Bethany Saltman SOPP Oral History Interview

ISABELLE JUNIPER

This is Isabelle Juniper interviewing Bethany Saltman for the SOPP Oral History on October 14th. And so I guess we'll jump right in.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Tell me about your early life and what led you to Antioch.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Oh gosh, my early life. As a- just like my life? My regular just like just

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Just kind of like a crash course up to coming to Antioch here, like, what brought you here and everything like that?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Okay, I grew up in a small town in Michigan and was not particularly good in academics or pushed in that way at all. Never really thought of myself as someone who did school very well. And I wasn't planning on going to college at 00:01:00all in high school. And then a friend of mine who was really smart, I always hung out with smart kids and I ended up going to East Lansing High School, which it's a really good high school in East Lansing Michigan. And so I had all these really smart friends who were going to Ivy League schools and stuff. And then this one kid, who was sitting next to me in my English class, he said, you know, you should really go, you should try Antioch and I was like, well, I don't know what that is and you know, why would they want me? And he said, you should apply, I think it'll be really good for you. So that's what I did. And I looked into it and I was blown away that this was that this place existed and applied and got in and that's why I went.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

So what were your first years like, do you remember like any kind of conversations around consent or topics like that where they like openly 00:02:00discussed at the time?

BETHANY SALTMAN

No, it wasn't. That wasn't at all on my mind or anybody's mind. We were just, you know, I ended up being really into school, doing really well in school. Really loving school. And had my friends, did all of our stuff but know that consent was not, consent wasn't really even like a word yet.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

How would you describe the campus life and campus climate?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Very fun, really. I always felt like it was very sex-positive very, and again 00:03:00before those words, you know, it wasn't, we weren't talking about it in that way. But looking back, it really was. Body-positive, sex-positive really wild, super unhinged. But it was also a place where you could really drill down and really learn as well. It wasn't just all parties for me.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

What year were you when you started to discuss, when the SOPP started to come to fruition?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Well, I was there and it really just got started. So the first thing at the Womyn's Center, I guess it was, I don't know. I mean, you probably know that 00:04:00you're better than I do. I got there in 1988 or 89. I entered in the winter of 88/89 and so I think that we first met in like 91, maybe I believe that's when the first meeting was in the women's center. And so, then I wasn't even planning on going to this meeting. But I thought I would try it because there were signs up that said that someone had been raped on campus and the administration wasn't doing anything about it. So I said, I want to go to this meeting and check it out. And so I went and because I was a writer, I sort of just got involved from the very beginning in writing this policy as of like that night.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

So what was the meeting like?

BETHANY SALTMAN

It was really emotional. One of the women I believe was in there talking about what had happened. And so it was really emotional very much, you know, like 00:05:00rousing and really inspiring and, you know, in that kind of a way like, wow, we really wanted to do something about this.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Was that the something that was done? Did you immediately after the meeting, begin to draft the policy? Or how was that night that night?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Yeah, and again I wasn't planning on going to the meeting, but I got swept up and really felt very passionately about it and it felt really good that I could be helpful. My skills as a writer were really helpful. So me and another group of, you know, it started as a big group. Of course, it got small real quick. I asked because people are busy and, you know, whatever. And so a group of maybe like eight women are. So we're really Central to making that first policy, 00:06:00writing the first policy and taking it to Adcil and and threatening, you know, that we were going to "violent physical action" would happen if they didn't accept it. And yeah, so that's that's what happened.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Did you take place in the Take Back the Night march that also happened around the time?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Probably if they were on campus. I think so, I think so. I don't totally remember that. But it sounds familiar.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

And so, drafting the policy. Do you remember what the atmosphere was like, when you were drafting the policy or what kind of specific details you wanted to include? Or did you have like a set like set of standards that you wanted to 00:07:00enforce or was it kind of sort of smaller spontaneous? Whereas as the as someone had the idea of a person would-

BETHANY SALTMAN

It was all very spontaneous. This idea that instead of asking for 'no' we should be asking for a 'yes', which is the most radical piece of the whole project and continues to be. That just sort of like happened. It was very much of a hive kind of experience. It wasn't like one person said it, you know, it was kind of just like, "why should someone be responsible only if someone clearly says no, we should flip that and make sure that the onus is on someone to say yes", period. And so that just spontaneously erupted and we were like, yeah, you know 00:08:00let's make that a thing and that was unheard of at the time. So, yes, it was totally spontaneous. It was the best example of just collective intelligence.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

So, when you presented it to Adcil, what was the reaction like?

BETHANY SALTMAN

They took us really seriously and were nervous because Antioch has a history of imploding and so they didn't want that to happen. But they also were like, okay, slow down, you know, but I remember the meeting and they were saying "we're going to bring in lawyers and we're gonna meet with you again" and I was like, wow, that feels really good. Like they really took us very seriously and I think they knew that, we were accusing them of not removing an accused rapist from 00:09:00campus and even back then that was serious. And, Antioch was, they were, they were good. Good people, you know, they really wanted to be on the right side of justice and they wanted us to have a voice and so, you know, it was a challenge to everybody to meet. But it was definitely, you know, for all the demands to be met and, you know, all the details, but the atmosphere was very, very exciting to be on the activist side because we were really having an effect really quickly. Really big effect.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Would you say most people's reaction when you first presented the document, how would you gauge the reaction?

BETHANY SALTMAN

From like the administration or from peers?

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Administration and peers.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Peers were mixed. I remember getting in a lot of fights with friends, but, because it was just so intense, it was a very, very particular... there was a dear friend of ours had died the year that fall before and I think there was a lot of trauma in the air and a lot of pain and so I think that was kind of mixed in there. But so there was a lot of conflict and just intensity mixed support. And as far as the administration is concerned, it was again, mixed support, but with respect with really wanting to like, figure it out.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

And so you mentioned that previous classmate had died do. And so, do you think 00:11:00that the previous classmate dying added to the tensions on campus? And do you think it was the result of the tensions that or this trauma that the SOPP came about?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Wait, say that question again.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Do you think it was a result of like the trauma in, like the tension?

BETHANY SALTMAN

I would never say that, but I would say that that was in the mix that it was, it's an intense place was a bunch of intense people and dealing with really terrible trauma. And so there was a lot in the mix. I think that, you know, I absolutely stand by what happened. I would never say, it was the result of a trauma in the sense of ill-conceived, but I think that that's in there somewhere as is the trauma of being a woman in this culture. In rape culture.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Would say like it exacerbated, the like the feelings on campus?

BETHANY SALTMAN

I would just say that it was in the mix. Okay?

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Thank you, I definitely wanted to get sort of, definitely a concrete on that position as well.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Yeah, I feel strongly that it's not like this happened because everybody was traumatized. It's not that.

BETHANY SALTMAN

It was a complex moment in my personal history and in the history of the campus, each piece was authentically important. All of them together. I mean, who knows like how people, how things function together is different than how they function alone, but I wouldn't say that there was a cause and effect or that one exacerbated the other.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

When you presented it to Adcil, was it just that group or did other people come and join you? Or did you like lose some people when you presented it to Adcil?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Well again, it wasn't linear like that. I mean, this happened so fast and sort of spontaneously that it was like a whole bunch of people and then and then people, you know, it wasn't like there was a group that we organized and then people left. It was more like a very organic process and the only reason I'm saying eight is because there's a picture from the record of, I believe, eight of us. I wouldn't have even remembered who those people were. I mean, that's how 00:14:00authentic. This had nothing to do with personalities or friendships. I wasn't friends with these people. I barely, I don't know their names. It was just a totally random collection of people who wanted to do this thing together. So different from how people think about social movements these days, which is so much more about, you know, like just a community kind of experience. This was a random problem solving radical move it just happened.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Interesting. That's really cool. And so, When you took it to Adcil and it did demands weren't met.

BETHANY SALTMAN

But they were they were met with respect.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

And did you take part in the community meeting that followed that as well with the women in black?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Yeah. Oh, yeah. For sure.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Could you tell me about that?

BETHANY SALTMAN

I mean, honestly, the only thing I really remember about that is what I've seen from pictures and I know I was there and I was passionate and that's pretty much all I remember. It was just that it was a very heightened experience, all of it. And so in some ways you remember it better and in other ways, it all becomes sort of a wash, because it was just like any very emotionally heightened experience runs together, but it's very distinct at the same time.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Who else are you talking to?

ISABELLE JUNIPER

So far, I have interviewed April Wolford, I'm interviewing Laurie Paul on 00:16:00Saturday who was one of the few, well, according to April, she was one of the women in black and I'm also interviewing Kristine Herman soon as well as well as Juliet Brown, who have all been- April's, been a big help in finding like, all these people who had had these all connections to this and so I can get everybody's experience on it.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Juliet was one of the team of people writing about the policy with me.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

So what was that like the writing of the policy?

BETHANY SALTMAN

That was a really amazing. I loved that because it was so creative and really had to be so precise and to go back and get feedback all the time from these adults, Adcil, and the lawyers, and it was thrilling, as a young intellectual, and a writer. It was an amazing experience to feel like I had a say, and I could 00:17:00actually communicate what was being shared, what was being articulated by the women that I was talking to by the Administration. It was one of my favorite writing projects ever,

ISABELLE JUNIPER

You said that the reaction for administration was respectful, but they adopted it but then they respected it but they also had a lot of misgivings about it?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Yeah, there was just a lot of editing that had to happen, any piece of legislation. So yeah, I mean, I can't remember all the details about all that, but I just remember a lot of details.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

When the policy was adopted, how were opinions on campus?

BETHANY SALTMAN

I think it was mixed and I think there was definitely, kind of a cancel culture feeling which I definitely felt. Like, I wanted to be supported and I was taking incompletes in my classes and it was a really personal thing for me. But, you there was certainly an element of that like 'ragey' cancel culture. Like if you don't agree, then you're going to be in trouble socially. And so that kept people from expressing themselves to me anyway, which is totally understandable, natural, but not ideal.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Would you say people were less likely to avoid you because of your involvement?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Maybe, but it was more because I was so strident, and I was so busy, and I was a little self-obsessed and absorbed. I remember like one friendship really suffered from it. And I didn't always handle it that well I was what 19 years old. Yeah, it definitely affected friendships, but I wouldn't say anybody avoided me that I'm aware of, none of my close friends. But it was a little bit of a line in the sand with some of my friends. Not because they didn't agree, 00:20:00but just because I was so involved and they weren't. And they probably felt like she's gonna be mad at me because I'm not involved or maybe I was, maybe I wasn't, but it was more just like it made some sides to my social life.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

One of the demands was an advocate and a system of peer advocates, how did the process go for choosing the peer advocate? Was that like a student-led or did Administration choose?

BETHANY SALTMAN

I don't totally remember how that worked, but I remember not liking it or her. I did not like her. I didn't think she got it. I thought she was really kind of mousey, and I did a lot of the peer education. I went into the dorms and I talked about consent with people but I didn't like the peer Advocate and I don't remember why. This is from a nineteen year old's mind, no offense, but I felt 00:21:00like things got very watered-down. Kind of diluted, something about her didn't feel like radical enough to me or something.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Do you think by the time she was brought in, do you think the policy itself had been diluted or do you think that was the result?

BETHANY SALTMAN

I don't think so. I don't think so.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

You were one of the peer Advocates. What was that?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Like I loved that. That was great. I really believed in it so much. I still do. I'm still a peer advocate in my life with my daughter and her friends and, you 00:22:00know, I believe in pleasure so much and I want everybody to have a lot of it. To me, it's so natural to talk about consent in this way. And so that's what was really lovely. I really enjoyed that.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Did you ever serve as a peer Advocate on any of the SOPP cases throughout the era?

BETHANY SALTMAN

No, I left. I was gone before that actually started happening.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Do you think the policy was effective once it was adopted?

BETHANY SALTMAN

I don't really know. I don't know. I mean, I know it was effective in instituting a change in thinking. A paradigm shift, which I'm incredibly proud of. I don't know how effective it was in preventing rape or sexual, I just don't 00:23:00know, not because I doubt it, but because I simply don't have the data. I really don't know.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

That's understandable.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Do you regret anything that you did at the time?

BETHANY SALTMAN

I don't regret doing anything. You know, I wish I'd had a little more insight into myself. As I was doing it to prevent some of the self-righteous 00:25:00indignation, which is never a good thing. But, you know, I was young. I was sort of like my young activists version of like sewing her wild oats, it was very necessary and I'm so proud of it and I'm so grateful that my awakening in a certain way, it was a feminist awakening. It's not, I wouldn't say a feminist awakening, but an activist and activism awakening, the capacity to feel like I could be effective was huge. And with that came a lot of self-righteousness. And you know, that's human nature. I don't think I could have prevented that, but I'm aware of it.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Do you think maybe that's self-righteousness? Sort of led to some of the policies detractors?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Totally, but it wasn't just me. Obviously. This is like a problem of radical politics or politics in general. I don't know the answer. It's like it takes people who are just like completely stuck on something to get anything to happen, but, I don't know, so it's not really a regret situation. It's more like just inside, just learning more about myself. And now the when I see other people, the social justice movement of today, the cancel culture Etc. I have a lot more insight into that than friends do because I was on the other side as a youth.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Has your work with the SOPP contributed to a lifelong involvement in social justice?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Oh, yeah for sure. Well as a lifelong understanding of social justice movement, I haven't been super political, I mean, I'm super political, I haven't been a big activist.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

I guess that kind of was a loaded question, not how I intended it to come off, but I did you answered it perfectly. Do you have any words for like Antiochians nowadays in terms of like either consent or how to enact change throughout the college itself or if you had any advice to give students?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Meditate. Meditation is a really good. It goes very well with radical politics 00:28:00because it keeps us grounded in authentic, experience and presence as opposed to a super heady kind of black-and-white righteousness. So I would, that would be my number one bit of advice for everybody to learn to meditate. I think that it's learning how to do this kind of stuff is so important and there's nothing you can say to someone who's in it that they will heed. That's why I think just learning how to meditate so that you can learn to listen to yourself, is a really good thing to do.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

(Describes the background of the first SOPP case) Do you remember anything of 00:29:00that at all?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Oh my God. I want to know what did I do? What happened?

ISABELLE JUNIPER

As far as I can gather in the Record. There was a case with the SOPP and the first person to bring one up was essentially steamrolled because the person she accused brought in two attorneys with him and based on letters in the Record, it 00:30:00created a big to do in the Record between the person who brought the complainant and then like the person directly who was accused and then they call their friends and stuff. And they're, there is a letter actually, from from you. I mean, there's a lot of friend letters in the record from you-

BETHANY SALTMAN

Oh my God.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

There's like at least four or five about, not only about the first case, but also, like about the SOPP in general,

BETHANY SALTMAN

Just me just me alone? Not with the group?

ISABELLE JUNIPER

There are two from you alone. Then there's the one with the peer advocates stepping down and then there is like two little interview portions with you that you're that you are quoted.

BETHANY SALTMAN

That's so funny I'd love to see the letters. Are they good?

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Honestly, I'm going to say they're a little intimidating.

BETHANY SALTMAN

What do you mean?

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Well like you had such a strong voice with a straight no bullshit tone.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Oh my God, but did it make sense? Was it like articulate?

ISABELLE JUNIPER

It's all very cohesive. It's all very articulate, it's a little intimidating.

BETHANY SALTMAN

In what way?

ISABELLE JUNIPER

I think just because it's so like it's so strongly worded and it's strongly worded, and very much like 'if you're not in line with us, we don't care.'

BETHANY SALTMAN

As in like my way or the highway.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Pretty much. Yes.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Yeah, well, that's not a surprise but that's amazing. I don't remember that at all. Oh my gosh, but so many Gen-X students were super articulate and like that.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

I think it's the thing that Antioch students do have in common and so it's really nice to see that.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

I've interviewed like a couple people like who I only had like experience with them, like through like articles and stuff. And like once like, It's sort of like two different sides to a person as well. It's really nice to see like the other side where they're not like they're not always on that tone.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Yeah, I'm on that tone a lot. Trust me. My family would not be at all surprised to hear this. This is funny. I have a 15 year old daughter who is like so over 00:34:00it, but that is funny. Oh my gosh, I well, if you have the letters, I'd love to see them. It would really be a hoot for me.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Okay, I can definitely work on getting those to you. You're not the first person to ask for her letters.

BETHANY SALTMAN

A long time ago and it's kind of like, oh my God. I'm 52 years old. And so, to think about like young me doing that. I mean, I'm proud of myself. I think it's really cool. And it's also interesting just from like a journey point of view like God. You know, it's just interesting.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

But in terms of anything like that, you don't remember?

BETHANY SALTMAN

No, it sounds familiar. It does sound familiar. It doesn't surprise me. Was I stepping down because I said the whole thing is like bullshit? Like I won't participate in this kind of thing.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

I think it was because that from what I saw and from what April has told me, I 00:35:00think it was because that the person had brought in two attorneys and essentially kind of steamrolled, any kind of thing that the college could do. I think you said yourself like The Advocate is kind of powerless against people like that. And so there was a like a feeling of the four of you didn't think that the college did enough. And so, you see it was signed. I can actually pull it up. I don't remember exactly, but there's you Juliet Brown, I think Kathleen Harris is on there, and there's a fourth woman who I cannot remember right now, but you essentially step down, stepped down from your role as a peer.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Wow. I was probably exhausted and needed a break too.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

That's totally fair. So were you ever contacted by the media during the media circus around the SOPP

BETHANY SALTMAN

I think so. I kind of didn't get involved in a lot of that stuff, but then I'll never forget after I graduated and saw the skit on Saturday Night Live. That was shocking. That was very humiliating. That was a really tough moment to feel like all of our work was being lambasted on the most public forum in the United States. It was just mocking in such cruel ways, and was so wrong, and so short-sighted, it was so misogynistic, it was just terrible. That was a very tough moment.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

I can imagine to see something you worked, so hard for being completely 00:37:00lampooned and the message just completely going over everybody's heads-

BETHANY SALTMAN

Yeah that sucked.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Do you think that was a general theme around the media circus?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Oh God. Yes. And we were so far ahead of our time, it's like ridiculous. I mean, nobody got it and it was like, I don't suffer fools well, so I'm not that interested in talking, trying to convince anybody of anything. Yeah, the media thing is just so much hype and so dumb. People are just so dumb that I couldn't get excited about that. I just I just saw things really differently. I'm still there, you know.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

I think that's exactly the tone of your writing in the Record.

BETHANY SALTMAN

Well, right? But I mean other people would think I'm a fool. What is that? Yeah, where is that? You know, who knows? But yeah, I know, I'm not, I don't have a lot of patience. I'm not one of those people who wants to like sit down and, I wouldn't be a good restorative justice person or anything like that. I'm not interested. It's not that I don't want people to transform, obviously I do, but that is not a strength of mine.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Do you think there are still conversations we need to be having around consent?

BETHANY SALTMAN

Oh my God. Yeah. Hell yeah, obviously. But it's really exciting to see how much this is now an accepted understanding. The conversation is getting deeper and 00:39:00deeper and deeper. Like consent was just level one, sort of table stakes and now we're getting deeper and juicier into what is sex-positive feminism? There's much more to uncover that I'm really delighted. I don't feel like that was the end of the conversation. That was just the beginning of a conversation. We're just changing mistakes, changing, that in a way that I think is obviously positive. And that now, it's like, let's talk about pleasure. Let's talk about, just like desire versus rules and all those things that are really juicy conversations that I never wanted to have before because consent wasn't even considered a thing. But now that there is a much more widely accepted 00:40:00understanding that consent is a human right now. We can start getting into the nuance of it. But before now that that was not possible.

ISABELLE JUNIPER

Thank you, I will stop the recording now.