A puerile spectacle, a bizarre gender passion play, erupted at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania last week when more than 200 shrill students, mostly women, staged an irate '60s-style sit-in to protest the school's handling of sexual assault cases. About 50 members of the group had been occupying the Old West administration building since Wednesday. See here.
The protesters called for the school to issue "red alerts" with every report of a sexual assault and to take a stronger stance against sexual offenses, with mandatory and irreversible expulsion for offenders. Students say they also want Dickinson to discipline students who make catcalls and lewd comments.
Armed with talking points, the hyperbole flowed like lava from Mount Vesuvius: "We all know somebody who has been sexually assaulted on campus. It's too much of a prevalent issue on our campus and it affects our lives directly," said senior Tiffany Hwang, 22, of Harrisburg. See here.
How did the school reaction? Neville Chamberlain would have been proud. The school's administration caved in, agreeing to notify students of all reported sexual assaults through the campus "Red Alert" system and televisions in the student union. In addition, students expelled for the offense of rape will no longer be able to appeal that sanction on grounds of "excessive harshness." See here. Junior Elizabeth Stuhr, a protest leader, said members were assured that they will have a role in drafting the policy. See here.
The school caved in for the sake of expediency. It's administrators actually understand that the issue isn't black and white. "It's an extremely difficult situation, and it can frustrate people who want to know everything and want to know it now," Dickinson president William Durden said in an interview. . . . . Because the cases are date rape or acquaintance rape, they can be difficult to investigate and deal with, Durden said. "It's all behind closed doors. It's extremely complex. Some folks would like to make it more simple than it is," he said. See here.
And it's not as if the school has ignored sexual assaults in the past. Dickinson College, which has 2,400 students, offers a women's center, a shuttle service that operates from 9 p.m. to 3 a.m. and a weeklong orientation for freshmen that covers topics including sexual misconduct and alcohol. There's also a student-organized program made up of volunteers who educate students about sexual violence. See here. In addition, Dickinson has agreed to spend $300,000 -- get that? $300,000! -- to "explore and improve its sexual misconduct dealings." See here.
Even without the policy changes insisted upon by the angry young women, it would not be unreasonable to characterize the school's present efforts as "overkill." Dickinson reported five forcible sex offenses on campus in 2009 (that's not to say all five were actual sexual assaults -- that's the number that was reported) according to federal data. Five. In 2009, there were 1,330 females on campus. No 2010 data were available. See here and here. Do the quick math. Five women reported they were raped. According to RAINN, 60 percent of rape victims don't report their rapes. Even assuming all five reports were actual rapes, that means 12.5 (round up to 13) women were actually raped -- out of 1,330 women. Spread over four years, that would be 52. Hmm. That's not even four percent, or less than one-in-25 -- a far cry from the canard that one-in-four women are raped during their college years (some say it's one-in-four during Freshman year; others, one-in-four before Thanksgiving of Freshman year -- the fact is, the "one-in" lie is altered to fit whatever circumstance a speaker wants).
By caving in to the protesters' demands that every accusation is worthy of campus-wide broadcast even before an investigation is conducted and regardless of how far-fetched the accusation, the administration is promising to foment good old fashioned, Chicken Little rape hysteria. We've demonstrated on this site time and time again that one need not go back as far as the hanging trees in the Deep South to find horrifying examples of this nation's sad penchant for overreacting to rape. The Dickinson administration is about to institutionalize that penchant.
The losers from the administration's capitulation are presumptively innocent young men, whose identities are more likely to be revealed -- either directly or by inference -- just on the basis of even far-fetched accusations.
The other losers are, of course, actual rape victims. Why rape victims? Because so many college rape allegations turn out to be outright lies that raising the profile of every cockamamie allegation before an investigation has been conducted does no favors to legitimate rape victims. Spend a few hours reviewing the innumerable cases we've reported that chronicle college rape lies in the recent past. Every time a publicized rape claim turns out to be a lie, the lie is reported, and the integrity of every legitimate rape victim is diminished. Think I'm making that up? Judges and law enforcement officials bemoan this very thing in false rape case after false rape case. I can show you a thousand examples from the recent past. Rape victims have written to this site, supporting our work, and emphasizing their detestation for rape lies because of the damage to their integrity.
During the 2008 presidential campaign, Ashley Todd, a John McCain volunteer, claimed she'd been sexually assaulted and had a "B" carved in her face. After it turned out to be a lie, feminist writer Jessica Vozel correctly wrote that "it’s dangerous and sad for legitimate victims when some of the most publicized sexual assault cases (Todd, the Duke rape case, etc.) end up being false reports." Vozel spoke volumes when she wrote: "it’s problematic . . . that [Todd's] story was automatically believed . . . ."
In the aftermath of the Hofstra false rape debacle, where the terms "witch-hunt" and "rush to judgment" do not adequately describe what the news media did to four innocent young men, Carol D’Auria of 1010 WINS said this: “We need to move slower." Does anyone doubt that if they could do it over, they would have waited to report the "rape" until after a preliminary investigation exposed the incident as a lie? The question scarcely survives its statement.
My guess is that by seeking to publicize every untested rape allegation, unfiltered by even a cursory investigation, the anti-rape activists really want to institutionalize the crackpot notion from the '70s that the woman is always to be believed. That idea is as repugnant to the rights of presumptively innocent men as it is to the truth. And publicizing every reported rape hurts legitimate rape victims, whether the activists know it or not. Sadly, even if they know it, concern for legitimate rape victims seems to be beside the point. The protesters were out to make an ideological point -- about alleged female oppression. Rape is just a tool to that end.
In the end, Dickinson released a statement thanking the protesters for their activism and concern. See here. "We applaud this kind of student engagement. Welcome it for this generation," said Durden. "So I think we're going to see out of this the result that we all want for the community. But we have to keep working on this." See here. Christine Dugan, a spokeswoman for Dickinson, said this: "Students were really frustrated by the slow pace of change." By protesting, the students "have indelibly left their mark on the college. We're all very proud of them," Ms. Dugan said. See here.
Innocent young men, and rape victims, be damned.
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20 comments:
With all the serious issues that require attention, the fact that these angry women would focus on this issue is almost astounding. And appalling.
The phrase "get a life" comes to mind.
Why in the world would any young man in his right mind go to Dickinson? And, why would any parents who love their son send him there?
Schools like this need to get the "Antioch Treatment" and have to close their doors due to lack of funding and support.
Let's spend a few 100k on five reports of sexual assault instead of putting that money into $1 preventable disease vaccines for women in Sub-Saharan Africa. The women's rights movement really knows its priorities.
It's not about women's rights or preventing rape for these women. It's about money and a kind of shortcut to power.
I noticed this when I was in university. Starting a hysteria about rape or discrimination is a fast track for ambitious students to higher status. It's something cool to put on their CV to say they were a leader of whatever or an activist in whatever.
They get a bunch of tools to follow them and ride the wave. Many of them lie to each other about having been raped or sexually abused.
It ripped out my heart to hear the disgusting lies, partly because never having actually experienced it, they had no idea how it feels. They actually equate things like getting a pinch on the butt, catcalls, and sometimes legitimate compliments with rape.
They're insane. It's all about social dynamics and fitting in or getting their name in the newspaper or on television.
Meanwhile men and women who've actually been raped have to deal with the shame that the liars and extremists only make worse. The icing on the cake is that the over inflated statistics you get when you go to try to get help surviving it, are full of anti male propaganda. So the few legitimate victims end up becoming tools because rape recovery programs, rather than teaching you how to trust people again, make you think that there's a rapist around every corner.
It is a racket. Plain and simple.
Other colleges with more sense should see this as a recruiting opportunity to poach Dickinson's male students.
Who should we contact at Dickinson College to protest this protest?
I am waiting for some of the Dickinson women to find this and to have a conniption. I am waiting for them to raise points you've debunked here a hundred times, because, I promise you, they will think they know this area better than you - even though nobody knows this area better than you - and they will size you up as just another woman hating neanderthal even though so many women are allied with you. I can't wait to see you humiliate them with something they don't care about: facts.
I think the protesters believe that rape is a rampant problem and that there are cover-ups. Even if the latter were true (the former is not), this is not the way to combat that.
Nicole,
Thank you for stopping by. And excellent commentary, as well.
What about me, Mr. Berkimer? Wasn't it nice that I stopped by?
Axel,
Indeed. I'm waiting with baited breath for them to show up. Either that, or the individual from the MSU article to show up stating that we aren't being fair to the protesters.
Never mind being fair to the accused. They don't seem to matter to these people.
“Students say they also want Dickinson to discipline students who make catcalls and lewd comments.”
--- What’s next, discipline male students who check out a coed wearing a halter top with most of her boobs showing?
"We all know somebody who has been sexually assaulted on campus.”
--- Does making eye contact now count for raping someone?
“By protesting, the students "have indelibly left their mark on the college. We're all very proud of them,"
--- Time for the male students to leave that place. Is this school the next Antioch that will close?
Atlas, the catcalls, etc. are problematic. The Supreme Court just ruled that vile protesters are allowed to picket military funerals (they picket because our armed forces allow gay soldiers -- the deceased were not necessarily gay -- their funerals are protested because they were soldiers). Those terribly hurtful protests are far worse than a few catcalls from admiring males, and justices from Scalia to Ginsburg said those protests were protected by the 1st Amendment.
I am waiting for a case where a boy is expelled or disciplined for staring at partially exposed breasts. It seems we have reached the stage where women can do as they please but men are supposed to hide eons of male hard-wiring because it might be "offensive." I'll tell you what: I might actually volunteer for the defense of that case if it ever arises.
Let's look for the silver lining: at least now the college will take all of these imaginary sexual assaults seriously. You can never be too careful, especially when feminists are afraid of the boogeyman!
Never mind being fair to the accused. They don't seem to matter to these people.
***
Innocent men matter to them, all right: we are their primary targets!
This has absolutely nothing to do with addressing any real threat. Rather, it's about spreading hysteria and guaranteeing that the victims of the next Duke or Hofstra Hoax are not protected.
"Five women reported they were raped."
Actually, that isn't true. According to that article it was "five forcible sex offenses", and even that sounds misleading to the average person. It would include sexual assault, such as that student who claimed some football player merely touched her breasts, and attempted sexual assault ("some football player tried to touch my breasts").
"They actually equate things like getting a pinch on the butt, catcalls, and sometimes legitimate compliments with rape."
Exactly.
It seems the term "innocent men" is an oxymoron now days.
"I'm waiting with baited breath for them to show up."
Internet People, please. It's "bated" breath. I can only imagine what baited breath smells like.
I'm not picking on anyone in particular, but I've never once seen bated breath spelled correctly on the internet.
Like "looser" instead of loser, and "walla" instead of voila, the internet is taking on a spelling life of it's own.
Hate being a school marm, but people, please...
Sexual assault is "he grabbed my tit." But feminists love to confuse people with that term.
The catcall, soon to be criminalized as "aural rape" and then used to increase sexual assault statistics.
Nevermind whether or not these women are inviting catcalls by dressing provocatively. After all, they have no responsibility whatsoever.
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