#MeToo, Sex Wars 2.0 and the legal regulation of sexual harm

La Faculté accueille la professeure de droit Brenda Cossman, Université de Toronto, pour la Conférence commémorative Patricia Allen 2020. Elle se penchera sur le mouvement #MeToo, arguant que ce phénomène peut êtrte envisagé comme étant une nouvelle version de la guerre des sexes, s'inscrivant directement dans la foulée des guerres sexuelles féministes des années 1970 et 1980.

La professeure Cossman s'intéresse à la réglementation juridique du sexe, du genre et de la sexualité. Membre de la Société royale du Canada, elle est directrice du Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies. Elle travaille actuellement sur un livre sur #MeToo sous contrat avec la NYU Press.

Cette activité est admissible pour 1,5 heures de formation continue obligatoire tel que déclaré par les membres du Barreau du Québec.

Résumé

[En anglais seulement] How should we regulate sexual harm? It is an issue that feminists have been debating for decades. From the sex wars of the 1970s to the contestations about #MeToo today, feminists disagree about sexuality, agency and law. The debates have long run deep, often antagonistic, occasionally outright hostile. Well before #MeToo erupted, feminists have been embattled in renewed and contentious sexual politics over the regulation of sexual harm. The feminist debate about regulating sexual harm was already in full swing.

Then came #MeToo. On October 15, 2017, Alyssa Milano began a viral sensation with her #MeToo tweet. Within a day it had been retweeted 500,000 times, and within days, millions of women from 85 countries had taken to social media with the hashtag. In the weeks and months that followed, powerful men – Harvey Weinstein, Charlie Rose, Matt Lauer, to name a few of the most prominent – lost their positions in the wake of the many stories of sexual violence and harassment. Broader conversations ensued about the pervasiveness of sexual violence against women, the meaning of consent and the role of law.

The massive outpouring of #MeToo stories was quickly met with a range of detractors. Many decried #MeToo for going too far – although what they meant by too far differed. Some called it a sex panic, others the end of flirtation, yet others the death knell to due process. While these criticisms came from across the political spectrum, some feminists also expressed discomfort and disagreement with elements of the #MeToo movement. This feminist debate was quickly framed as a generational one, with media reports focusing on the conflict between millennials and second wave feminists.

I argue however that age or generation alone cannot account for the fundamental disagreements around sexuality, agency, consent and law that are swirling around the #MeToo movement. Rather, I argue that these feminist #MeToo debates are better understood through the lens of Sex Wars 2.0 – the continuation of the feminist sex wars of the 1970s and 1980s.

Conférence commémorative Patricia Allen

Créée en 1992 par la promotion de 1988 à la mémoire de Patricia Allen, une diplômée de la Faculté qui fut tragiquement assassinée, la Conférence commémorative Patricia Allen est consacrée à la sensibilisation et à l'éducation de la communauté juridique et de la population aux problèmes sociaux et juridiques urgents liés à la violence, en particulier envers les femmes.