Suspect
statistics, new rules, fake news stories, and fake rape reports have
created a problem where there is not one. Yes, there is a problem on
college campuses when it comes to sex, but it is in no way a “rape
epidemic.” The problem is that college kids have been sucked into a
life of casual drunk sex. They spend their weekend nights partying
and having a good time. They then find
themselves waking up in the
morning not remembering exactly how they got into the bed they are
in, or why they slept with the person. Because after the fact they
regret what they have done and with whom they did it, these incidents
are called rapes. The push to call these casual drunken hook ups rape
has created what is now called the college “rape epidemic.”
People will say that girls are drugged at parties just to be taken
advantage of. While that happens occasionally, just as it does off
campuses, almost all “college rapes” happen when both the man and
woman are drunk and their senses lowered. This so called “rape
epidemic” is taking away from just how truly atrocious the real act
of rape is. It is also ruining the lives of many college students
forever, because the accused do not have a chance todefend
themselves adequately according to the Title IX rules that are in
place.themselves waking up in the
morning not remembering exactly how they got into the bed they are
in, or why they slept with the person. Because after the fact they
regret what they have done and with whom they did it, these incidents
are called rapes. The push to call these casual drunken hook ups rape
has created what is now called the college “rape epidemic.”
People will say that girls are drugged at parties just to be taken
advantage of. While that happens occasionally, just as it does off
campuses, almost all “college rapes” happen when both the man and
woman are drunk and their senses lowered. This so called “rape
epidemic” is taking away from just how truly atrocious the real act
of rape is. It is also ruining the lives of many college students
forever, because the accused do not have a chance todefend
themselves adequately according to the Title IX rules that are in
place.themselves waking up in the
morning not remembering exactly how they got into the bed they are
in, or why they slept with the person. Because after the fact they
regret what they have done and with whom they did it, these incidents
are called rapes. The push to call these casual drunken hook ups rape
has created what is now called the college “rape epidemic.”
People will say that girls are drugged at parties just to be taken
advantage of. While that happens occasionally, just as it does off
campuses, almost all “college rapes” happen when both the man and
woman are drunk and their senses lowered. This so called “rape
epidemic” is taking away from just how truly atrocious the real act
of rape is. It is also ruining the lives of many college students
forever, because the accused do not have a chance todefend
themselves adequately according to the Title IX rules that are in
place.Title
IX is part of the Education
Amendments Act of 1972. The rules contained
in Title IX deal
with sex discrimination and its prohibition.
The rules in Title IX are
part of the problem. It is because of Title IX that many of the
problems surrounding college rape are occurring. To
accuse someone of rape in
college, students are not told to go to the police, but
to go to the Dean of Students, or the Title IX officer
and fill out a Title IX
report. To get another student accused of
rape you only have to say
that you have been raped. There is no form of evidence that you need
to
present. When
a student is convicted
of rape the Title IX officer
on campus will send them a letter. The letter will contain a written
notice of the things the student has been accused of. The list of
charges does not have to be a complete list, and in most cases it is
not. This makes it very trying for any accused person to defend
themselves. For
a student to be accused of the crime
there just has to be a 50.1% chance that they
are
guilty. This means that once an accuser is able to prove that there
is a more likely than not chance of a rape, the
defendant can be convicted. Colby
Bruno who
is
an attorney explains
in College
Students
Fight
Sexual
Assault
Accusations,
“Accused
students often expect to be held to the criminal standard of
evidence, that it was beyond a reasonable doubt that they had
committed a crime. However, the US Education Department actually
advises colleges to use a lower standard of proof, a preponderance of
the evidence.” (1)
Preponderance
of the evidence merely means
that the accuser only has to prove that there is a more likely chance
than not of the defendant being a rapist. There
is what is called a
Hearing
Panel that is
in charge of
running these hearings. Their job is
to find if the defendant is guilty or innocent. The Hearing Panel is
comprised of one to three individuals, or panelists. These
panelists are chosen by the Title IX officer on campus. These
rules surrounding rape on campuses are in place to make sure that
real rapists in college do not get away, but in turn they are
tarnishing many names of accused and wrongly convicted students. The
reason for the standard to convict someone, and the reason women are
urged to take it to the Title IX officer and not the police is
because it is hard to prove that you have been raped in a real
courtroom. So in an effort to make sure that rapists do not get away
with rape, these lower standards have been created. In doing that it
has made it easier for some girls to take advantage of the situation. There
are cases when women have accused someone of rape to protect
themselves in one way or another. In an open letter titled Higher
Education about Sexual Violence, Brett
Sokolow of the
National Center for Higher
Education Risk Management
(NCHRERM)
highlights a case where
a women accused a man who she had been cheating on her boyfriend with
of rape. The reason for this? Her boyfriend had found out she had
cheated on him so she tried to cover it up. The accused man had to
prove himself innocent, as opposed to being proven guilty. Luckily he
was able to do that by showing a text message thread reading,
“Him: How do I compare with your boyfriend? Her:
You were great Him:
So you got off? Her:
Yes, especially when I was on top Him:
We should do it again, soon Her:
Hehe” (4)If
this student had not been able to produce this text message
conversation
because he had deleted it, as
most people would have, then he would have been accused and
convicted of a
rape that he had not committed. That conviction would have ruined his
life, wasted thousands of
dollars that he had spent
for the worthless partial
college degree he now possessed, and the years of his life that he
had spent on campus.So as you can see there are cases where there is clearly not a rape involved, but this man had to
Works
Cited
Donald,
Heather. "The Campus Rape Myth." City-journal
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Education about Sexual Violence from Brett A. Sokolow, Esq. and The NCHERM Group Part."
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Reynolds,
Glenn. "The Great Campus Rape Hoax." USA Today.
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Matt. "College Students Fight
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Globe.
N.p., 27 June 2014. Web. 8 Dec. 2014.
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Sinozich,
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2014. Web. 12 Dec. 2014.
<http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/rsavcaf9513.pdf>.
Sokolow,
Brett, Scott Lewis, Saundra Schuste, and Daniel Swinton. "An
Open Letter to Higher
Letter to Open Letter.
27 May 2014. MS. 116 E. King Street, Malvern, PA.
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