55 colleges investigated for sexual assault cover-ups
You know how Congress got a case of the blues over military sexual assaults and decided that they needed to take the authority away from commanders to prosecute those cases? Well, the Washington Post reports that 55 colleges are now being investigated for their own handling of sexual assaults on their campus.
The list from the Education Department continues the Obama administration’s push to shine a spotlight on sex assault in response to questions raised in recent years about how prominent colleges have handled rape allegations and related issues. This week, a White House task force released a report aiming to help colleges prevent sex assaults.
Three Ivy League universities landed on the list: Harvard University (its college and its law school), Princeton University and Dartmouth College. So did other prestigious private schools, such as Emory University, the University of Southern California and Amherst and Swarthmore colleges.
So, the Feds should be recommending that authority to prosecute and investigate these sexual assaults should be taken from college administrations given their reaction to military cases, right? Well, not quite;
“We hope this increased transparency will spur community dialogue about this important issue,” said Catherine E. Lhamon, assistant secretary for civil rights. “I also want to make it clear that a college or university’s appearance on this list and being the subject of a Title IX investigation in no way indicates at this stage that the college or university is violating or has violated the law.”
I don’t remember anyone recommending that the Pentagon “spur dialogue” about military sexual assaults. Nope they went right for the commanders’ authority. Because they can – the same reason a dog licks his balls.
Category: Military issues
Somehow I do not see Acedamia being subjected to the same rhetoric and hyper sensitivities as the Military has.
Don’t get me wrong, this is something that should be adressed, but in our soceity as a whole. The focus on Military Sexual Assault is way overdone as it relates to the prevelance of this in soceity as a whole. People who pound their chest in moral outrage about the “bruatlity” of the military, as if it is the military itself at fault need to sit down and chill the hell out.
Predators exist everywhere… hell, pretty sure the term “date rape” came out of the College enviroment.
No means no, and just because you can does not mean that you should. Pretty simple fucking concepts.
Yeah, when I saw this I was struck by the way the presss releases were written AS IF this were a preventative measure, as opposed to a response to the rapes, date rapes, and unwanted sexual contact occurring on and off-campus sites. Will the feds withhold student loan money, suspend grants, deny scholarships? Um, no. They certainly don’t want to single out any schools. They don’t want to indict or point the finger at the schools. The pols aren’t lining up to issue statements decrying the sexual assaults. That’s the way they all responded to the sensationalized cases of sexual assaults in the military that has frigtened to death every parent of a female recruit. Or maybe not.
Sexual assault, the new Red Menace. So when can we expect to see the Presidents and senior administrators dragged over the coals infront of a special committee hearing?
College administrators should have no role in investigating allegations of sexual assault or rape other than reporting such allegations to the local police. Unless real criminal procedures and rules of evidence are followed any finding is tainted and justice is not served. Colleges should not be able to establish their own system separate from the criminal courts to deal with such serious charges.
No organization that investigates itself is ever free from the suspicion that justice was not served. Colleges are notoriously weak at investigating themselves and many of their campus police are very weak at proper police procedure.
The same is true regarding the military with the added difficulty of assuming a commander will be forthright into an investigation that might cast aspersions on his command. Additionally, unlike the civilian world, in the military the alleged victim may not be able to immediately avoid all contact with her the person or persons she claims have victimized her. All of that leads to a very indefensible position as there is no real investigative transparency in those situations. There are no simple answers for this, but pretending that commands that investigate themselves will always be honest and detailed is not realistic.
What’s that, Obama slept through the night of the Benghazi attack, or was otherwise never seen in the Situation Room? Look, over there!!! Sexual Assault at College….Squirrel.
and on a similar note I see where the military is reporting 50% high sexual complaints than in previous years. They do, however, say that this is due to higher levels of reports filed vice an actual increase in incidents.
I always wonder whether anyone looks at how many of the reports turn out to be he-said/she-said or “Hi – wanna go out sometime?” “Sexual harassment!” situations.
I ran into a serial reporter once. She was trying to get out of deployment.
Colleges are incredibly scummy places.
Went to a college that covered up a rape murder on campus. Largest Clearly Act fine imposed in history and settled for millions in court. Checked their wiki page and not a single mention of this.
We’d have routine armed robberies on campus and the “solution” was to have 18 year old idiots in group of like 5 walk around in yellow shirts while students get stabbed in the parking structure where the police department on campus was located.
After that started happening they hired fat unarmed idiots to stand around increasing tuition.