<p>The college “tribunal” is adjudicating its (how many times have I said this?) Code of Conduct and its responsibility to the campus community. The accuser may take this to the criminal system, for their actions. That doesn’t magically say the campus now has no teeth in its Code of Conduct.</p>
<p>We’re not calling “everything” rape. Others and I have said that, too. The terms are sexual assault, sexual violence and in some cases, sexual exploitation. Some accusations are harassment without being those. </p>
<p>It’s some posters here who keep repeating, in one way or another, that we need to stop calling lesser offenses rape. T9 and the colleges don’t call all of it rape. Period. </p>
<p>Isn’t it amazing. Every time a guy drinks so much he can’t stop himself from having sex with the woman he is with, the woman he is with also drinks so much that she can’t stop herself from having sex with him. There is never, ever a case where a guy drinks so much he, allegedly, can’t stop himself but the woman he is with doesn’t drink as much, or wants to have sex but not with him, or is unconscious. And there is never, ever a case where a woman drinks so much she, allegedly, can’t stop herself but the guy is unconscious or nearly so. That never, ever happens, so we don’t need any laws or rules making it illegal.</p>
<p>I like the idea of victims making a police report, even if they choose subsequently not to cooperate in the prosecution. Taking the step of making the report adds credibility to their experience. I’ll guess there are few people who would affirmatively go to the police and make a false claim, as doing so would subject them also to criminal penalties.</p>
<p>Making a false accusation of rape is exceedingly unlikely to result in any criminal penalties, because the same reason that makes it hard to prove a true accusation is true makes it hard to prove a false accusation is false, for most of the kind of cases we’ve been talking about here.</p>
<p>I disagree, CF. If someone like Jackie made a report naming a UVA student who doesn’t exist as the attacker, like Haven Monohan, it would be pretty easy to prove that it was a false report. </p>
<p>That’s true, Bay, but Jackie is hardly representative of most students who bring sexual assault accusations to their college tribunals. In fact, as far as we know, Jackie did not bring an accusation to UVa, in the sense of naming people she claimed assaulted her. </p>
<p>I am sorry if this has been posted already. I can’t keep up with holiday things and the pace of this thread. I know of at least two western colleges being sued by males. I am posting the CU article. Title IX can and should work both ways:</p>
<p>There are guys who rape and assult. There are girls who are vengeful liars. Colleges haven’t acted as in loco parentis since the early sixties and for good reason. These “he said/she said” cases belong in the courts. Justice comes from getting to the truth. I wish our colleges could fix this problem, but they can’t. I’d hate to see a rapist go unpunished, but I’d equally hate to see an innocent male have his life ruined by false accusations. College tribunals can’t substitute for a court of law.</p>
<p>To honor Mandy Rice-Davies, who died this week, I’m so psyched I get to comment about the CU student who says that he was unjustly accused of nonconsensual sex: He would, wouldn’t he? Mandy Rice-Davies applies. (Google it.)</p>
<p>Seriously, we can’t take the CU guy’s lawsuit, or any lawsuit, at face value, without knowing the other side of the story. He might have been unjustly railroaded. He might be guilty as sin. We have no way of knowing. </p>
<p>When you go to a law library to research the law, you read actual cases. So I went I went to the law library last week to check up on the California laws about rape and resistance, I was reading the appeals of guys who were slimy lowlifes. These are guys we can all be glad were locked up. And yet, they were claiming their victims consented, despite all the evidence to the contrary. They would say they were innocent, wouldn’t they? Mandy Rice-Davies applies.</p>
<p>I agree we can’t take the law suit at face value. But there is no safe side for colleges; they can be sued from both sides. They don’t have the power of the courts so they can’t act like courts. They also can’t afford to get sued every time they make a decision by whichever side looses.</p>
<p>tvf4caster, yes I think your interpretation is correct. I think it would be very few cases that a college would cal the police over an accuser’s right to confidentiality. </p>
<p>dstart, every state’s laws vary slightly in what constitutes criminal sexual conduct. In Michigan, even for misdemeanor sexual conduct force or coercion is required. I don’t imagine there would be a slew of cases that a college would report to the police under mandatory reporting unless there is clear evidence of force or coercion at least in my state. Title IX give plenty of guidance on how to “separate” the he said/she said kids and remedy those situations. </p>
<p>alh, it looks like she went to the police a year and a half after it occurred probably because she was unhappy with Columbia finding him not responsible after she pursued that channel and she pursued that channel 6 months after the episode. </p>
<p>CU is a big campus, it’s surprising they couldn’t separate those two. He’ll lose if there was evidence by the accuser and the college didn’t break any of their process and procedures. Oh well add it to the list.</p>
<p>alh I don’t think the mattress college stunt will change anything. It gave Emma her moments of fame, a bill from the college for cleaning up the leftover mattresses and an internet history that will follow her into the real world this spring but perhaps an advocacy group will pick her up. </p>
<p>“The only honest answer is when I am drinking, at some point, the answer becomes yes. Same as it does for the female with whom I am drinking.”</p>
<p>If you “can’t help yourself” when you have been drinking, does that mean that any pretty female around you is in danger, or just the woman you were drinking with? If you’re able to control yourself so that you just don’t grab a random female minding her own business, but you confine your activities to the specific girl you were chatting with / flirting with / drinking with, you clearly DO have some control even when drunk.</p>
<p>(I’ll leave aside the sheer tackiness and grossness of getting drunk like that, and what it may signal about having a problem with alcohol. Grown adults don’t “drink to get drunk,” that’s immature hs and college behavior,) </p>
<p>momofthreeboys: I disagree. I think the more women speak up and refuse to be silenced, the more likely it is other women will be comfortable reporting assaults. I think the mattress protest is about rejecting the shaming women experience when they tell their stories.</p>
<p>I am having a lot of difficulty with criticizing women for being hot house flowers and girly-girls, when they won’t speak out, and then accusing them of bullying when they do start speaking out. It seems we put them in an impossible position. And then we tell them to just get over it already:</p>
<p>You are creating a construct, and then drawing conclusions, which medically do not exist, as provable in any situation. No one knows when that line is crossed ever because it varies by diet, environment (altitude), medication, temperature, etc. It is a convenient thought, but in the real world (this includes juries and judges) no one buys that it is always a male aggressor and passive female. </p>
<p>This is not a one-way street. Both sexes are affected the same way, and I am subject to the tipsy aggressive female all the darn time. You set up this false, not believable scenario that is only the guy who loses standard inhibitions. The females do as well and are often as aggressive as males.</p>
<p>You seem to not get the fact that when humans ingest alcohol their level of rational control is compromised after the first hour, some more than others. And to not medically acknowledge that female are as affected is medical quackery. </p>
<p>Why you create this scenario that women are just standing there getting preyed on is bizarre, as most adults have seen different, the aggressive female. But, if it makes you feel better that it is just men, then I cannot do anything, but point out the science of it. </p>
<p>You need to accept the science that on any given day, each human is affected differently by alcohol and to say that everyone knows when a line is crossed or that you know what control a person has holds no medical or scientific substance at all. You are making up what you want to believe about males, females and alcohol. There is no doctor on the planet who would back up what you say because there is no way to know without running cognitive tests.</p>
<p>I wasn’t setting up a straw man at all. I was asking about you specifically. I asked if you couldn’t help yourself if you were drinking, and you said yes, you couldn’t. So I asked - if you couldn’t control yourself, are random women around you subject to your advances, or just the woman (women) you were with? Since I presume / hope / pray you aren’t grabbing random women when you are drunk, that indicates that you DO have some control, that it isn’t just “oh boy, I’m aroused, the train has left the station, nothing can be done.”</p>
<p>And really, don’t kid us that you’re “subject to the tipsy aggressive female all the darn time.” You’re married. Social conservative that you are, I’m sure you push them firmly away. </p>
<p>If a college didn’t do anything in response to an accusation of sexual harassment or sexual violence, they would also be sued. Allowing a person’s harasser or rapist to remain on her campus is a clear civil rights violation.</p>
<p>And, remember, it’s the law that civil rights violation determinations have to be done by the preponderance of the evidence. </p>