[NEWS] Seven links on the Jian Ghomeshi BDSM scandal

[rfmcdonald]

One of the oddest sex scandals that have hit Canada so far began today and involves Jian Ghomeshi, a sometime writer and musician who has most recently become famous as host of CBC Radio 1's show Q and who has been accused of violence towards multiple women, sexual partners and otherwise.

MacLean's shares an article that provides a biography of his life and explains why he was so popular, even internationally.

The live, usually 90-minute cultural chat program soon became a centrepiece of CBC-Radio’s lineup, a showcase for A-list guests and catnip for a younger generation that otherwise proved elusive for CBC.

Beyond possessing a dulcet voice, Ghomeshi was a sophisticated and decidedly hip presence on CBC’s airwaves. He possessed a cultural facility aided by a long career in music and a finger-on-the-pulse knack to spin opening “essays” with much viral value. His Twitter account had roughly 284,000 followers as of Monday afternoon — CBC’s own had only 103,000.

Notably, Ghomeshi also had a knack for making celebrity guests feel comfortably swaddled in admiration while nudging them toward acknowledgements of criticism or personal revelations they might have been disinclined to share in other interviews.

Ghomeshi defended himself in a remarkable Facebook post, presenting himself as someone being attacked unfairly.

About two years ago I started seeing a woman in her late 20s. Our relationship was affectionate, casual and passionate. We saw each other on and off over the period of a year and began engaging in adventurous forms of sex that included role-play, dominance and submission. We discussed our interests at length before engaging in rough sex (forms of BDSM). We talked about using safe words and regularly checked in with each other about our comfort levels. She encouraged our role-play and often was the initiator. We joked about our relations being like a mild form of Fifty Shades of Grey or a story from Lynn Coady's Giller-Prize winning book last year. I don’t wish to get into any more detail because it is truly not anyone's business what two consenting adults do. I have never discussed my private life before. Sexual preferences are a human right.

Kevin Donovan's Toronto Star article outlines the allegations.

Over the past few months the Star has approached Ghomeshi with allegations from three young women, all about 20 years his junior, who say he was physically violent to them without their consent during sexual encounters or in the lead-up to sexual encounters. Ghomeshi, through his lawyer, has said he “does not engage in non-consensual role play or sex and any suggestion of the contrary is defamatory.”

[. . .]

The three women interviewed by the Star allege that Ghomeshi physically attacked them on dates without consent. They allege he struck them with a closed fist or open hand; bit them; choked them until they almost passed out; covered their nose and mouth so that they had difficulty breathing; and that they were verbally abused during and after sex.

Carla Ciccone's June post at xoJane describing an unpleasant date marked by incessant groping with a broadcaster widely believed to be Ghomeshi earned her the online hatred of many fans.

The next night, I met him at a wine bar for a quick drink before the show. When I walked in, I was greeted by both the overwhelming stench of his cologne and the sinking feeling that Keith was not, as I had assumed, gay. This wasn’t a friend date; it was a date, date –- at least to him. He looked at me the way a creepy older man looks at a young, silly girl he’s going to buy a drink he’s planning to slip a roofie into. I didn’t know what to do. He was 15 years older than me, but what’s more, I found him totally unattractive and didn’t want to be on a date with him. But I couldn’t just leave.

Brenda Cossman at The Globe and Mail makes the point that BDSM is not protected under Canadian law.

But, when it comes to BDSM – or at least its more intense versions – the law doesn’t actually care about consent. The Supreme Court has said that a person cannot consent to an assault that causes bodily harm. While the cases have typically arisen in the context of bar room brawls or hockey violence, other courts have applied the same reasoning to the sexual context. So, if a sexual activity causes bodily harm, a person cannot consent to it.

[. . .]

The Supreme Court has said that consent that is given only in advance isn’t determinative – consent is an ongoing process and a person must be in a state of consciousness to be able to withdraw that consent at any time. The case involved what’s known as erotic asphyxiation – basically, where a person is choked to the point that they lose consciousness. It’s a controversial practice within the BDSM community. But, those who practice it do so with carefully negotiated consent in advance.

So, lets assume for a moment that Mr. Ghomeshi’s side of the story is true (no, I am not saying that the women are lying – this is just a thought experiment). Let’s say he engaged in rough sex, very rough sex with consenting partners. According to the law, if it was rough enough to cause bodily harm, then he has still committed assault, regardless of consent. If he did hit, punch, bite or choke them – even if it was consensual – the law would very likely say that he committed assault.

Howard Levitt's National Post article likewise makes the case that Ghomeshi has no defense from the perspective of employment law.

If the CBC has convincing evidence that Ghomeshi was involved in non-consensual activities that constituted violence against women, he becomes a poisoned chalice and executives had no choice but to release him. The courts in Canada, and even arbitrators, have become increasingly sensitive to the impact of personal employee misconduct on employers' brands, and it is irrelevant if it occurs outside of the workplace. In an age of social media--tools that Ghomeshi uses skillfully--there is no such thing as private time versus work time. He had to know that.

The blog Sex Geek had a widely shared post suggesting that Ghomeshi's defense of his acts doesn't make sense for many reasons, not least of which are the specific complaints not about consensual BDSM acts they found icky but statements about outright non-consensual violence.

From Ciccone to the anonymous accusers, the women who are (or seem to be) complaining about him aren’t complaining about his kinks or calling him out for being a disgusting pervert. They’re complaining about far more mundane and familiar things: the ex-co-worker is noting unwanted ass-groping in the workplace. Ciccone mentions creepy non-consensual touching at a concert date that wasn’t supposed to even be a date, followed by stalker-y behaviour. And the anonymous women who wanted to get involved with him at first aren’t complaining about how gross his supposed perversions are. They’re making allegations of regular old non-consensual violence. And part of the reason they are saying they won’t come forward in person is because they’re afraid their pre-date conversations about kink will be used as evidence that they consented to what he did. In other words, these women may have said “sure, some kink sounds like fun” and are concerned that their own stated interest will be held up as evidence of consent to violence. If I am reading this right, these women were either themselves interested in kink to some extent, or at least weren’t put off by Ghomeshi’s interest, since they each still went on a date with him. This is a very different story than “Ew gross he wanted to use handcuffs what a total sicko!”

I'm inclined to end this links post by pointing to Dan Savage's evaluation.

We will have to keep reading, [. . .] with open minds and operational bullshit detectors. But we are unlikely to ever read "Ghomeshi found guilty" or "Ghomeshi exonerated on all charges" in a newspaper headline because there isn't going to be a trial—except for the one currently underway in the court of public opinion. And with four (or five) women telling similar and deeply troubling stories, with Ghomeshi getting at best qualified support from kinky bloggers like Zanin, and with none of his other BDSM sex partners stepping forward to defend Ghomeshi (at least so far), it's hard to see how he comes out on top. Because with the info we have right now this doesn't look like consensual kink. It looks like abuse.