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A Hard Message for Rape Victims
Yesterday, The College Fix sent out a powerful tweet regarding regarding rape accusations. As I’ve never dealt with the aftermath of rape myself, I cannot say I’d have the courage to follow its advice if someone I loved – or, heck, if I myself – had been raped. But I agree with them and this needs saying:
The "compassion" behind telling rape victims to stay away from police is enabling serial rapists & shielding admins. http://t.co/Oz4lnmSHvJ
— The College Fix (@CollegeFix) December 2, 2014
Put another way, the silence of rape victims is the number one enabler of serial rape. Not insensitive officials; not a “culture”; not the “patriarchy.”
Even in he-said-she-said cases likely to result in acquittal, a public rape accusation can make a big difference. It brands the attacker for life and gives any future victims extra ammunition. Victims of unambiguous — though, perhaps, hard-to-prove — rape must take their accusations to the police, no matter the pain or humiliation.
Though conservatives are supposedly indifferent to rape victims, the truth is that we take deep, grim satisfaction when the evidence takes one of these predators down. The difference is our commitment to due process. Our world view is not shaken by human depravity.
As best we know, the University of Virginia case has been hampered by the extreme reticence of the accuser. She should have gone to the police right away and she should make her accusation public now. As it is, the accused goes on in his anonymity while a fraternity and university have their reputations ruined.
It’s not as if the accused cannot be found (and it’s an admission of incompetence that the reporter says she can’t find him herself). We know he was a junior at the time of the alleged attack, and that he was a lifeguard. How many members of the fraternity fit that description? I can’t imagine it’s more than a few. Either the accusation is a complete fabrication, or a number of people know who the accuser is. I expect — sooner or later — that we will know a lot more about this case, and that is all to the good.
To me, the most incomprehensible people in this case are the friends who pressured the victim to keep quiet. Do people like that – social climbers with no empathy toward their “friend” – really exist? That detail, more than any other, makes me wonder about this story. Is it really true the reporter did not interview them? If they do exist, they’re little better than the rapists, in my view.
I’m honestly open to the idea that it’s simply too much to expect so much bravery from a victim shattered by rape, though we send men into battle and demand they face death, and have for all of human history. If so, however, we can expect rapists to continue their evil unabated; there’s no other way around it.
The one thing we can do as a society is reduce the stigma of the victim and offer encouragement. But if more women don’t come forward and report their attackers, feminist slogans of regarding the patriarchy and “rape culture” won’t do anyone any good; we’d be better if they left law-abiding citizens in peace.
Published in General
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It must be done when a rape kit is a usable item, but there is the consideration that it was consensual when it occurred and something has changed that position after the fact. If the woman is otherwise unmarked (no bruises, no bites, no broken bones, no skinned knuckles in an effort at self-defense, etc) then there is the valid consideration that the sex was not unwanted at the time it occurred. Lacking a witness a prosecutor would likely not take the case to court.
Regarding the U of V case, there have been a few online posts expressing skepticism of the truthfulness of the story. One of the reasons is, as you pointed out, the reporters aren’t fully investigating this.
Another reason why the colleges have this attitude is in most cases we’re not talking about cases where a sober lady minding her own business was forcibly raped.
Instead we’re talking about young women who do know better getting drunk at a fraternity party. Not a little bit tipsy, but out and out falling down drunk. And they are around young men who do know better who are also drunk, engaged in bad behavior.
Those cases are hard to sort out, and the presumption of innocence for the accused makes it easier to escape conviction. That’s why they’ve set up informal kangaroo courts.
You point out that just being accused has consequences for the accused (as well as the accuser). That’s actually unfortunate. But at least the accused will also suffer. It’s the primary defense us males have against those who wish to file false accusations.
Here’s my advice for young men considering college. Go to a men’s only college. Or go to a religious institution that discourages or bans pre-marital sex. At Brigham Young University anyone, male or female, who is caught engaging in sex outside marriage is expelled. Surprisingly Notre Dame, given their liberal proclivities outside of sex, has that policy too, though they may not enforce their ban the way BYU does.
There are also colleges like Hillsdale, while not as nosy about student’s sexual relationships, still discourages it, and like the other two colleges I mentioned, has no coed dorms. These schools primarily rely on older, more time tested customs and mores for interaction between the sexes, resulting in a safer legal environment for both.
If you’re going to major in a STEM field, consider an engineering only college. MIT still has more males than females (54:46) bucking the overall trend. It’s definitely not a party school. A less elite school, New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology has a male:female ratio of 3:1, and Socorro has no night life to speak of.
Kids who go to those types of schools are there to study and are less likely to find themselves in trouble.
A party school is a toxic environment. And given that the oft-cited rape statistics (1:5 women raped) are false, it’s young men (and older male faculty) that are in more danger than women, since it’s way too easy for women to get away with a false accusation.
Don’t go to a party school. If partying is your desire, don’t go at all. Party outside of college. It’s cheaper and safer at least legally.
I’ll go further. If you go to a typical college in the United States, stay away from the female students. Go off campus for your fun. Go in pairs, but not more than that (e.g. Duke Lacrosse). No organized parties.
Just for the record, I chose not to make borderline or false accusations the topic of this post, so I didn’t focus on the questionable journalistic ethics of the U of V story author. However, I certainly am following that angle very closely. As I said, I expect, in this case, we will learn a lot more in the coming days. I’ll even make a prediction: a suspect’s name will emerge, by one means or another, within a week.
I think a simpler set of rules would be: 1) Don’t get plastered unless you know and trust every single person in the room and 2) Don’t initiate sex (or anything much approaching it) with someone unless the two of you are sober and/or have been dating for a long time.
Here is my advice to young men who just want to party:
Advantage of doing this?
The downside? Those college kids will probably bore you. Even the ones older than you will seem like kids.
Seawriter
Every avowed feminist keeps talking about the “patriarchy” that allows rape to happen and go unpunished. This is pure unmitigated horse manure.
“Patriarchy,” taken literally, does not simply mean male dominated. That is something more recent. Its traditional interpretation, “rule of the father” is more appropriate.
And let me say this: If my 20-year old daughter, now a junior in college, were raped on campus someone would feel the full wrath of my patriarchy.
Absent from these stories is any mention of parents. Oh, the news media is chock-full of stories about helicopter parents who interfere and pressure faculty over grades. But where’s the more obvious one? You know, the one where Dad is told by his baby girl that she’s been raped on campus and no one will do anything about it and then Dad goes bat crazy and is arrested for assaulting the University president/provost/marshal (i.e. anybody he could get his hands on)?
Because THAT would be ME.
There are very few feminists who will call out the Hollywood actors who defend Roman Polanski. I have encountered one or two feminists who will call Hollywood out on this, but they are a tiny minority and tend not to be prominent. I don’t believe that America has a “rape culture”, but when Whoopi Goldberg says that what Polanski did to a 13 year old girl wasn’t “rape rape”, and is not run out of town for it, it causes me to suspect that maybe Hollywood has a rape culture. But you won’t here very many feminists talking about it. Feminists protect Hollywood the same way they protected Bill Clinton: it’s disgusting.
My university days were spent at a small Catholic school. Students that were from out of town were required to live on campus during their freshman and sophomore years. The school was small enough that the freshman and those parents that were on campus could attend a welcome speech from one of the priests.
He said; Welcome. Some of you will spend four years here and escape unscathed with a degree. Some of you will leave here as alcoholics. There will be some who will be expelled for conduct violations. Some of you will be told to leave for academic reasons. Do not leave your door unlocked in your dorm because you will discover that some students are thieves, thieves know how to read and write. Decide who you want to be because I will know who you are after we have lived together on this campus.
I have never forgotten that welcome to school speech.
Excellent. I never thought about it that way, and I think you’re right.
This sort of thing makes me afraid about sending my sons off to college (luckily, that’s a ways off in the future) — and it really makes me wonder how so many in my fraternity managed to graduate college in the 80s.
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Re : comment # 5
And stay the Hell away from women who aren’t at least that cautious and restrained. They’re pure poison.
My wife and I have decided that our advice to our future kids will include: “Ladies, do not sleep with [CoC non-compliant insult relating to the human anus]. Gentlemen, do not sleep with [CoC non-compliant insult relating to female canines]. Heed this advice and you will be spared much pain and suffering.”
I think you may need to edit your comment. A word appears to have been omitted.
(Of course, I am a past master at the typo.)
Seawriter
Eeeeeenteresting: now I’m seeing claims from UVA people that lyrics quoted in the story (see comments) are completely unknown. This reporter really needs to start giving straight answers to questions about this story or no reasonable person will take her seriously.
Sorry, I don’t take seriously any claim of “rape” that isn’t reported to the real, actual police (not the university) within hours.
Fixed!
I’d also like to say that Sabrina Rubin Erdely’s comment that she “reached out” to the frat boys is both a pathetic reliance on an cliche and a sign this writer has a tin ear for really creepy turns of phrase, given the context.
One can admire the article’s ability to kick-start discussion on rape. But our national conversation on rape culture has become foggy. I think the people who are advancing this discussion are (and have been for many years) looking for a problem to which their particular solution can be applied.
I think it is incorrect to conflate the behavior of drunken collegians, male and female, and any other unwelcome sexual advance, with what Whoopi Goldberg might call “rape rape”.
The line can be quite unclear I realize but is society really served by incarcerating a young man who took advantage of young woman who passed out or was incoherently drunk at a party. The answer is no it is not (I suspect that is a pretty controversial statement but there it is), but that is where they are trying to steer us. In fact, because we know people are not angels, including young women, we avoid a lot of potential problems by sticking with the laws as they are.
Recent article on Bloomberg by Megan McCardle says it pretty well.
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-05-05/rape-on-campus-belongs-in-the-courts