1. YES
MEANS
YES
YES
MEANS
YES
College student binge
drinking + date rape Fact:
The use of alcohol, like other forms of drugs, is learned by
people in various social settings. This learning involves both
skills in using the drug as well as attitudes toward a drug
and its use. That’s to say, peer group is a key influencing
factor for college students’ binge drinking behaviors. Col-
lege students are the most vulnerable to rape during the
first few weeks of the freshman and sophomore years. Hop-
ing to “ be accepted”, the newcomers usually join the drink-
ing culture on U.S campuses. Even if you know you are un-
der age and cannot handle your liquor. it’s always difficult to
say no to a tray of “Jell-O shot” that’s been passing around
in the basement of a fraternity party, especially when your
potential date is watching. The next thing you know? You
woke up in a stranger’s bed. Whether last night was a mis-
take or “an affair to remember” is a question to both us and
many judges in campus rape cases.
Haven’t we all been there?
When you were trying to go to bed at eleven’o clock
for an early Saturday workout the next day and your
neighbor was having a party that was loud enough
to wake up the dead. Angry as you were, there was
nothing you can do about it. You cannot bust up
the party that half of your grade is in, nor can you
tell them partying on a Friday night was a bad idea.
You had a stressful week and would not mind to get
drunk if you could... Three hours later the noises were
gone. Your roommate crawled back with a guy that
she did not know at the beginning of the night. Her
door locked. Something was probably going on be-
hind it...“Typical.”You thought., and then you turned
and go back to sleep.
If you woke up to your roommate’s screaming the
next morning saying the guy had raped her, what can
you tell the police? Should this be a crime, even if it
probably happened a hundred times last night on
your campus? Without any doubts, rape in any form
should not be tolerated. But when it is linked with
college students’drinking problems and our acknowl-
edged“hook-up”culture, how do we differentiate
foolishness from felonies?
Fewer than 5 percent of college women who are vic-
tims of rape or attempted rape report it to police. Low
reporting ensures that few victims receive adequate
help, most offenders are neither confronted nor pros-
ecuted, and colleges are left in the dark about the
extent of the problem. It’s not hard to deduce why
these victims prefer not to talk about their night-
mares, but what lies behind the silence, is a bigger
question of our society - gender discrimination. Wom-
en have a false attitude of sexual aggression among
our culture. That attitude is called“rape myth”. Rape
myth denies or minimizes victim injury or blames the
victims for their own victimization. Some rape myths
are the following:“Women who consent to going to a
man’s apartment also consent to sex,”“women ask for
it,”and“only promiscuous women get raped.”Because
women are subjected to a male-dominated society
that supports rape myths and restrictive beliefs about
women’s social roles, the fear of“slut-blame”concern
most of the rape victims. The sex role socialization
may encourage women to accept the blame for their
own victimization because they are the“gatekeepers”
in sexual interactions. In one study, over 40 percent
of those raped who did not report the incident said
they did not do so because they feared reprisal by the
assailant or others.
This kind of victim blame is not something women
have imagined. Alex Knepper, a columnist of Amer-
ican University newspaper“Eagle”published an
article called“Dealing With AU’s Anti-Sex Brigade”at
April 2010. His opinions, both offending and radical,
caused a wild discussion in American University.“Let’s
5 drinks in a row for men or 4 drinks
for women—definition of binge drink-
ing
44 percent of college student had
engaged in binge drinking at least
once in the past month.
474,000 students claimed that they
had unprotected sex After alcohol
had skewed their judgment
100,000 cases of date rape hap-
pen every year.
<5% College women who are vic-
tims of rape or attempted rape report
it to police.
V problem V problem

2. get this straight: any woman who
heads to an EI [fraternity] party as
an anonymous onlooker, drinks
five cups of the jungle juice, and
walks back to a boy’s room with
him is indicating that she wants
sex, OK?”Knepper is not alone.
Under the wildly debated column,
male student like Luke Turner said
that“girls who make mistakes are
often looking for a scapegoat”and
“blame fraternities.”We may all
share some degree of gender basis
that makes us judgmental about
the victim in sexual assault cases,
but people like Alex Knepper are
exactly what’s’preventing the vic-
tims to step forward and speak up.
Let’s look at some real-life stories.
Laura Dunn stayed quiet about
what happened in April 2004 at
the end of her freshman year at
the University of Wisconsin. That
night, Dunn was drinking so many
raspberry vodkas that they cut her
off at a frat house party. Still, she
knew and trusted the two men
who took her back to a house for
what she thought was a quick stop
before the next party. Instead, she
says they raped her as she passed
in and out of consciousness. Back
then, Laura had a boyfriend she
had been dating for four years
and they were getting close to
marriage. She was still a virgin, and
had been“waiting”together with
him. She broke up with her boy-
friend after the incident, without
ever telling him about the attack,
and she didn’t report it.
“I just kind of pushed it to the side,
you know, it’s this bad incident
that happened, and it was just a
mistake, we were all drunk. And
I just chose to, like, put it there.”
Laura said. She focused on her
schoolwork and kept her grades
up, but she can’t make herself for-
get what happened. She couldn’t
sleep and she lost weight. Fifteen
months later, when she was sit-
ting in a class, the professor was
talking about how, in wartime,
rape is used as a weapon of terror.
“And this professor stopped the
lecture and said that more than 80
percent of victims stay silent.”said
Dunn. She recalled that the profes-
sor said:“I want you to know this
has happened in my class to my
students, and there is something
you can do about it, and there is
someone you can talk about it
with.”The moment that lecture
let up, Dunn walked across to the
dean of students’office and report-
ed.
But justice is not always guaran-
teed. Kevin Helmkamp, the associ-
ate dean of students at the Univer-
sity of Wisconsin said that sexual
assault cases are among the most
difficult matters to determine.
Helmkamp said.“They clearly are
very, very difficult cases to inves-
tigate. Usually, there is not a lot of
corroborating evidence for one
side or the other,”he says.“It does
tend to come down to one per-
son saying this happened and the
other person saying, no it didn’t
happen that way.”In Laura Dunn’s
case, by the time she reported to
campus officials, one of the men
she accused had graduated. The
other said the sex was consensual.
The University of Wisconsin took
nine months to investigate, then
decided against punishment.
Dunn asked the Department of
Education to find that the universi-
ty had failed in its responsibility to
act promptly and to end the sexual
harassment she faced being on
campus with her alleged attacker.
Department of Education, howev-
er, said the University of Wisconsin
— despite taking nine months on
her case — had acted properly.
Shocked by the injustice, Laura is
striking back. She has become an
outspoken survivor and advocate
regarding campus sexual assault.
She worked part-time with Pro-
moting Awareness, Victim Empow-
erment (PAVE), a national nonprofit
focused on shattering the silence
of sexual violence on their national
leadership team. Laura also served
as their Communications Director
and founded their Survivor Justice
Campaign, which advocates for
sexual assault victims at all stages
of the criminal justice process. She
has successfully lobbied to pass
the Compassionate Care for Rape
Victims Bill (2007) in Wisconsin and
Jasmine’s Law (2010) in Illinois.
Recently she had started her own
nonprofit, SurvJustice, publicly
speaking to raise awareness of
campus sexual assault. To date
Laura have spoken out on NPR,
CNN,Time Magazine, CBS News,
Cosmo, and at Harvard Law.“(From
my case) The message they are
sending to victims,”Dunn said,“is
that sexual assault is not some-
thing they take seriously.”By being
leaders in those organizations,
Laura is using all courage in her
soul to seek for justice, no matter
how much was taken from her.
The more frequent you get drunk,
the worse the situation you have
put yourself and others in. For
Elton Yarbrough from Texas A&M
University, being convicted as
a rapist earned him 18 years of
jail time, and buried his future of
being an U.S. Air Force officer. It
is certainly not fun to be kept in
jail, but it doucbles the pain if you
don’t think you deserve it. In Elton
Yarbrough’s case, five women,
including four female A&M stu-
dents, testified Yarbrough raped
or sexually assaulted them, each
said she passed out or fall asleep
after drinking and woke to find
Yarbrough having sex with her or
touching her sexually. Yarbrough,
however, defended himself by
drawing a picture of a Friday night
on his campus.“You walk around
Northgate (one of College Station’s
most popular bar areas) you’re
going to see a lot of drunk men
and women. And then, at the end
of the night, you’re going to see
a lot of drunk men and women
going home together.”Yarbrough
also protested:“Pretty much all of
them said they were too drunk to
remember the details of that night,
but the only details they could
remember were incriminating
against me.”He was found guilty
because of a recorded conversa-
tion he had with one of the victims
two days after the incident over
the phone. Yarbrough was record-
ed to have said:“No I didn’t plan
it…I don’t know why...Look, I’m
sorry;”“I don’t even know what to
say. It was my fault. It’s no excuse
but I was drunk. Sorry for making
you feel that way;”“I mean, there’s
no excuse for anything. I mean, I
did something really stupid.”
The apology goes on, but the jury
is convinced that the victim de-
serves more. At the age of 22, Elton
Yarbrough was thrown in jail for an
18 years sentence of felony sexual
assault. Subconsciously Yarbrough
knows that it was alcohol that put
him behind the bars.“When peo-
ple drink, their inhibitions are low-
ered and, sometimes they have sex
with whom they wouldn’t normal-
ly.”he admitted in one interview.
Now the ex-economic major can
only do the math of how his drunk
behaviors cost him and his posi-
tion in his fraternity, his chance to
have a career, a clean record, and
eighteen years of his best time.
On college campuses, repeat
predators account for 9 out of
every 10 rapes, and alcohol com-
plicated every single one of these
rapes. Offenders like Yarbrough
are not rare. There are such a large
number of them on university
campuses that our researchers had
given them a name--serial rapists.
“They are vary forthcoming,”sais
psychologist David Lisak,“In fact,
they are eager to talk about their
experiences. They’re quite narcis-
sistic as a group-the offenders-and
they view the study as an oppor-
“They clearly are
very, very difficult
cases to inves-
tigate. Usually,
there is not a lot
of corroborating
evidence for one
side or the other.”
tunity, essentially, to brag. I know
who you are thinking about right
now—the guy we all know who
wouldn’t shut up about his ONS
romance.
Alcohol consuming leaves some
forever unsolved problems for oth-
er victims for the rest of their lives.
Jessica Gonzale
z, a now 22 years old single mother
recently lost her lawsuit against
the De Anza College baseball
players for gang raping her when
she was 17. After spotting through
a windowpane in a door what they
described as a semi-comatose girl
lying in vomit, three members of
the De Anza women’s soccer team
barged into the room, and brought
her to the hospital. A grim-faced
civil jury refused to hold the men
liable, nor award her a penny in
damages.
The jury found the defendants not
liable on the sexual assaults by a
vote of 12-0. Santa Clara County
District Attorney Jeff Rosen an-
V problem V problem

3. nounced his office would not file
criminal charges against any of the
offenders.“Sexual assaults involv-
ing highly-intoxicated people
are extremely difficult to prove,”
said Rosen. As sorry as he is for
what had happened to Jessica, he
cannot claim the offenders guilty-
there are not enough evidences.
Jessica was said to had as many
as seven vodka shots, and she
said she had no memory of the
evening from the time she drank
her third shot of alcohol. The
juror, however, believed that she
never lost conscious and that she
was capable of consenting while
she was in the bedroom. Facts
demonstrated several men were
in a bedroom engaging in sexual
activity with Jessica while she was
intoxicated. Other men watched.
None of them in the bedroom did
anything to stop what was going
on. All of them are intoxicated to
some degree. An alcohol expert
who reviewed Jessica’s drinking
pattern explained that her blood
alcohol level was rising while she
was in the bedroom and that it
didn’t peak until later in the eve-
ning. Jurors believed the men and
other witnesses, who testified that
Jessica brought beer to the party,
performed a public lap dance and
invited them in explicit terms to
have group sex.
There is no use for side-picking
since the case will“never be re-
opened.”Juror member Marc
Ancheta said in vein to the camera
that he believes justice had not
been served.“These guys were
animals. They should be hold
accountable. Sure a 17 years old
girl made a mistake, but they took
advantage of her.”The sore juror
Marc Ancheta said he wouldn’t
award the young woman millions,
but is in disbelief that she is get-
ting nothing for what was done to
her.“A couple hundred thousand
dollars (would be enough),”he
said,“she obviously needs a lot of
therapy.”Rape survivor Lisa Jensen,
who followed the trial closely and
has worked as a rape-crisis coun-
selor, dubbed the verdict“unfair”
and said she fears it will dissuade
women from reporting rape.
What the District Attorney did was
condemning the offenders with a
stiff face.
Dignity, health, and happi-
ness are taken from all the victims
of campus rape cases. Had they
not been drinking heavily, they
could skip this chapter in their
lives that is filled with horror and
tears. They would not need to
be dragged through this muddy
road of justice seeking. They could
have made their names in other
cases where neither shame nor
self-doubting is involved.
Now that we have learned exclu-
sively about the severity, is there
anything we can do? Of course
there is. let’s take a look at the
steps universities have taken for
this problem. Firstly campus police
are doing something. Typically
the campus police’s role in rape
prevention consists of providing
self-defense training, doing en-
vironmental assessments of out-
door areas vulnerable to rape, and
recommending the installation of
cameras, lights, locks, etc. Many
universities, like Purdue University
campus have student escort and/
or shuttle services so that women
do not have to walk alone on cam-
pus late at night. However, when
predominantly investing in such
approaches, the message to stu-
dents that the police send is that
“real rape”is stranger rape, while
acquaintance rape prevention is
left to other campus departments
or student organizations. Providing
rape aggression defense training is
another thing that universities po-
lice have tried. Many college public
safety departments offer women
students rape aggression defense
training to increase their ability to
fend off would-be rapists. Police
now commonly include such train-
ing in acquaintance rape preven-
tion programs, no longer focusing
only on stranger rape. Researchers
find that this training is too limited
to cause significant reductions in
acquaintance rape; not sufficiently
focused on the most prevalent
types of campus rape, and inade-
quate for causing any behavioral
change in male students.
“So now what?”you said,“What the
campus police do is not working,
and it is impossible to ban alcohol
from university campus parties.”
But it’s not just the police officers’
job to keep female student safe.
The university as an institution
can also do something--education
programs. The lecturers during ori-
entations are great gestures from
the universities. How do we get
them to listen? How do we talk to
our audience? In this situation, one
strategy that I think every univer-
sity should apply, which could sig-
nificantly reduce the chance that
our freshmen students engage in
drunk sex, is to apply“the stupid
drink”advertisement campaign on
campus.
The idea of“the stupid drink”was
invented by Syracuse University’s
S.I. Newhouse School of Public
Communications in the American
Advertising Federation’s national
student ad competition. It was
originally designed to fight drunk
driving and underage drinking.
This powerful slogan still echoes
in my head one year after I heard
about it. The brilliant advertis-
ing campaign points out alcohol
related problem is not even drink-
ing-it’s drinking too much. The
original strategies the students
If you can get a girl intoxicated to the point
where she’s coming in and out of con-
sciousness, or she’s unconscious — and
that is a very, very common scenario —
then why would you need a weapon? Why
would you need a knife or a gun?”
-- David Lisak
invented are highly applicable. The
campaign’s strategy is to“identify
and stigmatize the one drink”that
crosses the line. Its online ele-
ments include a website, featuring
TV spots and videos. One features
Bill Nye,“The Science Guy,”who
teaches students about the chem-
istry of drinking alcohol. Winners
of an online contest will appear
as Nye’s assistant in the next viral
video. Called The Drinking Insti-
tute, the site allows visitors to play
“symptoms of stupid”party games.
Students can also request a pic-
ture of stupid symptoms sent to
their cell phones. If friends overin-
dulge, students can send them the
picture. The same application is
also available on Facebook. Other
efforts include bar stamps, poker
cards and coasters with lines like
“The Stupid Drink: The quickest
way from cool to fool”As some-
one who had been a freshman
on university campus, the logic
behind this campaign seems solid
to me. College is supposed to be
a memorable period of our lives,
therefore, the last thing every
newcomer would want to do, is to
come off as“the stupid one”to our
new peers. Drinking with friends is
a social activity to us and bonding
increases between friends during
“hang-outs”based on the awe-
someness of the people. By adver-
tising“the stupid drink”, we can
send one clear message—don’t be
the stupid one who ruin the fun.
We need to tell our audience that
acquaintance rape ruin: 1friend-
ships, 2reputations, 3GPAs, 4physi-
cal health, 5mental health, 6sexual
performance after the incident,
as well as many other effects. This
strategy won the national AAF
advertising competition, because
given the chance it can work very
well.
Universities in the U.S. should
arrange the application of“the
stupid drink”campaign as soon as
possible. As far as I am concerned,
binge drinking and romantic rela-
tionships are getting too often on
TV. Our younger generation can
see at any day of the week that
someone attractive on TV flirting
with a nice, strong bout of alcohol
poisoning: the professional lush-
es on Jersey Shore, of course, but
also the diagnosed alcoholics on
Gossip Girls, the Orange County,
even the kiddies on Skins. Odds
ratio is as high as 4.86 between the
students who binged during in the
last year of high school and the
students who engage in college
binging. As our potential fresh-
man gets the wrong message on
TV more often, it is obvious that
the problem is only going to get
worse.
This seriously overlooked prob-
lem should not, and cannot be
ignored any longer. Every day,
girls like Laura Dann and boys like
Elition Burgton are walking on
our university campuses, a place
where we gain knowledge, lead-
ership, and our life-time friend-
ships with people. The problem of
binge drinking and date rape do
not suggest that our generation
has low moral standards. It only
means that our college students
need to have a healthier under-
standing about social and sexual
excitement. History requires us to
learn from the victims who have
suffered and pay respect to them
as the future leaders of our society.
Real men don’t
rape.
V problem V problem