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Rolling Stone UVA Rape Story is Disaster for All
Well, this is awful.
The Web blew up Friday afternoon with the news that Rolling Stone magazine no longer stands behind last month’s horrific, explosive story of a gang rape at a University of Virginia fraternity. A report in The Washington Post cast central elements of her story into serious doubt. Her friends and supporters now say they’re dubious, too.
It’s disastrous for everybody involved. At this writing, the victim, Jackie, insists she was telling the truth about being raped by seven students. Whatever the truth, she must be in a world of pain right now, particularly if she tried to extricate herself from the magazine story before it was published, as she now maintains.
The destructive fallout goes beyond one woman’s suffering. The Rolling Stone story, which had helped make it all but impossible to ignore the scourge of campus sexual assault, is now going to do the opposite. Because now, emboldened by this one possibly fabricated story of rape, the chorus of people who believe women routinely make these things up will grow louder.
It already has. You could see them doing their happy dances in the comments below the Post story, which, a couple of hours after it went up, looked a lot like 1950. If it turns out to be entirely false, Jackie’s story will join other fake narratives — the Tawana Brawley debacle, the accusations against the Duke lacrosse players — as weapons for those moral cave-dwellers who would have you believe that women “cry rape” all the time for attention, or revenge.
“No matter what the reality is, there is going to be the perception out there now that women lie about rape,” says Djuna Perkins, a former Suffolk assistant district attorney who investigates student sexual misconduct cases. “Every time somebody makes up a terrible crime, it does harm to the rest who tell the truth and don’t get believed.”
That sucking sound? That’s us being dragged back into the last century.
Can we please not go there? Jackie’s story might not be real, but a bigger one is. One in five women say they have been raped. One in 20 say they have experienced other forms of sexual violence. About 19 percent of undergrads say they experienced rape or attempted rape. In a fall survey of MIT students, one in six of the women who responded said they’d been sexually assaulted, but only 5 percent had reported it. It is everywhere, including at august New England universities.
Even without Jackie’s story, there is plenty in the Rolling Stone story to alarm: UVA is one of scores of schools being investigated by the federal government — and one of 12 receiving extra scrutiny — for its handling of sexual assaults. Other UVA students described their own rapes in the article, and the alarming unresponsiveness of school officials who seemed more concerned with the college’s reputation than with student safety.
Maybe all of these people are lying, too, you and Bill Cosby might argue. No. Various studies show false rape report rates ranging from 2 to 8 percent. There are no more fabricated reports of rapes than of other crimes, says Toni Troop of Jane Doe Inc., as much as some would like to believe otherwise.
“People don’t want to believe rape happens in the first place,” says Troop, whose job just got harder.
We are finally beginning to talk constructively about rape and its mind-blowing frequency. We are finally starting to blame those who commit it, rather than focusing on the character, demeanor, and clothing of victims. We have way more work to do, including coming up with ways to deal with campus sexual assault that protect all students.
We can’t afford to back off because of one big lie and some woefully inadequate journalism. Campus rape is as real as a case like Jackie’s is rare.
If only it were the other way around.
This quote hits the nail on the recent Rolling Stones debacle
For me, the Rolling Stone article is not the worst thing we saw in the past few weeks. Instead, I believe it is the WUVA interview with Dean Eramo* in which she admits that acknowledged rapists have been repeatedly allowed to graduate from UVa. Make no mistake: we have a problem that exists no matter what spin is put on Rolling Stone’s extremely tepid retraction.
– Logan S., Class of 2013 (UVA)
UVA should not be distracted from addressing sexual assault issues in wake of Rolling Stone article discrepancies
By Ziyanah Ladak
One in five women experience sexual assault during their time at college. This oft-repeated statistic certainly includes students at the University of Virginia, a university that exalts itself for being a community of trust and a community of honor. UVa is a university where students will be expelled for lying, cheating, or stealing yet it is also a university where there has been great failure at addressing cases of sexual assault.
In a shocking, long-form investigative piece published by Rolling Stone magazine a few weeks ago, writer Sabrina Rubin Erdely recounted the story of first-year UVa student Jackie, who was allegedly gang-raped by seven men at a UVa fraternity party in 2012. The account details the horrid specifics of the assault—describing college drinking culture, widespread minimization of Jackie’s allegations by her friends and the school administration’s seeming indifference.
As a current UVa student, I, as well as…
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Why would this former Phi Kappa Psi brother, UVA Class of 2014, retain a lawyer?
Click here for article. Maybe Wash Po should do their due diligence before destroying a survivor’s story. #istandwithjackie
Christopher Pivik, a former member of Phi Kappa Psi at the University of Virginia, has retained attorney Andrew Miltenberg, a lawyer who has represented at least two dozen men found responsible for sexual misconduct at their colleges, BuzzFeed News has learned.
Pivik, an analyst at Signal Hill in Boston, graduated from the University of Virginia in 2014. He did not respond to requests for comment.
Miltenberg confirmed Pivik was his client but declined to comment further. In an interview Friday, he lambasted a recent Rolling Stone story centered on an alleged gang-rape at Phi Kappa Psi.
“This was extremely irresponsible reporting. It fueled an already highly polarizing issue, and did nothing to help foster or continue a productive dialogue,” Miltenberg said.
In the piece, investigative journalist Sabrina Rubin Erdley tells the story of Jackie, who said she was gang-raped by seven men at a Phi Kappa Psi party in September 2012, when she was 18. None of the men are named in the story, except Jackie’s date, “Drew” — not his real name — a fellow lifeguard who allegedly “gave instruction and encouragement.”
On Friday, Rolling Stone issued a statement saying “there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie’s account,” following a week of stories from The Washington Post, Slate, and others calling the reporting of the story into question. Erdley, for example, did not reach out to the men allegedly involved in the rape.
BuzzFeed reached out to a woman believed to be Jackie multiple times on Friday but did not receive a response.
UVA Survivor Stories
You can find a compilation of UVA Survivor stories here.
If you’d like to share a link to a story that isn’t on the page, or if you or someone you know would like to share their story, please feel free to fill out the form here.
Thank you to all of you brave survivors for speaking up. We’re 100% behind you and support you.
A Survivor’s Call to Action
If anyone doubts the reaction of Jackie’s friends, read this current UVA student’s op-ed. As she eloquently puts it:
Many of you say you stand with survivors, but do you really? Take some time and evaluate what you say and how you act in regard to this subject. Recognize any defensiveness you may feel upon reading this article and channel it toward making constructive change. As a survivor, it is so angering to see some of the same people who blame me for my rape speak out on how horrified they are by the way Jackie’s friends acted in the recently published Rolling Stone article. We all play a role in rape culture, and I hope this column serves as a wake-up call for those who are passive in countering it.
This is a call to action. Recognize that this culture exists and actively work to change it. I support survivors, today and every day. Can you say this honestly too?
Do I have to burn my diploma? An open letter to the University of Virginia
Written by UVA alum, Lisa Jakub. Click here for the original post.
Thank you for speaking up for UVA students, Lisa.
Dear UVA,
I love you.
Half of my wardrobe is orange and blue. My car is covered in your stickers and my dog often sports a UVA collar.
I started undergrad at UVA at the age of 28. I was a high school drop out with a GED, no life experience outside of acting in movies, and a deep desire to learn. The day I graduated, in 2010 at the age of 32, was the proudest day of my life. You accepted me, you gave me a nurturing, safe place to spend four years.
At least, for me it was safe.
For many other women, it is not.
The recent Rolling Stone article, A Rape on Campus: A Brutal Assault and Struggle for Justice at UVA, has made some things very clear. Some horrible things. About the prevalence of misogyny and entitlement, of rape and abuse, of victims being silenced, of administrators sweeping accusations under the rug.
It must stop. Now.
I had never been proud of anything in my life before I went to UVA. I never felt proud of my film career or that I bought a house when I was 15 years old. But I was immensely proud to be part of a community that valued honor and learning. I was proud to wear my orange and blue. I wrote a memoir, which will be published next summer, and it ends as a love letter to you, UVA.
But I’m ashamed of my association with you now. I’m ashamed that this culture has been allowed to fester. I’m ashamed that the response to the assaults and rapes has been tepid.
But you can change this. Now.
April Wimberley has written a Change.org petition that outlines administrative changes that need to be made, as a first step to combat this culture of rape. Obviously, this is not simply an administrative issue, but the college needs to make it clear that these actions will not be tolerated. Suspending fraternities for the holidays won’t cut it.
The blame lies primarily with the perpetrators, but you have the power to stand up and say that this will be brought to light. We are not the only college that faces this issue – but we can be the one that faces it the best.
So, here’s the deal. If there is not significant administrative response to this issue, along the lines of the demands outlined on Change.org in place by the time the students return from winter break on January 12th – I will burn my diploma.
Anyone else who feels compelled to join me is welcome.
I know that as an institution, you are freaked out right now. But you need to lead us. You need to give us a reason to be proud of UVA again. You need to give us a reason to not want to burn our diplomas.
I cannot bear to look at my diploma from an institution that chooses to protect its reputation over its students. I will sacrifice what is precious to me, in an attempt to bring about a greater social good.
I will burn the only thing I’ve ever been proud of.
I love you, UVA. But my love, though deep, is not unconditional.
Yours,
Lisa Jakub
UVA alumna, class of 2010.
UVA Sexual Assault Coalition 