Why do high-profile campus rape stories keep falling apart?

[dead0man]

Link-Washington Post

You must be logged in to read this quote.

The author suggests four theories:
1.the activists don't vet their "victims" thoroughly
2.we only remember the cases that fell apart because they fell apart
3.sympathetic journalists doing a sh**tty job of journalizing
4.the "victims" desire to get their story out encourages them to tell the story the journalist wants to hear

Probably a bit of all of them.  This ain't good for anybody, but especially not good for actual victims of assault and rape or the falsely accused.  It's happened a few times to the cop haters too, but they've still got a much better record.  Is there anything else that could be causing this phenomenon?

[bedstuy]

That's 3 cases over 9 years, no?  What about the other 2 million rapes that happened in this country between 2006 and 2015?

[Marokai Backbeat]

I think the article largely answers its own question there. A large part of why these big, high profile stories fall apart is the desire to find the "perfect, emblematic" story. The story of an innocent, downtrodden girl, preyed on by a privileged attacker, who is ignored and dismissed by the uncaring school authorities. It's a very touching, sad story, but unfortunately reality doesn't fit so neatly into the narrative that many activists like to paint. Rape incidents are often ambiguous and complicated, and the ones that really gain traction are often those that like to craft a David vs. Goliath style story.

I think there's also a fifth reason you could suggest, cobbled together through some of the isolated thoughts of the piece and the top comment: A lot of prominent cases activists like to champion are very messy, ambiguous affairs that women are always being told are rape. Drunk sex isn't always rape, regretting a sexual encounter after the fact isn't always rape, consent can't be removed days after the fact, and unwanted touching or kissing isn't what the legal system would consider rape, either. The term "rape" has been stretched a lot by activists to encompass a lot of things that courts don't actually consider rape. It's made dealing with investigating and punishing these cases a lot more difficult, and a lot of women who have been raped aren't being believed because of cases like these, where incidents are being taken advantage of for the purposes of a propaganda war than genuine interest in solving the problem in an intellectually honest way.

That's 3 cases over 9 years, no?  What about the other 2 million rapes that happened in this country between 2006 and 2015?

Hence the term "high profile."

[Beet]

I think the more important question is- why was this article written? It seems to have little purpose other than to point out a few high profile campus rape cases that have been cast into doubt (although I think he problematically lumps in some that have been definitively discredited with those that have not) - cast them into some sort of pattern, and then speculate on how we should believe rape victims less due to said pattern. 

This seems like the sort of article that will do exactly what feminists feared from the discrediting of the Rolling Stone campus rape article, which is to cast more doubt on rape victims. It is also emblematic of how newspapers publish articles in line with the zeitgeist of the time, which only tends to exacerbate popular biases and imbalances. And this goes for either side, as well - last year, when the popular discourse was leaving people more inclined to believe rape accusers, the Post was publishing op-eds arguing that we should automatically believe them. This year, now that people are more reluctant to do so, the Post is publishing articles casting yet more aspersions on such cases. In both cases, the Post is playing into and exacerbating preexisting prejudices - most likely because it feels that articles that reinforce such prejudices will be more popular, and also because it may be subject to some of those itself.

I was never "on board" with any of the high profile campus rape cases - I think resting one's case on a scenario that one can never know is always risky, and when these high profile cases do do good, it's as much a matter of good luck as anything - however, I now that the pendulum has swung in the other direction, I think now is the time more than ever to support victims of campus rape. If I were a student on campus, I most likely would not have joined such a cause in 2014, but I would today.

[AggregateDemand]

In the US, the cases fall apart because they had no case to begin with. Some journalist or prosecutor wanted a high profile case so they pushed a narrative they had no chance of substantiating.

For the most part, campus rape stories are just click bait for worried parents with young daughters. Their concern is understandable, but the reality is that both young women and young men know exactly what's going on when they get completely sh*t-faced at a toga party or lingerie party. People who hate these college parties imagine they can be stopped by jailing young men and they create a predatory narrative to further the end goal.

Internationally, high profile rape cases fail because the prosecutors and law enforcement are inept. Examine the case of Natalie Holloway or Meredith Kercher (Amanda Knox). In both cases the guilty party was allowed to walk free. The Italians were particularly inept as they let the most likely suspect, give false testimony and evidence against the innocent parties in exchange for immunity (effectively).

[Marokai Backbeat]

and then speculate on how we should believe rape victims less due to said pattern.

Huh? Where was this argued?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I love how contrarian you are.

[Beet]

and then speculate on how we should believe rape victims less due to said pattern.

Huh? Where was this argued?

What do you think is being argued, exactly?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I love how contrarian you are.
[/quote]

Whether Jackie from U. Va was lying has nothing to with whether Susie from U. Kentucky is.

[Marokai Backbeat]

and then speculate on how we should believe rape victims less due to said pattern.

Huh? Where was this argued?

What do you think is being argued, exactly?

You certainly seem to think the article is arguing we shouldn't believe rape accusations because high profile ones have come apart from scrutiny. Or, at least, should believe them less. The central question of the article doesn't make that judgment.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Whether Jackie from U. Va was lying has nothing to with whether Susie from U. Kentucky is.
[/quote]

I don't disagree. We should just maybe hold off on making Susie from U. Kentucky into a national story until it's properly investigated.

[Beet]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I don't disagree. We should just maybe hold off on making Susie from U. Kentucky into a national story until it's properly investigated.

I don't think you'll find many who disagree that care should be taken in elevating individual cases where there's not a lot of direct evidence.

[Slander and/or Libel]

The assumption buried in the question in the first place is that the high-profile rape cases are the ones subjected to scrutiny, and they seem to fall apart at a high rate, and therefore we might want to be skeptical about the lower-profile cases as well. It may not be explicitly argued, but it's certainly there.

[Mr. Morden]

The author suggests four theories:
1.the activists don't vet their "victims" thoroughly
2.we only remember the cases that fell apart because they fell apart
3.sympathetic journalists doing a sh**tty job of journalizing
4.the "victims" desire to get their story out encourages them to tell the story the journalist wants to hear

Seems like there's an obvious 5:

5. The types of cases that get national media attention are the ones involving really extraordinary circumstances, and cases with really extraordinary circumstances are more likely to come from someone's imagination than those with more run-of-the-mill circumstances.  The Rolling Stone case, with gang rape as part of fraternity initiation, was elevated to national story because it sounded like it came out of a movie.  Stories that sound like they come out of a movie are simultaneously more likely to get national fame and less likely to be true (or perhaps, at least, less likely to be provable) than those that sound more "mundane".

[Cory]

What do you think is being argued, exactly?

That maybe we should tamper down with this ridiculous witch-hunt mentality prevailing in America's College campuses in regards to sexual assault?

[Beet]

What do you think is being argued, exactly?

That maybe we should tamper down with this ridiculous witch-hunt mentality prevailing in America's College campuses in regards to sexual assault?

A "witch-hunt" is never good. But if the notion is supposed to be that other people who say they are sexual assaulted are one iota less believable because of discredited high profile news stories, then that is absolutely incorrect.

[publicunofficial]

What do you think is being argued, exactly?

That maybe we should tamper down with this ridiculous witch-hunt mentality prevailing in America's College campuses in regards to sexual assault?

I'd agree with you if I didn't think that the alternative is going back to ignoring the massive amount of rape that happens on college campuses.

[TNF]

What do you think is being argued, exactly?

That maybe we should tamper down with this ridiculous witch-hunt mentality prevailing in America's College campuses in regards to sexual assault?

I'd agree with you if I didn't think that the alternative is going back to ignoring the massive amount of rape that happens on college campuses.

Is there a massive amount of rape going on on college campuses, though? Or are we just re-defining what used not be considered rape (i.e., having drunken sex) as rape, and the statistics are now reflecting that reality? If there's a mass epidemic of rape going on on college campuses right now, would we not expect it to not be confined simply to college campuses? There seems to be a huge logical leap of faith required in thinking that something like one-third of women (or whatever the statistic is these days, dependent of course on what activities are now considered 'rape') on college campuses have been raped, but somehow that pattern isn't reflected in society at-large or anywhere else, and it just stops after a stint in college or whatever.

[dead0man]

The assumption buried in the question in the first place is that the high-profile rape cases are the ones subjected to scrutiny, and they seem to fall apart at a high rate, and therefore we might want to be skeptical about the lower-profile cases as well. It may not be explicitly argued, but it's certainly there.

wait, wait, wait....shouldn't we be skeptical about every allegation (rape or otherwise, high profile or not) if we don't know the truth?

[Cory]

Is there a massive amount of rape going on on college campuses, though? Or are we just re-defining what used not be considered rape (i.e., having drunken sex) as rape, and the statistics are now reflecting that reality? If there's a mass epidemic of rape going on on college campuses right now, would we not expect it to not be confined simply to college campuses? There seems to be a huge logical leap of faith required in thinking that something like one-third of women (or whatever the statistic is these days, dependent of course on what activities are now considered 'rape') on college campuses have been raped, but somehow that pattern isn't reflected in society at-large or anywhere else, and it just stops after a stint in college or whatever.

This. It's like some people want us to believe that College rape rates are similar to the Congo. I mean c'mon get a grip.

Not to mention that these days "rape" has become the most versatile noun in the English language.

[ingemann]

Is there a massive amount of rape going on on college campuses, though? Or are we just re-defining what used not be considered rape (i.e., having drunken sex) as rape, and the statistics are now reflecting that reality? If there's a mass epidemic of rape going on on college campuses right now, would we not expect it to not be confined simply to college campuses? There seems to be a huge logical leap of faith required in thinking that something like one-third of women (or whatever the statistic is these days, dependent of course on what activities are now considered 'rape') on college campuses have been raped, but somehow that pattern isn't reflected in society at-large or anywhere else, and it just stops after a stint in college or whatever.

This. It's like some people want us to believe that College rape rates are similar to the Congo. I mean c'mon get a grip.

Not to mention that these days "rape" has become the most versatile noun in the English language.

I would't be surprised if the numbers of rapes in colleges are larger than among the population as a whole, simply because college students are away from their homes, among people they don't really know, often with their first experiences with alcohol and sometimes drugs. When that's said from what I have seen of how rape are defined in these rapports... well let's say that many of the women who they report have been raped, are likely not aware that they are counted in these statistics. There's not a clear border between consent and non-consent especially not when alcohol and drugs are included, and these rapports tend to set very clear borders up.

[Mr. Morden]

Is there a massive amount of rape going on on college campuses, though? Or are we just re-defining what used not be considered rape (i.e., having drunken sex) as rape, and the statistics are now reflecting that reality? If there's a mass epidemic of rape going on on college campuses right now, would we not expect it to not be confined simply to college campuses? There seems to be a huge logical leap of faith required in thinking that something like one-third of women (or whatever the statistic is these days, dependent of course on what activities are now considered 'rape') on college campuses have been raped, but somehow that pattern isn't reflected in society at-large or anywhere else, and it just stops after a stint in college or whatever.

This. It's like some people want us to believe that College rape rates are similar to the Congo. I mean c'mon get a grip.

Not to mention that these days "rape" has become the most versatile noun in the English language.

I would't be surprised if the numbers of rapes in colleges are larger than among the population as a whole, simply because college students are away from their homes, among people they don't really know, often with their first experiences with alcohol and sometimes drugs.

I thought that the higher-than-average incidence of rape on campus was largely a consequence of the ages of college students?  This study mentioned in the WaPo says that the rate is pretty much the same for those in college and not in college, when you control for age (though as they note, college attending vs. not college attending is also correlated with 100 other things, most notably social class):

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/12/19/rape-on-campus-not-as-prevalent-as-it-is-off-campus/

[Famous Mortimer]

Link-Washington Post

You must be logged in to read this quote.

This is another issue. Even the most liberal numbers concede that 3-8% of rape accusations are false. That's just going off cases where the woman confesses to making it up or where the accused has an alibi. It assumes that in the lack of evidence, all other cases must be true, which seems pretty unlikely. Not that I think false rape accusations are super common, but 1 out of 10 is not at all an unreasonable number. To hear most people talk about it, you would think it was a fraction of a percent.