<p>We've visited Whitman College, and it is definitely on our short list. Came across a couple reports from the student newspaper which causes some pause.</p>
<p>Forcible rapes up in 2008. 2% of female student body report rapes.</p>
<p>Not to turn this into a debate about the pervasiveness of drugs and sexual assault in society, but our concern is that these types of surveys tend to underreport the actual fact. </p>
<p>Yes, sex and drugs are probablly pervasive on all campuses, but with a tiny, remote, self-contained college like Whitman, what does this say about the culture of the student body and the atmosphere on campus? It makes the popluation of non-drug using students pretty small.</p>
<p>The student body is liberal and the women don’t know what rape is. </p>
<p>Getting drunk at a party, fooling around with a guy, then waking up the next morning to the realization that you had sex with an undesirable guy is NOT rape.</p>
<p>We had to do an alcohol and sexual assault awareness course in order to start at Michigan, and they cited a study that showed that the students’ estimate of percentage of drinkers was actually way higher than the actual percentage-- I imagine the same might apply to drugs, but I would worry about it, too. Worth looking into further.</p>
Note that the article says nothing relating to frequency of use. It says that 69% of the students at Whitman have used an illegal drug at least once. That means that (leaving issues of self-reporting accuracy aside) almost a third of Whitman students have never used an illegal drug even once.</p>
<p>Maybe I’m just a cynical old hippie, but that sounds pretty normal to me, maybe even a bit on the ‘straight’ side.</p>
<p>beg to differ Unholy Sigma…sex with a person unable to give consent is legally and morally rape. While it may be harder to prove if the person is unable to consent due to an over indulgence alcohol, it is still actionalble and prosecuatable.</p>
<p>We should all caution our daughters about drinking esp. drinking too much when with a group of people they don’t know well and therefore can’t trust to protect them. Let them know…don’t drink the punch, don’t accept open drinks from anyone and if you put your drink down and turn away for even a second do not pick it up again and drink it! </p>
<p>We also need to caution and guide our sons. There is very little to protect him should she decide to press charges. “She seemed into me” is not a convincing defense eventhough it may be true.</p>
<p>My boy has heard this message from me ever since I heard him singing along to some hip hop lyrics with the refrain “Blame it on the alcohol” last year. He was just 13 at the time and as you can imagine uncomfortable with the conversation. </p>
<p>TwistedxKiss my daughters took the same or a similar alcohol ed course on line and one of the things I remember them sharing was the number of young male responders who didn’t fully understand this simple truth. It is morally wrong to take advantage of a drunk person and it has the potential to open up legal action that will mar a young man’s college experience and perhaps his entire life. Those registered sex offenders on the Megan’s Law website include young men who have made this mistake as their sole sexual offense.</p>
<p>I know kids who’ve graduated from Whitman, and students currently there. None are party kids, and not a single one has ever expressed any concerns about drugs or rape or anything else. In fact, every one of them loves that school.</p>
<p>I think when you’re a parent it’s disturbing to hear these things, but I do believe it’s not going to be any different anywhere else… well, actually it could be a lot worse somewhere else.</p>
<p>This could be true. I don’t know. But I have seen people become so over-sensitized to the topic that their thinking becomes warped.</p>
<p>I was an RA for two years and underwent a lot of diversity training. In a workshop on women’s issues, one speaker referred to herself earnestly as a “potential rape survivor”. (That’s code for “woman who has not actually been raped.”) That’s twisted.</p>
<p>My D is a freshman at Whitman, and I have a junior at another LAC. While I applaud transparency, I can understand that these types of reports can be disconcerting for prospective parents. First of all, as Nightchef pointed out, the survey reports students who have ever TRIED a drug once. I feel as though I have spent the last 4 years immersed in college stats and visits, and while ALL colleges have this issue, my perception is that excessive drug use is less of a problem at Whitman than many other schools. The student body was one of the main attractions for my athletic D. The program is very academic (Princeton Review gives it a 98) and 75% of the student body is involved in intramural sports, not to mention the myriad of other extracurricular opportunities–radio, music and theatre to name just 3 very popular ones. While this doesn’t preclude drug and alcohol abuse, that subculture is not at all in one’s face as it is on many campuses. In fact, as a visitor, you’d have to look pretty hard to find it.</p>
<p>So fewer than half think drugs are as common as at other schools…sounds about like I would have guessed. Are some kids smoking weed? Most likely. Is it a dominant campus culture? Not that we’ve observed, and not like some other schools.</p>
<p>Thanks Wrist, we just want some perspectives. We’ve heard of some other PNW LACs that have a definite pot culture. We just wanted to see where we are on the spectrum.</p>
<p>If only 2% of the student body report having been raped (call that 4% of the female students) then Whitman students are lucky. The national average for college-aged women is way higher than that, I think.</p>
<p>And, Unholy Sigma, having sex with a person who is too drunk to give or withhold consent is most definitely rape. Someone who consents and then changes her mind the next morning is, of course, a different story; that’s not rape, but bad judgement.</p>
<p>My guess is one would get about the same result from a survey done at just about any urban or suburban high school much less college. As far as sexual behavior goes, taking advantage of anyone with diminished capacity is not to be tolerated. I would expect my Ss to say no even if the females were saying yes while drunk. Unfortunately, however, it appears drinking and sex for women is quite common place.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Though the survey was likely conducted in the UK, I’m not sure how different it would be here. It was a topic of the Tom Wolfe book I am Charlotte Simmons.</p>
<p>I don’t want to take any side in this discussion of what constitutes consent. What Unholy Sigma isn’t clear on is the intent of his word “realization”. </p>
<p>“waking up the next morning to the realization that you had sex” = implies no consent given, therefore rape</p>
<p>“waking up the next morning to the realization that you had sex with an undesirable guy” = may have been a willing participant, but now the beer goggles are off and the participant feels a necessity to protect their image whatever that may be. The so called “undesireable guy” is likely in a no-win situation.</p>
<p>"If only 2% of the student body report having been raped (call that 4% of the female students) then Whitman students are lucky. The national average for college-aged women is way higher than that, I think.</p>
<p>And, Unholy Sigma, having sex with a person who is too drunk to give or withhold consent is most definitely rape. Someone who consents and then changes her mind the next morning is, of course, a different story; that’s not rape, but bad judgement."</p>
<p>The line is very fuzzy between “a person who is too drunk to give or withhold consent” and “someone who consents and then changes her mind the next morning”. Being drunk just makes the whole situation sticky and difficult to sort out. </p>
<p>I don’t want to give anyone on here the idea that I think it’s ok to go around having sex with drunken college girls. I’m simply making the comment that rape has become a very broad term and that the 2% rape statistic doesn’t necessarily paint the whole picture.</p>
<p>In the article referred to by the OP, the Associate Dean of Students is intelligent and practical in how she approaches the subject of sexual assault. We can debate the definition, but colleges have to implement steps to take when “it” happens. I appreciate her strength and sensitivity to the issue.</p>
<p>^^I certainly think a case could be made. However when young men are intoxicated beyond the point of consent they are usually also intoxicated past the point of performance.</p>
<p>These surveys are next to useless in an objective sense.
At the University of Chicago, where I live and work, and where the squirrels are reputed to be more aggressive than the males, survey reports of rape are high, due entirely, IMO, to a strong student sensitivity to feminism. At high testosterone level, lubricated schools, what students regard as rape is much more elastic.
My own take at the U of C over a period of years is that University of Chicago women tend to be aggressive in all settings.</p>
<p>There are kinds of sex that don’t require the little man to be on the job.</p>
<p>I’m not merely being a contrarian. This is to me an air-tight logical argument: If one can not give consent when intoxicated, and rape is sex without consent, then a drunken man who has sex has by definition been raped. And I honestly want to hear, just once, that a woman has been prosecuted for rape after having sex with a drunken man. I just want to see how it plays out, although I think I can predict the outcome.</p>