Sarah Hepola Speaks about Binge Drinking and Sexual Assault

Sarah Hepola's book

By Davis Mathis

Sarah Hepola’s story has been part of the reason that college binge drinking gained much national attention in the past year, and on Thursday, the author and advocate shared her story with students at Trinity University.

Hepola, 41, author of critically acclaimed memoir, Blackout: Remembering the Things I Drank to Forget, told hundreds of students who filled up Laurie Auditorium, "My job isn't to make you drink less. That's your decision. My job is to make you think about drinking in a smarter way."

She told the audience that "blackouts" were often a part of her life when she was drinking, bemoaning the lack of education and information people have about the syndrome.

So she did her own research and spoke to experts. She learned that large amounts of alcohol can shut down the long term memory and causes a "blackout", or a loss of memory. In her opinion, this condition complicates the idea of consent for sex, and therefore is potentially dangerous especially for young college students.

Hepola spent much of her time talking about how alcohol affects sexual conduct. She said that she used alcohol to feel confident approaching men when she was younger but often ended up not even remembering the encounter. This leads her to question whether she could have given consent in those scenarios or whether she was too drunk for sex.

Sexual assault occurs when one of the parties involved does not, or cannot, give consent to sexual act. In Hepola’s words, "It's a mistake to not talk about alcohol when it comes to sexual consent."

"I think people like her are hugely important,” said junior Anusha Bradley, a Political Science major. “She pushed the discussion of rape culture and the role of alcohol in it forward through her own experience and research."

Another student in the audience, sophomore Business major Robert McCrory believes the drinking culture in colleges often leads to bad things happening, especially in terms of sexual conduct. “So, for me, to hear someone who has experienced so much be so passionate about the discussion around this is awesome," he said.

Hepola told students that she wants people to ask big questions about when someone is incapacitated and when they are too drunk to consent. "Everyone agrees that you shouldn't have sex with someone who is incapacitated, but what does incapacitated mean?"

Trinity, in her opinion, was a platform she could use to create more discourse around something she greatly cares about.