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Fake Outrage for a Fake Crisis
In one of the most annoyingly misguided media crusades in recent memory, the soccer world (read: Reddit, PMC, sports media, and virtue-signaling athletes who are delighted to be out of the Sauronic Eye for once) has fixed its laser gaze on Luis Rubiales, head of the Spanish FA (the top soccer organization in Spain; representing all club and national teams in the country). His crime, for which he is demanded to give up everything he now has and ever had, was a kiss.
After the Spanish National Team won the Women's World Cup last week, a traditional trophy presentation was held. In his jubilation, Rubiales kissed player Jenni Hermoso, just as thousands of soccer personnel have done thousands of times in moments of great triumph. Indeed, in the immediate aftermath, Hermoso laughed it off on camera as a passing awkward moment. In the days following that recording, I assume Hermoso has come to see that one moment of blasé honesty as a crucial tactical mistake (not that it matters; the original video of her has yet to make an appearance in any of the numerous "j'accuse" incendiary articles).
What Hermoso failed to realize in that moment (but has very much seized upon since) is that she had been granted the gift of victimhood. Not just as a woman, not just as a woman at the hand of a man, but as a woman footballer (one of the venerated subclasses, as elaborated upon in one of my past comments) at the hands of T H E P A T R I A R C H Y.
This one meaningless moment flashed overnight into an international dogpile, with consequences as wild as Rubiales' mother enduring a hunger strike. Unfortunately, Rubiales is experiencing firsthand that racism is not the only demand in excess of its supply, and that even a hint of raw meat, especially in the entirely invented space of "women's sports" "inequality," will be devoured, even if it was just shoe leather all along.
I think kissing people without their consent is bad and I don't think any of ("I was very emotional", "It has happened a lot in the past", "Some iconic moments are similar", "The victim didn't react the right way in the moment") are very good excuses or justifications. This is not complicated.
Something to keep in mind here is that 'the kiss' isn't a natural category that has a fixed relationship to human feelings or psychology. Many human societies across space and time don't even have 'mouth-to-mouth kissing' as a standard practice for romantic couples. So when you make a broad statement like 'kissing without consent is bad' or 'kissing without consent is fine' ... how, exactly, can that even be true? It'd have to depend on the social meaning we imbue kissing with, and not something about the physical aspect of the act itself. And ... what meaning is that? Other commenters in the thread have noted that the exclusivity / meaning imbued in a kiss varies across different western cultures, does that matter?
Also, what does this mean? In one sense, you can apply a moral rule in an uncomplicated sense. But surely the validity of that rule is, itself, complicated?
Sure, you can read my comment with an implied "in our present cultural context" if that helps.
I think forced touching is generally bad so I think forcibly kissing someone would be bad in probably any cultural context. It would be less bad if it had a different social meaning than it currently does, but it would still be bad.
It means I do not think either the rule itself ("kissing people without their consent is bad") or its application to this case (there's literally video of him doing it) are complicated. If you want to argue in favor of forcibly kissing people or that he didn't actually forcibly kiss her I'm open to hearing the arguments.
As doglatine noted below, this involves cultural norms that have changed recently, and maybe Luis has been slow to adapt. Are these changes good or necessary changes? I think that's a more complicated question than you imply.
I think the argument is that - when you combine the southern European more lax attitude towards kisses plus the commonality of 'doing crazy things right after you win a big event in sports', the kiss isn't nearly as bad as a boss randomly kissing a subordinate without their consent. And, to whatever extent it is bad, it's something that should at worst be called 'a mistake' and something he should apologize for, not something that's basically sexual assault and something he should be fired for. The idea that this 'is just bad, not complicated' tug on the idea of a man using his power in a workplace to force a woman to do things she doesn't want to do - is that what happened here? (I'm not sure what the right answer is to any of this)
How recently did social norms change such that forcibly kissing a woman is taboo? Luis was born in 1977. I'm confident forcibly kissing women has been taboo since the 90's, when he would have been a teenager.
As I said in my original comment I do not think "commonality of 'doing crazy things right after you win a big event in sports'" provides any justification or defense. Either as a general principle or here specifically. Probably it has some explanatory power for why he did it, but I don't think it goes at all to justification or mitigation.
I am not sure about "using his power in a workplace" but it was definitely "forc[ing] a woman to do things she doesn't want to do." Rephrase your example slightly. Coworker A forcibly kisses Coworker B at a public work-related function. A has no (formal) power over B. Is that just "a mistake", something requiring only an apology, or something Coworker A should face some discipline (perhaps not termination) for?
Right. What's at issue isn't "is nonconsensual random kissing bad" - most here would agree that him grabbing random players during practice and kissing them is bad, for various reasons. What's at issue here is precisely how bad it is, and how that trades off against other benefits. I mentioned the workplace because this moral sense that such kissing is very bad as opposed to somewhat bad - that little is a 'justification or defense' for it - comes from feminism broadly and #MeToo. Like, when such a nonconsensual kiss happens, it's the man forcing himself on the woman, it's absolutely terrible and sexist, etc. People who are defending this see it as 'she wasn't comfortable so he shouldn't do it next time', but not something truly terrible. In a triumphant moment where people do all sorts of crazy things, the kiss a minor issue - he made someone a bit uncomfortable, whatever - rather than something awful he should be blacklisted for. What's more common when you win a big sporting event are unprompted (and 'nonconsensual' as a result) hugs - randomly hugging a coworker for no reason is 'not okay', but hugging a fellow team member or coach right after you win the big game? That's normal and great, imo.
So when I discuss social norms changing, it's not about
but about norms changing enough for that to move from 'exuberance gone too far' to 'disgusting sexism and assault, not okay under any circumstances'.
I guess my evaluation of the degree of harm it does isn't dependent on the degree of social acceptance of the behavior. I appreciate that other people's evaluation is different but I don't understand why that should change my evaluation. Granted that Luis was raised in a time and place where it was more acceptable. His subjective feelings of its permissibility seem to go to explanation, but still not justification.
My argument is that culture is what makes that kiss so unacceptable in the first place! There are other possible cultures where such a kiss is not one of the main romantic gestures, and as such unprompted kisses are simply less 'bad' because they're not signs of unwanted romantic interest. The 'harm' people object to here comes from a ... haze of perceptions surrounding said unwanted romantic interest, as opposed to a generic unwanted touch (if he had merely hugged her, all the backlash wouldn't have happened).
According to wikipedia, in many places kisses on the cheek are greetings, and ... apparently in part of South Africa quick closed-mouth lip kisses are a 'common greeting' (although that has a citation needed, so idk about that). The harm is, necessarily, dependent on the society's ideas of what kissing is.
I'm not sure if your objection is an entirely principled 'no touch without consent', or mostly comes from the specifically sexual/romantic nature of mouth-to-mouth kisses? My guess is it's some sort of mix of the two? The current backlash is entirely to the latter.
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