Universities Under Investigation Re: Handling Sexual Assault

[honorgal]

Originally Posted by MysticCat

Thanks. So why do you think this article is worth reading? Because having read it, I thought is was completely lacking in competent journalism or persuasive presentation of an argument—it was nothing more than a castigation of the tweets of four supposed "leftist feminists" as a surrogate for castigating all "leftist feminism."

I guess the "Freak Out" in the hyperbolic headline should have clued me in; I didn't see any "freaking out" in the tweets.

And yes, I would have reacted the same way if the headline had been said "Right-Wing Mysogenists Freak Out."

There were a lot more tweets than four, they simply use those four as examples. And no, that doesn't implicate all "leftist feminists" any more than a tweet like "men should learn not to rape" implicates all men.

I found it worth reading simply because it's more evidence of the very unserious rape crisis hysteria that some leftist feminists have whipped up in the media.

The male victims of the "presumed guilty" crowd are starting to speak out.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/article...d-of-rape.html

And many college campus administrators aren't very happy about being caught in a no-win situation where no matter how sensitively they attend to the exquisite demands of feminist victim ideology, they can never be quite sensitive enough because, well, you know, MEN.

It will be interesting to see how the tension plays out in the coming years and the ensuing lawsuits.

[MysticCat]

Originally Posted by honorgal

There were a lot more tweets than four, they simply use those four as examples.

Perhaps there were more; the article doesn't say, at least as far as I could tell with multiple readings. And none of the four examples were examples of "freaking out."

I found it worth reading simply because it's more evidence of the very unserious rape crisis hysteria that some leftist feminists have whipped up in the media.

It's not evidence of anything except what four people tweeted. It's a form of yellow journalism.

And I'm sorry, but I have a hard time taking arguments that are constantly punctuated with charges of "hysteria" by the "leftist feminists" seriously. If an argument has merit, it can be made—and can be made much more effectively—without constant resort to that kind of polemic.

[honorgal]

Originally Posted by MysticCat

Perhaps there were more; the article doesn't say, at least as far as I could tell with multiple readings. And none of the four examples were examples of "freaking out."

It's not evidence of anything except what four people tweeted. It's a form of yellow journalism.

And I'm sorry, but I have a hard time taking arguments that are constantly punctuated with charges of "hysteria" by the "leftist feminists" seriously. If an argument has merit, it can be made—and can be made much more effectively—without constant resort to that kind of polemic.

And I have a hard time taking seriously the argument (made repeatedly and more shrilly in the last few years by feminists, the media, politicians, etc and obviously bought fully by some of the folks here) that there is a "rape crisis" when practical suggestions that could prevent future "rapes" are dismissed as victim blaming and icky.

Instead, we get ridiculousness like this:

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2....udbPS5g1.dpbs

Does anybody else remember that SNL skit that resulted when Antioch College made their feeble attempt to regulate all physical encounters among their college students?

Originally Posted by MysticCat

If an argument has merit, it can be made—and can be made much more effectively—without constant resort to that kind of polemic.

This is quite ironic.

[MysticCat]

Originally Posted by honorgal

This is quite ironic.

And yet accurate—and applicable to all sides of a debate.

[honorgal]

More evidence of how out of hand things have gotten, from a most unlikely source:

http://www.ncherm.org/wordpress/wp-c...HERM-Group.pdf

Brett Sokolow is a lawyer who is considered the "godfather" of the legal theory and cases linking campus sexual assault with Title IX. For him to be pushing back is surprising, to say the least.

In addition to the eye-opening factual scenarios he relates, I found the paragraph at the top of page 6 resonates.

Very reminiscent of the daycare sexual molestation panic in the 1980's.

[ASTalumna06]

Originally Posted by honorgal

And I have a hard time taking seriously the argument (made repeatedly and more shrilly in the last few years by feminists, the media, politicians, etc and obviously bought fully by some of the folks here) that there is a "rape crisis" when practical suggestions that could prevent future "rapes" are dismissed as victim blaming and icky.

Interesting, seeing as how you're the only one here carrying on and on about this "crisis"...

[AGDee]

Originally Posted by ASTalumna06

Interesting, seeing as how you're the only one here carrying on and on about this "crisis"...

I pointed out to her pages ago that she was the only one who used that term in this thread.

I would be hard pressed to find anybody who thought a false accusation was ok. People who make false accusations only make it worse for real victims because it reinforces the idea that victims are not really victims. It's a horrific thing to do to the man being accused and to all of the rest of us as well. I can't even imagine anybody here disagreeing with that point.

The fact remains that there are far fewer false accusations than there are unreported rapes. And statistics say that a rape occurs every 2 minutes in this country. A significant number of those go unreported because society is so harsh on the victims.

[honorgal]

Originally Posted by AGDee

I pointed out to her pages ago that she was the only one who used that term in this thread.

I would be hard pressed to find anybody who thought a false accusation was ok. People who make false accusations only make it worse for real victims because it reinforces the idea that victims are not really victims. It's a horrific thing to do to the man being accused and to all of the rest of us as well. I can't even imagine anybody here disagreeing with that point.

The fact remains that there are far fewer false accusations than there are unreported rapes. And statistics say that a rape occurs every 2 minutes in this country. A significant number of those go unreported because society is so harsh on the victims.

When this is so commonly representative of the typical college campus victim, I predict society will continue to be harsh:

But in the midwinter of 2013, Sendrow says, she was in her room with a guy with whom she’d been hooking up for three months. They’d now decided — mutually, she thought — just to be friends. When he ended up falling asleep on her bed, she changed into pajamas and climbed in next to him. Soon, he was putting his arm around her and taking off her clothes. “I basically said, ‘No, I don’t want to have sex with you.’ And then he said, ‘Okay, that’s fine’ and stopped,” Sendrow told me. “And then he started again a few minutes later, taking off my panties, taking off his boxers. I just kind of laid there and didn’t do anything — I had already said no. I was just tired and wanted to go to bed. I let him finish. I pulled my panties back on and went to sleep.”

http://www.phillymag.com/articles/ra...ssaults/?all=1

I find it hard to believe anyone would want their college age daughters to accept this message of passivity, ambivalence and victimhood that's being pressed by today's feminists. What a mockery.

[SydneyK]

Originally Posted by honorgal

I find it hard to believe anyone would want their college age daughters to accept this message of passivity, ambivalence and victimhood that's being pressed by today's feminists. What a mockery.

Why the crusade, honorgal? Clearly, you feel a need to discuss this ad nauseam, but why you feel such a need is beyond me. No one here has said they want their college age daughters to accept this message; no one here (but you) has labeled this situation as a 'crisis'; no one here (but you) keeps bringing up (bumping) the discussion just to figuratively say, "there's nothing to see here, so stop talking about it!" I just don't get it. Do you need to get something off your chest? Did one of your sons get falsely accused of rape or something?

I'm not trying to be combative, I'm just trying to understand where you're coming from. When someone gets on a soapbox the way you have, they tend to provide some background for perspective. Otherwise, it just seems like an unwarranted rant.