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October 18, 2005
Letter to the Editor: Professor criticizes columnist
Dear Nick Bell,
I am writing to you today to express my deep concern and outrage over the “Under the Covers” columns published in the Oct. 11 and Sept. 20 editions of the Oracle. Clearly, you are not qualified to address the issues raised by your readers, for your responses relating to forcible sexual encounters reveal you to be a person who has little or no knowledge of what constitutes consent under Minnesota law.
Moreover, in both columns, you completely omit any discussion of the responsibility on the part of the perpetrator. In the Sept. 20 column, he is a man who makes a woman “an offer she couldn’t refuse,” while in the Oct. 11 column he or she is absent entirely and your focus is on the victim who is a person who “sounds like [they’ve] been partying a lot lately.” This sole focus on the victim without any discussion of the perpetrator is particularly egregious and perpetuates the myth that victims of sexual assault are responsible for what happens to them. Saying “You are a survivor” does not erase the embedded assumption that the victim of this crime is to blame and she or he is entirely responsible for dealing with it.
Of the total number of women raped in America, seventy-five percent of them are between the ages of 15
and 21. The average age is 18 (National Victim Center and Crime Victims Research and Treatment
Center, Rape in America: A Report to the Nation, 1992). And the FBI tells us that one reported forcible rape or attempted rape takes place nearly every five minutes in the United States (Crime in the United States, 2001), while in Minnesota, which has seen a rape rate higher than the national average since 1993, there is a sexual assault every 83 minutes (OJP Fact Sheet, Minnesota Department of Public Safety, 2003). While most rapes are perpetrated against women, about 12 percent of victims of rape are men (Bureau of Justice Statistics, “Criminal Victimization, 2002”).
According to the law, intoxication by drugs, alcohol, or other source always equals non-consent. The mixed messages you send in your column serve only to confuse your readers that sex with an intoxicated person can sometimes be OK, when in reality, it is never OK. Sadly, your “advice” column serves only to reinforce the behavior of the perpetrators of these crimes, and to perpetuate attitudes that make it easier to accept and tolerate rape and sexual assault.
Before you begin your next column, I suggest you take time to educate yourself about the myths and facts regarding rape and sexual assault. There are many places to do this: In St. Paul these include Sexual
Offence Services of Ramsey County, and the Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault; in Minneapolis these include the Rape and Sexual Abuse Center, and Crisis Connection. Or you might check out Men
Ending Rape, an organization founded by a Hamline alumnus, to learn how you can avoid your continued participation in the problem and become part of the solution.
Dr. Kristin Mapel Bloomberg
Director, Hamline University Women’s Studies
Posted by msveum at October 18, 2005 11:18 AM
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