The Decline in Disclosure: Why Are College Students Not Reporting Sexual Assaults?

TRIGGER WARNING: This post analyzes a newspaper reporting of a sexual assault on a college campus and may therefore be triggering to some individuals.

The issue of sexual assault has over the last two decades, transformed into a widespread and omnipresent epidemic that continues to have profoundly negative effects on the individuals it scars. Particularly on college campuses, where hundreds of thousands of male and female students have been assaulted sexually without consent, stigmas of what it means to be both a victim and perpetrator of an assault have spread like wildfire. Indeed, these stigmas have, over the course of several years, given rise to an environment of toxic hostility that both directly and indirectly discourages college students from disclosing their attacks to authority figures or campus police.

In a case study by New York Times journalist Walt Bogdanich, the above claim was unfortunately confirmed through the voices of several college students who after reporting their case came to regret disclosing it. Despite the fact that almost every public and private university takes steps to educate their students about the resources in place to help victims, very few universities effectively and efficiently respond to claims of such assaults. For examples, in Bogdanich's case study it is revealed that hundreds of U.S institutions of higher learning have fallen under the watch of the Department of Education after violating Title IX standards. Bogdanich's study also identifies the poorly constructed hearing proceedings that colleges often use before charging an alleged perpetrator and shows readers that many times, the odds are against the innocent victim.

The issue of sexual assault should be particularly important to students at the University of Michigan because it an issue that strikes very close to home. While U of M was not directly mentioned in the above article, the nature of the school—large, public and economically and socially diverse—should prompt us, as students, to question the policies in place. Our campus is not an ideal haven for sexual assault victims; in fact, no university can be considered to be a perfect representation of proper case handling. If we truly wish to eradicate the force that is sexual violence, we must first employ each other to ignore the stereotypes surrounding such violence in the name of progress.

Questions for Reflection

To diminish the influence of stereotypes about sexual assaults and ultimately foster an environment that is welcoming to sexual assault victims, we should be more aware of the policies in place on our campus. What else do you think can be done on the individual level to encourage the disclosure of assaults? Do you believe that colleges can make a better effort in handling such cases? 

Sources

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/13/us/how-one-college-handled-a-sexual-assault-complaint.html