Q&A for colleges and universities released today.
https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/qa-title-ix-201709.pdf
There is a relevant New York Times op ed today by Jamil Smith, a Los Angeles-based journalist, who was a rape crisis counselor when he was at Penn. He also went around to fraternities to educate men as part of the sexual violence prevention program there. He wrote that many of the men in fraternities did not understand what constituted rape. For example, he stated that many of the men did not know that “a woman cannot not give legal consent if she’s incapacitated by alcohol or drugs.” He also stated that many of the men "haven’t been told that a woman who says yes early in a sexual encounter can still say no later, and further that “they don’t understand that a woman’s clothing or her sexual pat is irrelevant to whether she agrees to have sex. They don’t know that a woman isn’t required to physically fight them off to communicate that she’s not interested.”
It is not clear to me how long ago Smith was at Penn. I am somewhat incredulous that there were a lot of men who did not know these things in recent years. I haven’t yet look Smith up to see how long ago he graduated. But I think it is possible that if a man does not understand that certain situations constitute rape, he could feel that he was unjustly accused of rape, when in fact the accusation was accurate. (I do not mean this to apply to any particular case–it’s an existence proof.)
Smith was apparently born in 1975–so he was at Penn about 20 years ago. That makes some sense. I don’t know what fraction of men still hold the mistaken beliefs that he cited.
Let us not forget that men cannot give legal consent if they have been drinking, have the right to extricate themselves if they no longer wish to continue without fear of retaliation and their six pack abs are not free to touch. That is the whole point folks…and when unis suspend or expel men when all signs pointed to the female as the aggressor or dismissed the accusation if it was a same sex encounter or the one party was free to continue to harass because they were not “happy” with the process there was a problem.
I think it is tragic when an innocent person is accused. But realistically, momofthreeboys, the scenario that you suggest is not close to being the most common, numerically.
Also, I promise I will start worrying a lot about men who are having their “six packs” touched when they don’t welcome it under the following circumstances: Women are no longer told by police that they cannot walk alone in a good part of a major city in broad daylight. Women are not grabbed in the street by strangers. We have a President who brags about freely touching men’s six packs, because when you are famous/rich (I have forgotten which), you can do anything you want.
The issues with the newer guidance on Title IX have been pointed out for years prior to the change in Washington. None of this just popped up in the past 9 months. I believe the implementation would have continued to evolve through legal actions against university and colleges but this weeks action, while it will take awhile also, should speed up the process.
Colleges are still free to use the preponderance of evidence standard, if that is what they use for other disciplinary cases.
Yes that is how I read the revised guidance it is a choice and the process, procedures and sanctions should be similar to other conduct issues. They also added mediation as a choice which is excellent in my opinion.
@QuantMech - This isn’t an either or issue.
“I believe the implementation would have continued to evolve through legal actions against university and colleges”
Don’t forget the (probably moot now) lawsuit against the Department of Education itself for promulgating the DCL without public notice and comment.
I only have sons and they are long out of college. These days, it seems most colleges try to educate about consent. I assumed these educational programs were aimed at all first years, not only males. Is this correct? Could someone please comment?
I absolutely think women should be held accountable for rape and sexual assault as well as men. However, there just aren’t going to be as many cases. I would be interested in percentages if someone has done the math. I do believe and understand men are less likely to report.
Of course, there are also same sex rapes. I have no idea how often they occur and what percentage are reported.
Does anyone have an estimate of reported college rapes: male accused of raping female, female accused of raping male, male accused of raping male, female accused of raping female?
Hanna, maybe you have estimates? I would appreciate if you feel you could comment.
Maybe HarvestMoon knows the answer or has a sense of the answer from having read so many Title IX complaints.
The above post is a result of this article, which has had me thinking about numbers the last few days:
http://time.com/4926979/campus-sexual-assault-mothers/
And at least some accused will be quilty, so there is less chance than one in a thousand of being falsely accused, according to this author’s back of envelope calculations and assuming she isn’t too far off in her calculations. Does this seem correct?
I know many disagree with the one in five number for women sexually assaulted on campuses. What do we think is a realistic number?
I agree many colleges try to educate, but I think they don’t do a good enough job - and quite frankly high schools should be doing it too, in their health classes, rather than focusing on their dress codes and blaming girls for boys’ desires. It shouldn’t just be coved with new students during orientation, it should be reviewed every year for various student groups - fraternities, living groups, teams - not just interscholastic teams, but anyone that wants to register for campus intermural programs. Build affirmative consent into the student code of conduct - make it clear any punishment is not for the sexual conduct but for not obtaining affirmative consent, and have graduated punishments. Maybe the young man or woman who is reported once faces what some would consider a slap on the wrist, but if there are 20 reports, and he or she only contests the issue of consent, then perhaps that person needs to be more careful when choosing partners, and document the consent (I know, that kills the romance, doesn’t it)?
“Of course, there are also same sex rapes. I have no idea how often they occur and what percentage are reported.”
I have seen only a small handful of cases involving allegations against women. But both men and women accuse men. I see cases with two male parties in numbers that meet my expectations about how many college men have sex with men – like roughly 10%.
“I know many disagree with the one in five number for women sexually assaulted on campuses. What do we think is a realistic number?”
No one agrees on what the real numbers are. A lot depends on what definitions are used. This article says one in 53. Who knows if that’s right.
1 in 5, imo, is beyond preposterous. Were that anywhere close to true, my daughters would have attended convent schools. Where business would be booming.
1 in 5 makes perfect sense if we’re including every butt grab on the dance floor as “sexual assault” (in which case I’m among the survivors). We need new terminology to distinguish these actions the way we can separate different kinds of stealing into “shoplifting gum” and “grand theft auto.”
1 in 5 makes sense to me for my age group (60ish) if I just pick a group of woman friends at random and think about what they have shared with me about forced sexual activity. It’s something women I know have begun really talking about the last few years. Some are writing memoirs and this comes up. I’m not talking about butt grabbing. I’m not even talking about being too drunk to consent. They were overpowered by men they knew. Usually this happened in their 20s. I hope it isn’t as bad today.
I wonder what college age women think the numbers are?
I am way past college age, but I would guess that the true number is somewhere around 1 in 5, actually. Maybe 1 in 6? When I reflect on the number of women I know who were raped, some by men they knew and some by strangers, 1 in 5 seems totally plausible to me. A woman has to know you pretty well to share this information with you, in my experience. So I look at my close circle of friends and relatives, and that number does not seem out of bounds to me.
I was called for jury service a few years ago. I was in the first group to be impaneled for the voir dire. The defendant’s attorney asked the people in the jury box whether we knew anyone who had been raped, who was close to us. Another man who worked at the university in my department and I both answered yes. In my colleague’s case, the victim was his daughter. In my case, at that time, the victims I knew were my closest lifelong friend for one, and a college roommate for a second (not counting another woman on our same floor in the dorm who had been forced into oral sex by a stranger). Later I have learned of many other instances. A woman whose spouse worked at the university answered no, as did the people who had no connection to the university.
While I can’t speak for what college-age women think the numbers are, I can say that I believe the situation is much worse than when I was in college–either that, or women are much more comfortable speaking and writing about having been raped than they were in the past. Could be both. I think it is worse, though, by a bit.
1 in 53 strikes me as ridiculous. I know too many rape victims for that to be even plausible.