This is a complicated issue that can’t be even close to fully addressed in a single blog post. The claim that one in five women will be victims of sexual assault or attempted sexual assault (and some claim even higher numbers) is based on a number of surveys. Will it be evidence-based? Will different sides really listen to one another or will it be just an extension of today’s overall political climate, with everybody just angry at one another? Will it assume the inviolability of cherished norms such as the presumption of innocence or will such a presumption be seen as just another excuse not to believe the victim? The question is the tone and substance of the debate. The question isn’t whether college sexual assault is an important issue-of course, it is. So this is what is really at stake in the one-in-five debate. But the stay-away order remained in place, and was so broadly drawn up that he was at constant risk of violating it and coming under discipline for that." He was found to be completely innocent of any sexual misconduct and was informed of the basis of the complaint against him only by accident and off-hand. "I recently assisted a young man who was subjected by administrators at his small liberal arts university in Oregon to a month-long investigation into all his campus relationships, seeking information about his possible sexual misconduct in them (an immense invasion of his and his friends’ privacy), and who was ordered to stay away from a fellow student (cutting him off from his housing, his campus job, and educational opportunity) - all because he reminded her of the man who had raped her months before and thousands of miles away. Writing in the Harvard Law Forum the feminist law professor Janet Halley tells the story of a student she represented who, although innocent of any wrongdoing, was kicked out of his dorm and lost his campus job because he reminded a student of the man who sexually assaulted her: ![]() Roberts can still be found on a commercial database online, her photo featured below a banner that reads, ‘ protect your child from sex offenders.’"Įqually disturbing things are happening on college campuses. He described the playground offense as an act of ‘public humiliation, instead of a sexual act’-a hurtful prank, but hardly a sex crime. When I spoke to the victim, he was shocked to learn of Roberts’s fate. The terms of her probation barred her from leaving her mother’s house after six in the evening, leaving the county, or living in proximity to ‘minor children,’ which ruled out most apartments. ![]() She was prosecuted for ‘indecency with a child,’ and added to the state’s online offender database for the next ten years. "In Charla Roberts’s living room, not far from Paris, Texas, I learned how, at the age of ten, Roberts had pulled down the pants of a male classmate at her public elementary school. Among the stories she tells is that of ‘Charla’, a ten-year-old girl who ends up on a sexual predator watch list for “pantsing” another child at school: Those who doubt this should read a shocking piece by The New Yorker’s Sarah Stillman about children who end up on sexual predator watch lists. Overly broad measures often harm the very people they are intended to help. More recently, panic over “sexual predators” has led colleges to endorse overly broad definitions of sex crimes and an over-eagerness to punish perceived transgressors. Panic about black men raping white women led to lynchings. We have seen these sort of panics about sexual menaces before and we should learn the lesson that the outcome is often shameful. This sort of language does not promote a mindset conducive to a fair process for accused students or taking the time to look for best practices to prevent and respond to sexual assault. Words like “epidemic” are invoked at the highest levels. These are the sort of numbers we would expect to see in war zones. Colleges, and society more generally, need to take this issue seriously.īut the one-in-five statistic goes beyond this. There are about 10 million women in college so if even 1% are victimized by sexual violence that is a lot of sexual violence. ![]() But of course it is a big deal, and that is true whether the accurate number is one in five or one in 100. When many people, including sexual assault victims, hear the one-in-five statistic challenged it can sound like they are being told that sexual assault in college is no big deal. This is an area that needs to be discussed carefully and respectfully. At least it doesn’t mean what you probably think it means. President Obama and Joe Biden both repeatedly cited that number and it has been repeated many times in the media. It is hard to listen to the news and not hear the statistic that one in five women will be sexually assaulted or will be victims of attempted sexual assault while at college.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |