Student Says Rape, Jury Says Rape, Poo-Bah Says “Nope. Case Closed.”

By Professor Doom

     Our campuses are basically kingdoms. I’ve mentioned many times how fiefdoms, almost none of which have anything to do with education, soak up much of the student loan money, but today I want to talk about the immense power the Poo-Bah, the guy who’s running the whole school has, because he is the law on campus, regardless of what any stinkin’ piece of paper says.

       I’ve spoken before of the kangaroo campus court system, and the gentle reader should put very little stock in rulings made there, even if, as the university is prone to announce, the findings in the system are “unanimous.” The system is generally rigged, and is used to cover most everything on campus, from minor policy details to the most grotesque rape.

      Whenever some dispute occurs, a “jury” is convened, a panel of faculty (or possibly purely admin). Regardless of composition, these poor souls generally must do whatever admin tells them to do…if this committee disagrees with what admin wants, the gentle reader can rest assured they’re only making that disagreeable ruling because there’s simply no way to assert anything different. To really hammer this point home, I’ve seen a committee unanimously determine that it’s simply a matter of policy that 12 divided by 5 is 2.35—I’m serious, the five of them (one of them with a Ph.D. in Math Education) put together did that calculation to two decimal places even after I tried to explain it was incorrect.

       I honestly don’t think the committee was as incompetent as they claimed, but I relate the story because that’s generally how far a committee will go to appease admin.

       Getting back to today’s story:

“…a senior sociology major at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, went to the emergency room to report that she had just been raped by a classmate. Campus police arrived to take her statement, and the nurse examiner found a bruise on her cervix, which often indicates sexual assault. “

      When there’s a campus crime, things go a bit differently than what a citizen might think. The report doesn’t go to the police, it goes to the “campus police,” which basically is about as legit as your typical retail store security: they’re only going to do whatever the store manager (or the Poo-Bah in this case) tells them to do.

      The basic facts are as follows:

She hadn't been drinking. She said she had told her assailant "no" at least seven times. She told a friend she'd been assaulted almost immediately after she got the classmate out of her apartment — and then made a report to law enforcement within hours. And while text messages showed that Reed's classmate tried to text her the next day, she never texted back. Instead, she reported the incident to both campus police and the college's Title IX Office.

     Because sex crimes and sexual discrimination are so common on campus, and because such things are routinely covered up, our Federal government passed a law, “Title IX” in an attempt to stop it.

      Sadly, all the new law has done has created another huge wasteful fiefdom on campus. You really can’t use a law to create integrity, as many campuses have demonstrated.

      She made her report to the Title IX fiefdom, and they leaped into action, as per Federal law. They investigate, and I can respect that takes time. Four months later:

“…the Title IX Office found that Reed's classmate had not violated any university policies. The seven-page report never even mentions the bruise on her cervix. Instead, it dwells at length on the fact that she may have misstated whether she was in the bathroom or in the car when she sent a text message to a friend following the incident — a fact even the report acknowledges was "not in and of itself very significant."

     So we have an obvious whitewash. Federal law allows the student to appeal this finding.  Again, Federal law mandates a committee must be formed and to make a ruling. How’d that go?

“…university's Sexual Harassment Panel overruled the Title IX Office, finding that Reed's alleged rapist had violated SIUE's sexual harassment policy.”

     Great! She won on appeal. I have to admit, I’ve never seen anyone win on appeal—the system is so rigged, I’ve literally seen the same “judges” for the appeal be the same “judges” who made the original ruling, and literally destroy any new evidence presented…if they’re following admin orders the first time, they’ve going to do it again. It’s a stupid system all the way through.

      But, somehow, she won the appeal. Good for her, but it’s pointless. There was obvious whitewashing by the Title IX office, so clearly that’s what admin wanted. What will admin do since the evidence was so overwhelming that this Federally mandated panel had to concede the student’s claim?

“…the university's chancellor, Randall G. Pembrook, overruled the panel...”

    

     Bam! Game over. The Poo-Bah says “You lose! In Your Face! Hahahahahaha!” Boy, all those written Federal laws really changed things on campus, didn’t they?

     The student is still fighting, but it’s a lost cause even as I wish her luck. You can’t win on campus, they hold all the cards. Maybe she should try the “real” criminal justice system, not that it’s great shakes either.

     There are two points I want to make with this. The first is straightforward: no matter what happens on campus, the Poo-Bah can bury it. This ultimately explains why it’s so common to have sex scandals run on campus for a decade or much more before finally being caught.

     While not as horrific, another important issue is we’ve trusted the rulers of higher ed with hundreds of billions of student loan money, because written policies say they’ll act with integrity. 

     In light of the above, which didn’t even make any national news…why would anyone remotely suspect our Poo-Bahs are treating education (and all that sweet, sweet, student loan money) any more respectfully than they do Federal law or victims of sex crimes?

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