USA Today: Die große Vergewaltigung-an-Unis-Lüge

Americans have been living through an enormously sensationalized college rape hoax, but as the evidence accumulates it's becoming clear that the entire thing was just a bunch of media hype and political opportunism.

No, I'm not talking about the Rolling Stone's lurid and now-exploded fraternity gang-rape story. (...) For months we've been told that there's a burgeoning "epidemic" of rape on college campuses, that the system for dealing with campus rape is "broken" and that we need new federal legislation (of course!) to deal with this disaster. Before the Rolling Stone story imploded, Sens. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., and Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., were citing the Virginia gang rape as evidence of the problem, but now that the story has been exposed as bogus, they're telling us that, regardless of that isolated incident, there's still a huge campus rape problem that needs to be addressed as soon as possible.

And that's the real college rape hoax. Because the truth is that there's no epidemic outbreak of college rape. In fact, rape on college campuses is — like rape everywhere else in America — plummeting in frequency. And that 1-in-5 college rape number you keep hearing in the press? It's thoroughly bogus, too. (...) So why is this non-crisis getting so much press?

It's getting press because it suits the interests of those pushing the story. For Gillibrand and McCaskill, it's a woman-related story that helps boost their status as female senators. It ties in with the "war on women" theme that Democrats have been boosting since 2012, and will presumably roll out once again in 2016 in support of Hillary Clinton, or perhaps Elizabeth Warren. And University of Virginia President Teresa Sullivan hasn't apologized for her action in suspending all fraternities (and sororities) on the basis of a bogus story in Rolling Stone. Nor has she apologized for the mob mentality on campus that saw arrests, vandalism and protests at a fraternity house based, again, on a single bogus report. Instead, she's doubling down on the narrative.

This kind of hysteria may be ugly, but for campus activists and bureaucrats it's a source of power: If there's a "campus rape crisis," that means that we need new rules, bigger budgets, and expanded power and self-importance for all involved, with the added advantage of letting you call your political opponents (or anyone who threatens funding) "pro rape." If we focus on the truth, however — rapidly declining rape rates already, without any particular "crisis" programs in place — then voters, taxpayers, and university trustees will probably decide to invest resources elsewhere. So for politicians and activists, a phony crisis beats no crisis.

At least until people catch on. As George Washington University law professor John Banzhaf notes, "After a while, the boy who cried wolf wasn't believed, and the women who cry rape may likewise not be believed, especially with the accusations of rape at Duke University and the University of Virginia fresh in people's minds."

Even one rape is too many, of course, on or off of campus. But when activists and politicians try to gin up a phony crisis, public trust is likely to be a major casualty. It's almost as if helping actual rape victims is the last thing on these people's minds.

Herzlichen Glückwunsch, liebe Feministinnen! Habt ihr mal wieder TOLL hingekriegt!

Eure größten Feinde sind nicht die bösen Männerrechtler, für die ihr nur Hass und Verachtung übrig habt. Wenn ihr auf die gehört hättet, wäre euch dieses sich immer deutlicher abzeichnende Fiasko erspart geblieben. Eure größten Feinde seid ihr selbst.

Sehr hübsch veranschaulicht das auch ein Artikel einer Frau, die nicht damit klar kommt, dass sie Feministin ist, aber auch Mutter zweier Söhne. (Das ist etwas, was Feministinnen definitiv vermeiden sollten: Wenn man eine Welt bastelt, die die Hölle für Männer ist, kann es seelisch sehr belastend sein, männlichen Nachwuchs zur Welt zu bringen, den man liebt.)

As a mother of two sons, however, here’s what does surprise me: How little attention defendants of civil liberties have paid to what unsubstantiated rape charges can do to the lives of the accused. Even if it turns out that Erdely was dead wrong. Even if "Jackie’s" allegations about Phi Kappa Psi were completely fabricated, there will be an indelible smudge on that fraternity and those young men. And no apology will take that away.

Sure, you can find diatribes on right-wing websites and TV stations that sing this refrain. But among liberals like myself? I’ve listened to colleagues and friends rage endlessly about the male predator crisis on campus.

And I’ve bitten my tongue so hard I’ve practically bled. That’s because even my meekest attempts to question if this anti-date-rape crusade might be spinning into a full-blown hysteria have been gunned down. It’s been made clear that coming out "on the side" of an accused rapist is tone-deaf, misogynistic, and anti-feminist.

(...) In this hyper-sensitized environment, it’s not an unreasonable stretch for me to imagine my own son or one of his friends drinking too much, falling into bed with a young woman who has also drunk too much, and waking up in the morning to discover he’s a "rapist."

(...) I recently shared my concerns with a friend, who is the mother of three teen sons. She responded that women have silently endured the tragic toll of date rape for so long that the pendulum may have to swing in the other direction and hurt some innocent males before we find a balance.

Maybe so. But it won’t mow down my sons as it swings in their direction. I will tell them not to let their passions dictate their actions. I’ll warn them to abstain from alcohol and drugs when mingling with girls. I’ll draw up contracts they can ask potential partners to sign before they engage in sex. Maybe I’ll even ask them to have a witness present. Come to think of it, does anyone know where I can buy a male chastity belt? It just may be the next rage on campus.