New Jersey may be the next state to adopt the "Yes Means Yes" sexual assault policy amid national attention being paid to how colleges adjudicate the crime.
According to the Associated Press, the policy is currently just a proposal and there is not enough evidence to prove it reduces sexual assault. California was the first state to adopt the policy when Gov. Jerry Brown signed the bill into law in Sept.
Yes Means Yes requires explicit affirmation to proceed with a sexual encounter. The policy states that consent cannot be given if either participant is intoxicated, inebriated or unconscious. However, participants may give consent through non-verbal cues like physical reciprocation to advances or a nod of the head.
New Hampshire is also moving toward adopting the policy, as a lawmaker filed a draft for a bill in Oct. But Yes Means Yes is not universally accepted. Though student advocates at Harvard are pushing administrators to adopt the policy, a group of law professors are not sold on it.
Critics of the policy say it shifts burden of proof to the accused, while others believe it will not have the desired effect for the victims. But students and faculty members in favor of the Yes Means Yes policy indicate that the current way of handling sexual assault allegations is not working.
"We certainly agree with the university's desire to address a wide range of behaviors through their policy," Jessica Fournier, a student at Harvard advocating for the policy change, told the AP. "However, we believe referring to these acts simply as 'unwelcome' does not encapsulate the severity of these actions."
Title IX is the federal law that requires schools to adjudicate sexual discrimination and it defines misconduct as "unwelcome and offensive," which many advocates see as outdated. Many of whom believe it is a time for a new definition.
Laura Dunn, executive director of the sexual assault survivors' organization SurvJustice, told the AP she was raped in 2004 as an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin. Choosing to identify herself, she said she wishes her school had an affirmative consent sexual assault policy. She was drinking that night and she said that, with a Yes Means Yes policy in place, administrators would have seen that she did not give consent.
