The Swamp

Three different articles on first two pages on Deadspin about campus rape by student-athletes (or in Kent State's case a coach's son of a player on that coach's team) at three different schools, each of which has allegedly had some level of cover-up or failures to properly investigate.

Baylor

Tennessee

Kent State

Giff and I talked a bit about Missoula, by Jon Krakauer in the reading thread. It's a terrifying read for anyone, but especially for people with daughters.

Rape is of course not limited to college campuses, but those campuses are often the first times that a lot of young women are living away from the home. What strikes me as the most puzzling is the lengths that police departments/universities seem to go to to protect the accused. Given, that is a crucial part of the justice system, but it strikes me as odd that even when presented with overwhelming evidence that something happened the powers-that-be still declined to press charges.

In a lot of the cases they dismiss the accuser's solely because they were intoxicated at the time. Look, I've been in college. I've been at parties where people were drunk, including girls who were flirting with me during the party. I think it's also fair to say there were opportunities for me to have taken advantage of someone. But I never did it. I don't deserve any props for that. It's just basic human decency, no?

I couldn't help but notice that, too. Sobering way to start the morning.

Did you read (what was at the time) the top comment on the Baylor article noting the school has had institutional problems with on-campus rape going back to the 1890's?

rass wrote:I couldn't help but notice that, too. Sobering way to start the morning.

Did you read (what was at the time) the top comment on the Baylor article noting the school has had institutional problems with on-campus rape going back to the 1890's?

No, I typically don't read the comments, but just checked it. Just disgusting.

rass wrote:I couldn't help but notice that, too. Sobering way to start the morning.

Did you read (what was at the time) the top comment on the Baylor article noting the school has had institutional problems with on-campus rape going back to the 1890's?

Same. I almost posted about the Tennessee and Kent State things myself. I have Missoula on my Kindle and sad to say it might be time to finally read it.

It's distressing to say the least and arguably the worst part is that no one really seems to be appropriately pissed. Jameis Winston possibly raped his way to a number one overall draft pick.

What's sad is that this was a hot topic back when I was in college. There all kinds of stories of different schools covering up or not investigating reported sexual assaults on their campuses. Schools are just so scared of appearing to have a problem that they find it easier to sweep it under the rug. And considering that this has been going on - and reported about - for decades without any real changes, I guess that sweeping is working.

brian wrote:

rass wrote:I couldn't help but notice that, too. Sobering way to start the morning.

Did you read (what was at the time) the top comment on the Baylor article noting the school has had institutional problems with on-campus rape going back to the 1890's?

Same. I almost posted about the Tennessee and Kent State things myself. I have Missoula on my Kindle and sad to say it might be time to finally read it.

It's distressing to say the least and arguably the worst part is that no one really seems to be appropriately pissed. Jameis Winston possibly raped his way to a number one overall draft pick.

Yeah. Though I think the commentator slightly misrepresented what happened (Brann wasn't necessarily killed by pro-rape gunslingers):

From wiki:

He alleged that male faculty members were having sexual relations with female students and any father sending his daughter to Baylor would be risking her rape. In Brann's view Baylor was, as he published, "A factory for the manufacture of ministers and magdalenes." (ibid, Conger).

Brann was shot in the back by Tom Davis, a Baylor supporter who resented the reference to "magdalenes" (meaning 'prostitute' in this context) because his daughter was a student at the University. After being shot, Brann turned, drew his pistol, and fired multiple shots at Davis, who fell, mortally wounded, in the doorway of the Jake French Cigar Store. Brann was shot through the left lung with the bullet exiting his chest. He was forced to walk to the city jail but later escorted home by friends (Waco Daily Telephone, 1898). Brann died the morning after he was shot. Engraved on Brann's monument is the word TRUTH, and beneath it is a profile of Brann with a bullet hole in it.

Though that is pretty damn Texas.

One other slight threadjack with this quote from Brann:

I have nothing against the Baptists. I just believe they were not held under long enough.

Super complicated topic and I don't envy the parties involved directly or indirectly. I am amazed when the universities get involved in what should be a criminal complaint (but that was an outcome of schools not doing it before). W&L is currently being sued by a former student (male) for being railroaded in the process for an allegation. Now this was all handled via Title IX requirements for the school and not a criminal probe. It puts schools in a position to investigate and prosecute for a crime when they are not properly trained to do any of that.

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Shirley wrote:What's sad is that this was a hot topic back when I was in college. There all kinds of stories of different schools covering up or not investigating reported sexual assaults on their campuses. Schools are just so scared of appearing to have a problem that they find it easier to sweep it under the rug. And considering that this has been going on - and reported about - for decades without any real changes, I guess that sweeping is working.

Which is fucking insane. Assuming people see it as a universal problem where no school is immune, exposing/fighting it should be seen as a positive.

This is also hurting my interest in sports. Disgusting.

I dated a girl in the early aughts who was raped by her boyfriend the first time she ever had sex and the reaction to it was so similar to what was describe in Missoula. A) no one believed her because it was her boyfriend and B) her response was just to start fucking everything that moved. I was actually relieved when I heard that it was only 50 by the time we got together. She was an amazing girl, but I was too immature to get over that and it ultimately doomed our relationship. Now she works for the Dallas County DA helping prosecute these cases. I can't imagine a better rep for those victims.

Taking it home again ... La Salle had a "RAPE SCANDAL" in 2004. Two incidents featuring three basketball players where coaches didn't report it up the chain. When the university leadership found out, all three players were expelled and the two coaches were fired. One of those players is still in the NBA. This was seen as a massively negative event overall for the school.

Campus rape and coverup was around in my day. I am curious if rape is more frequent now, I suspect it is because cultural attitudes regarding sexuality are a bit different, but the numbers now compared to then don't matter a lot. The biggest difference I think is campus officials did not need to actively coverup the way they do today. I think because of peer/cultural pressure women were less likely to report, and cops/police departments were less likely (than today) to pursue the claim of a drunk rape victim. The schools didn't need to cover up because it was more often done for them.

A_B wrote:I think it's also fair to say there were opportunities for me to have taken advantage of someone. But I never did it. I don't deserve any props for that. It's just basic human decency, no?

That basic human decency was in shorter supply than I expected in my college days. Most of my friends and peers shared this behavior, but not nearly enough. This was a shock to my naive self, that for so many it was ok to have sex with an extremely drunk or passed out woman, with clear lack of consent or even with drunken consent. I think we've kicked this topic around previously on the swamp.

I'll check out Missoula.

It's a big talking point here. Had a big survey last fall about sexual misconduct of any kind and the university has been releasing campus news bits to lead up to a big university forum later in the month.

howard wrote: The biggest difference I think is campus officials did not need to actively coverup the way they do today. I think because of peer/cultural pressure women were less likely to report, and cops/police departments were less likely (than today) to pursue the claim of a drunk rape victim. The schools didn't need to cover up because it was more often done for them.

It also now means $100K-$200K lost for every kid that decides not to go there.

Yeah, money changes (corrupts) everything.

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and the original:
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Around the time I was looking at colleges, 60 Minutes or 20/20 or another similar show did a piece on UPenn's shady practices in under reporting crimes. They'd either neglect to file reports, or write up the location as being just off campus, so the stat would count as happening in Philly instead of on campus. When I took a tour of SUNY Binghamton with my parents, another parent asked a question about on campus crime and rape. The tour guide had stats, including zero rapes. My father almost lost his shit, as he had a parolee go back to prison for violently raping a student on campus, and he knew of a number of other crimes that weren't reported. My mother kept him from saying anything on the tour, since it was an undergrad girl reading the script, but he went off on the Administration afterwards. The crimes remained unreported.

What happened to the delete button? Or the double post prevention?

SYB-BOT

Just disgusting and vile. Yet, somehow, I want to blame this, and the whole U of Tenn 'culture' and the Peyton Manning allegations on Rick Barnes.

From what I've heard of Jones from CMU insiders this does not sound implausible.

Now it's a full he said-he said with Jones issuing a flat denial last night (through his lawyers). I'm not unbiased because I hate UT, but I really think at some point the NCAA is going to have to come down HARD on some big school. It wouldn't hurt my feeling if it was Tennessee. I mean, 50% scholarship reductions or more hard. And if it is deemed to have been a culture extending back to the mid 90s, I don't think the death penalty should be off the table.

I feel pretty strongly about this issue.

A_B wrote:Now it's a full he said-he said with Jones issuing a flat denial last night (through his lawyers). I'm not unbiased because I hate UT, but I really think at some point the NCAA is going to have to come down HARD on some big school. It wouldn't hurt my feeling if it was Tennessee. I mean, 50% scholarship reductions or more hard. And if it is deemed to have been a culture extending back to the mid 90s, I don't think the death penalty should be off the table.

I feel pretty strongly about this issue.

I do too, and I agree with you 100%... but there is too much money involved here. A school this size and you get sponsors and politicians involved.

There's a reason why these are cynical times.

howard wrote:Just disgusting and vile. Yet, somehow, I want to blame this, and the whole U of Tenn 'culture' and the Peyton Manning allegations on Rick Barnes.

Barnes is most harmful to his own team during games.

Seriously, how awful do you think this event was for the coaches of the non-revenue sports programs?

Athletic director not in attendance. That's a real good look, too.

DSafetyGuy wrote:

howard wrote:Just disgusting and vile. Yet, somehow, I want to blame this, and the whole U of Tenn 'culture' and the Peyton Manning allegations on Rick Barnes.

Barnes is most harmful to his own team during games.

Seriously, how awful do you think this event was for the coaches of the non-revenue sports programs?

Athletic director not in attendance. That's a real good look, too.

Does this woman have daughters?

“If you want to go back 20 years and accumulate incidents, I would imagine you could look at a lot of schools like Tennessee and come up with a similar story,” softball coach Karen Weekly said. “And I think what's happened here, and that's the part that I feel is unfair, if you look today, the culture here now, the culture we're all talking about, the culture our student-athletes are a part of, they love it. I think they're probably surprised at what's being said about Tennessee in the national media.”

Well, if she's a softball coach there's a 99 percent chance she's a lesbian. So likely no.

brian wrote:Well, if she's a softball coach there's a 99 percent chance she's a lesbian. So likely no.

I think that comment violates rule #1.

So this Yale Hoops thing is interesting
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There is just so little public information on this story. Interesting the hoops team was backed off from their protest/show of support. This campus seems to me the poster child for PC run amok (while I decry what I see a gross excess of what should be a positive force if moderated at a reasonable level, yet I mourn that Bill Buckley isn't alive to see this as his head would explode.)

howard wrote:There is just so little public information on this story. Interesting the hoops team was backed off from their protest/show of support. This campus seems to me the poster child for PC run amok (while I decry what I see a gross excess of what should be a positive force if moderated at a reasonable level, yet I mourn that Bill Buckley isn't alive to see this as his head would explode.)

Title 9 has screwed this up. If it is a crime, let the police and prosecutors handle it. If it is not a crime, than the school should have no grounds to take action.

Well, here are some details, from one side of the story.
Former basketball captain suing Yale over expulsion for sexual misconduct accusation

I'm gonna have to read up on Title IX, I have no idea what that law has to do with rape. I thought it was about sports for women in college. Also, let me insert my opinion, the idea of campus committees adjudicating in clearly criminal matters is abhorrent to me. In general I hate campus committees dishing out justice; that is what deans are for. And the police/judicial system for crimes.

eta: I just read the wiki article on Title IX; jesus fucking christ, I had no idea. I mean, rape and sexual violence is a serious, widespread problem, but this ain't the way to fix it.

I almost started a thread on this Yale thing last week. When this story popped, my first thought was this story:

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In a nutshell, the Yale QB was up for a Rhodes Scholarship. The first version of the story is that he was faced with a dilemma: Play against Harvard in their version of The Game or go to the Rhodes interview and miss The Game. He chose to play and skip the interview. Hero! Only, turns out, he was also wrapped up in Yale's University-Wide sexual complaint morass and perhaps that's why he skipped the interview - Rhodes had yanked his nomination/application/whatever you call it.

But the relevant point, and why I thought about it in connection to this current situation, is that the "facts" behind the accusation, and the "investigation" into the situation, and the faculty panel, and the lack of information or recourse provided to the accused... Total fucking bullshit. In the effort to provide a "safe place" for the accused, they have set up a system that is BEGGING for someone to abuse it and fuck someone's life up.

While nothing ever went in QB Witt's record at Yale, the accusation and the fact that it was before the University's disciplinary committee was leaked to Rhodes, his future employer and the NYTimes... Effectively fucking his shit up, but good.

The fact that this guy's story isn't even being mentioned in the context of this basketball guy is... I don't know what. I just find it weird. I'm not overly fixated on these types of issues and this was the FIRST thing I thought of... It's not like I had to pull two random or wildly divergent circumstances together... This happened at the same damn school, less than 2 years ago!

Fuck them. Death penalty is too good. Shut the school down.

Jesus. I hate planet earth.

Rice performs Baylor scandal themed halftime show

I'm 50/50 on that performance.

Fuck Ken Starr. Injustice to art briles. Holy tuck.

rass wrote:Rice performs Baylor scandal themed halftime show

Brilliance.

While campus assault is an important issue, Title IX language has complicated how schools handle such allegations. I have 2 daughters who attended UND, so I am acutely aware of the potential for abuse.

There are 2 issues that concern me as to "due process". One is the school's running on what is essentially a criminal investigation without the proper training, as was mentioned here previously. The other is that until last year (in ND at least), a defendant was not allowed legal counsel at these hearings (legislature mandated that defendants are allowed legal counsel, by law, last year. The schools BTW opposed this citing it as an "educational opportunity".)

A case at UND about 3 years ago had the school's investigation lead to finding the defendant guilty and expelled, while the police criminal investigation cleared the defendant and led to charging the accuser with filing a false criminal report. This student was not an athlete, just an ordinary student. Even after the criminal investigation was closed, the school would not readmit the defendant for over 2 years.

The problem is that for schools that do not hold investigations on their own they run the risk of losing Federal funding under Title IX. So they feel compelled to hold hearings, though unqualified to do so. It creates another problematic layer to an already difficult issue.

SportsDoc wrote:While campus assault is an important issue, Title IX language has complicated how schools handle such allegations. I have 2 daughters who attended UND, so I am acutely aware of the potential for abuse.

There are 2 issues that concern me as to "due process". One is the school's running on what is essentially a criminal investigation without the proper training, as was mentioned here previously. The other is that until last year (in ND at least), a defendant was not allowed legal counsel at these hearings (legislature mandated that defendants are allowed legal counsel, by law, last year. The schools BTW opposed this citing it as an "educational opportunity".)

A case at UND about 3 years ago had the school's investigation lead to finding the defendant guilty and expelled, while the police criminal investigation cleared the defendant and led to charging the accuser with filing a false criminal report. This student was not an athlete, just an ordinary student. Even after the criminal investigation was closed, the school would not readmit the defendant for over 2 years.

The problem is that for schools that do not hold investigations on their own they run the risk of losing Federal funding under Title IX. So they feel compelled to hold hearings, though unqualified to do so. It creates another problematic layer to an already difficult issue.

I was wondering about this part of it. It almost seems as if the schools need to band together to set up some kind of independent tribunal to deal with these things. They would have the power and expertise to investigate and make decisions as to whether they believe the accuser has proved her case to a sufficient degree, and then the school could act on that finding.