"'I don't know many people who are engrossed in the party scene and have spoken out about their sexual assaults,' says third-year student Sara Surface. After all, no one climbs the social ladder only to cast themselves back down.... Frats are often the sole option for an underage drinker looking to party, since bars are off-limits, sororities are dry and first-year students don't get many invites to apartment soirees. Instead, the kids crowd the walkways of the big, anonymous frat houses, vying for entry. 'Hot girls who are drunk always get in – it's a good idea to act drunker than you really are,' says third-year Alexandria Pinkleton, expertly clad in the UVA-after-dark uniform of a midriff-baring sleeveless top and shorts. 'Also? You have to seem very innocent and vulnerable. That's why they love first-year girls.'"
From the Rolling Stone article
"A Rape on Campus: A Brutal Assault and Struggle for Justice at UVA," via the NYT article
"Rocked by Rape Report, University of Virginia to Hold Special Meeting," which says:
The Rolling Stone article detailed what appeared to be the preplanned gang rape of a student in 2012 in an upstairs room of Phi Kappa Psi house, followed by a botched response by the administration. And it alleged that rape has long been an ugly undercurrent of the social system at the university, treated as an unfortunate byproduct of the school’s party culture, whose eradication was less important than maintaining the university’s well-burnished image.
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52 comments:
Rolling stone? Most likely fake then.
Here's a question maybe someone can answer for me.
We frequently hear of so and so being a rape survivor, as if her (or his) condition had an alternative, namely non-survival.
But if the alternative to rape survival is not death, what might it be?
And, if so, can others be survivors of things other than rape or death?
"Everything bad in my life now is built around that one bad decision that I made," she says. "All because I went to that stupid party."
Yeah, that, and not going straight to the hospital and the police. That's why the animals are still on the loose.
- Krumhorn
Don't drink much, study, don't take other kidad too seriously. Don't treat your college career as an excuse to act like a 16 year old for 4+ years.
The separation of childhood and adulthood is growing progressively thin. The incidence of rape may be addressed as both a cause and effect. The former is quite clear, and no one disputes the crime of rape, or perhaps rape-rape. The latter, however, is a taboo topic, that is spurned in political company. Viva la Sexual Revolucion!
"But if the alternative to rape survival is not death, what might it be?"
It's post-traumatic stress. Really, did you find that question hard?
It is a sad commentary about alcohol and the hookup environment on campuses today.
Lower the drinking age.
We have to get these girls to go to the cops immediately. Or we are made to wonder if there has been a change of heart, a growing regret.
I find the Rolling Stone story hard to believe. Drunk college boys are capable of a lot, but I am not sure you could get five of them to rape a stranger in the dark or for her date to be nonchalant a few days later. A lot of the story does not ring true. Too pat in too many ways.
In these cases, I hate to say it, but post-traumatic stupidity fits the bill.
Dionysius was a Greek too. But in Virginia he is called Bacchus.
Wait a minute. I thought America has always rejected the concept of collective guilt--isn't that we allowed Germany back into the family of nations after WW II and treated the Japanese people with respect post WW II? So why ban the activities of ALL fraternities? Why not just the one where the alleged rape took place? Further, what about the rest of the student body? What is the prevalence of sexual assaults among the "independent" non-fraternity males (i.e., the "GDIs"} vs fraternity members? I smell a Duke Univ, PART II treatment here of UVA fraternities based on blind ideological hatred by both the faculty and the MSM.,
So the fresh-women need to stay away from the Greeks acting out as gods of wine and the fertility of nature.
Proto-adults, fresh from transcending the age of majority, just having left the comforts and security of the nest, with a predilection for rebellion, are prone to unforced exhibitions of bad judgment. Perhaps risk management should be a mandatory course for fledgling adults. It's normally a parent-instructed education, but the evidence suggests there has been a dereliction of duty, or perhaps a conflict with the popular culture (e.g. progressive morality).
If you scan through this thing for "police" it's quite revealing.
'Minutes later, her three best friends on campus – two boys and a girl (whose names are changed) – arrived to find Jackie on a nearby street corner, shaking. "What did they do to you? What did they make you do?" Jackie recalls her friend Randall demanding. Jackie shook her head and began to cry. The group looked at one another in a panic. They all knew about Jackie's date; the Phi Kappa Psi house loomed behind them. "We have to get her to the hospital," Randall said.
Their other two friends, however, weren't convinced. "Is that such a good idea?" she recalls Cindy asking. "Her reputation will be shot for the next four years." Andy seconded the opinion, adding that since he and Randall both planned to rush fraternities, they ought to think this through. The three friends launched into a heated discussion about the social price of reporting Jackie's rape, while Jackie stood beside them, mute in her bloody dress, wishing only to go back to her dorm room and fall into a deep, forgetful sleep. Detached, Jackie listened as Cindy prevailed over the group: "She's gonna be the girl who cried 'rape,' and we'll never be allowed into any frat party again.'
All sounds pretty plausible to me.
Original Mike wrote:
Lower the drinking age.
I hear libertarians argue this point a lot. BUt I don't get it. Why would lowering the drinking age lead to less drunken hookups?
When I was in college and we had people who were under the drinking age, they went to keg parties on campus if they couldn't get into a bar. If they were of the drinking age, they'd still go to the same keg parties. Lowering the drinking age won't make irresponsible drinkers responsible drinkers.
Duke lacrosse. Duke lacrosse. Duke lacrosse.
Let's wait to find out what happened before we presume guilt. I certainly don't trust Rolling Stone and the story seems awfully "after school special".
Ann Althouse said...
It's post-traumatic stress. Really, did you find that question hard?
So rape victims who suffer PTSD are not survivors?
+1 on lowering the drinking age back to 18 (grew up in such a state back then). Drinking is much less alluring if legal.
The "tell" in the story is the statement by one of the fictitious rapists that one of the others HAS to do it, because all of the members of the fraternity do it. Rape? This is the giveaway that the writer is making this up. No major frat at any major university would have such a requirement. Only in a non frat guy's fevered imagination.
We have two unreliable witnesses here. Rolling Stone and a bunch of lawyers for a UVa frat. [Disclosure: I was a member of Phi Kappa Psi at W&L.] [Another disclosure: as a W&L grad and a VT employee I am morally obligated to think the worst of Wahoos.]
In any case, if the frat boys are guilty they belong in jail. I can't think of a more incompetent group of people to adjudicate this case than UVa administrators.
The student justice system is the wrong place for this case. The only possible punishment is too strong for the innocent, too weak for the guilty.
"Blogger Ignorance is Bliss said...
Ann Althouse said...
It's post-traumatic stress. Really, did you find that question hard?
So rape victims who suffer PTSD are not survivors?"
Yes, exactly. The question that I still find hard is the usage of "survivor", a word usually indicating some sort of fairly terminal condition. One of the salient aspects of this blog as I recall is Professor Althouse's regular interest in how words are used.
I can certainly see a woman (or man) in a permanent catatonic state as a non-survivor of rape.
The more her (or his) condition begins tp approach the everyday life of the average person, however, the more I begin to question not only how opportunistic the usage of "survivor" might be becoming but, more importantly, how I, too, might employ it to benefit myself in some way in my own life.
For example, have we diluted the meaning of the term sufficiently that I might call myself a survivor of Luc Besson's Lucy? If so, I want those hugs. I need them. I do.
If not, let's stop debasing what linguistic integrity we still have.
"The three friends launched into a heated discussion about the social price of reporting Jackie's rape, while Jackie stood beside them, mute in her bloody dress, wishing only to go back to her dorm room and fall into a deep, forgetful sleep. Detached, Jackie listened as Cindy prevailed over the group: "She's gonna be the girl who cried 'rape,' and we'll never be allowed into any frat party again.'"
These are "friends"? Deciding that their future social life is more important than helping a woman who's just been criminally assaulted?
If I were UVA I would throw them out for lacking any moral compass or common sense.
jr565 said...
I hear libertarians argue this point a lot. BUt I don't get it. Why would lowering the drinking age lead to less drunken hookups?
More places become available to drink so the frat house is not the only game in town. Universities could have event with alcohol, and security. Because bars have an economic incentive to not be known as the place women go to get raped contrasted with frat houses that have readily available bedrooms upstairs.
I refuse to believe that there are people in this world who are unwilling to risk their reputations to take a bloody and beaten girl to the hospital.
Owen: "These are "friends"? Deciding that their future social life is more important than helping a woman who's just been criminally assaulted?"
How dare you question these young people (several of whom are women!!!) with special insight into the human condition.
I'll bet you are an older white male.
Check your privilege older white male!!
"there's a whole generation with a new explanation"
UVA alumna here. I don't wish in any way to impugn the woman in the story. It's the writer I don't trust.
UVA full of blond-haired students and rich kids? Is that the real rap? Did the author ever visit the grounds?
Also, I find the non action of the beloved administrator to be criminal if the allegations hold merit. And agree the university has no business adjudicating alleged criminal and violent behavior.
Frats don't rush in September either, so there wouldn't be a first year pledge and other pledges would already be in or out.
I was young and naive once as well, but the frat mystique and social power the others seem to be so in fear of? I never felt that whatsoever and it did not describe the experience of anyone I know.
I question whether anything is accurate in Rolling Stone. I also find it hard to believe rape is a "rite of passage" at the frat. It does sound "Duke LaCrosse-ish."
These friends sound like shit. Your friend is bloodied and barely able to speak and you worry about your prospects for future parties? Jeez the drugging preppies in the movie traffic were better friends. At least they dropped their ODing friend at the ER door. Forget the police. What about your friends health?
Perhaps I forget what it is like to be young, but when I was 16 and hung out in a dark bar with a friend, a 40ish guy bought us a lot of drinks (daiquiris of course!). I stopped when I read the signs (putting his hand on my knee, making passes at both of us) and he asked us to go home with him. When my friend was too drunk to say no, I called my mom. I knew I would be in trouble, but I knew it would be worse for my friend if I didnt. She was grateful I did.
Is a campus tribunal in any way the right venue for adjudicating an alleged gang rape? We're not talking about a drunken hookup one later regrets--of course the University can't handle a case like that! If you bring the crime to the police I think you then have a good case for the University stepping in with a hearing, etc, to keep the accused and accuser out of the same classes, or more likely to work out how to enforce the protective order(s) the court system would almost certainly grant the accuser. UVA botched the response? Of course they did!
I have no doubt many non-consentual sexual encounters happen on campuses. No doubt a low percentage are reported as rapes.
This particular story seems implausible however. A three-hour rape by multiple strangers after being tackled and falling through a glass table and being struck in the face? And her friends think only of the future parties they won't be invited to?
But UVA seems to have a problem with rape. Both the boy/men and the administration. This story has caused many others to come forward with accounts that are far more believable, even if more ambiguous. The constant is the bizarre system created to address the allegations.
Even though I do not believe this particular story, it has convinced me to talk with my high-school daughter (who I know does not drink yet) about the dangers of drinking, drinking to excess, drinking around groups of men she does not know, accepting drinks from any male, known or not, and the fact that some men at college are sexual predators. Don't leave friends alone at fraternities. It is not victim blaming to teach situational awareness.
If this story is true, however, someone should take a flamethrower and torch the Phi Psi house. Over break when nobody's there of course.
Most of that hooking up is consensual. But against that backdrop, as psychologist David Lisak discovered, lurk undetected predators. Lisak's 2002 groundbreaking study of more than 1,800 college men found that roughly nine out of 10 rapes are committed by serial offenders, who are responsible for an astonishing average of six rapes each. None of the offenders in Lisak's study had ever been reported. Lisak's findings upended general presumptions about campus sexual assault: It implied that most incidents are not bumbling, he-said-she-said miscommunications, but rather deliberate crimes by serial sex offenders.
The campus adjudication process is unlikely to reach these persons who, among other things, are likely to have become skilled at picking victims who will not file complaints, or who will be ineffective complaintants if they do. This is one of the strongest arguments for taking these issues out of the hands of the schools, and making the police and the courts deal with them. These are serious crimes where protection of the society at large is at issue.
Most of that hooking up is consensual. But against that backdrop, as psychologist David Lisak discovered, lurk undetected predators. Lisak's 2002 groundbreaking study of more than 1,800 college men found that roughly nine out of 10 rapes are committed by serial offenders, who are responsible for an astonishing average of six rapes each. None of the offenders in Lisak's study had ever been reported. Lisak's findings upended general presumptions about campus sexual assault: It implied that most incidents are not bumbling, he-said-she-said miscommunications, but rather deliberate crimes by serial sex offenders.
The campus adjudication process is unlikely to reach these persons who, among other things, are likely to have become skilled at picking victims who will not file complaints, or who will be ineffective complaintants if they do. This is one of the strongest arguments for taking these issues out of the hands of the schools, and making the police and the courts deal with them. These are serious crimes where protection of the society at large is at issue.
Wow. I am a member of a fraternity and we held parties but nothing close to gang rape was ever even joked about. We had adult supervision in our alumni board and adviser. The house has expelled members for not adhering to the principles of brotherhood which encourage teamwork, loyalty, duty, and respect for others. Our national office has been approached by colleges asking for new chapters to be established because of the good behavior of our members. I enjoyed watching "Animal House" but I did not live it. If UVA condones crimes I agree they should stop it. If UVA is not guiding their greek system to live up to ideals then I agree they should close the greek houses. They should probably take a good look at behavior in their dormitories, too. College administrators are supposed to help guide the next generation. This is a failure in my eyes. I hire college graduates and I will probably pass on UVA resumes for a good long time after reading that the place is out of control.
Bullshit. The entire RS story is quite clearly a fabrication. I find it hard to believe anyone would actually take it seriously. There isn't a single plausible sentence.
However, a couple of fictions that were highlighted by my own pledging experience a generation ago, are that: There is no way actives would join in with pledges being hazed. That kind of defeats the whole concept of hazing. And, hazing isn't done at socials. Ever. Also, being a Phi Psi myself, it's inconceivable that you could assemble a group of seven rapists out of the entire population activated since 1852, let alone in a single chapter on a given year. Wouldn't even think that of another fraternity's membership, even the fracking Sigma Nu's... Sure, there may be one or two evil people in any given group, but not seven in such a small population.
...
I call shenanigans. The tell for me was the phrase, "grab its motherfucking leg." This is a contrived attempt to make her alleged attackers sound as though they thought of her as less than human. And I don't like to call shenanigans unless I'm pretty damn sure.
"It's post-traumatic stress. Really, did you find that question hard?"
Yes. People have been dealing with post trauma stress since coming down from the trees. For all sorts of reasons. Are we now raising helpless little flowers who cannot even muster enough courage to report violent rape?
She should want to castrate her date with a dull knife.
This is something that has been on the back of my mind since I read the story earlier today: why would her reputation would be in jeopardy had she come forward back then? There is nothing shameful about being the victim of rape!
I feel there is some cultural background I'm missing here.
A. Take a group of teenagers never taught by their parents how to be adults.
B. Add lots of alcohol they were never taught how to drink.
C. Set them all free to mix and match as they wish.
D. Be shocked by the results.
I can't help but notice these evil frats did not go out looking for girls, the girls come to them.
What's the political affiliation of the people running that university? At least 90% Democratic Party? That's what I'd guess. But nobody in MSM will ask the question.
So we have a victim of a brutal gang rape who was talked out of going to the cops by friends who didn't want to risk their potential popularity? And a university official who was neutral about whether she should go to the police?
I'd think when you're old enough to be in college you're old enough to know you go to the police when you're a victim of a vicious assault. If you choose not to do so then it's not the fault of any system, and the only "rape culture" is the one you choose to adhere to by listening to your dumbshit friends.
And that may sound like "victim blaming" and maybe it is--because no one took this to the police, those rapists get away scott free--and who wants to bet whether they'd do this again to someone else?
They should change the name from UVA to McMasters University.
Or better yet, McMartin. That would make more sense.
... I have no excuse.
"...she'd initially been intimidated by UVA's aura of preppy success, where throngs of toned, tanned and overwhelmingly blond students fanned across a landscape of neoclassical brick buildings..."
Nobody with a functioning plausibility meter, who's been paying any attention at all to the world around them in the last few years, could read past this line without doubting every single thing that follows.
The thing that struck me about the RS Article (I will assume it's mostly true, albeit embellished): Her friends did no one a favor by urging her to stay silent, and at all levels, she knows it. Her silence wasn't good for her, and it wasn't good for the subsequent women who wandered upstairs into a frat alone with a man. (Why weren't warning klaxons going on in her head as she ascended the stairs?)
Now the aftermath: People trying to sound feminist-positive on NPR, with lots of quotes such as I Know this has been going on for years here. And the "journalist" doesn't think to ask: Why didn't you say something before today?
I realize my assumption of veracity in the article may be fatal, btw. This has a similar smell to Duke.
"She smiled at her date, whom we'll call Drew, a good-looking junior – or in UVA parlance, a third-year – and he smiled enticingly back."
Rolling Stone has now become so culturally sensitive that they use a pseudonym for the cad who lured a young woman into a three-hour gang-rape. Gang-rape masterminds deserve their privacy too, you know.
They will ID the frat, though. Sic 'em!
Like the Duke scandal & reporter Stephen Glass, Sabrina Erdely has fabricated UVA gang rape article. Richard Bradley nailed it. http://www.richardbradley.net/shotsinthedark/2014/11/24/is-the-rolling-stone-story-true/. And Watch her delivery on Newshour: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/article-brutal-sexual-assault-provokes-investigation-university-virginia/
Like the Duke scandal & reporter Stephen Glass, Sabrina Erdely has fabricated the UVA gang rape article. Richard Bradley nailed it. http://www.richardbradley.net/shotsinthedark/2014/11/24/is-the-rolling-stone-story-true/. Watch her delivery on Newshour: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/article-brutal-sexual-assault-provokes-investigation-university-virginia/
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