Community Statement of Consent and Consequences

Community Statement of Consent and Consequences

As a community, we are addressing a pattern of non-consensual behavior from at least one individual. We will not tolerate the disregard of consent.

Consent means two people (or more) deciding together to do the same thing, at the same time, in the same way, with each other. Touching without valid consent is assault; sex without valid consent is rape.

Basic guidelines of consent:

Confirm valid consent before engaging in sexual or intimate behavior.

Anything other than an enthusiastic “yes” to a sexual advance or during a sexual or intimate act is a “no”. This “no” is a final answer to further engagement and must be respected.

Consent cannot be assumed, and no one should ever feel entitled to sex. Even if someone has had a previous sexual encounter with a person, or a person has agreed to intimacy in the past, it does not mean that you do not need to obtain express consent for any further intimate encounters.

Silence must be interpreted as a no. It is not okay to proceed in an act unless all other parties say it’s okay. Silence can easily mean something other than "yes," and bad judgments in this area are no excuse.

There are circumstances in which consent, even when given, is not valid.

Consent would be invalid when coerced, intimidated, threatened, forced, when given by a mentally or physically incapacitated person (including an intoxicated person), or when given by a minor.

In a sexual encounter, when one person withdraws (stops engaging or touching back), this may mean that they are uncomfortable with the sexual activity and that consent is no longer valid. At that point, it is time to stop completely and talk about each other’s desires and limits.

Continued requests or verbal pressure for sexual activity can be coercive and/or intimidating and may invalidate consent. It is not the responsibility of the victim to fight off or act in any way to stop a sexual aggressor.

Emotional manipulation, lies, or misleading behavior leading to sexual activity constitutes coercion, and cannot lead to valid consent.

A member of our community and living spaces has violated others by not taking "no" for an answer to his sexual advances and destructive behavior. Many women in our community - platonic friends, roommates, lovers, and partners - have been repeatedly touched, isolated, coerced into sexual situations, emotionally manipulated, psychologically abused, sexually assaulted, or raped by someone who is active in our community. We will not tolerate these violations any further. As a community, we now have a zero-tolerance policy for violating anyone's personal self and space without expressed consent.

As a community, we have also decided that apologists will not be tolerated. An apologist is a person who argues in defense or justification for the person who is committing a violation of another person’s space or self, or a person who diminishes or invalidates the feelings and actions of a survivor of abuse and assault.

What we need are good allies. An ally is someone who advocates for and supports members of a community other than their own, reaching across differences to achieve mutual goals. A good ally believes the women around them and does not diminish or question the series of events or behaviors a woman is naming or calling out. A good ally will call out abusive behavior when it is seen or heard, immediately and directly. To be a good ally means paying attention to presently harmful patterns, not accepting excuses for them, and not participating in victim blaming.

As a community, we recognize that it's of paramount importance for all members to feel safe and empowered. It is our hope that through dialog, we can teach these values to anyone willing to participate. However, it undermines the solidarity of our community and the effectiveness of our struggle when members become antithetical to the concepts of equality and anti-oppression by bringing oppressive power structures to our community.

In our fight against oppression, we must actively negate the subjugation of women that has infiltrated our communities. Rape and sexual violence are tolerated, excused, normalized, and even condoned in patriarchal societies. When rape culture is present and permitted in our activist communities, we undermine the values that motivate our activism and lose vital survivors and allies who feel devalued or too unsafe to work within our communities. Analyzing ourselves and our communities and taking action to negate oppression is necessary in the practice of resistance because liberation cannot be achieved without resisting all oppression, no matter its form.

As a community, we have decided that one consequence for these actions is to call-out the perpetrator if they are present in our living spaces and active communities. Geovanny (Geo)  Gutierrez has violated the rules of consent. As it stands right now, because of this individual’s actions, R.O.O.T.S. (Radical organization for organic teaching and sustainability) EcoVillage and other activist communities in which we participate as a collective are unsafe spaces for women. R.O.O.T.S. and our greater communities (activist and non) are no longer going to allow this dangerous behavior to continue. Geo's repeated excuse of alcohol and addiction are no longer, and never were, acceptable. Geo has continued to violate and ignore others' boundaries. He has verbally and emotionally abused others. He continues to touch and coerce women within our communities, even after they have made it expressly clear that they are saying "no," whether through actions or words. As a community that will not tolerate this behavior, we have decided that violating one’s person and space will end in exclusion from our living, organizing, and activist spaces. Those who choose to violate others will no longer be invited to participate in our communities, and we will urge other communities to follow suit in banning them (Geo), and anyone else who violates a person in any way.

We sign and hold ourselves accountable to this statement as former or current roommates, friends, lovers, or partners of Geo’s:

Natalie Atwater
Amanda Austin
Caitlin Austin
Whytney Blythe
Dawnielle C.
Laura Cauvel
Sarah D.
Jessica Harmon
Spencer Harmon
Jamie Tilley
Corey Williams
Anonymous