Volume 21, Issue 1, Spring 2007
James Stacey Taylor
Pages 55-63
Autonomy, Responsibility, and Women’s Obligation to Resist Sexual Harrassment
In a recent paper Carol Hay has argued for the conclusion that “a woman who has been sexually harassed has a moral obligation to confront her harasser.” I will argue in this paper that Hay’s arguments for her conclusion are unsound, for they rest on both a misconstrual of the nature of personal autonomy, and a misunderstanding of its relationship to moral responsibility. However, even though Hay’s own arguments do not support her conclusion that women have a duty to resist sexual harassment this conclusion can draw support from arguments that are independent of hers. Women, then, do indeed have a moral obligation to confront those who sexually harass them.