesn't include us”: Heterosexual bias and gay men's struggle to see themselves in affirmative consent policies

Abstract

Abstract Rape and sexual assault are considered forms of gender violence, or violence against women, and affirmative consent policies were created as a primary prevention strategy to combat this kind of sexual violence on college and university campuses. Such policies are often promoted as being inclusive and applicable cross‐culturally because of the gender‐neutral language within affirmative consent policies; however, the highly gendered nature of sexual assault discourse has become hegemonic and thereby unintentionally reinforces a heterosexually gendered false dichotomy about sexual violence. This qualitative study utilizes in‐depth interviews with 10 gay men to explore how they perceive affirmative consent policies. The results found that gay men perceived an implicit heterosexual bias within affirmative consent policies that reinforced heterosexist conceptions of sex, gender, sexual scripts, and sexual assault. Ultimately, this made it challenging for participants to see themselves in affirmative consent policies. Moreover, it burdens gay men whose experiences with sex and consent, as well as sexual assault, do not fit within the heterosexist paradigm of current sexual assault and affirmative consent discourses/policies.