Like 66 other universities, Dartmouth College is
under investigation by the federal government due to its failure to
adequately handle and report instances of sexual assault on campus.
Critics of these colleges contend that Dartmouth is one of the
worst offenders—it has allowed rape culture to permeate the campus,
depriving victims of justice and support, they say.
To address some of these concerns, Dartmouth is sponsoring a
summit on sexual assault this week. General admission is $300 per
person, or $100 per student—a steep price, given that the most
useful thing such a summit could provide is a dose of reality. Dire
pronouncements like the infamous
1-in-5-women-will-be-raped-during-college statistic are ill-founded
and probably gross exaggerations, given that rape rates have fallen
dramatically over the last few decades. Rape still happens, of
course, and when it does, victims should keep in mind that sexual
assault is not an academic matter akin to plagiarism or cheating on
a test: it is a crime, and should be treated like one. Students who
believe they were the victims of a crime should call the police
immediately.
Unfortunately, there is little evidence that the summit’s
organizers and presenters are giving students the plain truth about
rape.
Inside Higher Ed published details of some of the early
presentations, and the report is disturbing:
Outside the Q&A session, the bulk of Sunday’s and Monday’s
presentations explored a more abstract concept than federal
regulations: the media that students consume. Robin Thicke’s song
“Blurred Lines,” with its raunchy music video, was a popular
example of entertainment that the presenters said “normalizes
acquaintance rape.”Sexual assault on college campuses is a public health problem
that affects all of us,” said Jean Kilbourne, a media critic and
filmmaker. “We need to pay attention to the environment. Just as
it’s difficult to be healthy physically in a toxic environment,
it’s the same with sexual assault in an environment that is
culturally toxic.”Kilbourne has been studying advertising and its messages
for decades; she said she believes advertising has never been more
problematic in its depiction of sexuality and violence.
Women are constantly depicted as objects, as being in danger, or as
disparate body parts, she said. Grown women are infantilized, young
girls are sexualized, and men are often depicted as controlling and
even violent. [emphasis added]
Really?
Never? That seems absurd. Advertisements are a reflection
of culture, and the culture of past decades was undeniably
regressive when compared to modern attitudes about gender,
sexuality, and violence.
One does not have to enjoy Robin Thicke’s music in order to
reject the notion that it promotes rape, or is a symptom of a
culture that is growing more pro-rape. Rape has fallen 80 percent
since the 1970s!
Perhaps it’s their optimism denial that makes activists on this
issue so difficult to take seriously. Or perhaps it’s their
seriousness. Observe this lesson from an aptly-named presenter,
Gail Stern:
In Sunday’s opening session, which focused on the telling of
rape jokes, Gail Stern, who develops programs and curriculums about
sexual violence, outlined many of the same issues discussed Monday.
At one point, Stern stood in front of a large Venn diagram, with
one circle labeled “things that are funny” and another labeled
“rape.” They did not intersect.Colleges must make it clear that rape jokes have no place on a
college campus, Stern said, reminding the audience of some
particularly egregious incidents, including a pro-rape chant that
was shouted by St. Mary’s University students during the college’s
annual “Frosh Week.” It had been a tradition for five years.
Colleges should also make sure that any artists, speakers and
entertainers brought to campus aren’t promoting similar messages,
she said.
Colleges should not do that. If they vigorously
protected students from ever encountering a potentially offensive
work of art, or speech, or piece of entertainment, they would be
daycares, not institutions of higher learning and critical
thinking. In fact, public universities are actually obligated to
permit students and faculty to air uncomfortable ideas and give
provocative commentary. Private institutions, like Dartmouth, may
resort to censorship in the name of feelings-protection if they
wish, but the caliber of the education they offer will certainly
suffer when professors are afraid to have unfettered conversations
with their students.
Universities with bad track records of handling sexual assault
can provide services to victims. They can give more accurate
reports to the federal government. They can encourage students to
behave responsibly (to that end, the policy most likely to further
curtail rape would be a
lower drinking age).
But when bad things happen, activists shouldn’t blame tasteless
jokes or Robin Thicke songs. They shouldn’t expect that any good
would come of outlawing them, either.
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