Greek life may exacerbate a situation. It is not a cause of all rape on college. Not all girls who are raped are drunk or are doing anything risky, even on a college campus.
Apparently risky things include:
One quick note on the University of Utah number: that year (2024) and the year before were an anomaly.
one “multiple-month relationship plagued by interpersonal violence” accounted for 110 of the school’s reported rapes included in the 2024 number. And in 2023: of the 175 reported rapes, 150 stemmed from one “dangerous relationship” during the 2021-22 academic year.
The University of Utah definitely has issues in that regard, and definitely needed to protect those two individual victims, but I think it’s worth noting that those two numbers are not representative.
I am not putting the onus on the woman. I wouldn’t go to a frat party either. Some one said “insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results”
“New York’s current laws puts the onus of proof on the victim.”
“Drinking and consent - Cornell rape allegations expose ‘loopholes’ in laws” by M. Halpert (BBC)
There is no magic bullet solution . I understand all rapes don’t happen only at frats. But if many rapes happen at frats, don’t go there. That is a partial fix to the problem. While waiting for the magic bullet, you don’t need to ignore sensible solutions in the meantime.
What is missing from your analysis?
The Jesse Butler case. I think those women met their offender in a HS math class. Virtually every single case of an offender and a young child. Every single case of a young teen being molested by her gymnastics coach, pastor from church, next door neighbor. Athena Strand- 7 years old. Molested and then murdered by a fedex driver who was dropping off a package and saw her playing ON HER OWN FRONT YARD.
Apparently the only safe place for a woman/girl/female teen is inside her house. Except for the thousands of women/girls/teens molested inside their own homes by a family member.
Coffee shop sounds like a great solution. Tell the next 9 year old who tries to press charges against her pastor (and she won’t be believed- he has status, clout, is likely BFF with the chief of police) that she should just be hanging out in a coffee shop.
Every time someone states something - such as @neela, myself, and others, the response, like @SJ2727 is - oh, so everyone should stay home or not do anything? It’s also, why should a woman have to do these things.
The answer is - they shouldn’t. No crime should happen. Period, end of story. We all agree.
No one should be carjacked, no home should be robbed at gunpoint or even shoplifting, forest fires that wreck houses shouldn’t happen from arsonists, no one should be a victim of cyber crime. No one should be hazed. And no one should be sexually assaulted. No one. And there’s not a single person I’ve read that said so.
I think everyone is agreement.
All people are saying is - take steps to reduce the likelihood.
Should you have to? No.
But as college nerd just noted, Rape Y men can’t be stopped.
So people have to take steps to help reduce it and many have been mentioned and prefaced as I can’t believe you have to do this - like the drink cup toppers or condoms as was mentioned, walking with friends as mentioned - by some of you that continue to attack others.
These are things society shouldn’t need - I think we all agree. But we do.
None of us walk alone in downtowns at night - for fear of being followed or robbed. None of us (hopefully) cut off drivers on a busy street - in hopes of avoiding road rage. None of us (hopefully) go into Best Buy and take some expensive equipment and stick it inside our jacket and walk out.
Best Buy has security sensors on their stuff. They shouldn’t have to.
No, I’m not equating to stealing headphones with SA.
I’m just saying - both sides are saying the same thing.
One side just gets mad when the other says, well, you have to take these steps to lessen the likelihood of what we all know is a terrible thing.
It shouldn’t happen - but it does - and that’s where many that are being anatagonized are coming from.
I’d rather my kids, my wife, myself take steps in life to be safe rather than be a victim and say, no one should have to live like this - because once you’re a victim, you’ll never forget.
Each of these issues need to be solved as best as we can. You can’t have everything — frequent the place where violence is being perpetrated against you, likely planned violence, have free flow of alcohol in the frats while such violence is being perpetrated, and hope for some change. What are you willing to change? How can the outcome change with no other changes?
The focus on what women need to change is drowning out the point of this case - that universities also have an obligation to mitigate those risks for their students. This particular frat house has been a problem for DECADES. Underage drinking and drug use has been an issue there for DECADES. The police were at the frat house ONE day before the gang rape for a drug arrest yet they were allowed to have a party the very next day with no oversight. Cornell cannot claim they weren’t aware of the problems, yet it took a gang rape before they shut down that fraternity.
Interesting how this NY law is being characterized as a loophole, a negative connotation meant to gather public support to change it. There is nothing loophole-y about it. The law currently reflects an expectation of personal responsibility. They’re wanting to change the law to absolve people like Jane Doe from any personal responsibility. They’re wanting to put the onus on other people, many of whom have never had a drink and don’t know how to spot an intoxicated person, to parse every interaction to see if the other person that is conscious, speaking, and making perfect sense realllllly feels a certain way. 
Seems a bit ridiculous.
Nobody is disputing that the university has to do what it needs to do. Maybe cops should be allowed on campus, and haul people away for all the crimes that happen on and off campus etc.
But people also have to take responsibility for their own selves.
I went to zero frat parties in college, don’t drink outside my own home and then only rarely, and met my spouse at a religious observance. So you don’t need to point out to ME about risk mitigation when dealing with the opposite sex. But claiming that women who go to frat parties are the problem- when I’ve just shown you how ginormous the problem is- 7 year olds molested while playing in their own yard-- is what the kids like to call “tone deaf”.
To equate this case with that of molesting a 7-year-old in any way, shape, or form is a travesty against that 7 year old. There is no similarity or comparison, and it is offensive to say that there is.
Short of a BYU type, name a college where it hasn’t?
So why has society accepted it?
The government focuses on NIL and college athletes.
Where’s the outrage for this? I don’t hear this as an issue brought up to politicians. Maybe it is and I’ve just missed it.
Where’s the consumer, speaking with their wallet, saying - hell no!!??
Honestly, it wasn’t on our radar other than practice safety - but maybe it should have been? Maybe it should have been - I mean, being a consumer?
The schools all talk about safety btw - with the blue lights and more. That was mentioned everywhere, every school admission session and tour.
I hadn’t thought of or even really knew much about Title IX before this thread but it doesn’t seem a mechanism for safety but moreso justtice - but from all everyone is saying about it, it has serious flaws.
I didn’t “equate”. I am pointing out to a poster who claims that women should meet men in coffee shops and not at parties that girls/females/women are at risk EVERYWHERE. All women. Elderly women. Young girls. At church, at home, in school, at gymnastics practice, in doctors and dentists offices. EVERYWHERE.
You are looking to provoke me- but I did not “equate”. Reality bites sometimes. But coffee shops are not the answer to a problem which exists literally everywhere.
It’s been interesting to me to see the “I am Jane doe” posts on social media. A number of them are like this in that - girl had too much to drink and it ended badly. There are also a number where girl was planning to drink in moderation or even drinking soda and got roofied. There an are a number where the girl was just hanging out in her dorm and - sometimes drunk male, sometimes not - got attacked. There are too many ones where the girl just went to office hours or otherwise tried to get academic help from a TA or prof. You know, good girl doing the right thing. You know what some of the other stories are? Girl got drunk in frat house, woke up to find herself in some guy’s bed - still fully clothed with a trash can next to the bed and the guy sleeping on a sofa. There’s the ones where someone overheard two frat bros setting up for a Jane doe type situation and got the girls (it was 2 of them) out of there. There’s the ones where a guy saw a girl drunk and got her sorority sisters to walk her back, or took her back himself, or paid for a cab to get her back. There’s even the one where a guy got physical after walking in on someone about to assault a passed-out girl and ended up with assault charges himself - because he beat up the would-be rapist. Personal responsibility goes both ways. Men make choices. There’s a reason that (statistics posted at least twice above) 90% of college rapes are committed by a small number of repeat offenders. It’s because rapists are going to rape, and they take advantage of any vulnerability. Sometimes that is a woman drinking, sometimes it is an unequal power relationship etc. sometimes she is just alone in a dorm room. There is not feasibly any situation in which a woman can totally protect herself from a rapist. The blame goes to the rapist, period.
lol what? What is the situation where all these innocent unworldly men end up face to face with drunk women?
Why exactly are men so very worried they can’t have sex with an incapacitated woman? I find this incredibly disturbing. This is your worry? I taught my son to not have sex with strangers. To not look at a woman who has too much to drink as an opportunity. If you’re talking personal responsibility about a woman violated while drunk, you’re missing the actual opportunity for personal responsibility. Be better.
When I read A Thousand Splendid Suns, I wondered how men could justify keeping women covered, not allowing them out without a man’s permission, not allowing them to talk to a man not their relative. Now I get it. They are concerned for the woman, because she risks being SA if she wanders the world as an independent person. Right? No! We shouldn’t have to worry that we will be SA when we move through life.
(And yes, I know that many men are not the problem. However, I sense a reluctance to name the actual issue, which is that men too often believe that women exist for the pleasure of men. Too many men - and yes, some women - excuse unacceptable behavior by other men. It is critical to raise our sons to understand that this is not okay.)
This is an independent website tracking this case, not affiliated with Cornell University or the Chi Phi fraternity.