* The Washington Post examines LAX's alcohol problem:

[Huguely's] lacrosse team has a strict alcohol policy. In 1999, Coach Dom Starsia adopted a rule that allowed players to drink only one night a week, usually Saturdays. A player who broke the rule a single time would be suspended indefinitely. A second offense would result in dismissal from the team.

"Alcohol and lacrosse have gone hand-in-hand since my days at Brown [University] in the 1970s," Starsia told The Washington Post at the time. "Whether it is post-game celebrations or just in general, there was something about the sport and alcohol, and Virginia was no different. I always thought alcohol was an issue here, and it is something we talked about before the season began."

* Also in the Post, Daniel de Vise asks if the tragedy could have been prevented had Huguely's former run-ins with police—including an arrest for threatening in which he threatened to kill a female police officer—been reported to the school:

Following the death of a student, apparently at the hands of another, University of Virginia President John T. Casteen III is asking the obvious questions: what did officials know of George Huguely's past behavior, what should they have known, and might they have somehow prevented the death of Yeardley Love?

Casteen said in a news conference Wednesday that school officials were unaware of Huguely's prior arrest for a drunken and aggressive encounter between the six-foot-two Huguely and a female officer almost a foot shorter in the college town of Lexington, Va. The struggle ended with Huguely Tasered and handcuffed.

In fact, university officials should have known, at least in theory. Huguely should have told them, under a school policy that requires students to report any encounters with police. Huguely evidently didn't follow that policy.

* Vise also suggests that Spodak's alcohol policy may have had unintended consequences:

Some of the measures U-Va. has taken to protect students could have unintended consequences, said Barry Spodak, a national authority on threat assessment. He zeroed in on the decade-old policy that forbids the male lacrosse team, of which Huguely was a member, from drinking more than once a week, with stiff penalties.

Could such a rule have the effect of pushing the drinking underground?

"When formulating rules and policies about student behavior, it's wise to keep in mind whether a proposed policy will inhibit students and staff from reporting worrisome behavior," he said.

* Meanwhile, Christine Brennan for USA Today comes right out and says that "the tragedy could have been prevented," had the UVA Women's Center's proposed anti-violence network been implemented earlier:

Two weeks ago, Claire Kaplan, director of Sexual and Domestic Violence Services at the University of Virginia Women's Center, organized a 2 1/2-hour session for a small group of the school's athletic department staff on a topic that has been vitally important to her for years: the creation of a support network to help student-athletes deal with gender-based violence.

* And Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell, who doesn't have the best track record with women's issues, said in a statement that he's committed to preventing tragedies like this in the future:

"We are reaching out today to President Casteen to arrange a personal meeting with the Governor. The Governor wants to study and fully consider every possible idea that could help prevent such a senseless crime from taking place in the future. He looks forward to hearing the President's insights and thoughts on the issue."

Do you wish that Rihanna and Chris Brown would put aside their differences and resume their abusive relationship already? No? Then you'll hate WPGC's newest concert promotion!

WPGC 99.5, a D.C. hip-hop and R&B station, is currently airing a concert promotion that uses the theme of "bringing Chris and Rihanna back together" in order to get people to listen to the radio.

In truth, the concert is offering up tickets to see Chris Brown in D.C. and Rihanna in London, so WPGC is only bringing Chris Brown and Rihanna within 3600 miles miles of each other, but look! They creepily Photoshopped a picture of them together, so it's almost like the real thing. "95.5 is brining Rihanna and Chris Brown together again... sort of!!" the promotion announces. "win tickets to see Chris Brown in DC and qualify to see Rihanna in concert in London! Everytime you win Chris Brown tickets you qualify!"

And just in case you didn't get that it was a joke about how Chris Brown beat up Rihanna and wouldn't it be great if that was still happening: "Bringing Chris and Rihanna back together—-within legal restraining order limitations of course—-From 955 PGC!!"

I understand that the only thing that might make someone excited to win Chris Brown tickets anymore is the possibility of also winning Rihanna tickets. And hey, I would love to win a couple of free tickets to see Rihanna in London! But this promotion is so offensive, I'm not sure I could really muster the strength to pick up the phone to be the 9th caller here. Who is the target audience for this? People who truly want to watch Chris Brown in concert, travel a few thousand miles to watch Rihanna in concert, and in the meantime think about how awesome it would be if those lovebirds could make it work? Or people who think domestic violence is so totally hilarious, this strange virtual double-billing is worth the joke? Who knows: Maybe Chris Brown's team just wanted people to know that he was back on tour again, since it's not like he can make much news on his own without invoking the shining stardom of the girlfriend he beat up nine times.

So, the cutest viral wedding video of the moment—dare you not to cry!—is this wedding entrance dance staged to Chris Brown's "Forever." Goddamnit!

Full disclosure: I was a shameless "Forever" fan before Brown became super famous for assaulting another super famous person. I still love this track—it's a really great pop song. And fuck, because the unbearable cuteness of this wedding video only helps re-establish Brown as a swoon-worthy romantic authority instead of a guy who beats up his girlfriend.

I can see why some people might experience a little bit of cognitive dissonance watching the adorableness of the video while listening to the musical stylings of a domestic abuser. What I can't understand is why Jive Records would little get upset over this!

Apparently, the record label has taken issue with the use of the song in the widely-circulated video. They should be sending newlyweds Jill and Kevin an autographed Chris Brown headshot; as MTV blogger Tamar Anitai points out, this little piece of publicity is "the most redeeming thing Chris Brown has done in months, albeit indirectly."

Why do women stay in abusive relationships? That's the question Slate's Linda Hirshman poses in her review of the new abuse memoir Crazy Love. Hirshman thinks the question is a "terribly important one" to ask women, and that it is a "mark of respect" to do so.

And yet, Hirshman's question remains a rhetorical in her review of Leslie Morgan Steiner's book—because Hirshman never attempts to answer it. She writes:

In the press kit for Crazy Love, Steiner says it's easy to see why she married someone who choked her on a regular basis. She was, she says, "kind, insecure and desperate for intimacy. … It is not difficult to understand why anyone … could become trapped in an intimate manipulative relationship."

. . . Steiner is wrong: It is difficult to understand why she stayed in this awful relationship, given that she was not risking starvation and had no children with her abuser.

Hirshman's theory isn't an attempt at understanding why a woman would stay. In fact, Hirshman argues, it is that very attempt at understanding that is to blame for the perpetuation of abusive relationships. Hirshman calls this "the soft bigotry of low feminism"—when we try to understand why women stay with their abusers, we stop focusing on empowering women to get out.

Hirshman has a point here. Women are not helpless. They have agency. They can make choices. There are escape routes from abusive relationships, and women can take them. Acknowledging this is not the same as blaming the victim—-it is, however, often the only way to make the abuse stop.

But listen to how Hirshman now rephrases the question. It's not "Why do women stay in abusive relationships?"—it's "Why do women's self-destructive fantasies drown out the warnings that years of old-style feminism have alerted us to?"

Yep, after ticking off the only reasons Hirshman deems rational for staying—it's not money, and it's not kids—she decides to rationalize it for herself in perhaps the most offensive way possible:

The victim stays with the abuser because she likes it! She is living out her fantasy. What's more, she just doesn't listen to those who know better—why, old feminists, of course. What a crazy, stupid victim.

It's telling that Hirshman points only to physical reasons for staying with an abuser (money and children), because throughout, she fails to address that abusive relationships are rarely solely physical affairs. She doesn't mention that abusers employ emotional manipulation and social pressure deliberately and constantly to make sure their victims don't leave. Instead, she points to an 11-year-old girl "who got wind of her impending genital circumcision and walked 25 miles through the Kenyan bush at night to reach a Girls Rescue Center"—a daring physical escape, to be sure.

The escape routes for emotional and psychological abuse are often more difficult to discern. And when you fail to address that, asking a woman why she stays in an abusive relationship isn't a "mark of respect"—it's a mark of condescension.

So, Hirshman reads a book intimately detailing Leslie Morgan Steiner's four-year abusive relationship, puts it down, and writes an essay asking, "What was this woman thinking?" I haven't read Crazy Love, but I assume that's the point—understanding the victim's perspective. Why don't we listen to her?

In the strangest allegation, the suit accuses photo boss Gresham of having "purchased panties with a MPD insignia and provided them to the females in his office." In the most violent, the lawsuit alleges Gresham "hit [Gilkey] on the top of her head with a telephone receiver so hard she bled because [Gilkey] made a disapproving face and mouthed disapproving words when she witnessed Defendant Gresham lying to his wife while he spoke to her on the telephone."

The suit accuses Gresham and the District of Columbia of "sex harassment," creating a "hostile work environment," "intentional infliction of emotional distress," and "retaliation." The District of Columbia is also accused of "negligent training and supervision." The suit alleges that "MPD knew about Defendant Gresham’s proclivities as a sexual predator, was informed of Defendant Gresham’s actions towards Plaintiff, and failed to take appropriate remedial actions against Defendant Gresham." The complaint requests damages for "physical and emotional distress" and asks that Gresham be removed from his post.

Gresham picked up the phone at MPD's photo lab yesterday. When asked about the case, Gresham said he hadn't heard anything about the lawsuit. "I have no comment, and don’t know anything about [the allegations]," Gresham said.

Gilkey's attorney, Ted J. Williams, previously represented MPD employee Tina Hall-Johnson in another sexual harassment case against Gresham and D.C., which the city settled in 2001. When asked about the new case against Gresham, Williams said, "I find it shocking that the Metropolitan Police Department would continue to employ this person, who clearly is a sexual predator and harasser and a wart, knowing what he had done to one employee. Also of concern is they were on notice of the actions of this man, and there is absolutely nothing that we’ve seen to show that they’ve taken any appropriate action."

According to the complaint, Gresham's alleged verbal harassment began shortly after Gilkey was hired on as an MPD lab technician in June of 1994. Gresham, Gilkey's superior, is accused of commenting that Gilkey "had big full breasts" and "walked like she had good pussy." Gilkey also alleges that Gresham told her "he would give her money if she would permit him to lick her pussy" and that "if he gave her his penis she would be wearing a mattress on her back." According to the complaint, Gresham made many of these comments while he "licked his tongue" or "while touching his penis. Gresham is also accused of introducing a “peter meter” in the office, a term the complaint does not explain.

The complaint also accuses Gresham of several instances of physical harassment:

While in the dark room, Defendant Gresham would walk behind the Plaintiff and touch her body with his erect penis. Defendant Gresham on one occasion grabbed the Plaintiff’s breast and told the Plaintiff that if she informed anyone he would make it hard for her. Defendant Gresham repeatedly showed Plaintiff pornographic pictures and pictures of nude women on beaches. Plaintiff informed Defendant Gresham over and over that his actions were unwanted and asked him to stop.

While MPD was investigating Gresham in regards to the Hall-Johnson suit, the complaint reports that "Gresham was detailed out of the MPD Photo Lab for approximately one year." Following the absence, however, the suit states that Gresham returned to work, "where he began his sexual harassment as if he had never left the photo lab."

After reassuming his post, Gresham is accused of continuing his verbal and physical harassment of Gilkey between the years of 2000 and 2006, including exposing Gilkey’s breast, displaying pornography “where one man had his arm up the other man’s ass,” and constantly telling Gilkey “how good she looked and [that] he would do anything to fuck her."

The suit claims that Gilkey reported the abuse to supervisors in 1998 and 2003, as well as during the course of the Hall-Johnson investigation. In both ’98 and ‘03, the suit alleges that supervisors "failed to act on Plaintiff’s complaint and did not either investigate Plaintiff’s complaint, refer Plaintiff to the MPD EEO office or restrain Mr. Gresham in any way."

In response, the suit alleges, the harassment intensified. According to the complaint, Gresham:

created a situation by which Plaintiff’s co-workers would not speak to her or assist her so that she was forced to ask him for assistance. Defendant Gresham would then take advantage of [Gilkey] having to seek assistance from him and would touch her inappropriately or ask her for sex while complying with her request for assistance. He also encouraged Plaintiff’s co-workers to harass her with the ultimate goal of increasing control over Plaintiff and force Plaintiff to have sex with him.

When contacted yesterday, MPD spokesperson Traci Hughes said that the police department "cannot comment on matters that are currently in litigation."