* The Daily Beast's Tricia Romano declares Old Spice Guy Isaiah Mustafa a "post-racial commercial genius." Commercial genius? Yes, ladies. Post-racial? Not so much, says Georgetown Girl.

* Liz at THE LINE writes about the problematic social imbalance between fraternities and sororities:

The social structure that we lock into as a sorority is, for lack of a better word, stupid. Here’s how it works: sororities are dry and fraternities are not. This means there is absolutely NO alcohol allowed in the sorority houses. If the fraternities host all the parties, decide who gets to come, and provide all the alcohol, who holds all the power? Frat parties can be fun –my friends and I are even known to take our costumes to the next level. But there is a problem with the structure because it promotes an unbalanced social scene.

* Help Holla Back DC! re-brand itself.

* Milk Nymphos star Lorelei Lee talks to Broadsheet about the importance of keeping her real name private:

While most of the fan mail that I receive is positive, I've also received a number of e-mails that have been pretty frightening. For my own safety, my professional name is the one that I use in every public context. There was never a need for my legal name to be revealed in open court. The prosecutor's claim that using my professional name would give me an "air of legitimacy" was incredibly insulting.

According to the Examiner:

Five out of eight Washington-area universities reported an increase in sexual offenses to the Department of Education from 2007 to 2008. The University of Virginia and Virginia Tech as well as Georgetown, George Mason and Catholic universities reported an increase in sexual assaults—which include rape and any other sexual act against someone's will.

This is how the Examiner crunches that data: "Women are increasingly being victimized on college campuses across the Washington region, with romantic relationships behind most of the assaults, according to the FBI and statistics from local universities."

Nope. It's certainly possible that more women were assaulted at local colleges in 2008 than were in 2007. But equally possible is that more women reported their assaults to authorities. So based on the data, we're really not in a position to either panic or pat ourselves on the back here.

But let's take a closer look at the data. Of the eight schools the Examiner included in its data, five saw their sexual assault report numbers fluctuate by only one assault. At Virginia Tech, reports increased from 3 to 4 assaults. At George Mason, they dropped from 12 to 11. At Catholic, they increased from 1 to 2. At American University, they dropped from 2 to 1. At the George Washington University, they increased from 5 to 6.

Of the three remaining schools, The University of Virginia saw the highest jump in reports—5 to 16. Georgetown saw reports increase from 8 to 10. And at the University of Maryland, reports dropped from 21 to 17.

What do these numbers mean? Absolutely nothing, probably. Unfortunately, the Examiner's go-to campus expert, University of Maryland administrator John Zacker, doesn't help to clarify matters:

He said sexual assault on campus is much higher than data reveals—the number of assault cases ranged from three to 16 in area colleges during 2008, but only 5 percent of victims file a report.

Zacker said students are building higher thresholds for obsessive behavior and waiting longer to report incidents—if they report them at all.

"There are some [victims] that incur this behavior for months without reporting it," he said. He said the invasive nature of campus investigations also deters victims from reporting—especially considering only 10 percent to 25 percent of students found guilty of sexual assault face expulsion, according to a report by the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit research center.

Zackler knows that there are huge barriers to reporting sexual assault on college campuses, so it's disingenuous for him—and the Examiner—to claim that a small fluctuation in the already tiny number of sexual assaults reported on campus has any sort of statistical significance. But even more bizarre is the fact that Zackler is actually arguing against the data's (likely insignificant) trend. If more students reported assaults in 2008 than 2007, where is the evidence that students today are "building higher thresholds for obsessive behavior and waiting longer to report incidents—if they report them at all"? Zackler may have personal knowledge that some victims on his campus have high thresholds for obsessive behavior and wait a long time to report their incidents, if they report them at all. But situating Zackler's observations as a frightening trend without presenting any comparative data is extremely misleading.

A local college student was shot in the ankle over the weekend after she refused to give her phone number to a guy on the street. The student was leaving a party with a group of friends on early Sunday morning when the man shot her for rebuffing his sexual harassment. As she told Fox 5:

He told my cousin that he was gonna shoot at us if i didn't give him my number, and then he started shooting . . . I thought somebody kicked me in my leg, like, it was a lot of us running, so I thought somebody kicked me. I didn't know it was a gunshot.

The bullet is still lodged in her ankle.

Women who are harassed on the street have two options:

1. Be nice. Do what they want. Laugh nervously at their jokes. Surrender your phone number. Endure an increasing amount of sexual harassment. Get labeled a tease when you eventually turn down a date / refuse sex / don't answer the phone call / otherwise fail to please the stranger who is harassing you.

2. Be dismissive. Ignore the stranger's advances. Refuse to surrender your phone number. Tell him you're not interested. Endure an increasing amount of vitriol for turning the guy down. Get labeled a bitch immediately.

Which path do you choose? The college student chose to be dismissive; she got shot. But remember what can happen to you when you choose to be nice: After being stalked and then cornered in an empty Metro parking garage early in the morning, Emily Ruskowski eventually agreed to give the man her phone number. Then he groped her breast and attempted to enter her car.

The bitch-or-tease decision is made necessary by the pervasiveness of casual street harassment that can quickly escalate into a serious threat. I would talk about how easily unwanted sexual advances can turn into angry, violent advances, but in reality, the two scenarios are often indistinguishable from one another. When a man demands the phone number of a woman who is obviously uninterested in him, or when he propositions a lesbian couple that is obviously uninterested in him, or when he reaches out to grope a woman who is obviously uninterested in him, he is just as threatening as the man who intimidates a person into surrendering her wallet, or screams homophobic slurs at a lesbian couple, or exerts physical violence over his victim.

The difference is that the first category of advances is explained away as innocent consequences of a runaway libido and the victims' mixed messages; the second category is recognized as unacceptable violence. Sexual harassment is harassment; sexual assault is assault. If you don't want to contribute to a culture of street harassment the moves a man to shoot a woman who won't go out with him, then don't cat-call, don't ogle, don't ask for a number, don't grab, and don't follow. Stop tasking women with the potentially dangerous decision of how to let a guy down easy.

In the world of sexual assault prevention, the work of University of Massachusetts psychologist David Lisak has gained some serious traction. Lisak has spent the past 20 years studying men who commit acquaintance rapes. In the past year, that work has been dissected by feminist blogs, employed in an investigative report from the Center for Public Integrity, and integrated into the policies of campus safety nonprofit Security On Campus. Being a bit of a fan girl myself, I was happy to discover more from Liak: This CBS news interview in which the researcher talks about the ways in which non-stranger rapists operate, how they're ignored by the criminal justice system, and why these men tell him about the rapes they've committed. Transcript after the jump.

The most common rape is a non-stranger assault where the victim is picked out by the offender at a party, at a bar. The degree of acquaintance between them is usually very, very incidental. It is really just the perpetrator finding a particular individual who they're going to target. And so if they're in a bar, if you've got a predator in a bar, he's not going to look for the most sober individual in the bar. He's going to look for the most intoxicated individual. In fact, he'll look for the individual who is not only intoxicated but seems to be doing outrageous things.

Somehow all we can do is take the statement from the victim, take the statement from the alleged perpetrator, and then throw up our hands because they're saying conflicting things and we don't know how to resolve this. That's not how we investigate other crimes. You know, in almost any other circumstance, if we have an alleged perpetrator, we begin an investigation. And it doesn't end with asking the alleged perpetrator whether or not they did the crime. Rather than taking the report and investigating the alleged offender—which is what we do in virtually every other crime and certainly in violent crimes, that is our approach—and yet somehow that's not the approach that's taken in non-stranger cases.

The reason that this is such a common part of the scenario—the non-stranger assault—is that we know, and I've interviewed these rapists for 20 years and they have told me explicitly, they are predators. They go after victims in those kinds of circumstances, and they look for potential victims who are already somwhat vulnerable. They're going to get her so intoxicated that she might have blackouts, she may be unconscious, she is much more susceptible to all the manipulations you would use. So for example, you get her completely intoxicated and then you say, "You know what? You really shouldn't drive. I'll drive you home." And then, presto! The rapist has her in his car, and the assault can happen whether in his car, his apartment, or wherever, but she's under his control. And that scenario has been described to me so many different times by these non-stranger rapists.

Predators look for vulnerable people, and they prey on vulnerable peope, and if as a criminal justice system, we're going to essentially turn away from any victim who is drinking or any victim who is in some way vulnearble, we're essentially giving a free pass to sexual predators. A lot of these men, especially the serial rapists, are very very narcissistic, there is nothing they enjoy more than to sit down in a room with a guy like me and impress me with all their sexual exploits. And that's how they view them.

Celibacy is probably not a feasible option for most undergraduates, but students at Duke University may want to consider it anyway.  Duke's new rules governing sexual misconduct and coercion are so vague, subjective, presumptive of guilt, and oblivious to the dynamics of consensual sexual relations that they pose a risk of prosecution even for students engaging in innocent foreplay.  Sexual misconduct at Duke includes "inappropriate (or non-consensual) touching," as well as rape; "inappropriate touching" and "acts of a sexual nature" that require clear consent include ("but are not limited to") touching and "attempted touching" of an "unwilling person's" erogenous zones, "either directly or indirectly."

Kaminer continues by stating, "I don't know what constitutes a non-consensual, indirect, attempted touch, but I wouldn't try it at Duke."

Really? Surely Kaminer, an extremely accomplished lawyer, can manage to understand three different legal concepts at one time. Touching a person in a sexual manner without that person's consent is sexual assault. And if you touch that person sexually with something other than your hand, it's still sexual assault. And if you try to touch that person sexually with something other than your hand, it's attempted sexual assault.

After all, it's not as if Duke just pulled the terms of its "non-consensual touching" rule out of its erogenous zone. The full Duke rule against inappropriate touching defines it as the "touching or attempted touching of an unwilling person's breasts, buttocks, inner thighs, groin, or genitalia, either directly or indirectly." The Duke rule is eerily similar to the standard applied to everyday citizens in jurisdictions across the country. In D.C., for example, "misdemeanor sexual abuse" is defined as engaging "in a sexual act or sexual contact with another person . . .  without that other person's permission," where "sexual contact" is "the touching with any clothed or unclothed body part or any object, either directly or through the clothing, of the genitalia, anus, groin, breast, inner thigh, or buttocks of any person."

It's possible that Kaminer, a career legal expert, is unaware that groping exists, and that it is not legal. But I suspect that what's really going on here is that Kaminer is reluctant to recognize this very real, very much illegal form of sexual assault because of where it takes place—college.

In the United States, the cultural narrative surrounding a college student's sexual experience tends to by extremely hypersexualized. It's not just that undergraduates are assumed to be promiscuous—it's also that the sexuality of college students is presented as "out of control" and "gone wild." The subtext here is that when people choose to pursue an undergraduate degree, they must also necessarily abandon their autonomy over their bodies and their right to choose their own sexual experiences. Underlining these assumptions is a deeply warped attitude toward sex: Because many college students choose to have sex—and sometimes, lots of it—we deny them to right to ever choose not to do it.

Because we hypersexualize college students in this way, we tolerate sexual assaults on college campuses that we would never tolerate in other communities—in the workplace, in public spaces, in society at large. As I noted earlier, the non-consensual, indirect, attempted touches that Kaminer is so confused about are illegal in most places. And when those types of crimes are committed within certain communities, they also constitute sexual discrimination. Thanks to Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 and Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, such discrimination is outlawed in education and employment, respectively. Despite these parallel protections, I suspect that college sexual assault skeptics like Kaminer would be less eager to discredit a workplace sexual harassment policy that prohibits employees from sexually assaulting their co-workers at work functions.

Meanwhile, as long as a sexual assailant attends the same university as his or her victims, Kaminer is fit to explain away illegal groping as "innocent" and "well-meaning," dismiss victims as "self-proclaimed," and determine sexual coercion to be "imagined." Administrators who are interested in protecting college students against sexual assault are ridiculed as "virginal," furthering the idea that college students must either embrace a climate of non-consensual sex or abstain entirely. Kaminer then goes on to argue that college students who prefer their sex to be entirely consensual have no place in the university setting at all: "Intellectual debate cannot thrive, individual liberty cannot survive, and 'healthy sexual relationships' cannot develop in a university that seeks to eradicate 'personal affronts,'" she writes. In short, if you can't stand a little groping, perhaps higher education is not the place for you. If that's not educational discrimination, what is?

After a week of national media coverage over a column by Alex Knepper casting doubt on the existence of date rape, American University student newspaper The Eagle has devoted its home page to serious discussions of the problem of rape on campus. In one story, the paper discusses proposed changes to the school's sexual assault policy; in another, an anonymous victim of campus rape shares her story. Has the campus conversation at AU progressed from these widely-publicized accusations of "rape apology"? Let's go to the comments!

In response to news that the school's new sexual assault policy would clarify definitions of terms invoked to describe sexual assault, and would "differentiate between the charges students receive for different types of sexual assault," commenters complained:

Everything was better in the '60s:

Men are tired of 5 decades of women telling us what we say is unacceptable. We will say what we will, when we will, in the manner that we so chose.

What you believe we should say, how we should say it, or the way we should say it, is of no importance.

If you do not like the way in which we state our opinions, then too bad.

The law is so inconvenient:

What the hell is the school doing keeping records on students for sexual assault? Isn’t that the job of the police?

The first boy who gets falsely accused (it will happen with people like Gail Hanson in charge) should sue AU into the dirt. Furthermore, the false accuser should be expelled forthwith.

This fragile imagery will not stand:

Get the fuck over yourselves and your fragile imagery of women, its embarrassing and you give women everywhere a bad name.

This guy figured it out, everybody!

I have a way to prevent rape. How about all of yall stop sluttin it out and wait until you are married to have sex. Have a blessed day.

Token completely nonsensical comment:

How about AU gets it’s own abortionist? Problem solved.

This article about sexual assault on campus sounds like a great opportunity for me to make a rape joke:

What about girl on girl date rape?  It’s a serious issue.  I would know.  I frequently date rape other chicks.

Shut up. They like it.

Wait, someone else had the exact same idea!

This guy in my class raped me in my dream. Can I press charges?  I’m pretty sure Women’s Initiative would approve of that idea.

Did you know that preventing rape hurts women?

We need to prevent rape.  Here’s how we do it.  We need to protect girls because they are fragile and men are evil.  So here is what we will do.  We will petition the university for a new rule that says girls can’t leave their dorm rooms after 5 PM.  If they must leave, they shall be escorted by campus security.  If any man comes within 50 feet, he will be tasered on the spot.  DOWN WITH EVIL MAN-RAPISTS!

Rape victims are huge whiners:

The same thing happened to me my freshman year at a frat party.  But I am not going around claiming “rape” and trying to get sympathy.  If the girl and the guy are both drunk, the girl does not get to claim “rape”.

Unless you say “No”, “Stop”, “Get off me” or something to the likes, then it isn’t rape.  Two drunk people having sex and later regretting it does not equal rape.  It’s called a mistake.

Policies meant to prevent rape are so immature!:

People will act in their own self-interest. As a mature and educated person, one ought to expect other people to act in their own self-interest. If a drunk guy spots a drunk girl and the drunk girl is coming onto him, he is going to attempt to have sex with her. This is not rape. It is human nature.

Rape is just one big misunderstanding:

Guys can’t read girls’ minds.  Many drunk girls come to frat parties wanting to get drunk and hook up.  How can we tell which drunk girls are wanting to hook up and which drunk girls are not wanting to hook up if both sets of girls are acting the same way?  Unless the girl tells me that she doesn’t want to have sex, I am going to assume that her come-ons are genuine and she wants to have sex.  And I will pursue sex unless she tells me to stop.  How am I supposed to know what she wants unless she tells me?

Just like drinking and driving causes dangerous accidents, so too does drinking and partying with frat boys.  I’m sure people who drink and drive do not intend on crashing their cars, but they still do because they made the stupid decision to drink and drive.  They knew that alcohol affected their judgement yet they still chose to drive.  And they deserve to die in car crashes.  Have a sense of self-responsibility and stop blaming others for your mistakes.  The guy was probably just as drunk as you.  You knew drinking would effect your judgement.  And you still chose to get shitfaced.  You brought this on yourself.  I do not feel sorry for you one bit.  Hopefully you learned something from your mistake.  But as evidenced by it happening to you again, I guess you didn’t.  It will probably happen to you again and again until you learn some self-responsibility.

Plenty of anti-rape AU students are also making their voices heard on this thread. To the haters, I have to ask: What is so threatening about a policy revision that would make the school's sexual assault policy easier for students to understand?

This week: How to erase your relationship doubts by conforming to stilted gender roles; Buster Darkhole is MIA; college students are getting relationship inspiration from The First Wives Club soundtrack. This time with feeling:

UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND: Girls must be girls.

Sex Tips: In a post-Valentines entry, UMD Diamondback advice columnist Esti Frischling administers a remedy to a female student who is concerned that her new beau is getting a bit too sweet on her (his super-serious Valentine's Day plans "freaked [her] out." Frischling's advice: In order to foster romance, ignore your obvious incompatibility, shelve your feelings, and stick to reinforcing traditional gender roles. "To be honest, I very rarely hear of girls complaining about getting too much attention," Frischling writes. "What is appealing about all these niceties and cutenesses, though, is it means someone cares about you. . . .  Perhaps it’s best not to say anything about how you don’t approve of his Valentine’s Day efforts. Instead, slow things down in other ways that won’t reveal to him how picky and alternative you are. If Hallmark has taught us anything, it’s that no one wants those things in a girl."

Life Lesson: A man doesn't like a complicated woman. Who cares if you don't even like him, either? "However you choose to handle it, don’t make him feel bad or insecure about trying to do nice things for you," Frischling writes. "It’s completely understandable that at this time it was too much for you, but unless you want to scare him away, just let it go."

Progressive Meter: And there's nothing worse than scaring away a guy who freaks you out, amirite ladies? :(

AMERICAN UNIVERSITY: Sex columnists are MIA.

Sex Tips: None. The AU Eagle's trio of pseudonymned sex writers—Buster Darkhole, Maxwell Hillcrest, and Amber Sparkles haven't churned out a column since "Stereotypes a Problem for Lesbian Community," a piece which caused some problems for the lesbian community on campus, actually. (A sampling: “Many try and divulge the deep mystery that is lesbian sex. However, this is often met with much difficulty. Lesbians, being quite secretive, rarely give out the methods they use for sex, but we have done the research for you and found out some interesting facts.”)

Life Lesson: Sometimes better to burn out than to fade away. The "AU Threesome" started off their sex-writing careers with a vaguely non-consensual bang back in September, and they've kept up the controversy since—until they fell off the Eagle's map three-and-a-half months ago.

Progressive Meter: This one gets a big frowny face, because I miss these kids. :(

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY: Bette Midler is on the soundtrack to our lives.

Sex Tips: In Hoya "Rounding the Bases" columnist Colleen Leahey's latest, undergrads are advised to avoid festering in "pseudo-relationships" that lie in the gray area between hooking up and exchanging Varsity letterman jackets. Leahey sketches the scene: "After many weeks (sometimes even months) of being together, you and your partner have yet to go on a real date. Many nights, your special friend has a bit too much Burnett’s and passes out, leaving your texts annoyingly unanswered. But when you’re together, everything is perfect. Suddenly, the good outweighs the bad. This, my friends, is another—and the most common for college students—example of when you should leave. Your optimism, hoping to make something good out of a total train wreck, is causing you to trap yourself in an unhealthy relationship. Stay too long and you will end up feeling insecure and unhappy."

Life Lesson: If you suspect that Leahey is writing from a bit of an old-school perspective—beware the Dangers Of Hook-Up culture!— here's some more evidence: "Eventually, you will realize how much happier you are. As great as consistency is, enjoying you’re freedom is so much more fulfilling. And if you’re ever feeling really down, take a tip from my friends and I: Blast The First Wives Club version of 'You Don’t Own Me.' Trust me, you’ll be basking in the golden rays of your newfound singledom before you know it."

Progressive Meter: The First Wives Club is a film about three sassy, middle-aged divorcees who exact revenge on their ex-husbands after they are all discarded for younger women. Is it just me, or is it kind of freaky that a sex column for young people is gleaning relationship inspiration from a movie about cliched, messy divorces caused by hopelessly cliched young women? :-|

In many cases, however, students found responsible for sexual assault through the college judicial process are administered little more than a slap on the wrist, leaving victims to continue pursuing their education in close proximity to their assailants—or drop out.

CPI's examination of sexual assault data found that, in colleges across the country, expulsion was a rare punishment for even the most serious of cases:

As much as 75 to 90 percent of total disciplinary actions doled out by schools that report statistics to the Justice Department’s Office on Violence Against Women amounted to minor sanctions, although it’s unclear from the data what the nature of the “sexual assault” offenses were. Among those modest sanctions: reprimands, counseling, suspensions, and community service. The most common sanctioning reflected what the data calls “other” restrictions—alcohol treatment, for example, or social probation. Interviews and records in these cases show that other minor penalties include orders that perpetrators write a letter of apology, or make a presentation to a campus advocacy group, or write a research paper on sexual violence. Administrators note that they sometimes issue multiple sanctions. For instance, they may require a no-contact order, a housing ban, and classes on sexual consent. By contrast, the database shows that colleges rarely expel culpable students in these cases—even though the Justice Department encourages its campus grant recipients to train judicial panels to hand down “appropriate sanctions, such as expulsion.”

For many victims, of course, receiving a letter of apology from their rapists does not help to restore their lives or alleviate the hostile environment caused by attending classes with, living close to, and running in social circles with their attackers. These minor punishments also fail to satisfy the third requirement of Title IX: Preventing the future occurrence of sexual assault.

Indiana University, which CPI notes has "expelled only one of 12 students found responsible for alleged sexual assaults in the past four years," explains that “our basic philosophy is not to expel.” Instead, the university offers what CPI characterizes as "teaching moments."

One IU student who was found responsible for "sexual assault (power differential)" was administered a short suspension during the university's summer term, a period when few students even stay on campus or enroll in classes. According to his victim, the student had seen her crying and drunk in the hallway, followed her into her dorm room, and forced sex on her as she passed in and out of consciousness. According to the CPI report, IU did not see this student as a threat to other women on campus. "The university will kick out a student believed to be a threat," CPI reports. But according to Indiana University officials, 'that does not mean that every single person found responsible for sexual assault gets expelled. They’re not all predators.'" The victim ended up dropping out of school.

CPI has uncovered several stories that follow that same narrative. A junior at Bowdoin College "reported being raped by a baseball player in her dorm after an alcohol-soaked party." The player, who was found responsible for the "charge of sexual assault," received a social suspension, but was still allowed to play attend home games; the victim transferred schools. A Penn State student reported being raped by a classmate in an off-campus apartment. Her assailant, who was found responsible for "nonconsensual oral sex" and "nonconsensual intercourse," had his degree delayed for one year; the victim dropped out and transferred, but not before swallowing "'a big handful' of sleeping pills."

Universities that don't choose to expel rapists from campus operate under the assumption that these students won't assault again. Research has disproved that assumption:

But critics say that attitude fails to recognize a disturbing reality about campus rape: Many incidents go beyond “miscommunication” among two drunk students—a common characterization among school officials—to predatory acts. Lisak, the U-Mass professor, has studied what he terms “undetected rapists” on college campuses. His research suggests that over half of student rapists are likely repeat offenders who rape an average of six times. Yet administrators, Lisak observes, “think of serial rapists as the guy who wears a ski mask and jumps out of the bushes.”

“Schools that overlook this paradigm are failing their female students,” charges Bruno, of the Victim Rights Law Center, referring to Lisak’s research. “Giving someone a deferred suspension is like giving someone carte blanche to do it again.”

After the Indiana University victim the judicial process, she received an e-mail from another woman who also lived in the IU dorms. The same student who had cornered her while drunk and crying, the woman wrote, "has come into my room on two occasions and forced himself upon me." In an appeal, the IU victim forwarded the woman's ominously similar claims on to officials. According to CPI, "Indiana University officials did not factor her claims into sanctioning."

According to a George Washington University crime alert sent out today:

On the evening of Tuesday, Feb. 16, 2010, GWPD received a report of a forcible fondling that occurred in Gelman Library on Sunday, Feb. 14, 2010, at approximately 11:30pm. The victim reported that she was assisting the suspect when he unexpectedly put his hands down her pants and up her shirt. The victim pulled away and fled the area and the suspect left the library.

SUBJECT DESCRIPTION: Black male, 6' 3"- 6' 7", 265 lbs., 35 to 45 years old, wearing a white sweater.

And those are just the sexual assaults that make the crime alerts and campus papers. According to the G.W. University Police Department crime log, which keeps a record of all illegal activity reported to campus police, the "forcible fondling" was the second sex abuse case reported to police this month (the other occurred off-campus). In January, the crime log recorded three incidents of indecent exposure (all likely related to the mountain biker), and one case of on-campus stalking. In December, another indecent exposure suspect was barred from campus. In November, a peeping tom case was closed without identifying a suspect; a sex abuse case in Mitchell Hall was referred to MPD. In October, a case of voyeurism was referred to Student Judicial Services. In September, the log recorded two cases of on-campus sex abuse. In August, it recorded two cases of off-campus sex abuse. That doesn't count sex-related crimes that are coded as harassment, assault, or "lewd acts"—or crimes that are never reported to campus police at all. We've still got three months left before the school year's over.

When it comes to college sexual assault, I have always been quick to point out that the media has a tendency to sensationalize sexual assaults committed by strangers while ignoring the underreported problem of campus acquaintance rape. But it's worth noting that even the rarer stranger assault cases are a fairly regular fixture on a college campus.

Following the assault, Montgomery College rolled out a comprehensive administrative response across its three campuses. The Takoma Park campus immediately went into a two-hour lock-down. Campus police reviewed video surveillance of the performing arts center, where they identified the man who was later charged in the attack—a former Montgomery College student and one-time student tutor. Administrators reached out to faculty and staff to help facilitate conversations with students. The school sent out multiple campus-wide messages alerting students to the university's response, reminding them of campus counseling services, and inviting comments from students.

But let's focus for a minute on one Montgomery College administrator's public reaction to the attack. Two days after the assault, Dr. Clemmie Solomon, Takoma Park/ Silver Spring Dean of Student Development, sent a campus-wide e-mail reminding students of their responsibility to take charge of their own safety on campus.

The e-mail read:

On Tuesday, January 26, 2010, one of our Takoma Park/ Silver Spring students was sexually assaulted in the bathroom of the Performing Arts Center on the Takoma Park/Silver Spring Campus. The suspect was apprehended by the Montgomery County Police Department a few hours later. Please keep the victim of this heinous crime in your thoughts and prayers.

This unfortunate event reminds us all of the importance of remaining vigilant when it comes to safety. Accordingly, I seek your support in efforts to promote a safe and secure environment. Safety is everyone’s business and it requires each of us to play a part. I want to share steps that each of us can take to try and minimize risk, but remember that some of the best security measures are those you create for yourself. Make them part of your daily routine.

Solomon's tips included:

* Keep an eye out for anyone who is loitering or hanging around campus.

* Be aware of your surroundings. For example: As you walk to your car check to see if someone is around or near your car as you walk up to it; have your keys ready.

* Get into your vehicle quickly and confidently.

* Travel in groups, especially after dark.

When Montgomery College student Rebecca Levy received Solomon's e-mail, she was perplexed by these vague new security measures. After all, the campus rape victim had been assaulted in the middle of the day, in an on-campus facility where any student should have a reasonable expectation of safety. How could entering her car with confidence have prevented her being targeted in a women's bathroom? How could walking in groups at night have prevented this afternoon assault? And how could noting campus loiterers have singled out a potential rapist on a college campus teeming with "loitering" students?

Levy fired off an e-mail to Solomon. "The onus is not on women to prevent being raped, but your e-mail suggests otherwise," she wrote. "Your common-sense safety recommendations are an insult not only to the survivor of Tuesday's assault but all women and all survivors, who are generally only guilty of such crimes against safety as daring to use a women's restroom at the college we pay to attend." Levy, who informed Solomon that she has "several years of experience doing workshops on this very topic at schools, conferences, and women's groups," then offered to share her war chest of local sexual assault resources with the dean. "Rape is widely accepted as being a hate crime, and I wish the school would treat it as such," she concluded.

Solomon wrote back:

Thank you for your email regarding the assault on the Takoma Park/Silver Spring campus. Your feedback is appreciated.

The safety recommendations outlined in my memorandum to Montgomery College students were designed to provide general safety tips for our college community. These recommendations are widely accepted as good crime prevention measures for students on college campuses.

Montgomery College is continuing its efforts to make the college a safe and secure learning environment.

So Levy stepped up her criticisms of Solomon's original missive:

Publicly responding to a rape with general safety recommendations ignores the status of rape as a hate crime. It also is victim-blaming, because it suggests that by complying with any of the recommendations (which vary in uselessness from getting into a car "confidently" to being wary of people "loitering" on campus which is practically the school sport) one can avoid being raped. I am not satisfied with your response and maintain that it is an insult to women and all survivors of sexual assault. That is unacceptable.

Questions I would like to ask Dean Solomon:  How will entering my car with confidence prevent me from being raped in my school's women's bathroom? Are women who urinate on campus failing to take responsibility for the entire campus's safety? Do you ever walk alone at night on campus?  How do you think the victim of last week's crime might grade the effectiveness of your general safety tips?

Unfortunately, Solomon didn't respond directly to my request for comment (or to Levy's last e-mail). Montgomery College Associate Communications Director Elizabeth S. Homan did call to say that Solomon's e-mail was written in response to student demand for safety advice in the wake of the assault. Homan also noted that, in addition to its various immediate responses to the assault, Montgomery College is currently planning additional campus programming aimed at identifying and dealing with the problem of sexual assault.

The question remains, though: Was Solomon's general safety advice an appropriate component of a school's response to a campus sexual assault? For a professional opinion, I turned to Sarah Martino, communications coordinator for campus sexual assault watchdog SAFER Campus. "It is definitely not a surprising response, but it is not an appropriate one either," says Martino. "A lot of schools offer really, really general safety information in terms of how to keep yourself safe from a 'predator,' but they're really not addressing the fact that if you're assaulted on campus, the perpetrator is likely a peer . . . and campus rape generally does happen in places where you’re supposed to feel safe—in a dorm room or in this case, a campus academic building."

Martino says that staging community conversations surrounding sexual assault—like the one Homan notes are in the works—can have an extremely positive effect on a campus reeling from a high-profile sexual assault. Telling students to always watch their back while on campus? Not so much. "It's incredibly harmful to act as if students are doing something wrong by just walking around," Martino says. "That’s really disheartening, and I wish we didn’t hear it more often."

The battle for ideological dominance in our nation’s capital’s collegiate sex columns continues. Are our local campus columnists on the forefront of radical sex writing, or are they bringing back the good-old-days of referring to all former sex partners as  "trash"?

This week: How to "recycle" last week's "human trash," in the bedroom; how getting waaaaaasted will help you get into her pants; why you should never approach the person you're fucking in public.

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY:

Sex Tip: Georgetown Hoya relationship columnist Colleen Leahey goes green this week by applying the three R's to drunken GW hook-ups. In short: Your previous sex partners are "trash." Having sex with a casual hook-up twice means you're "recycling." "Human recycling is rather different from rocking your older sibling’s hand-me-downs," Leahey writes. "It typically involves alcohol, bad judgment and a late-night phone call. However, it happens on college campuses—all the time. So, is there some sort of benefit to this practice, or should an old hook-up be thrown in the trash, never to be touched again?"

Life Lesson: Sex makes everybody feel worthless. "Next time you see your random hook-up out, think about the repercussions of what you’re about to do," Leahey writes. "Weigh the pros and cons of your situation; if it seems worth it, then feel free to recycle one more time. But do remember, you could wake up the next morning feeling like a piece of trash yourself."

Progressive Meter: Even environmentalists are vulnerable to the conservative idea that having sex destroys every boy and girl's precious reserve of purity. ZERO.

—

THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND:

Sex Tip: Seal the deal while she's drunk. UMD Diamondback advice columnist Esti Frischling returns from winter break to dole out advice on how to hook up with the girl you had your eye on last semester. Whatever you do, make sure she's not sober: "You didn’t man up and have your way with her when you had the chance, and now you’re just a loser with some number in your phone," Frischling writes. "The next time this happens, you have to capitalize on her tipsy advances."

Life Lesson: COLLLLEEEEGGGGGE! "I wouldn’t go straight to the sober, daytime date just yet. That’s a serious recipe for disaster. . .  you might not be drunk at that time during the day, meaning you’ll be less confident and she’ll be less attractive," Frischling writes. "I think you should meet her where you’re both most comfortable: drunk at a bar. You also don’t want to be stuck alone with her when everything goes to shit, you realize you have nothing to talk about, and you’re both terrible dancers."

Progressive Meter: Buhh. DRUNK.

—

HOWARD UNIVERSITY:

Sex Tip: This time in the Howard University Hilltop's "He Said . . . She Said" column, the He and She team up to warn undergrads against becoming somebody's "boo." According to the Hilltop, "boo" really stands for "Boy Other Option" or "Broad Other Option," depending upon the gender of the "side jawn" in question. How to be a good boo: "Don’t spend all your money, don’t ask a bunch of questions, don’t expect to meet their friends, don’t go physically farther than your emotions will allow, and never try to come up to them when they’re with another person."

Life Lesson: Boos can graduate to boyfriends and girlfriends—if they know their role. "We’re young and many of us have lots of options to choose from when it comes to being in a relationship—especially the guys on campus—so I can’t blame them for testing the waters before jumping into commitment," they write. "But the key to being a good boyfriend/girlfriend is first being a good B.O.O. Play by the rules folks, and you will win."

Progressive Meter: Some aspects of boo behavior show a respect for your sex partner's autonomy—a willingness to allow some physical and emotional distance "before jumping into commitment." Other characteristics of the boo appear to be an entrée into an abusive relationship. Never try to come up to them when they're with another person! THREE.

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

Welcome back from Winter Break, sexually active college students (and old people wondering what those darned kids are up to these days)! The battle for ideological dominance in our nation’s capital’s collegiate sex columns continues. Are our local campus columnists on the forefront of radical sex writing, or are they bringing back the good old days of pretending that sexual orientation is just a "phase."

This week: When you're fucking a guy named "Dirty Jersey," and he doesn't want to wear a condom; how to stop being friends and start getting laid; is bisexuality the new black?

HOWARD UNIVERSITY:

Sex Tips: in "Is Bisexuality the New Black?", Aaron Randol surveys Howard University students about this crazy new "trend." "Is college a catalyst for bisexual behavior? And if so, does this mean bisexuality is nothing more than a trend, the new black?" Randol writes. "The notion that bisexuality in college is just a trend proves controversial for[one bisexual man]; as he, like many others, have had feelings towards both sexes before college."

Life Lessons: One of Randol's classmates describes the campus male bisexuality epidemic: "I am positive more guys at Howard than girls are trying bisexuality. Less than 5 percent of the girls that I know of here are trying or have tried it, but I’d say 50 percent of my guy friends have tried. I don’t know if it’s Howard or if it’s how people are leaning in general. But it seems like here, 1 in 3 guys are gay or bisexual. It’s not even weird to hear a guy is gay or bisexual at Howard any more.”

Progressive Meter: After setting up the trendy bisexual straw man argument, Randol is ready to smack down that particular theory. Let's hear it, Randol! "So is bisexuality the new black, nothing more than a trend, a staple on the public scene?" he concludes: "Maybe not." Bleh. ZERO.

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY:

Sex Tips: Georgetown Hoya dating columnist Colleen Leahey reflects on the Swiftian nature of her romantic life. Taylor Swiftian."The entire situation was straight out of a silly Taylor Swift song: I had a thing for my best guy friend. While he dated various girls, I put myself in the friend zone, giving him advice and being there when he needed to vent to someone," she writes. "Secretly, though, I was hoping he would realize that I was the one he truly liked."

Life Lessons: Refreshingly, Leahey combats this trademark Swiftian passivity by advising unrequited lovers how to step up and do something about it. "So, this new year, if you’re finally ready to admit to your inner desires, then do be more aggressive with your feelings," she writes. "Go with your impulse; if you think there’s a spark and it’s not one-sided, make a move. . . . Don’t overanalyze or freak your friend out, but you do have to make a slight effort if you want something to actually happen (unless you’re trying to be the next victim of the T. Swift syndrome)."

Progressive Meter: Slight effort! What can I say, I'm a sucker for refusing to fall victim to the T. Swift Syndrome. SEVEN.

GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY

Sex Tips: Hatchet sex columnist Layla admits she's done it without a condom—with a guy she calls "Dirty Jersey." "Since [the first night we had sex], despite his protests, I insisted on a condom every time like I knew I should," Layla writes. But that didn't last: "Somewhere during the next five or six times we had sex, my resolve dissolved. I went from being adamant about using protection, to making Dirty Jersey pull out to get a condom, to finally staying quiet about it. Part of me hoped that he would catch on to my desire to use a condom, but he never did. To be perfectly honest, it felt amazing without it and it was just as much my fault as it was his."

Life Lessons: Fuck that guy! "I may be guilty of condom-use abuse in the past, but now, I am most definitely reformed," Layla writes. "It also helps that I'm not dating Dirty Jersey anymore."

Progressive Meter: What does strapping on a rubber say about your politics? According to Margaret Talbot's "Red Sex, Blue Sex," teen pregnancy is higher and condom use lower in this country's red states. So we'll count this prophylactic flip-flopper as a moderate. Feminist bonus: She ditched a guy who clearly didn't give a shit about what she wanted in the bedroom. Too bad she softens that with a healthy dose of self-blame.  FIVE.

photo via nerdcoregirl, Creative Commons Attribution License 2.0

The George Washington University came out number one . . . in attempts to force kissing and fondling without consent!

According to the results of the survey, which was conducted through Facebook over the past year, GWU is the second-most unsafe school for women of the ten schools surveyed, with 43 percent of female respondents claiming that they had personally experienced (or knew someone who had experienced) sexual harassment or sexual assault. Harvard was rated the most unsafe at 45 percent.

Here are some depressing statistics about old GWU (full disclosure, it's my alma mater): Eighteen percent of women at GWU claimed to have personally experienced "attempts to force kissing or fondling without consent," the highest percentage across the ten campuses. Three percent of G.W.'s female respondents claimed to have been the victim of "actual forced sex," tying with the University of Minnesota, the University of Nebraska, and the University of Florida for the highest percentage of reported rapes. GWU also ranked first in the percentage of female respondents who "personally knew a victim" of an attempted rape, at 24 percent.

While GWU took the dubious top honors in many of these terrible categories, I'm afraid that many of the campuses which came out looking better may actually be worse off for women. Three schools—the University of Washington, Texas A&M, and Harvard University—repeatedly showed up in the "Best" column in the Campus Tolerance survey, meaning that its undergraduate respondents reported low rates of sexual harassment and assault among themselves and their friends. While 24 percent of GW students reported to have known a victim of attempted rape, only 10 percent of students at Texas A&M could say the same thing. And while 18 percent of GW students reported being kissed or fondled against their will, only 3 percent of University of Washington students reported being subjected to that.

Of course, on college campuses, a sexual assault problem and an under-reporting problem often go hand-in-hand. Do University of Washington students really keep their hands to themselves, or are those students less likely to recognize an ass grab as fondling against their will? Does George Washington have one of the highest rates of attempted rapes in the country, or are rape victims more likely to talk about their experiences there?

It's hard to say. But in media reports, GWU has often come off as hotbed of college-aged sexual assault. According to Laura Sessions Stepp, the highly-publicized term "gray rape"—and the accompanying hysteria over the new youth "hook-up culture"—originated from her conversations with GW students. This year, GW experienced a pretty high-profile instance of mass dorm fondling. The incident led some on campus to blame the victims, but the public narrative about the attack also reinforced the idea that touching and kissing without consent is a serious crime.

I can't say with any certainty whether sexual assault is more prevalent at GW than at other college campuses. But I do know that in recent years, some GW students have been willing to participate in a very public dialog about campus sexual assault. Some of them have even been willing to put intimate details of their young sex lives up to the scrutiny of aging media experts (see: LSS' tome inspired by GW's sex life, Unhooked). GW should be criticized for any of its failures to adequately address sexual assault on campus. But it shouldn't be branded the "Worst" simply because its students are engaged in the conversation. The Campus Tolerance study, unfortunately, can't make any serious distinction between the two.

The battle for ideological dominance in our nation’s capital’s collegiate sex columns continues. Are our local campus columnists on the forefront of radical sex writing, or are they bringing back the good old days of ice cream sundaes, hand-holding, and offensive lesbian stereotypes?

This week: When fuck-buddies stop fucking; exploring the "mystery" of lesbian sex; parsing the appeal of the "holiday honey."

THE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY

Sex Tips: GWU Hatchet sex columnist Layla is breaking up with her fuck-buddy, "007." The new development helps Layla realize that sex with 007 was just filling another void. "Amidst flashbacks of all of the ways he could make me shiver, I realized that 007 and I tend to fall back into our pattern of hooking up when we're trying to get over particularly bad breakups," she writes. "After a messy breakup, it was always easy to go from innocently hanging out with 007 in his basement, to going down on him."

Life Lesson: Fucking is not as powerful as Facebook. "One of my friends says the best way to get over a guy is to get under a new one . . . At the end of the day, however, the feeling of 007's hands all over me didn't entirely replace the tactile memories I had formed of hookups with my ex," she writes. "I still had to get over my ex using the tried-and-true method of time and patience, not to mention hiding his updates on my Facebook news feed."

Progressive Meter: Layla has sex with dudes she has no interest in dating, and they're both adults about it. Great! I just hope 007 was going down on you, too. Seven.

AMERICAN UNIVERSITY

Sex Tips: This time around, AU's anonymous threesome employs a fourth wheel, Beaver McRugmuncher, to help the trio deal with the subject of—guess!—"the phenomena of lesbians." Yes! I have been waiting all semester to hear Buster Darkhole's theories on lesbians! Go on: "Many try and divulge the deep mystery that is lesbian sex. However, this is often met with much difficulty. Lesbians, being quite secretive, rarely give out the methods they use for sex, but we have done the research for you and found out some interesting facts," they write. "Everyone inevitably thinks of scissoring when they think of lesbians. However, from what we have heard, lesbians do not actually do this."

Life Lesson: "Rule number one: don’t piss off a lesbian. They are naturally born with the ability to kick your ass." Umm . . . too late!

Progressive Meter: Let's see here. We're debunking some stereotypes (lesbians rush into relationships) while creating some others (lesbians will "kick your ass"). We're erasing some common fantasies ("everyone inevitably thinks of scissoring when they think of lesbians") and replacing them with some . . . less-common ones (lesbian sex "is like a Jell-O shot: first, you get your finger in to loosen it up, then place your mouth around it to get at the goods.") At the same time, we're reminding everyone that "lesbians are more than just Jell-O shots at parties." Color me confused! Two points. I guess.

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

Sex Tips: Hoya sex columnist Colleen Leahey introduces me to a couple of new relationship terms: "Holiday Honey" and "DFMO." Leahey got "Holiday Honey" from her mom: "My mom began using it several years ago, when my older sister was a freshman in college. Every break (Columbus Day, Thanksgiving, Winter, et cetera), Kelly and her high school boyfriend would rekindle their flame for several days, then let it fizzle when they returned to their respective schools." God knows where DFMO came from, but it stands for "Dance-floor make-out." According to Urban Dictionary: "Most of the time a DFMO is voluntary, but they can also occur when a drunkard grabs your face and starts making sweet sweet love to it."

Life Lessons: Holiday Honeys "knew you before you went to keggers and made out on the dance floor with several other partygoers in a night. They evoke a general innocence in you, a quality that can seem lost in the throes of chaotic college events. When with them, you’re reminded of corsages, ice cream dates and movies you never actually watched," Leahey writes. "The nostalgia associated with an old flame is extremely comforting."

Progressive Meter: Side-note: I think name-checking your mom in a sex column is really sweet. Too bad she's invoked to make the argument that relationships were so much better in the good old days of the 1950's high school. Four.

Photo by State Library of Queenstown, Australia

The fight for ideological dominance of D.C.’s college sex column “movement” rages on. Are our local campus columnists on the forefront of radical sex writing, or are they bringing back the good old days of valiant male chivalry—only drunker? This week: G.W. student fucks Marine; UMD students are bitches, dicks, or pussies; American University issues a Very Special sex column. It must be sweeps week:

GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY:

Sex Tips: In Layla's latest heterosexual female romp, G.W.'s resident sex columnist extols upon the virtues of fucking servicemen. She also floats a revised idea of traditional courtship: Men are still confined to the rules of chivalry, but everyone gets drunk and you can do it whenever you feel like it. "Leaning against the bar, I spotted Prince Charming, an incredibly sexy combination of chivalry and a hint of danger, walking down the stairs," she writes of a random Marine she spots while sitting alone, "double fisting" drinks at the bar. "Having stubbornly worn my three-inch heels, I literally stumbled into his arms and swooned at how valiantly and easily he caught me. In my opinion, there is nothing sexier than a man with an accent, especially if its southern and he happens to call me ma'am." They decide to get it on. "Prince Charming grinned and pulled out an umbrella, proving that even in the face of a certain hookup, chivalry is not dead."

Life Lesson: Layla insists there is "something scandalously orgasmic about making out with a marine in the middle of a bar to bad 80s music," proving that people are into some freaky shit. Side-note: Layla may needs to take some life lessons from the Buster Darkhole school of sex column euphemisms. Her target is called "Prince Charming." Her friend? "GI Jane."

Progressive Meter: I count six references to "Prince Charming," two to "chivalry," and one each to "swooned" and "valiantly." Layla's column describes a thoroughly modern tale—they meet at a bar and hook up—but the vocabulary is stuck in another century. Three.

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THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND:

Sex Tips: This time around in UMD senior Esti Frischling's regular advice column, she tackles the problem of a third-wheel friend who knows that one of the coupled-up friends is cheating on the other. Frischling's advice—don't snitch, but encourage them to break up, and if they don't, go ahead and fuck the one who's getting screwed over—isn't as memorable as the way she tells it:

- "You better not rat either way (bitch)."
- "I mean, he can’t possibly see her as marriage material if he’s having all this premarital sex with all the sluts, right?"
- "approach the guy and say something along the lines of (and feel free to quote me directly) 'Dude stop being such a dick — your girl is hot, lay off the adulterous pussy.'”
- "I say—and this is my final answer by the way—blow up his spot and f— his girl. Yeah."

Life Lesson: Apparently, bitches, sluts, dicks, and pussies are A-OK in the Diamondback. But in the end, all we get is a "f—."

Progressive Meter: While it's difficult to discern a political bent in decisions over snitching, I do find the emphasis on "marriage material," "premarital sex," and "sluts" a bit off-putting here. You're in college. Stop rating the validity of your relationships on whether or not you're planning to get hitched to the person you're currently doing. On the other hand, the advice that the advice-seeker "f— his girl"  seems to be applied with no concern as to whether the advice-seeker is male or female. Cool. Five.

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AMERICAN UNIVERSITY:

Sex Tips: This go-around, AU's trio of porn-named sex columnists—Amber Sparkles, Buster Darkhole, and Maxwell Hillcrest—have teamed up to deliver a Very Special sex column about personal responsibility. This conversation—how to avoid unwanted pregnancies, STIs, abuse, and disappointment—is important. But Sparkles, Darkhole, and Hillcrest may be biting off more than they can chew here. The column is a little bit about pleasure: "Many people enjoy sex without condoms—scratch that, nearly everyone enjoys the sensations of sex more without condoms." A little bit about shame: "it is your life. It is not the life of the girl who might yell 'slut' at you when you walk home from a fantastic evening." And a little bit about dying of AIDS: "imagine two boys at Apex going home together. They may have amazing sex, but if it is unprotected, the consequences can be fatal."

Life Lesson: Sex undertaken without "planning ahead" can lead to babies, disease, and unhappiness.

Progressive Meter: The column is titled "Planning ahead helps ease worries in bed," but the three-author treatment focuses entirely on sexual anxieties, and not on the peace of mind that can come with entering into sex fully prepared and ready to go. The intended take-away here—when you're having sex, you should be concerned with satisfying your personal needs and taking care of yourself, not conforming to societal expectations—is a fine one. Unfortunately, the message gets lost in a sea of downers about the possible outcomes of doin' it: campus shaming, misogyny, blood tests, abortion, and death. Four.

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

"Both of these incidents exemplify ways that GW can improve security on its campus," the Hatchet editorial informed students. According to the camps paper, the bathroom hammering reveals how the university needs to "better expedite information in response to major security threats on campus." The sexual assault, meanwhile, "shows that students have a responsibility to keep themselves safe."

Perhaps it was not the best choice of words.

Both incidents, which occurred on Friday, Oct. 9, involved an assault upon students in a private on-campus facility. The male graduate student suffered a "non-life-threatening head injury" after he was "using a urinal when the suspect . . . came out of one of the stalls, stood behind the student and hit him in the back of the head with a hammer." Earlier that day, several G.W. freshman awoke to a strange man sexually assaulting them in their private dorm rooms. The paper, disappointingly, softens the man's actions as "sexual advances":

One female student who lives on the eighth floor reported that the man woke her up by trying to kiss her, and "attempted twice to place his hands down the front of her shorts," according to the police report. The female began screaming and the man ran across the hallway to another room, where he woke up another girl. She said he told her he had met her at Josephine, a popular nightclub.

"That's when I knew I didn't know him—I've never been to Josephine," the second female student said in an interview. "Then he grabbed my head and tried to kiss me."

In the editorial following the incidents, the Hatchet board wrote that the sexual assaults constituted a "valuable reminder of the necessity for students to lock their doors at all times and to take responsibility for guests you bring into residence halls."

These general safety precautions—lock your doors and don't leave your guests unattended—are good to know, but it doesn't take a G.W. Hatchet editorial for students to finally understand the arguments in favor of locking doors. Actually, a sexual assault on campus is not a "valuable" public service announcement, nor is it an appropriate opportunity to inform victims that they're lacking in personal responsibility. The Hatchet noted that the assault victims had "accidentally left the door unlocked" before they went to sleep. Compare that lapse in "responsibility" to the guy who illegally gained entrance to a private dorm, climbed to the 8th floor, and systematically sexually assaulted a hallway full of sleeping women. Oh, well. At least he taught those girls a valuable lesson!

Why doesn't the Hatchet see the a student getting hammered in the head as a "valuable reminder" that using a public urinal puts men in a vulnerable situation to a surprise attack? And why is the campus' latest head injury victim not reminded that he has a "responsibility to keep himself safe" from deranged criminals? Maybe it's because that sort of teaching moment works to place the blame on the guy who's just taking a piss, instead of the unpredictably violent guy with the hammer. Take away the hammer, unlock the door, and turn the bathroom victim into a hallway full of sleeping women, and all of a sudden, nobody's responsible for your sexual assault but you.

The G.W. Hatchet is writing to a pretty small campus community. The women who were sexually assaulted read that editorial. They know that their experience is being used by the campus press as a "valuable reminder" of campus irresponsibility. I hope they write back.

Early this morning, George Washington University police apprehended a suspect who had been seen attempting to "touch several females while they were sleeping." According to a campus alert, a male student helped the suspect access campus dorm Thurston Hall at 19th and F Streets NW around 4:30 this morning. A security camera then recorded the male student "leaving the building alone soon after signing in his guest," leaving the suspect unaccompanied in the freshman dorm.

The incidents sound familiar to a series of sexual assaults that have hit the campuses of Georgetown and the University of Maryland in recent years. But unlike the Georgetown and UMD cases, in which suspects continued to terrorize the campus communities for years, GW's nighttime sexual assailant was immediately neutralized. The suspect was apprehended after several students living in Thurston hall "brought the male to the security desk at Thurston Hall" and police were notified. The suspect is currently in police custody.

The GW campus alert reminded students not to sign strange people into freshman dorms and then leave, so that they may touch sleeping women in your absence. "Students who violate the security protocols, such as the sign in procedure, may face serious consequences through the Office of Student Judicial Services, up to and including suspension or expulsion from the University," the alert read. "In this case, a student signed in a guest and left the building, and put the security of all of the other residents in the building in jeopardy. Students should not allow people they do not know to piggy-back in the building and students are required to follow the procedure of escorting any guest they bring or sign into their residence hall."

Photo by RyanGWU82

This week, the Nation’s Alex Dibranco declared that the college sex column represents "a radical progressive movement in the sense of pushing against traditional silence and the status quo." That might have been true when sex columns first popped up on college campuses in 1996, but now, fucking and telling is a normal campus activity for radicals and right-wingers alike. At this point, simply rehashing your heterosexual, vanilla, and gender-role-informed Saturday night hook-up through the campus press does not a sexual revolution make—even if you publish under the pseudonym "Buster Darkhole." Sady of Tiger Beatdown and I talk about where the student sex column should go from here.

References: George Washington University's sex column, penned by "Mr. Darcy" and "Layla" [Exhibits A & B]; Georgetown University's sex column, penned by Colleen Leahey [Exhibits C & D]; American University's sex column, penned by "Amber Sparkles," "Maxwell Hillcrest," and our pal Buster [Exhibits E & F].

SADY: ah, the kids today. what are they up to? other than pretending they know enough about sex to write about it, OBVS, since the kids of many various days seem to believe the same thing.

AMANDA: also, inventing hilarious pseudonyms for themselves, like Rex Butthole and V. Gina

SADY: i know, right? or BUSTER DARKHOLE, Legitimate Writer and Giver of Mature Sexual Counsel [Exhibit E]. somehow, i just hold out the hope that Buster Darkhole is his real name and this is the only career path open to him.

AMANDA: hahaha

SADY: actually, as i read your summary, i was fondest of the work and pseudonym of MR. DARCY [Exhibit A]. i remember the third-act twist in Pride and Prejudice which mr. darcy exclaimed, "verily, miss bennet! our coffee date has involved a most unexpected oral manipulation of my genitals! yet i cannot refuse the fair lady Bingley, who is a superfreak in word and in deed!"

AMANDA: agreed, but at least mr. darcy is better than "layla" [Exhibit B], the name of the female columnist. though i knew a lot of kids in college into Clapton, so i guess it's a cultural thing

SADY: haha. but, you know, reading these things and your summary of them, i was reminded of (CURSE ME FOR UTTERING THE FORBIDDEN NAME) T*cker M*x. [Exhibit douche]. Somehow, it's just not scandalous any more to note that ladies like to have sex and are having casual sex. Unless you are the Pope, in which case all sex scandalizes you to some degree or another. The Kids These Days are pro-sex, including the lady ones. but they're also pro-ridiculously-conservative-gender-norms. and i had somehow hoped that making the point that ladies and dudes can both enjoy sex would change things. IT HAS NOT.

AMANDA: one idea i've seen in a couple of these stories (and from adults talking down to college-age people, too) is: yes, women like to have sex just as much as men do, but they have to not do it in order to be happy [Exhibit E].

SADY: oh, yes. the HOOKUP CULTURE! which is DESTROYING LADIES' CHANCES OF HAPPINESS!

AMANDA: because if they don't not have sex they'll never be in a relationship, which is what they REALLY want.

SADY: right. your vagina has to accumulate enough charge, through non-use, in order to work its Boyfriend-Entrapping powers on the dude of your choice.

AMANDA: i just read a chapter of a new book about young adult sexual experiences, ill remember the name later [Exhibit Laid: Young People’s Experiences with Sex in an Easy-Access Culture], and the introduction compared "hooking up" to a "microwave burrito" — you want it in the moment but eventually, you're going to regret it. the book called casual sex "settling," and insisted that good sex can only be had in committed relationships. personally, i really like being in a relationship, but part of the reason i like it is because i'm not only in the relationship so that i am ALLOWED TO HAVE SEX. i imagine this worldview just ends up with a lot of women settling into relationships with people they they don't really like that also don't provide great sex

SADY: yeah, and the mr. darcy column (i am sorry i keep returning to it! it fascinates me!) sets up the same good girl/bad girl paradigm. like, i COULD be with the girl who i might legitimately want a relationship with... or i could be with AWESOME SEXY TIMES lady. and, you know? it's kind of sad to me that dudes still think this division exists. although hilarious that dude is puzzling out loud over how he wasn't able to "settle down" as a damn college student.

AMANDA: i know. but then at the end, darcy is all, "you know what, maybe i can find a freaky girl that i love!" but you know he's just gonna kinda keep fucking both of them. Whatever. that is the weirdest thing to me about the Concerns over the Hook-Up Culture. why should college students be encouraged to search out their Final Life-Long relationship among the first relationships they've ever had? that makes no sense, and neither does telling girls that hooking up will damage them. they can look for a boyfriend whenever they want to do that. or a girlfriend, which is one thing that none of these sex columns is really addressing.

SADY: YEAH. it's all boys sexing the girls, and ridiculous gender stereotypes of boys sexing girls [Exhibit D], but these "sex" columns often seem more like the work of not terribly reflective or original straight college kids marveling over the fact that they can have sex and not worry about their moms overhearing them or showing up to offer suzy a ride home before it gets too late. but shouldn't "sex" be a more, um, inclusive discussion than this thing about giggling over how you got SOOOO wasted and sexed up someone in your totes heterosexual manner last night?

AMANDA: of course, i would say yeah, but i can see why this happens. when you're in college, those things are exciting to you, as a boring heterosexual person, even if its not terribly interesting to even, say, your classmates. it can be hard to look past your own experience when you're first experiencing all these things. also, it can be hard to write when you've recently graduated from 5 paragraph essays.

SADY: oh, yeah. and, i mean, that's cool and all. but it also – and i speak as someone who is ancient as the grave and yet remembers similar pressures from when i went to college – it creates this weird atmosphere on campus, where you ARE, to some degree, pressured to have enough casual sex to prove that you can do it and aren't some clingy relationship-needing heterosexual female, yet you're also a slut if you don't eventually have a relationship, and you don't exist, basically, if you're queer.

AMANDA: yep.

SADY: like, it's about "freedom," and rebellion, but freedom can only ever take one pre-existing shape. by trying to make sex more public, you should be opening it up, but you end up writing a script for what sex should look like. which is not good for anyone, actually.

AMANDA: no, and it's not particularly fun to read. which should be the main point. though i thought the American University anal sex column was getting there a little bit. at least Darkhole was all, "if you want her to put her finger in your butt, it's cool, man." [Exhibit F].

SADY: well, i mean, you have SEEN HIS NAME, right? he is buster darkhole! this is the column he was born to write!

AMANDA: yeah. I mean, it's possible that Darkhole is a little too eager with the anal sex. i think i noted that the column didn't mention the fact that like, it's cool not to have anal sex, too, if you're not into it.

SADY: maybe his full name is actually Buster Orhis Darkhole III.

AMANDA: i really want to score an interview with this person. but the AU column is an interesting approach because it is three people, two men and one lady, and i don't know if there's any gay or lesbian representation on that board, but that approach does open up the possibility of diversity, and not preaching one person's crazy high school abstinence-only education lessons to an entire campus [Exhibit C]. although god knows how they actually get together and write that thing.

SADY: yeah, i mean, i'm fond of the collaborative approach to all this. maybe if there were like FIFTEEN college sex journalists per campus (and there are probably enough candidates!) you might get one of them that is confident enough not to just say whatever they think will make them look cool and sexually experienced, middle-school style. and hey, maybe one or two that aren't straight people! that would be fun! i mean, i am skeptical of the entire "sex expert" position. i'm a grown lady who has been thinking about this stuff for the majority of my grown lady life, and i'm still not an expert on how my OWN sexual relationships should go.

AMANDA: it's interesting, because the Nation's piece on student sex columns painted them as this really radical progressive movement. and i think there's a confusion there, because people still think that "talking about sex" makes you a liberal and saying "people shouldn't talk about sex" makes you conservative.

SADY: right! and i think it is an issue of the younger generation! battle lines have shifted a bit; now, EVERYBODY talks about sex, liberal and conservative and that's kind of taken for granted. it's what they say that is the issue. or, alternately, the fact that everybody who is given a platform to do so seems to say the same thing.

AMANDA: right. and i don't know what Mr. Darcy or Ramm Bottomham's political persuasion is, but I imagine there's more political diversity in these columnists than there is actual sexual diversity. which is weird!

SADY: yeah. and, honestly, i think T. Otis Notavirgin or whatever are – MAYBE! JUST MAYBE! – feeling more pressure to seem in line with the most widely accepted version of College-Age Sexuality than to actually, seriously think about sex and maybe come up with some insights.

AMANDA: yeah, and seeing as whenever i happen to write about college students they all flood my comments with insights like, "gay," or ... "gay," i can't really blame them [Exhibit frat]. college students are really harshly scrutinized over their sex lives, and college sex columnists must experience the worst of it.

SADY: Honestly! Here is what I think: I think that Buster Darkhole and Layla and Mr. Darcy and whoever are all filing these pieces that are like, "so I got totally WASTED! and had SEX! like PEOPLE MY AGE TEND TO DO!" then they are going home to make microwave popcorn and watch a movie and call their moms. and maybe ask someone out to a movie. that is what i believe. or hope?

AMANDA: i think they're probably also silently weeping over the comments and/or getting shit from their friends [Exhibit single tear].

SADY: oh, god yes. but, you know, if embarrassing college sex columns are what it takes to teach the young people about Dealing With The Terrible Mean Blog Comments That People Will Eventually Leave On Any Blog Ever, I think it's a sacrifice worth making. sort of!

Photo by BodogGirl

Criticisms of D.C.-area student sex columns, however, rarely take the form of the right-wing, anti-sex diatribe. At local colleges and universities, sex columnists are more likely to catch heat for furthering sex-negative sentiments, antiquated gender roles, or sloppy writing.

Last month, the American University Eagle's anonymous sex column was criticized for trivializing rape, ignoring LGBT students, and discouraging women from pursuing sex. Also this month, Georgetown University student journalist Juliana Brint accused her campus' sex columns of being "backwards, anti-feminist screeds" based on "outdated, belittling generalizations about the female psyche." How progressive are our local student sex writers?

—

Student Paper: The G.W. Hatchet

Columnists: Mr. Darcy, an anonymous heterosexual male; Layla, an anonymous heterosexual female.

Areas of Coverage: In Darcy's inaugural column, the male sex columnist posed an Austenian dilemma: Shall he choose the nice girl who gives a satisfying blow job, or the freaky one into semi-public window sex? Answer: Looks like he's sleeping (with both of them) on it for a little while longer. In Layla's latest go-around, she describes her unorthodox relationship with a "best friend" from out-of-town: They do it all the time, but they're not dating or anything, and it's awesome!

Progressive Score: 6. Both Darcy and Layla describe their personal experiences with casual sex with multiple partners—and they do so with respect for themselves and for everyone else involved. In college, that can be difficult—it's hardly edgy, but I'll take it. The problem with first-person sex columns from two heteros, though, is that the LGBT experience is completely shut out of the paper.

—

Student paper: The American University Eagle.

Sex columnists: Three anonymous writers—one female, two male, sexual orientation undisclosed. Their porny bylines: Amber Sparkles, Buster Darkhole, and Maxwell Hillcrest.

Areas of Coverage: The trio got off to a controversial start last month when they posited this hypothetic sexual experience—"It’s three in the morning. You have it inside you right now. It kind of hurts. You’ve had one too many cups of jungle juice"—as a normal AU hookup. In their follow-up column, Sparkles, Darkhole, and Hillcrest winked at the controversy as they moved on to another taboo campus topic. "It’s 3 a.m. and he has it in you right now. It hurts," the column read. "You are two sober, consenting adults who have just embarked on the journey of anal sex."

Progressive Score: 7. While the first column from the threesome was extremely ill-advised, this servicey anal sex primer—don't use silicone lube with silicone toys!—imparted some helpful and open-minded advice for dorm-dwellers embarking on an anal excursion for the first time. It also made a stab at inclusiveness: "Gay, straight, bisexual—it doesn’t matter," the column reads. "Anyone can enjoy the feeling that comes from anal stimulation, no matter their gender or sexual orientation."

But while the column worked to dispel the "taboo" against straight men enjoying ass play, it failed to tackle the pressure many straight women feel to do anal. It also only addressed the anal pleasure derived from massaging the prostate. Not everybody has a prostate!

On the other hand, the threesome managed to stir up some conservative ire for the column—always a good sign. "I am appalled at the content of the Eagle’s new column," wrote one commenter. "I find this particular article vulgar."

—

Student Paper: The Georgetown University Hoya.

Sex Columnists: Colleen Leahey

Areas of Coverage: According to Brint, who writes for the Georgetown Voice, Leahey's "backwards, anti-feminist screeds" come from a long line of conservative Georgetown sex columnists (Julia Allison was the first). In Leheay's first column, she declared that "The quest for 'Prince Charming' consumes the lives of most 20-something females." The odd advice in her second column wasn't so much gender-specific as it was stalker-specific: "After shouting their name, you wait for them to come running into your arms. Instead they ask, 'Why are you following me?'"

Progressive Score: 4. Leahey may very well have her hands tied at this particularly conservative student rag, which is lucky to have a sex column at all. "“[V]ulgarity is discouraged through all sections in The Hoya,” Hoya Managing Editor Marissa Amendolia explained in an e-mail to Brint. “[W]hen it comes to editing for style, vulgarity—and, depending on the situation, this may include sexual explicitness—is subject to editing as long as the editor maintains the author’s viewpoint.” That being said, Leahey doesn't have to get vulgar to become a bit more open-minded. It would behoove her to direct her columns to all members of the campus community, not just heterosexual females she deems "desperate."

Nevertheless, I give Leahey and the Hoya major points for refusing to hide their sex coverage under a pseudonym (even a pseudonym as inspired as "Buster Darkhole"). The Hoya's sex talk may be low on the sex, but at least they own it. If there's nothing wrong with talking about casual sex and anal experimentation, why keep your identity under the covers?

Note: I couldn't find any current sex columns at the UMD Diamondback, the Howard University Hilltop, or, uh, Catholic University. If you know of any other local student sex writers, let me know!

It’s three in the morning. You have it inside you right now. It kind of hurts. You’ve had one too many cups of jungle juice. You think his name is Andrew, but you’re not really sure. You thought you would never be that girl, but there you are, in your drunken haze.

You wake up the day after to an unfamiliar ceiling, some guy who smells like booze, AXE body spray and, well, something else. He wants to cuddle and you’re starting to think maybe this drunken hook-up [ ________ ].

Reader: How did the AU Eagle complete that sentence?

a. You're starting to think maybe this drunken hook-up was rape.

b. You're starting to think maybe this drunken hook-up was a product of society's shaming of female sexuality, which encourages women to resort to dangerous, heavily intoxicated, and painful sex with strangers instead of openly pursuing empowered, respectful, and satisfying sexual experiences with desired sexual partners.

c. You're starting to think maybe this drunken hook-up could turn into something.

If you picked choice C, congratulations. That's right: The Eagle chose to use a woman's hazy, drunk, and painful sexual experience in order to illustrate the serious on-campus problem of . . . drunk women wanting boyfriends!

"A lot of people think that their first sexual experience in college is something meaningful," the column continued. "We can tell you that it is not. " The columnists then informed AU females some strategies they should try next time, instead of painful drunk sex: "lets face it girls, more often then not you’ll have to slow the guy down. That’s more than okay—it adds to your 'mystique.' Flirt with them, step in a little bit closer, laugh at all his jokes, flip your hair, basically everything you see in the movies without the sex. I said without the sex."

So, women who want to get laid on the AU campus can either a) endure drunk and painful stranger fucking, or b) laugh at jokes that aren't funny, and . . . not have sex. What the fuck? And these are the paper's sex columnists!

Some readers and on-campus groups agreed that the Eagle's sexual scenario posed more pressing questions than "Why can't the drunk girl find a boyfriend?" Like, "Was that hypothetical girl just hypothetically raped?"

Many members of the campus community argued that she was. AU Students For Choice penned an e-mail to its members calling the piece "alarming," and describing the opening scene as “an explicit rape.” And in a letter to the Eagle, campus group Women’s Initiative wrote, "This is called rape . . . Not only does the column normalize sexual assault as a drunken hook-up that happens to everyone, but it places the responsibility of stopping sexual assault on women by telling them to 'slow the guy down.'”

Readers also chimed in on the consent issue. "Next time you write a sex article don’t write it like a date rape story," wrote one commenter. Wrote another: "If it hurts, and you’re so wasted you don’t know what’s going on, then that is rape. And that’s not okay or normal."

But others came to the Eagle's defense. "How the hell is that rape?" wrote one. "I hear of this kind of stuff happening all the time. We’ve all been there at one time or another when you have drunk sex, so what? Its the people who end up trying to build a relationship off of that who are stupid."

In its own response to the campus outcry, the Eagle defended the piece as "provocative" and called the outrage "confusing." "For better or worse, many drunken hook-ups on this campus are completely consensual. Women’s Initiative knows it. AU Students For Choice knows it. Sometimes, people get drunk intending to hook-up!" The Eagle then attempted to shame all members of the campus community who voiced concern about the Eagle's strange sex advice. "Baseless charges and unwarranted outrage make these groups look silly," the retort read. "On issues as serious as rape and sexual assault, they should know better than to cry wolf."

The students crying "rape!" and the students crying "completely consensual!" will probably have to agree to disagree—if there's one thing I've learned from sex blogging, it's that arguments over whether theoretical scenarios constitute rape are rarely resolved. But that doesn't mean the two camps can't find a mutually productive discussion somewhere in this mess.

The groups who claim that the Eagle piece "normalized sexual assault," and those who claim that drunk sex "happens all the time" and that "people get drunk intending to hook up!" aren't talking past one another—even though they refuse to agree on rape, they're still voicing different perspectives on the same problem. If the Eagle finds the question "is this rape?" silly and baseless, why not ask them some alternate questions: Why is it considered normal for women on campus to choose disappointing, painful, hazy sex? Why is it a campus trend for women not to just unexpectedly wake up in a stranger's bed, but to get drunk with the intention of waking up there? And since when is declaring painful sex "normal" a valid excuse for perpetuating it?

Pandagon's Amanda Marcotte has got some pretty good answers to these questions. In a post on the Hofstra false rape accusation, Marcotte explains how slut-shaming can lead women to resort to dangerous, heavily intoxicated, and painful sex with strangers—instead of openly pursuing empowered, respectful, and satisfying sexual experiences with desired sexual partners. She writes:

There is nothing wrong with you if you want to have group sex. Now, I wouldn’t recommend that you go about it as this young woman did. Like it or not, but a single woman in a group sex situation with a bunch of men she barely knows that have been drinking heavily is something that could turn to rape, or even if it doesn’t, it could seem menacing once you’re into it, and therefore you may not feel safe changing your mind if it gets weird. A lot of young men have really mixed-up, fucked-up attitudes about this sort of thing, because the homoerotic element is going to turn them on and then they’re going to get upset about that, and they might get more aggressive to demonstrate that they’re Not Gay. There’s a serious amount of danger there. That said, it’s foolish to assume that some young women aren’t going to have group sex fantasies, and the sheer amount of shame that is placed on them for wanting to act those out will push a lot of them to make really, really bad choices under the influence of inhibition-lowering drugs like alcohol.

The only cure for this is to stop shaming women for being sexual. Without the shame driving people to make rash, dangerous, and foolish choices, you’re going to have a lot more planning of group sex that involves vetting partners and getting consent and creating safe words and all that. And then, you own your choice and take responsibility for it. Which makes you not inclined to say it was rape if the word gets out that you did this. If your reputation isn’t in danger, then you have no cause to do bad things in an attempt to save it.

I don't mind that the Eagle's semester-opening sex column presented rash, drunk, awful sex as a normal college experience—it can be. But instead of examining why college women have sex they don't like, or telling college women that they deserve to have better sex, the Eagle told AU's female population that good girls don't give it up. That attitude isn't going to make sex on AU's campus any better, but it will help to keep it drunk. Hey—at least it will be "normal," right?

The Catholic University of America (CUA) this summer revised its student rules to clarify that the school condemns sexual assault more strongly than consensual sex. The change to the policy, which became official July 27, comes in the aftermath of litigation questioning the propriety and effectiveness of the university’s longtime regulations.

Prior to the change, the CUA campus code performed an awkward lumping operation when it came to sex: Its sexual misconduct clause outlawed “physical conduct of a sexual nature that is unwanted by either party and/or that is disruptive to the university community, such as any sexual expression that is inconsistent with the teaching and moral values of the Catholic church.”

The new rules are all about distinctions. The university has tossed the “Sexual Misconduct” clause in favor of one that clearly differentiates between consensual “Sexual Relationships,” which it calls “inconsistent” with the religious nature of the university, and “Sexual Assault,” which is “unacceptable behavior, will not be tolerated, and will be adjudicated to the fullest extent afforded to the university.” According to CUA’s new policy, prohibited “sexual relationships” include “sexual acts of any kind outside the confines of marriage.” (Less genitally-inclined displays of disruption, like men kissing, are still undefined.) Prohibited “sexual assault” is defined more progressively: “sexual contact without meaningful, explicit, ongoing consent.”

The school’s administration quietly published the revision in its online Code of Student Conduct last month, noting only that its “sexual offenses section [was] strengthened to clearly articulate unacceptable behavior.” CUA did not return a request for comment.

Why has CUA struggled to nail the wording on its sexual assault policy? While other schools strive to protect their students from predators and themselves from lawsuits, CUA has to juggle a third consideration: protecting its relationship with the Vatican.

As the national university of the Roman Catholic Church, CUA earns points with the Pope by outlawing sex among its students, on-campus and off. Keeping undergraduates’ hands to themselves is easier said than done, but the Holy See doesn’t come knocking for evidence of enforcement. Fucking in CUA dorm rooms is common, but the infraction rarely—if ever—rises to administrative review. During the 2006-2007 school year—the only year the university has reported figures on the infraction—CUA recorded zero violations.

Enforcing a “sexual assault” policy, on the other hand, is required under U.S. law. According to university watchdog group Security on Campus, Title IX “prohibits sexual harassment of college and university students whether the harasser is an employee or another student,” as sexual assault is considered “an extreme form of sexual harassment”—and qualifies as gender discrimination.

By creating a clear distinction between the two infractions—sex, which is unenforceable, and sexual assault, which must be strictly enforced—CUA may begin to move past the legal and moral mess that has marked its sex policies for years.

The controversy over those policies came to a head earlier this year, when two students involved in a contested sexual assault incident on the CUA campus later sued the university (Screw U, 5/7/09). The incident involved a female CUA student, a male CUA student, and three of his high school buddies, all of whom engaged in one very visible violation of the sexual misconduct policy in the spring of 2008: a late-night, open-door, thoroughly witnessed group-sex session in a CUA dormitory. The female student later reported the incident as a sexual assault; the male student, who was expelled, maintained that the incident was consensual. Both students cited Title IX in their complaints against the university. The female student alleged the university acted with “deliberate indifference” to her sexual assault claim; the male student claimed that the sex policy was administered inconsistently. (Both suits have since been settled out of court.)

Here’s where the university’s former sex policies failed. The boy’s suit claims that the university failed to give him a “fair and impartial disciplinary hearing” to make his case that the incident was consensual. As a result, the suit alleged, CUA effectively expelled him over a couple of lesser infractions—engaging in oral sex and consuming alcohol—while his female accuser received no punishment for the same offenses. In order to prove that he was unduly punished for his maleness, the boy’s lawyers invoked a CUA celebrity: Antonella Barba, a pop singer who made national news when she competed in the sixth season of American Idol in 2007.

At the height of her American Idol exposure, Barba was a CUA undergraduate. During the course of the competition, photographs of Barba in various stages of Catholic shame surfaced on the Internet. Most of the photos—like the one of her posing in a wet T-shirt and thong next to the World War II Memorial—are fit for Maxim but not necessarily prohibited by catechism. One photo, however, allegedly shows Barba—or a look-alike—performing oral sex on a man. CUA’s response to the matter amounted to an expression of sympathy for Barba and her family. She graduated from the university in 2008.

Even though the boy was expelled over a much more serious offense—allegedly engaging in oral sex without his sex partner’s consent—his lawsuit still built his discrimination case upon CUA’s failure to enforce the campus’s many consensual sexual infractions. The boy’s lawyers demanded that CUA deliver “all documents relating to any investigation, determination, discussions, complaints discipline, or the like concerning Antonella Barba, including, but not limited to, all documents relating to your decision not to expel her.” In most sexual assault policies, the differences between the boy’s case and Barba’s would be glaring. At CUA, the infractions were hardly discrete. According to the old policy, both instances of sexual misconduct were outlawed in the very same sentence, and no further definition of consent was provided.

CUA’s revised sexual assault policy helps to clarify the importance of that little nuance between the cases—consent. The university’s new sexual assault policy still prohibits premarital sex, but it also clearly acknowledges the importance of consent in these forbidden relationships. The separation of sex and assault will help the university prove that it is not “deliberately indifferent” to the possibility of on-campus assault—even as it deliberately avoids policing the consensual stuff. Previously, CUA prefaced its sexual assault policy with the following proposed strategy, which urged both victim and perpetrator to remain chaste: “The optimal approach and most appropriate solution to this issue is for all persons to develop and live by a value system that respects other persons’ bodily integrity and the sacredness of human sexuality.”

By eliminating that “solution,” CUA has opened its sexual assault policy to those victims who may have strayed from the catechism, consensually, in the past. The definition will both help the university discipline sexual assault offenders and confine its judgment on consensual dorm-fuckers to the religious realm.

Illustration by Doug Boehm

Date Rape Anthem: Asher Roth's "I Love College"

Relevant Lyrics:

I can't tell you what I learned from school but
I could tell you a story or two, um
Yeah, of course I learned some rules
Like don't pass out with your shoes on (get the sharpie)

And don't leave the house 'til the booze gone (no we're not leaving)
And don't have sex if she's too gone
When it comes to condoms put two on (trust me)
Then tomorrow night find a new jawn

Why It's So Rapey: On the surface, Roth's love-letter to undergraduate debauchery condemns date rape ("don't have sex if she's too gone"). So why would this Village Voice detractor call the Morrisville, Pa. rapper's first album "nothing more than a soundtrack for date rape"?

Maybe it has something to do with the context of Roth's one-line defense of consensual sex. At the beginning of his video for "I Love College," Roth awakes on a fraternity house couch with a half-naked girl passed out on his lap. He doesn't date-rape her: He just pushes her off onto the floor and starts drinking again. Later, when the party is in full-swing, Roth boasts that he drank the party house dry as he "danced my face off and had this one girl completely naked." He doesn't date-rape her: He just uses her naked body to boost his cred in a rap song.

Roth's song does sets limits for consensual sex—don't do her if "she's too gone"—while simultaneously urging college students to push those limits by getting wasted and getting it on—in other words, doing her when she's juuuust gone enough. In a fraternity house full of people partying naked until all the booze is gone, "she's too gone" might start to seem pretty relative.

Meanwhile, one in four women will be sexually assaulted while in college, making the listener wonder how Roth learned the "rules" of college behavior. Roth knows now not to a) pass out with your shoes on, b) leave before the booze is gone, c) date-rape a girl, and d) have unprotected sex. Has he learned from experience?

Still, it's enough for commenters on feminist blog Feministe to defend Roth against charges of racism and sexism: "He does the bare minimum of saying, '…don’t have sex if she’s too far gone,' whatever his motives," one writes. "I honestly didn’t expect that much because date rape is usually so fucking hilarious to frat boys."

The counter-protest was organized by Colin MacDonald and Ian Goldin, GW students who were joined by "between 80 and 100 people" in raising signs, chants, and face-locks against the church. At the height of the action, Freshmen Paige Medley and Lauren LaMonte kissed "to show their support for gay rights." It looks like there might have been some tongue, but it's too close to call.

For those also interested in, ahem, showing their solidarity, check out Hatchet photographer Marie McGrory's shot of the kiss here.