For those who have been in a media blackout for the last few weeks, Rolling Stone magazine (one of the guiding lights of my adolescence), screwed up and published an unreliable account of a gruesome frat-house rape at the University Of Virginia.
A young lady named "Jackie" was supposedly gang-raped by seven guys. For three hours. During a party. On a floor covered with shattered glass. And she refused medical treatment. And the guy she claims to have gone with might not exist. And etc., etc., etc....
Rolling Stone printed every word of it. The University prez shut down the entire Greek/Frat system. No judge, no jury.
A few media groups are now picking apart the story, but they're concerned about not doing violence to the "larger truth" - that there is a culture of rape in America.
Horse hockey.
Considering that Jackie's behavior didn't take place in a vacuum, here are two types of questions that real journalists would be asking:
1) What classes has "Jackie" been taking? Victimology 101? Intro to Grievance Studies? The Western Canon As A Metaphor For Rape? Advanced Privilege-Checking?
Has "Jackie" been exposed to classroom instruction that taught her that unless she is oppressed, then she is part of the problem?
I would love to know. Considering that a frat house has been vandalized, picketed, shut down and otherwise defamed, and that some guys could've gone to prison, I think we all have a right to know the crap that the University Of Virginia has possibly been pumping into that young lady's head.
2) The culture of rape schtick has apparently gone from bug to feature, and I'm wondering what all-female universities do with their evenings (without white straight males to fear, protest against, and warn each other about).
Does anyone else think that Jackie might have been to one to many of the Rape Culture Seminars? Did she go to any Take Back The Night marches?
Did some variety of Victim Envy cause her to do this? There are no effects without causes, and this fable had some causes.
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It's looking more and more like Jackie made up the entire story. I'm just curious about why she did it, and I wish that more journalists were.
A young lady named "Jackie" was supposedly gang-raped by seven guys. For three hours. During a party. On a floor covered with shattered glass. And she refused medical treatment. And the guy she claims to have gone with might not exist. And etc., etc., etc....
Rolling Stone printed every word of it. The University prez shut down the entire Greek/Frat system. No judge, no jury.
A few media groups are now picking apart the story, but they're concerned about not doing violence to the "larger truth" - that there is a culture of rape in America.
Horse hockey.
Considering that Jackie's behavior didn't take place in a vacuum, here are two types of questions that real journalists would be asking:
1) What classes has "Jackie" been taking? Victimology 101? Intro to Grievance Studies? The Western Canon As A Metaphor For Rape? Advanced Privilege-Checking?
Has "Jackie" been exposed to classroom instruction that taught her that unless she is oppressed, then she is part of the problem?
I would love to know. Considering that a frat house has been vandalized, picketed, shut down and otherwise defamed, and that some guys could've gone to prison, I think we all have a right to know the crap that the University Of Virginia has possibly been pumping into that young lady's head.
2) The culture of rape schtick has apparently gone from bug to feature, and I'm wondering what all-female universities do with their evenings (without white straight males to fear, protest against, and warn each other about).
Does anyone else think that Jackie might have been to one to many of the Rape Culture Seminars? Did she go to any Take Back The Night marches?
Did some variety of Victim Envy cause her to do this? There are no effects without causes, and this fable had some causes.
***********
It's looking more and more like Jackie made up the entire story. I'm just curious about why she did it, and I wish that more journalists were.
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