Discussion for article #230768
Were police ever brought into this?
If so, did they ever speak with the press?
If they were not notified, does anybody know why?
The story was about how the school handled the case. Why do the cynics at Reason care so much about the alleged rapists? Guilty conscience? Fundamental moral defect?
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“Few have questioned Erdely’s account of the frat culture”
Uh, part of the account of “the frat culture” is that a gang rape occured amongst several students and that a woman bleeding from broken glass wounds was able to leave shortly afterwards without so much as anyone raising an eyebrow. And more or less the entirety of the accuracy of this account has been brought into question. Here’s a better rundown: http://www.mindingthecampus.com/2014/12/more-questions-about-rolling-stone-and-uva/
So, wrong on that.
While not defending rape or any of the perpetrators, there is always reason to exercise skepticism about sensational stories or reporting. Or have we all forgotten Stephen Glass?
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Somehow didn’t think TPM would be in the “questions have been raised” zone of reporting. Are you taking a position or not?
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Rolling Stone has one of the most notoriously rigorous fact-checking departments in journalism. They totally re-report the story. Interesting that WaPo is going after this.
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You should read the article if you haven’t. It’s very good and iterates some real systemic problems with campus policing of sexual assault. The writer says that Jackie, the woman at the center of the story, never went to the police because of her emotional issues resulting from the assault plus the belief that the campus was helping move things along internally. It’s easy to believe Jackie’s reasoning but it also gives fuel to skeptics.
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TPM articles generally fall into either the “opinion” or “reportage” buckets. This is a perfectly valid reporting piece, I think, detailing an ongoing debate and linking to the various viewpoints.
Here’s a central issue that coverage will be dancing around: Part of the reason this article went viral was that at its core was an incident of campus sexual assault that no one, absolutely no one, could claim was a case of “he-said, she-said” or drunken consensual behavior. If the central story was a Cosby-esqe tale of a woman having one beer and waking up six hours later naked in a frat-house bedroom, or a woman’s story of kissing turning to sex against her wishes, there are many people who would question her story. This writer painted a picture that left no room for argument – it was rape like a knife-wielding assailant in an alley. With no room for argument about the case, the article could paint a compelling picture of administration misdeeds since any inaction was clearly wrong. Unfortunately and unfairly if the central rape story should fall apart, the article suffers too. It would be awful, which is why it’s being covered so intensely.
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The Rolling Stone story says that Jackie went to an official at the university who handles these situations and that person didn’t really encourage her to report it to the police.
The weekend that Hannah Graham disappeared, several rapes were reported in the UVA campus area. We never hear about it otherwise (I live in Charlottesville). I think we only heard about it then, because there was a young girl missing from a frat party. She walked away on her own, but got lost. A serial killer found her, though. And a search party found her remains a few months later. The alleged killer (who murdered another young college girl) had withdrawn from two colleges in recent years because of sexual assault allegations. It’s a shame nobody reported it back then.
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Maybe someone could point Allison Benedikt and Hanna Rosin to Caitlin Flanagan’s March 2014 article in The Atlantic.
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It’s 2012 and yet rape victims (or at least female rape victims) and their stories are subjected to a degree of skepticism and scrutiny that other crime victims simply do not receive. It’s like asking an assault victim “are you sure you got punched in the face? Were there any bruises? Why weren’t their bruises? Are you sure you just didn’t have a mutually consensual boxing match and then decided to change your mind because the other person won? Why hasn’t anyone made any effort to get the alleged perpetrator’s side of the story?” And all this directed at victims of an especially traumatic crime.
And then the same people demand to know why the rape victim didn’t go to the police or report it closer in time to the crime.
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I read the RS article in its entirety and was disturbed by the account of the assault as well as confused by the lack of follow-up with the perpetrators. If Erdely did in fact short cut that part of the reporting, it undermines the remainder of her reporting. It could very well be that the assault was just as vicious as reported, and it could be that the University’s reporting and victim advocacy is broken as reported. But, it is puzzling why Erdely would tie the whole story together with a fairly unsubstantiated and under-investigated account of a vicious gang rape.
Just to assume for a minute, I’ll assume that there was a rape, it was violent, and this reporter was lazy.
“If a reporter were doing a story about a university accused of failing to address the mugging or robbery of a student, that reporter would not be expected to interview the alleged mugger or robber.”
Says it all.
Fact is, the University does not deny that the woman reported her assault (although–understandably–it took more time for her to do that than would have been ideal. Nor does it deny the account of what the university official who took the complaint did. Which was, in essence, to dissuade the victim from doing anything that might rock the boat.
Let’s remember that this story is right in one respect: UVA did not suspend fraternities and sororities because of a gang rape, but because of the black eye it got from this story. That speaks volumes about the way most colleges and universities handle sexual abuse/sexual violence cases.
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I thought that is what editors were for. The journalist did not publish this on her own. It is not her reputation on the line it is Rolling Stone’s.
And what would you expect him/them to say? “Didn’t do it,” "“my lawyers say I can’t talk to you,” or “I confess, I did it!” would seem to be the entire spectrum of choices. Very edifying in any case.
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Aaaaaaah, no caveat included? Then it wasn’t “fair and balanced.”
The entire MSM needs to go eat a bag of dicks.
BRASS TACKS: Forced false equivalence is a form of bias.
Well your citation to a conservative concern trolling contrarian rich white conservative male asswipe douchecanoe website dedicated to crusading against all that teaching of liberal stuff at colleges is certainly going to do nothing but enhance the credibility of your argument here.
I especially loved the prominent hot link to an article from the American Conservative entitled “UVA’s Jackie: A Wahoo Tawana Brawley?” Because that’s just precisely the kind of fair-minded, even-handed intellectually honest skepticism this story needs.
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The school has every reason to claim hoax if it isn’t true, they are hurting badly over this so not sure why they would go along if they don’t have evidence