Consensual Violence: Sex, Sports, and the Politics of Injury

by Jill D. Weinberg Ph.D, JD

Overview

In this novel approach to understanding consent, Jill D. Weinberg presents two case studies of activities in which participants engage in violent acts: competitive mixed martial arts (MMA) and sexual sadism and masochism (BDSM). Participants in both cases assent to injury and thereby engage in a form of social decriminalization, using the language of consent to render their actions legally and socially tolerable. Yet, these activities are treated differently under criminal battery law: sports, including MMA, are generally absolved from the charge of criminal battery, whereas BDSM often represents a violation of criminal battery law.

Using interviews and ethnographic observation, Weinberg argues that where law authorizes a person’s consent to an activity, as in MMA, consent is not meaningfully constructed or regulated by the participants themselves. In contrast, where law prohibits a person’s consent to an activity, as in BDSM, participants actively construct and regulate consent.

A synthesis of criminal law and ethnography, Consensual Violence is a fascinating account of how consent is framed among participants engaged in violent acts and lays the groundwork for a sociological understanding of the process of decriminalization.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520290662
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	05/31/2016
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	160
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Jill D. Weinberg, PhD, JD, is Assistant Professor of Sociology at Tufts University and a scholar at the American Bar Foundation. Popular accounts of her work have appeared in the Advocate, the Huffington Post, Talking Points Memo, Truthout, and the Society Pages.



 

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vii

Preamble: A Chokehold 1

1 Consensual Violence and the Politics of Injury 4

2 From Acts to Legitimacy: The Path of Social Decriminalization 22

3 Devising Rules and Norms, Creating a Culture of Consent 42

4 Enforcing and Rationalizing Rule Violations 63

5 Transforming Consensual Violence through a Legal Register 84

6 The Social Embeddedness of Consent 102

7 Conclusion: Consensual Violence Reimagined 117

Notes 125

References 131

Index 139