In this article, we use 198 interviews with young men and women to explore how they define and negotiate boundaries of unwanted sexual contact in public drinking settings. Men and women’s contrasting experiences reveal that in bars and nightclubs, sexual aggression against women is routine and typically involves physical threat. For men, however, consensual and nonaggressive contact can register as problematic when disruptive to men’s control of heterosexual interactions. Men’s aggression toward other men who disrupt their access to women is cause and consequence of women’s sexual aggression experiences being less visible. We contribute to sexual assault literature by illustrating how heterosexual power dynamics—specifically, disproportionate visibility and defense of men’s desires—shape tolerance of barroom sexual aggression, discourage bystander intervention, and set the stage for more serious forms of assault to occur and go unpunished.

在本文中，我们使用198次与年轻男女的访谈来探讨他们如何定义和协商公共饮酒环境中不必要的性接触的界限。男女之间的对比经验表明，在酒吧和夜总会中，对女性的性侵犯是例行的，通常涉及身体上的威胁。但是，对于男性而言，自愿性和非侵略性接触在破坏男性对异性恋互动的控制时可能会成为问题。男性对其他破坏女性访问权的男性的侵略是导致女性性侵略经历鲜为人知的原因和结果。我们通过说明异性恋力量动态（特别是对男人性欲的过分可见性和防御力）如何塑造对酒吧性侵略的容忍度，为性侵犯文献做出了贡献