If She's Drunk, He's Guilty; If He's Drunk, Too, He's Still Guilty
From a story by Peter Jacobs at Business Insider, "How 'Consensual' Sex Got A Freshman Kicked Out Of College And Started A Huge Debate":
An ongoing legal dispute over a drunken sexual encounter between two freshmen, which occurred one year ago last week at the college, has become a battle over how to define the terms that govern campus sexual-assault policies....Per Occidental's policy, students are unable to consent if they are "incapacitated" -- a state of being that, although often caused by alcohol, is distinct from drunk or intoxicated.
After examining all of the evidence provided by Occidental's team of outside investigators, an external adjudicator made several key determinations. First, that sexual intercourse had in fact occurred; second, that Jane Doe gave her consent; and, third, that Jane was incapacitated when she did so.
As the external adjudicator wrote:
[T]he fact that Complainant successfully navigated herself, under her own power, to the Respondent's room, indicates both that, at the time, she had an awareness of where she was and that her motor skills were sufficiently intact to enable her to walk unassisted. Those factors, however, must be considered not in isolation but along with all of the other evidence regarding the Complainant's condition during the relevant period.The report added that Jane Doe was "incapacitated at the time she engaged in the conduct or statements that indicated she consented to sexual intercourse with the Respondent."
One final question remained: Should John Doe have known that Jane Doe was incapacitated, and thus unable to effectively consent?
Indeed he should have, the adjudicator found. Citing Occidental's policy stating that "Being intoxicated or impaired by drugs or alcohol is never an excuse for sexual harassment, sexual violence, stalking or intimate partner violence and does not diminish one's responsibility to obtain consent," the adjudicator determined that John Doe had committed sexual assault, despite not having knowledge of Jane Doe's state at the time.
My suggestion for men on campus -- and I'm not joking -- is to go in with a bunch of friends for a time-share on a prostitute until they're out of college.
"My suggestion .... is to go in with a bunch of friends for a time-share on a prostitute until they're out of college."
+1 on that insight. At a minimum, men have no option except to stop dating women how attend their own school. Preemption is the only effective defense. Once a man becomes entangled in the university's Star Chamber system for gender-related complaints he cannot and will not receive justice. By design, the process itself is a punishment -- one from which he will not fully recover.
Lastango at September 17, 2014 12:04 AM
Y'know... Seekers...
Listen, I'll never pass up a chance to ridicule academe or its administration.
But part of what's happening here is that as higher ed becomes a more polished and less-genuinely challenging and educational, stupider people start showing up and asking why things have to be so unpleasant. And since there's this huge industrial infrastructure around the campus making money, nobody wants to tell the lesser students that they're wasting their money... Meanwhile, the "community organizer" types are never going to tell the aggrieved students that they really oughta just grow up.
It's all ugly and dumb, but that's what's happened to higher ed. They gave the people what they wanted.
And meanwhile, if there are any college-agers reading this: Don't get too worried about it... Specifically, the "prostitute" chatter is worthless. You should no more listen to those people about how your sex life works than you should listen to the panty-bunched schoolmarms with their ludicrous ideas about 'consent'.
There have always been twitchy, sexually incompetent girls around, right? They were on campus when I was there, and when my father was there, and you've seen them in your own schoolrooms since kindergarten.
You've equipped yourself with sensitivity, powers of observation and your own intuitions, as have the women you'll most want to nail anyway. They'll be glad to see you.
Crid [CridComment at Gmail] at September 17, 2014 1:01 AM
Get an online degree - save your money, save the hassle.
MarkD at September 17, 2014 5:26 AM
Agree w/Crid.
I think the colleges should tell the students the following:
1) Adult activities should not be the school's problem; and
2) If it becomes a school problem then a police report will be made and both parties are on suspension until the police investigation is complete. If it is clear that both parties were equally drunk (per the investigation)then both parties are suspended until things are sorted out to the Feds approval.
NOT GOING TO HAPPEN.
The people that don't know that drunk sex (as well as driving beyond your/road traffic capabilities) is problematic are babies (or truly learning-impaired for which life sucks).
The babies entering college need to entertained, pampered to, protected (no unpleasant speech), and subjected to a PC environment run by people that can not succeed anywhere else and will do anything to keep Daddy's money coming in.
If advice is given by the college it should be:
"No drunk sex for a lot of reasons. If you don't know by now that life is hard then look around and learn from some other fool's stupidity. NO ONE CARES ABOUT YOUR STUPID ACTIONS. We've got our own issues to deal with."
Like I said. Not going to happen.
Bob in Texas at September 17, 2014 6:14 AM
My suggestion is to not date people who attend the same institute of higher learning, and for the love of Pete don't have sex on your campus as that probably will allow them to stick their nose into it if your partner decides to complain about you.
Also, if she appears to be drunk, do not walk, run for the hills. Make up a story if needed. Your gramma died. Yes, I know, you've used that 3 times already this semester. One more won't hurt.
The only way to fight a woman is with your hat: grab it and run.
I R A Darth Aggie at September 17, 2014 7:10 AM
Adult activities should not be the school's problem
Except that the DoJ and the Office of Civil Rights disagree with you. And I hate to break it to you, but unless you are an alum who writes checks with lots of zeros on it, the academy isn't going to listen to you.
DoJ/OCR is threatening to withhold federal dollars for institutes of higher learning for failing to accept their interpretation of Title IX, and applying it.
What does withholding federal dollars look like? no federal student aid, no Pell grants, no federally backed student loans, and for those institutes with federally funded research grants, future denial of grants.
If you have them by the balls, their hearts and minds will soon follow. So throwing some men under the bus looks like an adequate solution. Keeps the institute afloat, and allows them to hire more middle and upper-level admin types to manage this aspect of campus life.
As for Like I said. Not going to happen. well, sorry Bob, hate to break it to you, but it already has and will only continue to get worse.
Unless you and Crid have a sure-fire method of sorting out the squirrely women of the world? if you do, please share. Unless busy filing a patent on it?
Eventually, men will be taking course solely online. Biggest beneficiary? the University of Phoenix (and similar colleges).
I R A Darth Aggie at September 17, 2014 7:28 AM
Regarding this:
"2) If it becomes a school problem then a police report will be made and both parties are on suspension until the police investigation is complete. If it is clear that both parties were equally drunk (per the investigation)then both parties are suspended until things are sorted out to the Feds approval."
How about nothing like that at all? The issue here is arbitrary, capricious or politically-motivated suspensions/expulsions by schools, without any sort of due process. You're merely suggesting a slightly-different set of criteria for these actions, which will be open to the same arbitrary, capricious or politically-motivated implementations.
We should leave the determination of guilt or innocence to the criminal justice system, not to private entities and/or other quasi-government agencies. That's what we have a CJS for - not perfect, I grant you, but still the least-worst choice. Universities, like beauty parlors and oil-change shops, have no business deciding the guilt or innocence of their customers and applying public sanctions to them based on their private determinations.
A university should be no different than the public square - if you're guilty of some crime, then the CJS will punish you appropriately, and is the only appropriate means for applying any punishment at all. But if you've never been found guilty of any wrongdoing by the impartial mechanism that's there to decide guilt or innocence, then nobody else should be able to apply life-altering sanctions to you - like public expulsion from school. I'm getting tired of the ever-growing range of extra-judicial punishments and 'administrative' sanctions being dreamed up to apply to people we don't like, who have never been found guilty of any crime.
llater,
llamas
llamas at September 17, 2014 8:23 AM
College men: Boycott all college women. Do not date them. Sex with off campus women is just as good.
The boycott will (a) force college women to date non-student men to whom all these crazy rules do not apply, or/and (b) women will lobby the college and/or legislature to change the rules.
Nick at September 17, 2014 8:50 AM
and for the love of Pete don't have sex on your campus as that probably will allow them to stick their nose into it if your partner decides to complain about you.
That doenst matter, there are cases of women complaining to colleges to things that happened with a guy over the summer in other states and even countries.
Dont date women from your college at all, and if they lie about being from our college file rape charges, ie rape via fraud, with the college immediately
lujlp at September 17, 2014 9:12 AM
Also as she failed to get his consent why wanst she expelled as well?
lujlp at September 17, 2014 9:16 AM
The backlash we have been seeing is entertaining, unless you look at the lives smashed, and money spent...
The problems that colleges are gonna have is that young men are suing them UNDER title IX for not applying the rules equally, and once that kinda pain starts happening... some changes will be made.
Prolly stupid ones, initially.
Off campus is just fine, if you go to a small school, but seriously people, at ASU there are 45,000 students. At CU in Boulder EVERY person your age is likely to be in school there within a radius that's reasonable like 50 miles. So, this is a problem with your cohort, that you can't always run from.
For example, best chica I met in college, had a reason to be interested in me the 22yr old, when she was 29. She wanted to make babies, immediately. Imagine my surprise. When I balked at "immediate" she found the next guy who was 40 and gave her immediate.
Can't say if I dodged a bullet, but certainly, ALL this stuff has the potential feel of a butterfly on your skin.
Attached to a millstone that will drown you.
Sally Palm and her 5 sisters will never let you down, of course.
But she ain't gonna teach you how to deal with a living and breathing woman later... no good answer.
OTOH, back in my day [looks over glasses] there was a certain amount of "courting" involved. Where "dating" hangin out with, and generally being with woman was a worthwhile persuit, even though it may never go anywhere... because it allowed you to learn the other part of life with a person, that is NOT sex.
Maybe it's better for Sally P. to be your drunk hookup, and to approach RL Women with suitable caution.
The other alternative, is to just opt out, cuz this doesn't get much easier.
Don't mind the cackling from the balcony seats... older guys that have already fought these battles will always cheer you on, while laughing at the pratfalls. Alternately amused, and wistful of the antics.
http://images.amazon.com/images/G/01/video/stills/muppets5-large.jpg
SwissArmyD at September 17, 2014 9:24 AM
"DoJ/OCR is threatening to withhold federal dollars for institutes of higher learning for failing to accept their interpretation of Title IX, and applying it."
I hope this works out as well for the feds as Michelle's school lunch mandate did.
Isab at September 17, 2014 9:25 AM
I am torn on this case. As someone who was a really insecure, immature, body conscious 17 year old when I started college, I totally buy that she has issues (possibly PTSD) from losing her virginity to a guy she barely knew. That being said, she did consent, and she consented even though a bunch of people were telling her to stop it.
She had two friends say "time to go home now, you're too trashed". She went back out still looking to party. She found a guy, who was also completely trashed, who also wanted to party. Again, her two friends said, go home Jane. She said she was, and snuck back out and slept with him. The guy seemed to have encouraged her to do that, but that's not coercion.
She was drunk. We all do stuff when completely majorly trashed that we don't do sober. She made a really stupid decision that she probably shouldn't have made, but it was her decision. Her friends tried everything within reason to stop her from doing it aside from locking her in her room. It didn't stop her.
I think one of the issues that we have as a society is that when something traumatic happens to us, whenever possible, we need it to be someone's fault. In this case, the traumatic experience wound was self-inflicted, and maybe she doesn't know how to deal with that. Maybe Occidental doesn't know how to help her with that. Something can be completely traumatic, you then have to spend months and months getting over it, and totally be self-inflicted. This is an extreme situation.
It's hard to get past the blame game and the self-loathing, but isn't that part of growing up? Learning you're capable of being your own worst enemy, doing things you'd never thought you could do, and learning to forgive yourself?
Janie4 at September 17, 2014 9:59 AM
"DoJ/OCR is threatening to withhold federal dollars for institutes of higher learning for failing to accept their interpretation of Title IX, and applying it."
"The issue here is arbitrary, capricious or politically-motivated suspensions/expulsions by schools, without any sort of due process."
Both of the above statements are why I suggested:
"a police report will be made and both parties are on suspension until the police investigation is complete. If it is clear that both parties were equally drunk (per the investigation) then both parties are suspended until things are sorted out to the Feds approval."
Impartial treatment to both parties, shifts the responsibility from the college back to CJS, and should throw a bone to the Feds since it's a CJS investigation.
It might even be a warning to fickle girls and immature boys, but doubt it since they and their parents are really into denial about personal responsibility.
Bob in Texas at September 17, 2014 10:08 AM
It ain't PTSD, it isn't even particularly "harmful" as the article claims. It's "gawd, that was dumb", which all of us have had, in one form or another. Sometimes that's how you have to learn.
The real question is why the guy's lawyers aren't claiming discrimination - since they were both trashed, he surely has as good a claim as she does. Make the school show gender neutrality, that is the way to get rid of this kind of stupidity.
a_random_guy at September 17, 2014 12:04 PM
@ Bob in Texas - I understand what you're suggesting, and it's better. However, in trying to be 'impartial to both sides', what you are actually achieving is a horrible (but equal!) injustice to both.
How about this approach? You think you've been assaulted? Go to the police. Unless and until somebody - anybody - is convicted of a crime, the university will take no action against anybody.
Just like outside, in the real world. No sanctions against the person you accused, just because you accused them. You know - that whole 'presumption of innocence' thing?
And - by the same token - if somebody accuses somebody else of assault, why should the accuser suffer any consequences simply for having made the accusation? A lot of work has been done to remove the cultural and social barriers to reporting these kinds of assaults, the suggestion that an accuser should suffer the same sanctions as the accused in the name of 'impartiality' will only tend to dissuade people (*women) from reporting real assaults that really happened.
(*I'm trying to be gender-neutral but have to recognize that the vast majority of accusers are women and the vast majority of the accused are men.)
llater,
llamas
llamas at September 17, 2014 12:04 PM
First, ask the administration what blood alcohol level creates a presumption of incapacitation. In most states .08 % creates a presumption that you are too impaired to drive. So,similarly, there would be a presumption you are to impaired to fuck. FUII - Fucking Under The Influence of Intoxicants.
Then fraternities should invest in a breathalyzer. "My dear, before you blow me would you blow my breathalyzer?"
Another possibility is to make sure you are always more intoxicated than the lady, thereby presumably making you the victim of the lady's sexual predation. Of course, you would have to act preemptively by lodging a complaint first.
Bill O Rights at September 17, 2014 12:36 PM
Bill o Rights,
You don't have to file first, but you do have to file. And if they refuse to accept your filing (yes, it does happen) then you threaten to sue them for gender discrimination in federal court. You also have to make it clear that if the kangaroo court takes your filing and just throws it out while proceeding with her's you will sue in federal court.
Ben at September 17, 2014 2:00 PM
Llamas,
You are right. I am purposely making it hurt for both parties so the message will reach both parents, the frat/sororities, and the Feds.
Until that happens guys are screwed if they screw.
Bob in Texas at September 17, 2014 2:28 PM
"I'm ashamed I got drunk and had sex. Jail that guy and destroy his life for me, would you, Daddy equivalent? Thanks ever so much."
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at September 17, 2014 5:19 PM
I've wondered about the now passe term 'LUG' and thought about its place in the newer campus rape phenomenon.
Found this article re: campus sexuality and the last paragraph raises interesting points.
http://www.alternet.org/story/1256/confessions_of_a_l.u.g.
I primarily teach juniors (young adults turning 21) and grad students at a large state university. I used to live in the ground zero of off-campus multi-student rental houses while raising a pre-teen daughter as a single dad. It was interesting to see and hear how young men and young women behaved towards each other. How do you account for waking at 2:30 am on a Thursday morning and seeing a line of 20 or so co-eds walking in only panties and completely unbuttoned long-sleeved white men's Oxford shirts (no shoes, pants or bras)? They were being led by two older co-eds (23 yo or so) down my street, later entering one of the wildest party houses on the block. Seemed wierd. Probably weren't preparing for Thursday classes.
My daughter is now a sophomore in college in another state. Scared for her. But she's seen and heard it all.
College is growing-up time. It's rough and random. It should be fair to both sides. But even grown-up life isn't fair. It sucks.
Bob at November 30, 2014 8:28 AM
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