Today in “The Daily Beast,” there is a lengthy article talking about Paul Nungesser, who continues to maintain his innocence after being accused of sexual assault by Emma Sulkowicz, Columbia University’s “mattress girl.” Compared to the “New York Times” article that came out in December, this one actually makes him seem innocent. He even provides text messages sent after the attack that demonstrate that he and Ms. Sulkowicz were in good standing. (One of them says: “I love you Paul.”) Here is a link to the article below:
This country needs to de-stigmatize sexual assault investigations. We can start by eliminating anonymity and treat such allegations like we treat reports of other grave crimes; all parties should be named. The Police and prosecutors should be involved from day one. This is not a responsibility for the colleges, as Columbia’s handling of this has demonstrated.
I have a had time making sense of this one as well. First, I don’t understand the timeline. The article linked above states that Nungesser was called to the Office of Sexual Misconduct in April of 2012 yet then goes on to say the attack against Sulkowicz occurred in August of 2012. When was she assaulted and when did she report it?
The text exchanges between the two subsequent to the attack are puzzling as well, yet it is hard to dismiss the claims of 3 women. It is also unclear to me when the “break” in the friendship occurred. They were clearly on good terms through the Fall of 2012 so what happened that changed that? I think this is one where the truth is extremely hard to determine.
@HarvestMoon1 I think the April 2012 thing is a mistake (Should have been 2013).
I agree, the texts are odd, but the fact that 3 women came forward against the alleged attacker is hard to dismiss.
The fact that the 3 women were acquainted does not bother me. Perhaps it was the similarity of their circumstances that gave them the confidence to come forward. What bothers me is the texts between Nungesser and Sulkowicz which clearly indicate an affection for each other in the Fall of 2012, months after the alleged attack. That is counterintuitive to me. I think there must be more to the story - when and why did that friendship, which was alive and well in the Fall of 2012, breakdown?
I don’t see the contradiction here. Sometimes women remain on good terms with their attackers for a time. The text messages don’t sway me one way or the other.
It is counter intuitive because the university found him not-guilty but the advocates kept pushing their agenda including broadcasting names of not only him but other young men on campus. That’s what went wrong at Columbia I think. Even though they didn’t include the text messages which supported his defense during the Nungesser hearing, maybe Emma had always had an agenda regardless of the outcome…who knows. Maybe the guy’s alittle kinky and it freaks people out… who knows. But he didn’t deserve to be the poster child for the mattress dragger and her co-hort.
As a second-wave feminist who personally enjoyed the (sexual) freedoms my generation received from the work of our mothers…I must say it is not attractive when practiced by teenagers with little experience and less maturity than I think we had when we went off to college. And frustration with hook-up culture must be a part of the anti-rape movement or women wouldn’t react the way they are reacting sometimes. I just hate to see the need to “express” one’s self come at the expense of another individual who doesn’t deserve the negative press.
I find it remarkable that no matter what exculpatory evidence a guy brings forward, it is inevitably dismissed.
In this case, it would appear that he is probably innocent, and that Sulkowitz persuaded the other two to redefine their interactions with him as abusive in order to support her in the spirit of some kind of misguided sisterhood.
Sulkowitz has done very well out of this whole thing: she has achieved status as a performance artist, her apparent goal, that she could never have hoped to achieve as a private undergraduate. I find her behavior, sustained over a long period of time, not the initial confusion and trauma described by experts elsewhere, highly unconvincing. It is “too draining” to talk to the police, but not “too draining” to carry the mattress around, talk to the Times, attend the State of the Union, etc? I would guess that it is “too draining” because she would have to answer pointed questions on pain of perjury.
On the other hand, I find it virtually impossible to imagine why she would have made this story up out of whole cloth. It is difficult to imagine that a person could be that calculating and vicious. But such people do exist. Perhaps it was something that she initiated, and she then became addicted to her vision of herself as victim. It is strange.
I think her parents encouraged her also They hired a media savvy adviser for their D, they wrote letters at a time when the media was growing weary and she was starting to fade after her moments of fame. There was much orchestration in my opinion. No one knows what set her off…the poor kid who got accused doesn’t even know because a fair amount of time passed and the “post event” messaging between the two doesn’t even give a clue.
A finding of not guilty does not mean the guy is innocent - well technically it does mean that he must be treated as innocent. Like I said maybe he’s into kinkier sex that Emma likes but that doesn’t mean it’s criminal. Maybe he’s a bit of a jerk and once she talked to a former girlfriend of the accused she decided to go after him. She didn’t even file any complaints until after she talked to the former girlfriend and a year after the sex she apparently didn’t like. This is not a good case to support much of anything other than a story of a spoiled little rich girl who became a performance artist and gained national attention at the expense of someone else. She has been walking a very fine line between performance artist, vigilante and potentially defamation.
So Dstark once accused, never innocent? Even with the finding of not guilty, you think it is OK for him to continue to be vilified just because there is no way to prove he is innocent? What would this guy have to do to prove he is not guilty of this accusation? At what point is this not harassment?
There are certainly cases where the University ignored evidence and did not take the women’s claim seriously. That does not seem to be the case here. The Daily Beast article seemed to back up its points with information. And made the point that a rape victim may not respond as expected (meaning her texts etc should not necessarily be taken to mean she was not traumatized).
You are right, he may not be innocent but if a not guilty does not mean just that, how can the accused ever clear their name?
My opinion…It is very difficult to clear your name. The best way is to live a great life going forward. People are pretty good about giving others second chances.
in my opinion is the equivalent to saying even if he was found not guilty he might be guilty or a finding of not guilty does not mean the guy is innocent.
He is also a German national so perhaps his history at Columbia will not be as well publicized in Europe where he will probably seek employment after graduation in May.
