<p>I feel fairly confident we can teach our sons not to be the seducers PG describes.</p>
<p>I think it is most important to teach men who are not rapists to intervene, and to understand that the likelihood of a mistake being made is very low. In other words, guys can imagine making a mistake, though most have NOT, by the way, or being falsely accused, though this is no more common than in the case of any other crime, 2% which is average for all criminal reporting, and so they “buy” the defense.</p>
<p>Once guys realize, though, that this is a group of predators, they are much more likely to support reporting, to stigmatize the rapist and not the victim, and this, in my opinion, will lead to more and more reporting. More reporting, particularly in this case, is the only thing that is going to get this group behind bars, where they belong.</p>
<p>It’s a side topic, but has anyone else here read Sherri Tepper’s book “The Gate to Women’s Country”?</p>
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<p>I want to clarify a few things here, although I’m late seeing this. Chancellor Thorpe was not fired. Rather, he resigned to go to WUSTL, and the reason had to do with sports, not the situation being discussed. He was a beloved, very well-respected chancellor at UNC. He had the support of the faculty, students, staff, and most alumni. However, after the academic problems with the football team and his firing of the coach (which made a small, very vocal group of “football above everything else” alumni angry), he decided to go somewhere where he could devote himself solely to academics and not handle sports problems. WUSTL is the winner in this.</p>
<p>The Honor Court should never have had to handle sexual assault cases. When a student brings honor court charges against another student for rape, it is often well after the event, there is typically no physical evidence, and there have been no criminal charges either because of lack of reporting or lack of physical evidence. An honor court’s hands are tied if it gets to be a “he says/she says” situation. In this case, after the accused student was found “not guilty,” the accuser continued to</p>
<p>Yes, he “resigned.” It remains to be seen if WashU is the winner.</p>
<p>Thorpe will certainly be better off there.</p>
<p>The accuser, as you have called her, never named the young man. That she was threatened with expulsion is a black mark on all of us. Had the DOJ not gotten involved, she would have been expelled and effectively silenced, no? </p>
<p>The DOJs involvement in rape and harassment on college campuses will change the way this is pursued, but, also, it changes the way the women view themselves. The more women speak up, report and agitate, the more young men who support them, the quicker we can get the offenders off campus. Their name will come up more than once.</p>
<p>The following are three categories of undetected serial rapists traits/techniques I grouped from Lisak’s article at post #453</p>
<p>— identify “likely” victims, test prospective victims’ boundaries; plan and premeditate their attacks, using sophisticated strategies to groom their victims for attack, and to isolate them physically. </p>
<p>So, I should suggest to my niece to watch out if some guy seems to be testing her boundaries, grooming her to be compliant while trying to isolate her from contact with her friends. Check.</p>
<p>— use “instrumental” not gratuitous violence; they exhibit strong impulse control and use only as much violence as is needed to terrify and coerce their victims into submission; use psychological weapons – power, control, manipulation, and threats – backed up by physical force, and almost never resort to weapons such as knives or guns;</p>
<p>So, I should suggest to my niece to watch out for guys who seem really, really screwed down tight and who in any way try to use power, control, manipulation, and threats – backed up by physical force on her.</p>
<p>— use alcohol deliberately to render victims more vulnerable to attack, or
completely unconscious.</p>
<p>So. I suggest to my niece to watch out for the guy who encourages heavy drinking by her in the relationship.</p>
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<p>I am not certain that is true at all. There are some similarities, but also some huge differences. Starting with choosing victims they know (or getting to know their victims). And not being indiscriminate in age and appearance, in fact apparently preferring women in a very narrow range of age and appearance. And, in all likelihood, not thinking what they were doing was “wrong”. The guys who jump out of the bushes with knives may think women in general deserve to suffer for being such b*****s, but they are pretty clear that they are committing a crime.</p>
<p>Anyway, the million-dollar question is how much reported college rape – reported to authorities or reported to researchers – involves withdrawal of consent after the fact, rather than actual coercion or force. I used to think a meaningful amount, enough to worry about, and not just in a particular case. But the predator theory makes that difficult to believe, because I don’t think there is really some small subset of men who are especially prone to have women wake up and think “I couldn’t have done that!” Or, rather, maybe there is such a subset, but it happens to them because the women know, after the experience, that whatever it was they thought they were getting into, or didn’t clearly say no to, what happened to them was rape. Perhaps there’s a difference between sex with someone who is doing it out of attraction/admiration/appreciation, or even simply a desire to have fun, and sex that turns out to be an expression of anger against women and a need to exercise control over them.</p>
<p>Sorry, poetgrl. I accidentally sent my post before finishing it, and the editing time expired while I was editing, so my post doesn’t fully reflect my feelings, and I am stuck with the incomplete version I posted earlier. Let me try again.</p>
<p>I believe her. I believe that she was raped, and I believe that she is a very brave person for telling her story. The problem is that she didn’t go to police originally. She says that she was discouraged from doing so by a dean. If that is the case, there needs to be some very serious questioning of the whole process.</p>
<p>Everyone who is raped should be encouraged to call 911 or go straight to a hospital and get an exam, then file criminal charges. These perpetrators need to be in prison, not merely expelled (at worst). Honor courts should never be involved in these cases. They have students who are well-trained in handling cheating cases, but they should no more be handling rape cases than cases of murder or armed robbery.</p>
<p>I have personal knowledge of Chancellor Thorpe’s resignation. It was indeed voluntary, and it wasn’t about this situation. He decided it was better to leave and let someone look at the football situation afresh. He had just about had it (understandably) with the pressures involving balancing academics with a prominent sports program.</p>
<p>If you are a friend of a college girl who seems to be being treated like what Lisak describes, or if you think you have a fraternity brother who acts like that, to whom at the university should the student report these suspicions?</p>
<p>Marsian, off topic, but I personally like Holden. I also think a lot happened on his watch that was more than he could handle, and this DOJ investigation falls under that category. That said, as I have said on this thread repeatedly, these issues are culture wide to the entire university system in the United States. As to Holden, I think he will be better suited to a smaller university. JMO.</p>
<p>JHS–</p>
<p>rape has nothing to do with sex. It is a crime of anger and power and control.</p>
<p>Many college women wake up thinking, “well… not gonna sleep with HIM again.” Or even, “Uh-oh. Damn!”</p>
<p>This is not the same as rape.</p>
<p>I work with many PTSD cases. Rape, as much as active military service in a war zone, produces PTSD, a severe and debilitating disorder. One night stands, regretted or not, do NOT produce PTSD. </p>
<p>Most girls, these days, really don’t regret one night stands, anyway.</p>
<p>Rape is rape. It is the perseveration on the rare occurrence of an inexperienced young man taking things too far with an ambivalent young woman and not realizing it which detracts from the much bigger question: Why on earth are men so willing to insult themselves as not being able to tell the difference between an aroused consent and rape?</p>
<p>Frankly, rape culture is far more insulting to men than to women, imho.</p>
<p>“While I think it’s probable that a small group of men commit a disproportionate percentage of rapes, I think it’s also probable that at least some of these men honestly don’t think what they did is wrong.”</p>
<p>Isn’t this the textbook definition of a psychopath?</p>
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Sorry, but that’s just a slogan. It’s not rape if it doesn’t involve sex (and anger, power, control, too). Everything that makes it difficult to talk about, to prosecute, to guard against, is because it involves sex. I agree with you that it’s a crime of anger, power, and control, but so, often, is a robbery or a battery. </p>
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It has been a long time since most girls regretted one-night stands as a general matter (although I don’t think anyone has called them “one-night stands” since we were doing that). One of what I suppose you would call the “rape myths” is that younger college students are more vulnerable to rape because there’s a relatively short period in many women’s lives when they feel ambivalent about their own ability to consent to sex (that part’s not the myth), and that ambivalence can express itself by things like saying no-no with your lips when there’s yes-yes in your eyes, or getting yourself drunk enough not to say no but then feeling horrible for doing that, or not being willing to admit to others or even yourself that you said yes and looking for someone else to blame. I think all of that occurs, by the way; the question is how often it results (or might result) in a rape accusation. (And, to be clear, I think the no-no situation has to be treated as rape no matter what her eyes said, and there’s certainly a point where I believe a woman loses the capacity for consent, but I think the breathalyzer idea is awful, and that young men and women are not about to stop using alcohol to overcome their own inhibitions and ambivalence.)</p>
<p>Anyway, young women age out of that stage pretty fast. They get comfortable thinking, “Well, that was a mistake,” rather than “How could that have happened to meeeeee? What if my mother finds out?” And in general they learn pretty quickly how to avoid feeling like they made a mistake. I wasn’t kidding before when I said that one of the surest ways to avoid being raped in the kind of situation we are talking about is to consent. NOT to “give in” to pressure or coercion, but to be comfortable saying to yourself, “My goal for the evening is to get laid. If I am successful then yay for me. If it turns out I picked the wrong boy, well, live and learn.” I think lots of women wind up with that attitude, but not necessarily on the first few tries.</p>
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<p>Huh? I don’t understand that statement at all. If, as you have been convincing me, most rapes are the result of repeated, calculated action by a small group of misogynist, fratty men, many of whom have been at it for years, where does the “rare occurrence” of an “inexperienced young man taking things too far” come in? How is this consistent with anything else you have said? The predator theory is that the young man knows exactly what he is doing and gets off on taking advantage of ambivalence.</p>
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<p>This is a very strange paragraph. You probably typed quickly. I’m not at all sure what it is you are trying to say. Are you saying in order to NOT be raped, you should go out WANTING to get laid? What? I don’t understand at all.</p>
<p>One of the confusions here and the reason I mentioned this perseveration on the confused young “accidental” rapist, is this odd stuff. I really don’t understand most of what you are saying about women and sex and rape. But, I’m sure you know.</p>
<p>The reason rapes are most frequent during freshman and sophomore year, during the first few months of school is due to the inexperience of young women understanding predatory behavior and the fact that the predatory sex offender chooses the less aware. </p>
<p>It’s going to be much easier to get a new freshman drunk and in your frat room when she is disoriented, doesn’t know how much she can drink, etc… These sex offenders are skilled at this. In general.</p>
<p>The myth of the accidental rapist perpetuates rape culture. It says, “This could happen to you.” It says, “She really said yes.” It says “we were drunk.”</p>
<p>The men I know tend to believe that this “mistake” would be very, very difficult to make. </p>
<p>Rape is not about sex. At most it is about masturbation.</p>
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<p>I would venture to guess that for many parents the idea of the inexperienced young man ending up facing a rape charge is worrisome because they could see their own kids in that situation, while they cannot imagine their sons as predatory rapists.</p>
<p>JHS, poetgrl is referring, I think, to the fact that when we have had these discussions many of us have worried about this scenario probably more than it statistically deserves. And that gets in the way of addressing the larger problem.</p>
<p>I believe that what JHS meant was that young women who acknowledge their own sexual desires and act on them, rather than being in denial about having sexual desires and seing themselves as acted upon rather than acting are more likely to fall prey to the predator. I would see this as akin to the mentality that says “I won’t go on the pill because that would mean I WANT to have sex and PLAN to have sex, and “nice” girls don’t do that.”</p>
<p>It’s not just on here, Consolation. In the media, in the narrative about college rape, the myth of the accidental rapist looms larger than deserved. there is almost an inverse relationship to the time given to the accidental rapist and the frequency of this event. It’s a story people like to play out.</p>
<p>But, it’s so irrelevant and it gets exasperating.</p>
<p>In the meantime, this 4-6% is preying on our young women. It’s ridiculous.</p>
<p>I’m just glad the DOJ is now involved. Maybe we will get some workable policy over time. For example, strong record keeping about reported rapes. Information given out to young men on campus that very few men commit most rapes. Just some accurate information would go a long way. This has gone on this way for far too long.</p>
<p>Also, rape has nothing to do with sex unless you believe there is only one person involved in the sex act. How can rape be about sex? Define sex. Does sex include two actual people? Let me put it another way, rape has nothing to do with sex FOR THE VICTIM.</p>
<p>Is it better to be arrested for rape, as in the case of the gang rape in Stuebenville? Or to be the hero who exposed the rapists and spurred law enforcement to pursue the case, but be arrested as a hacker by revealing the rapists electronic information and possibly recieve more prison time for that, than the rapists will.</p>
<p>[Exclusive:</a> Leader of Anonymous Steubenville Op on Being Raided by the FBI | Mother Jones](<a href=“http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/06/kyanonymous-fbi-steubenville-raid-anonymous]Exclusive:”>Exclusive: Leader of Anonymous Steubenville Op on Being Raided by the FBI – Mother Jones)</p>
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<p>This makes it sound like “the frat room” is the situs of most rapes. poetgrl, is that a substantiated fact?</p>
<p>Here is what I found.</p>
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<p><a href=“https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/182369.pdf[/url]”>https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/182369.pdf</a></p>
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<p>I meant they are LESS likely. Sorry.</p>
<p>Very interesting, 07DAD. I have had the feeling that people like to talk about the frat house and the frat boys and so on because it is comforting for them to assign the rapists to a category that can be dismissed as the “other.” Not MY son… Which of course ignores the fact that rape culture is alive and well at schools with no frats or minimal frat presence.</p>
<p>my apology for the flippant fraternity room comment. I actually don’t have a thing against fraternities any more than against dorms, or fraternity men, for that matter.</p>
<p>Just the criminal sex offenders, wherever they reside</p>