Sexual Assault at UT-Austin

Posted on | June 23, 2014 | 34 Comments

“Campus police questioned two University of Texas football players as part of a sexual assault investigation,” involving an incident that allegedly “happened early Saturday morning in the San Jacinto Residence Hall.”

Then there is this sentence:

According to the university’s most recent security report, victims reported nine on-campus sexual assaults in 2012.

Does anyone else remember how George Will became the living symbol of “rape culture” in American journalism? It involved two statistics cited by feminists: First, that 20% of college women are victims of sexual assault as undergraduates; and second, that only 12% (roughly 1-in-8) of sexual assaults are reported to authorities. Applying that math to enrollment figures and reported sexual assaults at Ohio State University, Will found that even if you multiply the number of sexual assault reports by 8.33 (thus to represent the 12% figure) the calculations showed “a sexual assault rate of approximately 2.9 percent — too high but nowhere near 20?percent.”

Well, what about these numbers for UT-Austin? If there were nine sexual assaults reported on campus in 2012, but only 12% of such crimes were actually reported, this would mean that there were 75 assaults total that year. If 2012 was an average year, we can multiply that number by a factor of four to reach 300 as the total number of sexual assaults (both reported and unreported) during the typical four-year undergraduate career of a UT-Austin student.

In 2011, there were 38,437 undergraduate students at UT-Austin, of whom 51.3% (19,718) were female. If my math is correct, this means that the sexual assault rate was slightly more than 1.5%.

Of course, the ideal number would be zero, but the point is this: Administration officials including Vice President Joe Biden have been touting these statistics — one-in-five college women victimized by sexual assault, only 12% of which are reported to authorities — as justifying a federal policy to combat what is being described as an “epidemic” of rape on campus. Yet when we apply these statistics to actual data, we find that the numbers don’t add up, and that the alleged “epidemic” involves a vast exaggeration.

The problem is not whether opinion columnists offend us by using language about “privilege” and victimhood as a “coveted status” (George Will’s thought-crime). Rather, the problem is something much simpler: The administration is lying to us, and these lies are being used to justify federal policies that could be very harmful.

There was more evidence that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction in 2003 than there is of a college rape “epidemic” in 2014. But if feminists cared about evidence, they wouldn’t be feminists, would they?

UPDATE: Thanks to Greg (@g56yu) on Twitter for pointing out this November item about “underreported” assault at UT-Austin:

“If you look at the national statistics, they’ll say one in four college women is likely to be a victim of sexual assault by the time they complete college, and for men it’s one in six,” said Jennifer Hammat, institutional Title IX coordinator and assistant vice president for student affairs. “For a campus population of 50,000 [students], that means we should be seeing 12,500 cases a year. And we’re not.”
There were only 18 forcible sexual offenses reported in 2012, including those occurring on campus properties, residence halls, non-campus buildings and adjacent public property, according to the University’s Annual Security Report released last month. The year before, there were 16.
Erin Burrows, a Voices Against Violence health education coordinator, said these low statistics should not be interpreted to mean UT students experience radically lower rates of sexual assault compared to students at other universities.

A couple of things: The 50,000 enrollment number includes grad students and, if you add in sexual assaults against students that reportedly occurred at “non-campus buildings,” the number for 2012 roughly doubles — so, about 3%, the same as at Ohio State.

More importantly, however, both Hammat and Burrows have it fixed in their mind — as a fact — that a certain large percentage (1-in-4) of students are victims of sexual assault, so the relatively low number of reported assaults at UT-Austin doesn’t mean anything.

In other words, ignore the available facts, believe the scary statistics.

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Category: Crime, Education, Feminism, Sex

Comments

34 Responses to “Sexual Assault at UT-Austin”

Dave
June 23rd, 2014 @ 10:21 pm

Your numbers mean nothing to feminists. They can’t do math and are proud of it!
Kevin Lafayette
June 23rd, 2014 @ 10:53 pm

Yep. The only thing reality is good for is ignoring and lying about.
Mike G.
June 23rd, 2014 @ 10:59 pm

Pretty soon, if it isn’t happening already, just admiring a good looking woman on a college campus will be grounds for a sexual assault charge…at least if feminists have their way.
frankfromtexas
June 23rd, 2014 @ 11:00 pm

This is simple; if the men weigh the same as a duck, they’re made of wood, and it’s OK to burn them at the stake.
Kirby McCain
June 23rd, 2014 @ 11:10 pm

A coed goes to a party, drinks, takes the guy to her room and they have sex. Later, her therapist tells her she was raped and it’s national news. But when three basketball ball players at Oregon gang rape a coed, that’s local news. You don’t need to know about that because it not a part of the #rapeculture consciousness raising campaign. Feel free to fill in the blanks.
Evi L. Bloggerlady
June 23rd, 2014 @ 11:11 pm

Math is a black art of the Patriarchy.
robertstacymccain
June 23rd, 2014 @ 11:17 pm

Yes, I can fill in the blanks: RAAAAACIST!
ChandlersGhost
June 24th, 2014 @ 12:52 am

‘We didn’t burn them, we hanged them.’ – TS Eliot
RKae
June 24th, 2014 @ 1:10 am

That’s all because of talking Barbie.
RKae
June 24th, 2014 @ 1:11 am

You forgot to mention that shortly after her therapist convinces her that she was raped… he has sex with her.
RKae
June 24th, 2014 @ 1:13 am

You see, this is why I’ve discovered that it’s pointless to talk to lefties. They give you crappy statistics, then say, “What do you have to say about those statistics? Huh? Huh? Huh? What? Come on! Answer me!”

And, of course, you’re not allowed to say, “I think those statistics are wrong.”

Whether it’s “rape culture” or Global Warming, all they do is run on junk science.
Funeral guy
June 24th, 2014 @ 1:19 am

Now we can add simple math to logic when talking about things that leftists have no clue about.
Adjoran
June 24th, 2014 @ 1:59 am

Useless stats, as they include not only rape and attempted rape, but also “unwelcome advances.” So the feminists include the guys who did take “no” for an answer as still “guilty” of “sexual assault.”

So the point is . . .???
Adjoran
June 24th, 2014 @ 2:01 am

Nationally, there is roughly one rape per 200,000 women each year.

The number who said “no” is suspected to be larger, but their suitors are also considered “rapists” for the purpose of campus stats.

Suck on it, Mandy.
concern00
June 24th, 2014 @ 2:22 am

Ultimately being male is sexual assault personified.

On another note, has anyone noticed a link between de-institutionalization (1972 I think) and a surge in the regressive movement?
K-Bob
June 24th, 2014 @ 5:21 am

And deducted the sex as business expenses on his tax form.
K-Bob
June 24th, 2014 @ 5:23 am

I always like those, “One in four Americans struggles with hunger,” stats.

I struggle with hunger at least once or twice a day, Just opening a box of cereal takes time away from watching the teevee. Who can I sue?
Gunga
June 24th, 2014 @ 8:45 am

Imagine a place…where 1-in-4 women get raped…and women pay to go there (in fact, go deeply in debt for the privilege)…and go there in increasingly great numbers…and people generally agree that this place is a “good” place for women to go… Then please go take your medication if you think this place is real.
Gunga
June 24th, 2014 @ 8:46 am

RAPIST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
RS
June 24th, 2014 @ 8:57 am

We focus on the statistics, when we should focus on language. We say the statistics are bogus, because we have a centuries old understanding of what constitutes a “sexual assault.” As pointed out above, the problem is in the definition of “sexual assault.” The Left has defined it in a way which allows it to inflate the statistics for its own purposes. In any argument with the Left, it is absolutely necessary to start with the definition of terms.
Gunga
June 24th, 2014 @ 9:06 am

There are three kinds of people in America:
Those who are bad at math and those who are bad at statistics.
Daniel O'Brien
June 24th, 2014 @ 9:18 am

Shouldn’t this be RAAAAAPIST?
RKae
June 24th, 2014 @ 11:39 am

Sounds like you need some government assistance. I think I speak for all taxpayers when I say, I’m delighted to work extra hours to pay for a social worker to open your cereal box.

And, of course, we need more technology: a robot to stuff the food into your mouth and make your jaw go up and down.

I don’t know about you, but I can hardly wait to have that done to me so that I can genuinely wonder how the human race existed before such robots were built.
RKae
June 24th, 2014 @ 11:40 am

Is casually browsing now the same as shoplifting?
RKae
June 24th, 2014 @ 11:41 am

And, of course, a homosexual man eyeing you will be OK.

And it’ll be a hate crime for you to refuse his advances.
RKae
June 24th, 2014 @ 11:43 am

Imagine a place where 1 in 4 women get raped, and if they attempt to go to school they get acid thrown in their faces.

Leftists have no qualms about a place like that.
RKae
June 24th, 2014 @ 11:44 am

And, yet, somehow it’s the right wing that’s “anti-science”?
DeadMessenger
June 24th, 2014 @ 1:19 pm

You mean he OR she has sex with her, you racist!
DeadMessenger
June 24th, 2014 @ 1:23 pm

It’s entirely Bush’s fault. And racism.
DeadMessenger
June 24th, 2014 @ 1:30 pm

That could be the mall if you were talking about economic rape.
Mike G.
June 24th, 2014 @ 3:17 pm

They’ll think ‘hate’ crime if they make an advance at me.
K-Bob
June 24th, 2014 @ 9:07 pm

Heh.
K-Bob
June 25th, 2014 @ 1:53 am

You mis-spelled “shop-raping”
K-Bob
June 25th, 2014 @ 5:56 am

Percentages are mean.