How Gender, Race, and Sexuality Shape Young People’s Blame Attributions for Sexual Aggression in Public Drinking Spaces

• In Event: Roundtable: Gender and Crime

Abstract

Sexual aggression is so ubiquitous in public drinking settings that many people perceive it to be an inevitable—albeit unpleasant—part of socializing in these spaces. Most research on the subject focuses on the experiences of heterosexual and cisgendered individuals and is therefore theoretically and methodologically limited in its scope. In this paper, we contribute to the literature on aggression and sexual aggression in barroom settings by comparing and contrasting the stories LGBTQ-identified persons and straight people tell about their experiences with such conduct. Using interviews with 25 LGBTQ people and 180 straight people in the southern United States, we explore how gendered logics around sexual aggressiveness/passivity and strength/weakness shape how they—from different intersectional locations—narrate experiences with and attribute blame for incidents of unwanted sexual contact in bars and clubs.

Authors

• Sarah Becker, Louisiana State University

• Justine Tinkler, University of Georgia

• Elizabeth Weltman, Louisiana State University