1.1. Why is Consent becoming an increasingly sensitive issue in the Nowhere Community?

Nowhere is an incredibly diverse community, and we value a diverse range of viewpoints and types of self-expression. Our principles also place high value on self-management and self-reliance. For these reasons, clear verbal communication is very important to ensure that each person’s boundaries are understood and respected. We have become increasingly aware of a problem of consent violations within the community.

Particularly after Nowhere 2016 and 2017, feedback and discussions via Facebook show a high level of complaints related to consent violations, most of them dealing with physical harassment. We are also aware of some major events reported through various channels: Malfare, Norg, and unofficial Nowhere consent activists (such as contributors to the Facebook NoBED, Yes!BED group). Consent violations also affect other aspects of the event that come up frequently, such as volunteer burnout and filming/photography.

The cause is probably a combination of factors such as a lack of basic consent education, lack of full understanding of the 10 Principles, lack of skills in intercultural communication, real individual perversity, the physical and mental impacts of exhaustion from the event, and the influence of illicit substances. Although it is difficult to quantify the exact number and nature of violations consent violations, we believe that even one single major violation is enough to merit escalating the response to this issue to an organizational level by designating human and material resources toward these efforts.

The bottom line is that the event is facing a risk for being the scene of recurrent consent violations if no action is taken at the Norg level to officially, proactively fight this phenomenon.

In this proposal, Krevette (Welfare Enough volunteer and Borderland 2017 Consent Project Leader) and Aleta (founder of the NoBED, Yes!BED consent education project) will outline several specific measures that build on existing projects, are reasonably cost-efficient, and would make significant progress toward reducing consent violations at Nowhere and wherever our community members gather.

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1.2  Definition Consent / Consent Violation

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