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The “No More Curfews on Campus” rally held on February 12th was effective in drumming up PR for the Women’s Center and similar campus groups, but it did little to offer solutions for campus safety. Rape is certainly a serious matter, and the attempted attack on a woman behind the Knight Library on January 30th deserves the attention of students, administration and the Department of Public Safety. The incident comes on the heels of last year’s string of attacks around the campus area. Though the DPS won’t go out on a limp and say that the same person is responsible, it certainly seems plausible. With such a miscreant on the loose, all students on campus need to be on guard and the authorities need to be making special efforts to find the culprit.
But when groups like the “radical cheerleaders” step behind a microphone and use words like “rape culture” and “controlling men’s behavior” we should be more than a little suspicious of their motives. After all, it’s certainly a stretch to describe the University of Oregon campus as being anything but politically correct. For Saferide co-director Lezlie Frye to say that there is a campus “rape environment” which imposes a curfew on women is nothing short of hyperbole.
Perhaps Frye’s real message, subtly hidden behind the smoke and mirrors of fear tactics, is summed up in her statement that the Women’s Studies Program and the Women’s Center are “grossly underfunded,” and that increasing funding to them would go a long way towards making campus safe. If you believe that that there is any correlation behind the funding of these groups and the actions of the “campus stalker” than I’ve got thirty stocks of Enron to sell you.
“It’s not about women changing their behavior,” said guest speaker Michelle Manoguerra, quoted in the Register Guard. “The focus should really be on the person who is perpetrating the assault.”
Michelle’s statement comes in contradiction to the message of the rally. The person perpetrating the assault wasn’t the one on trial before the angry masses gathered in the EMU amphitheater holding up “I Eat Rapists For Dinner” signs. The atmosphere seemed to suggest that it was the male gender that was really standing trial. Never mind that the campus stalker—obviously a mentally disturbed and deeply troubled individual— isn’t really a good representative for male society at large. Sadly, the January 30th assault was just an excuse to gather and bash male driven culture. As evidence of the discriminatory patriarchy, organizers pointed to the University’s supposed curfew of women on campus. It was unclear from their message just when or what this curfew was, but it seemed to stem from the fact that University dared to have the ordasity to suggest that women needed to be careful when walking around campus at night. In their minds, the focus should be on controlling men’s behavior, not women’s.
Nobody should be expected to walk around campus at night and not risk some sort of criminal assault, be it robbery, rape, or panhandling. Male or female, you’re certainly as safe walking down 13th street at night as you would be waking down Broadway. But common sense says walking through a dark graveyard or unlit alley isn’t a good idea. If you feel unsafe walking around campus at night you can always arrange for the DPS to give you an escort. The Emerald actually offered the reasonable suggestion that student groups could become involved in the escort effort. If Saferide is going to remain on campus in its current form, this would be a good opportunity to branch out.
The Emerald editorial about campus safety was mistaken in painting the campus to be an unsafe place. The campus crime statistics—readily available online at safetyweb.uoregon.edu— don’t point to any large rape epidemic. Between 1998 and 2000 there have been two incidents of forcible sex offenses on campus or on on-campus residential facilities, and one incident of nonforcible sex offenses. Aside from burglary and arson, the statistics show campus to be a relatively crime free place. Again, you’re probably safer walking around campus at night than through any of the bordering neighborhoods.
The uproar over campus safety in similar to another exaggerated epidemic: hate crimes. Hate crimes have become an issue of late in light of the situation Arab-Americans and practicing Muslims face in the aftermath of September 11th. Obviously any discrimination they face in entirely unjustified, as both our President and every major media have been quick to point out. But even before September 11th, liberally slanted media like MTV have been pushing for hate-crime legislation. In January 2001, MTV launched a major campaign to raise awareness of the hate crime “epidemic.” The campaign opened with a documentary about the Mathew Shepard murder titled “Anatomy of a Hate Crime,” followed by an MTV News special on hate crimes and a “scroll” of hundreds of names of hate-crime victims.
“It is shocking in 2001 that hate crimes still happen on a daily basis,” said MTV spokesmen Brian Braden. “While 90 percent of our viewers overwhelmingly recognize that discrimination is a serious problem facing our country today, fewer than five percent will acknowledge their own bias.”
When Brain suggests that people should acknowledge their own bias, he’s really suggesting that white males driving around in pickups and watching WWF are perpetuating a racist climate. But do the facts support his statement? Not at all. In 2000 (the most recent year for which statistics are available) the total number of hate crime offenses for all bias motivations (9430) was less than one-thousandth of one percent of the total number of all criminal offenses (11,605,751) in America. (For all the numbers, see www.fbi.gov) This hardly seems to justify a whole hate crime caste system. Yet MTV continues to paint hate crimes as a virus infecting all walks of American life and a byproduct of American elitist culture.
Yet hypocritically, MTV continues to air videos by Eminem with blatant anti-homosexual messages. Further more, the PC police at MTV took it upon themselves to blur out a poster of Scarface with Al Pacino holding a gun from a recent episode of MTV Cribs. This was deemed more offensive and dangerous to society than the show Dismissed, in which is the winner is the person most willingly to put out in front of a national audience.
Perhaps the worst insult to intelligence of late is Susan Rankin’s skewered diversity survey. You may remember the ads that ran in the Emerald hyping the figures. Did you know that 53% of students believe that classrooms are discriminatory? That’s what the ad says, so it must be true. Never mind that Rankin admits to designing the survey to overrepresent minorities. You don’t have to take statistics to find something wacky in that logic. Using the same polling technique, you could find that 74% of the population believe in the tooth fairy by overrepresenting the repressed toddler voice.
Still, even if the survey is biased, it does seem notable that some people truly believe that the campus atmosphere is discriminatory. This is Eugene after all, the most politically correct town this side of Berkley. What more is it that the University could do to promote diversity? How about setting up a research institute designed to promote and support inquiry and dialogue on racial, ethnic and cultural diversity? See: Center on Diversity and Community. How about setting up University and State sanctioned programs with the goal of recruiting and retaining more minority faculty members? See: Minority Recruitment Program and Faculty Diversity Initiatives. How about diversifying curriculum by adding majors in ethnic studies, women’s studies and Judaic studies in an effort to increase the diversity of programs available? See… well, never mind, it’s already been done.
The fact of the matter is that minority professors are in high demand at many Universities to fulfill their own diversity programs. That limits the pool, and increases the cost of recruiting. This doesn’t bode well for the University of Oregon, which notoriously under pays its faculty. That’s why many prominent minority professors are lured to Washington and Californian schools. Plus the fact that Eugene isn’t exactly a cultural melting pot, minus the influx of Californians and hippies.
But in Oregon’s favor, the UO does rank well in minority student enrollment. 12.9% or students enrolled are ethnic minorities, and 8.0% are international students. Those numbers compare nicely to Oregon State’s 14.9% ethnic minorities and 8.0% international students. Portland State University lists their minority students at 17% and international students at 5.0% All in all, the UO numbers run fairly parallel to other state universities. But of course none of these numbers will show up Susan Rankin’s survey.
Neither will these numbers: There are 14 registered democrats to 0 registered republicans in the Political Science department. 30 registered democrats in the English department; 1 registered republican. 12 democrats in the Sociology department. 1 socialist. 1 green party member. 0 republicans. Things don’t get any more “diverse” in the other departments either. Combined number of republicans in Journalism and Women’s Studies departments: 0. Students in these programs certainly are getting a realistic view of the real world.
Of course democrats are just as qualified to teach Writing 121 as republicans are, or socialists for that matter. These numbers aren’t a grand indictment against the University’s faculty. But if you really want to talk about “diversity,” these numbers are just as relevant as Susan Rankin’s. Number are just that, numbers. And numbers alone should be enough to sway someone into believe that the University of Oregon campus fosters racism, rape culture, or sexism. We can leave that up to the “No More Curfew” rallies.
Pete R. Hunt, a senior majoring in journalism, is the Editor-in-Chief
of the Oregon Commentator
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