A handful of universities made headlines recently for sexual assaults on their campuses, but you shouldn’t hold your breath if you are waiting to see USI in these headlines anytime soon.
It’s not because sexual assaults don’t happen at our school, but because it seems USI has developed a nonchalant rape culture on campus – not just among the student body, but among university officials, as well.
No, I don’t know what occurs behind closed doors.
No, I don’t know if the rumored ‘under-the-table payoffs’ to the university from assailants’ parents are real.
No, I haven’t been a part of, or witness to, the university’s procedures.
What I do know is how the university publicly responds to these situations.
In the Sept. 21, 1988 issue of The Shield, a story ran about a USI student who reported to Indiana State Police (ISP) that she was raped on campus after her night class on Sept. 7.
Detective Gary Gilbert of the ISP said the student was confronted by four males as she was walking to her car after leaving class in the Technology Center around 8 p.m.
She told police the men came up from behind, held their hands over her eyes and mouth, and took her to a “grassy area that is not well-lighted.” There, three of the males held her down while the other one raped her.
By January, no leads had been made in the investigation, even with a $1,000 reward being offered.
Gilbert told The Shield that the victim had submitted to a polygraph test, and she passed.
It was reported in the Sept. 21 article that USI officials learned of the rape Sept. 8, when the ISP contacted them. However, the university did not release any information until Sept. 14.
Walter Hopkins was among faculty who spoke out at that time against the university’s handling of the rape.
“I felt concerned, simply dumbfounded when (the rape) appeared in the paper,” he was quoted as saying.
He said the university officials’ first priority should have been to inform students. Another faculty member echoed his sentiments and added, “The delay from the time the rape happened and was reported to the time it was told at USI was too much of a time gap for students to protect themselves.”
Almost exactly 26 years after The Shield published the article reporting the rape, it published a story online about an alleged sexual assault on the Burdette Trail.
This past September, a female student was no more than “2/10ths of a mile” into her jog when the alleged attack occurred between 10:45 a.m. and 11:30 a.m.
Unlike the 1988 assault, the Office of Public Safety sent out an alert to students about four hours after learning of the incident.
While it seems strides have been made over the years along the lines of transparency, the issue remains in the attitudes – not only among university officials, but students as well.
At the time, Vice President for Business Affairs Byron Wright said other universities’ problems are due to conflicts in their environment. He went on to say, “One incident (at USI) in 20 years isn’t too bad.” (Less than one month later, a 20-year-old student was arrested for raping a 14-year-old girl on campus in an unrelated incident.)
While being interviewed about last semester’s incident, Public Safety said it was an isolated incident and that things like this don’t happen on our campus.
It’s not only naïve, but also irresponsible to think that sexual assaults don’t happen on our campus.
That’s not to say that Public Safety denies these crimes occur, but to simply appear to brush every occurrence off as an “isolated incident” and think that’s the end of it is ridiculous.
After the 1988 rape, it was implied that the lack of light on campus caused the assault. “We’ve installed these new high-mounted lights on the south side of the library,” said John Klingelhoefer, director of the physical plant.
With the sun rising at 6:44 a.m. the morning of last semester’s assault, there would have been an ample amount of sunlight by the time the rape occurred.
A lack of light doesn’t cause rapes. The solution isn’t as simple as installing more lights. It’s installing a new attitude and way we talk – or in most cases it seems, don’t talk – about what’s happening.
The assault last semester wasn’t talked about enough – and that’s coming from someone who works at a newspaper.
While the university presents the right intentions on the surface, it seems like there are underlying dictations to keep things mum.
Maybe it’s the intense pressure of “selling” the school?
It’s not random to assume that the university keeps its image at the forefront of its thoughts. Through recent changes, such as the university’s re-branding or the introduction of a new media policy, USI is putting its best foot forward in not just steering its image in the direction it wants, but to control the message it presents to future investors – incoming students.
I can’t help but wonder if seemingly ‘down playing’ sexual assaults on our campus is part of that controlled message – “You’re safe at USI, where every rape is an isolated, uncommon occurrence.”
That’s not to say that the campus isn’t a safe place, or that there are serial rapists on the loose. It’s to say that, as much as we’d like it to be true, USI is not immune to these crimes, and the attitudes of both the administration and the student body should reflect that.
After the alleged assault last semester, there were many jokes made about the incident on social media sites and in person – not only about ‘watching out for rapists on the trail,’ but also about the student that came forward, and the fact that she waited 24 days to report it.
Too often, victims of sexual assault don’t come forward right away. Sometimes fear or embarrassment hinders them to act in their best interest. Sometimes it’s other factors.
When students make jokes about it, it can affect a someone’s decision on whether or not to come forward with their case.
As opposed to painting the picture of sexual assaults on our campus as uncommon, seldom and isolated, whether it’s out of sheer ignorance or something much more calculated, students and officials should make more of an effort to encourage more people to come forward.
