To the rapists of Chi Phi: while you can flee your house when it gets egged and spray-painted, the person whose autonomy you stripped has to live with the trauma for a lifetime. It is telling that you are more upset about the violation of your property than your complicity in depriving a human being of autonomy over her own body. I’m a pacifist by nature, but forgive me if I find that perhaps a sliver of justice was served when Chi Phi was defaced by Riot Moon activists.
Rape is a culture issue, one deeply rooted in Cornell’s Greek life system. In May, I wrote about the dangerous group-think and predatory elements of frat culture in the wake of TDX’s use of date rape drugs and sexual violence against women. And yet, in September, I was deeply troubled to see that rape reports at Cornell increased once again. I’ve seen commenters on Sidechat in recent days writing that students not directly affected by this particular incident of assault don’t have the right to be affected emotionally. I vehemently disagree with this take — sexual violence affects all Cornellians, not just the direct victims.
Empathy is what makes us human, and a member of our community experiencing great, preventable harm at the hands of other Cornell students is deeply saddening. It’s highly likely that most women on campus are deeply shaken by the alert that we received. Although this was one incident, everyone has someone they love who has been affected by sexual assault. Just because we’re not directly involved in this horrific incident doesn’t mean we shouldn’t recognize how deeply wrong it is and demand better. There needs to be more empathy for survivors and more accountability for perpetrators on this campus, full stop.
Ever since the crime alert came out, students on campus have created — and spread — their own narratives about what happened. It’s one thing to express outrage and horror at the male entitlement that reared its ugly head when a gang rape occurred on our campus. Certainly, I needed time to process the emotionally painful news with friends, as I’m sure many students did.
But it’s completely different — and dangerous — to engage in the victim blaming and shaming rhetoric that is prevalent within campus social circles, especially Greek life. Sexual violence is the only crime where victims are consistently demonized at such a large scale. And it’s not just men. Far too many women on campus also play a role in furthering false narratives, casting doubt on survivors’ reporting and defending perpetrators. I’ve seen in my four years here how the grapevine is used to defame SA victims on this campus, and I have a few things to say, namely, someone’s assault is not your gossip.
Stop sowing doubt about the validity of a survivor’s story. It was difficult enough for them to come forward. Believe victims. Please. Even if you don’t know them and even if you don’t like them. The details of their assault are not for you to analyze and poke holes in.Their previous sexual history has nothing, I repeat nothing, to do with their credibility. (It’s also none of your business.)
I can tell you this: no one goes through the Title IX system who is not serious about their assault. It is a broken system that so rarely delivers substantive justice to survivors anyways. Since my sophomore year, I have worked on national Title IX research and seen outcome trends for those who do choose to report. The overwhelming majority of complaints are closed due to insufficient evidence. This background leaves me deeply skeptical: simply put, I don’t trust the University to protect survivors appropriately.
Institutionally, the Title IX system — and our University at large — fails survivors. Students have attested as much. Reporting is statistically retraumatizing for victims and occurs at a bureaucratically slow pace, muddling the testimonies of witnesses as time passes. Survivors are picked apart by their peers and case adjudicators, and too often do not attain any semblance of justice. With this in mind, I completely agree with Riot Moon’s statement that police and the Cornell administration cannot be trusted to keep us safe.
It’s sad, though unsurprising, that there’s as much outrage against activism by anti-rape activists as there is against the crime itself. Whether or not you agree with how Riot Moon’s activism was demonstrated, they called it like it is: fraternities are “mass perpetrators of sexual violence on campus,” and the University needs to stop being afraid of losing alumni donors by pretending like it’s just a few bad apples. How can Cornell be a safe environment when rapists are allowed to walk around campus and attend classes and social events?
Cornell has taken a hard stance on protestors that used force against police officers at the career fair, suspending them from campus for advocating for their beliefs. In the same vein, then, logically, the perpetrators of the horrific act that occurred on Oct. 25 should be expelled for drugging and gang raping a member of our community. They can not be given the opportunity to reoffend when research shows that 87 percent of alcohol-related campus sexual violence is committed by repeat offenders. Letting rapists off the hook or giving them a slap on the wrist just provides the immunity to continue to perpetuate sexual violence onto other victims. And if Riot Moon is penalized for their actions before the rapists, Cornell will prove exactly what they value most: property and privilege, while not respecting student wellbeing. Rather than allowing administrators to adjudicate with skewed interests, as a campus community, we must talk about accountability from the bottom up.
As a senior, I am most worried for the younger women on this campus who may be most at risk with these types of offenders walking around without consequence. The university didn’t even specify at which fraternity the most recent assault occurred, and the identities of the rapists are currently unknown to the general public. And just because other members of this fraternity may not have actively been the perpetrators in this case does not absolve them of responsibility. Every single person living in that house has been complicit in condoning behavior that amounted in a violent and egregious act of sexual violence. (And this is just the one the public knows about, thanks to the bravery of the survivor.)
The activists put it best in their letter: “We no longer tolerate a culture that teaches men to rape, the use of sexual violence to subjugate others, or a ‘justice system’ that continually forces survivors to relive their trauma and leaves abusers unpunished and un-shamed.” I have to ask why this is still a controversial take at Cornell.
Carlin Reyen is a fourth year student in the College of Arts and Sciences. Her fortnightly column Just Carlin’ It Like It Is centers around student life, social issues, Cornell life hacks and the University’s interactions with the broader community. Carlin can be reached at [email protected].
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