Roughing the Passers: Sex, "Convenience Feminism," and the NFL

Ben Roethlisberger returned to work last week, having lost a month of income because of "plying a minor" with alcohol and having sex with her in a bathroom.

Simultaneously, the New York Jets organization again finds itself in damage control mode after Episode Two of "Sex And The City: The Harassment Files" broke this past week, this time starring current Minnesota Vikings quarterback and former cocktail waitress Jen Sterger. Favre allegedly made "inappropriate" digital, ahem, "overtures" toward Sterger. Both hearkened me back to the Tom Brady sexual harassment skit from Saturday Night Live.

Roethlisberger's return and the Jets scandal come shortly on the heels of the L'Affair De Karen Owens, the widely discussed 42-page PowerPoint thesis culled from the Duke graduates carnal "field work." Within the report, Ms. Owens regales with fond recollections of her drunken sexual exploits, and names names. While her behavior has been criticized by some, the feminist site Jezebel echoed the sentiment of many, with Irin Carmon writing "it's another reminder that women can be as flip, aggressive, or acquisitive about sex as men can." Ms Carmon is correct that there is a double standard, because if a man had wrote such a presentation about deflowering tipsy coeds, the matter would be in the District Attorney's office. Have we forgotten the last time the Duke Lacrosse team was in the news?

It's time for some straigt talk on what has become increasingly treacherous terrain for men to traverse. In a world where women send racy texts every second, "Inappropriate advances" is code for "the guy guessed wrong." Rape shield laws were adopted to remedy what we saw in pre-civil rights Christian America, blaming women for brutality against them. They've too often now a reinforced pillbox from which to shoot anonymous, vindictive sniper fire.

Its no surprise the media, save Kansas City Star reporter Jason Whitlock, has whiffed on the real story. We have raised two generations of women who know they can play the game of Bad Judgment Roulette with House money. We have become so indulgent of women's concerns that we are petrified to scrutinize them as adults. They've found out that equality is not always so "empowering" when the check comes. We have a word for sentient humans who can't be held fully responsible for their behavior: children, and we consistently treat women as such when we don't hold them accountable. Call it convenience feminism, the idea that women can dine at the buffet of equality, only eat the pie and cake, and complain when they get sick.

It is why, when grown women are achieving, they insist (rightly) on being called "women," but when they are either victimized or get into trouble, they are referred to as "young girls."

It's why female politicians can take on men's traditional leadership roles yet cry for chivalry when boxed around the ears rhetorically like, well, men.

It is why females teachers who have sex with their students can get as little as 30 days in jail and a mulligan, while male counterparts get double-digit pen time followed by a lifetime sexual predator label.

It is why we continue to define men by what they make, and burden them thusly, (from child support laws to paying for first dates), yet raise holy hell over the "tragedy" of the mythical wage gap.

In mutually consensual, but illicit, sexual matters, it is always the male who is prosecuted as a criminal. It is why only mostly boys get prosecuted for "sex-ting," despite the fact that teen girls have created more child porn with their cam phones in the last 5 years than all the world's pedophiles did in the period between 1950 and 2000.

It's why Bill O'Reilly could keep his job after implying that kidnap and rape victim Shawn Hornbeck "liked" being liberated from school and chores, and that a few rounds of sodomy between XBOX sessions was worth it. (Substitute the words "Elizabeth Smart" for Shawn Hornbeck, and see how it sounds),

And it is why, for the purposes of these twin scandals, we dogmatically hew to this idea that "all women deserve the same deference," that men's esteem flows from their action and behavior, and women deserve respect "just because."

I have nothing against Ines Sainz, per se. But I find it telling that when asked on Outside The Lines about her treatment, Judy McManus said she was afforded consistent professional deference in the Jets locker room, echoing sentiments of the likes of Pam Oliver and others. So what is the difference? Well, Ines Sainz is the sports media equivalent of John Oliver of The Daily Show. Her stock in trade is puff pieces with sexualized overtones. She's the equivalent of the girl in 8^th grade who initiates dirty jokes and giggles when a boy cops a feel. Conflating her with Sally Jenkins or worse, Erin Andrews is insulting. Both are serious sports reporters who earnestly practice their craft, and the latter was violated and publicly embarrassed through no fault of her own. The other is a fading bikini model and pageant winner. You want to be a serious reporter? Stop groping men's biceps at the Super Bowl.

Yet the media and the NFL brass snapped back at Clinton Portis with the unthinking reflexiveness of a cornered pit viper. And for what? Saying what was true? That many women position themselves to be in professional contact with desirable, affluent men? Think Samantha Stevenson or Julie Chen. In a grown up world we can admit this.

And while the facts of the Sterger affair have yet to fully flesh out (partly because Sterger has the female privilege of hiding from inquiry), seemingly grounded people who should know better are recklessly coming to her rescue. Syracuse professor and pre-eminent pop culture analyst Robert Thompson was indignant that the only images circulating of Ms Sterger are those with her, ahem "girls" fighting her tight shirt to get out, as if he were her lawyer trying to exclude unflattering evidence. She was not the staff accountant. Her job was to arouse men and be sexy, and she must own it. Whether she was harassed or not is a discrete matter.

Feminism brought the sports world some great things, like Title IX. However, as in general society, it changed the way women view them selves but not the way men and women view each other. 50,000 years of evolutionary biology cannot be overcome, and our perilous failure to grasp this has left empowered women and confused men in the wake, especially in the workplace. Fail to approach a woman who gives you an ambiguous signal, and she sees you as a jerk. Take the same signal as a green light, and HR calls you in. Karen Owens and Ben Roethlisberger stand against the backdrop of 25 years of "acquaintance rape education," where men have been pounded with the precept that any sexual activity with inebriated women is predatory per se, and it's legal cohort; only women having sex are absolved of responsibility for inebriant-induced bad behavior.

The mixed messages continue in legion. In the Black community men have been told women don't like to be called "bitches and hoes," only to see the men who use those words most freely have the greatest pick of women. Beer commercials tell men to "MAN UP" and be like "The Most interesting Man In The World," after they've been raised that men aren't doing enough (feminine) chores in the home. Tucson bars are enforcing "aggressive approach" rules and kicking men out, while we often hear women say they were interested but a man "gave up too easily."

The message is clear to boys and men; the system is there to protect girls and punish boys. Regardless of circumstance, you, young man, are always responsible. Like Charlie Brown, no matter how many times Lucy cruelly puts you on your back, nothing happens to her.

What's at play here is the visceral instinct to protect women from those who would abuse them. That is noble, and something to be revered. But the subtext of the instinct in practicum is the primal understanding of inherent inequality. What's equally primal is men's drive to act when a women presents sexual availability. What happens all to often is that women presented the latter now move the goalposts post hoc, and we allow it. It breeds dangerous resentment in men, and smug, blithe entitlement complexes in women, both detrimental.

As boys playing impromptu games in the park or backyard, we set the rules up beforehand, and let the outcome play itself out, living with the consequences. Girls and women today grew up with an outlook similar to the first two maxims of the book The Rules, that "the woman always makes the rules" and "the woman can change the rules as she sees fit." It's cute in a book about dating, but as applied in our daily overall interactions, it has dire consequences.

The twin NFL "scandals" illuminate a crossroads in male/female interaction. I certainly don't have all the answers, but until we are willing to discuss inconvenient truths and answer the questions begged, men will increasingly feel like beleaguered NFL defensive players caught in a Catch-22, their every option rife with risk. As Ben and Brett have seen, some passes get you into more trouble than others, but it helps when all parties are playing by the same rules.