Please, please please continue to speak with your kids about rape and sexual assault

Could someone, please, explain me, why sex crimes are so prevalent in colleges? More than in general population? More than in high schools? More than in Detroit? Far more than in gang-controlled areas (many gangs stand against rape culture)? What is wrong with colleges, specifically?

BTW, “unique life experiences” is not the code word for hard-working minorities. “Unique life experiences” may be a VIP kid, from a wealthy family, with poor grades, a feeling of entitlement, and a VIP package. It could be a child of a donor or a politician. It could be … anything. Holistic approach works all ways. “Unique life experiences” means that the student should not be admitted, by college administration still admits him/her.

The only logical explanation to the epidemic of sex crimes in colleges is that college adcomes manage to select a mix of students that are prone to sex crimes. My personal experience with teenagers from different walks of life - affluent, and poor, and very poor - tells me that the absolute, overwhelming majority of kids in US are really, really good kids.

I talk with my daughters about being careful of the circumstances they put themselves in all the time – yes young men should know better but I also think young women need to think about their own safety too, I will continue to do this and I am sad this happened to someone you know.

<The girl I know well who was raped, was raped by an upper middle class white boy. His attorney father came to every hearing and court appearance.

What unusual circumstance should adcoms be looking for? Smug entitled males? >

IMHO, you don’t know why and how this upper middle class white boy was admitted. “Unusual circumstances” are not the code word for poor, or underperforming, or minorities. Were there any red flags in the “upper middle class white boy” behavior, any disciplinary actions, drug problems, etc., that adcoms decided to omit from consideration? You would never know. Because all is swept under the rug of “unusual circumstances” during admission.

I know that, statistically, a typical high school has far less sex/drugs/violence problems than an elite college. Even a high school in the most unprivileged neighborhood in LA doesn’t have all these constant issues with sex crimes. The general population of US teenagers is not bad, in fact they are good kids! Thus, I believe that colleges do something special, when they select their students.

High schoolers are not living together and drinking late into the night in coed environments.

OP if she was raped I hope she got a rape kit done and called the police.

“Could someone, please, explain me, why sex crimes are so prevalent in colleges? More than in general population? More than in high schools? More than in Detroit? Far more than in gang-controlled areas (many gangs stand against rape culture)? What is wrong with colleges, specifically?”

The stats on college rape have been debated extensively on CC. No one disputes that campus sex assault is a big problem. It is quite murky, however, whether the rate of incidence on female undergrad students is higher/lower than incidence experienced by females aged 15-25 who are not on college campuses. My own view after research, which many on CC disagree with, is that the incidence level on campus is the same or lower than the incidence level elsewhere. There’s even a good amount of data out there that suggests that HS aged females are sex assault victims at a higher rate than college students.

My other view is that the best thing to do (on campus and off campus) is to focus on those prevention measures that have actually been shown to be effective in reducing the problem. And not focus on ideas or measures that sound good or which fit into a world-view but which have not been shown to work.

What seems to work on campus: awareness and bystander training (for both sexes); but even more so is training females to resist, self-defend and be aware. A Canadian study published in the NE Journal of Medicine reported a two-third incidence reduction from this! Spare me the lectures about victim blaming – that what I want my daughters’ colleges to do!!

Getting a handle on drinking (if you could figure out how to do that) would also be a big help. Since over 80% of sex assaults involved drug/alcohol use by the victim, the perp. or both.

One good thing. The highest risk time for campus sex assault for females is from start of freshman year through Thanksgiving break. The so-called “red zone” for this year is just about over.

@momofthreeboys Yes, she did.

“One good thing. The highest risk time for campus sex assault for females is from start of freshman year through Thanksgiving break. The so-called “red zone” for this year is just about over.”

Oh, goody! /sarcasm/ Until next year though, right? Rapes will continue to happen in subsequent years and between December and August. I’m all for telling daughters to be careful but rapes won’t stop happening until we train our sons to not to be respectful of women, to control themselves, and to be vigilant and stand up to their peers when they see unacceptable behavior. Anything else is a bandaid not a solution.

cardinal2020mom:

I am so very sorry for your friend’s daughter. Thank you for this alert.

“I’m all for telling daughters to be careful but rapes won’t stop happening until we train our sons to not to be respectful of women, to control themselves, and to be vigilant and stand up to their peers when they see unacceptable behavior.”

Sure, Great idea. Thanks. None of us had thought of that.

You have any proven ideas on how you are going to make that happen? What exactly do you think all of us as parents (many like me with boys and girls) should be doing that we haven’t been doing?

Please share your silver bullet with us so that we can all implement and put this issue to bed.

And while you are at it, please tell us how you are going to remove all the bad drivers from the roads? Because then we wouldn’t have to teach our kids to wear seatbelts and drive defensively.

I think it’s a good idea to look up what your school’s official policy is on sexual assault/how they handle cases. Our Students Union also runs weekly bystander intervention workshops once a week at our campus pub.