Reclaiming the Meaning of ‘No’ : Tyson verdict: a clarifying moment for America

Power and fame and sex--that most combustible mix--has in recent months dominated three front-page cases: Anita Hill versus Clarence Thomas, Patricia Bowman versus William Kennedy Smith and, now, an 18-year-old woman versus ex-heavyweight boxing champ Mike Tyson. It has been an extraordinary, and unsettling, period of high-risk volleys of “he said-she said.” There can be little doubt that more than coincidence links the three cases.

In contrast with Thomas, who was confirmed by the Senate to the U.S. Supreme Court despite charges of sexual harassment, and Smith, who was found not guilty of rape, Tyson was convicted Monday on one count of rape and two counts of criminal deviate conduct against a contestant in the Miss Black America contest last July. A jury in Indianapolis deliberated less than half a day before reaching a verdict of guilty. Yet even after it had found that Tyson lured the young woman to his room and raped her as she begged him to stop, fans continued to cheer the boxer on--”Hang in there, Mike!” and “Don’t worry about it, Mike!” What’s going on here?

MISDIRECTED SCORN: The support that some continue to show for Tyson, a convicted rapist, is more than a demonstration of celebrity worship, though there’s plenty of that in America. Sympathy for Tyson is a way of showing the scorn directed at women who charge men they date with rape. Many men--and women too--continue to have a fundamental problem with the concept of acquaintance rape. After all, they argue in the Tyson case, what was she doing in his hotel room at 2 o’clock in the morning? Didn’t she “ask” for it? What did she expect?

What did she expect? According to her testimony, she expected to go sightseeing, escorted by the famous Tyson. Foolish? Naive? Sure. But foolishness or naivete is not a crime, and hardly surprising from an 18-year-old college freshman who was in Indianapolis for a beauty contest. What she expected was a romantic dream. What he expected was fast sex. He was the only one who got his wish.

DIRECT MESSAGE: Tyson’s conviction, which he will appeal, has been hailed as a victory for all acquaintance-rape victims who might have been afraid to come forward because they feared that they would not be believed. Perhaps they felt that, in exercising poor judgment, in winding up in a situation that they found themselves regretting, they had “asked” to be raped.

Now, slowly but surely, American society seems to be coming to accept that when a woman says “no” to sex, it should be assumed that “no” is what she means.

The Tyson case showcases many disturbing lessons about prevailing values--how too many young people are dazzled by wealth and celebrity, how too many idolized, overpaid superstars expect to have whatever they demand, at whomever’s expense, whenever they want it.

But the most enduring--and positive--result from this verdict is that the word “no” may have regained its true meaning as, in this kind of case, the very last word.