Brett Ferrell and Sam Ross's Viewpoint column ("Bogus one-in-four rape statistic," Sept. 12) represents the authors' ignorance and insensitivity, and its publishing did a disfavor to everyone at the University.
I do not believe that the authors have any right to question the one-in-four statistic on the basis of the evidence gathered from the University Police Department. Obviously, neither author is aware of the number of rape cases that go unreported every year. Due to the nature of the physical, mental and emotional damage inflicted on the victim, many do not desire to report the crime to the police. If the University Hospital or Sexual Assault Resource Agency were able to release statistics on the number of rape and assault victims they see, I believe that ample evidence would be found to support the one-in-four statistic.
The authors would have done themselves a favor to understand that a woman is more likely to be assaulted or raped by someone that she knows. Sorry to take away the "bogey man in the bushes" theory. I find it almost humorous when the authors allude to the statistic putting a crimp in their dating styles.
I do agree with the authors on the point that rape is a reprehensible crime, but it is not SAFE that trivializes it as was suggested in the article; people such as Ferrell and Ross work to trivialize it.
Katie Marages
SARC IV
In the United States, one in four college women report surviving rape or attempted rape since their fourteenth birthday. Ferrell and Ross contradicted this statistic with unsubstantiated claims. Those who question the one-in-four statistic are unconvinced by a study of over 6,000 students at 32 colleges and universities.
The best way to determine statistical accuracy is to repeat the study and compare findings. After the Koss study, which confirmed the one-in-four statistic, Sandberg, Jackson and Petric-Jackson found that 21 percent of women report being forced to submit to sexual intercourse on a date.
The United States Center for Disease Control released a survey in 1998 that asked college women: "In your lifetime, have you been forced to submit to sexual intercourse against your will?" Twenty percent of college women said yes. This 20 percent did not included additional attempted rapes which Koss included in her findings. Time after time it has been shown that approximately one in four college women has survived rape or attempted rape - these results reflect more than "advocacy research."
It is irresponsible to deny that sexual assault occurs, or to assume that reported statistics reflect the only incidents of assault. Moreover, the authors of Tuesday's column missed the point - even one rape is still too many.
Dan Carlile, CLAS IV
Sexual Assault Leadership Council
Carrie Altman, CLAS III
Women's Affairs Committee of Student Council
Allison White, CLAS IV
Inter-Sorority Council
"Here we go again," I thought when I read Ferrell and Ross's Viewpoint column which attacks researcher Mary Koss's highly-regarded work. In their effort to critique how sexual assault statistics are gathered, Ferrell and Ross perpetuate the myth that women don't lie about rape, feminist researchers do.
For the past decade, Neil Gilbert, Warren Farrell, Katie Roiphe and Suzanna Hoff Sommers, none of whom conduct their own original research, have attempted to discredit the anti-sexual-assault movement. These individuals deliberately twist Koss's work and then "quote" these misinterpretations as fact.
For example, Gilbert states that because so few of the women in Koss's study identified their experience as "rape," her conclusion that 27.5 percent of women are assaulted is an inflated statistic. This is a specious argument, since the participants clearly did affirm that their experience fit the legal definition of sexual assault or rape.
Neil Gilbert built his reputation as an academic "assassin," attacking progressive and "feminist" causes with clearly ideological motives, such as child abuse prevention programs and acquaintance sexual assault, which he considers a fabrication by feminists to boost the budgets of sexual assault centers.
Among social scientists around the world, Koss's work has been considered some of the finest examples of research in a difficult field. Koss and University alumna Sarah L. Cook responded to Gilbert's extraordinary attacks by stating, "this study has stood unchallenged in the professional literature since its 1987 publication in a leasing peer-reviewed psychology journal and has since been joined by additional empirical papers based on the same data set that were also deemed worthy of publication" ("Facing the facts: Date and acquaintance rape are significant problems for women," Current Controversies on Family Violence, Gelles and Loseke, 1993).
By failing to do their homework, Ferrell play a game of "telephone," repeating falsehoods, thus causing untold damage to sexual assault survivors and the good work of many women and men here at the University, and throughout the world. It's time that they faced the facts: Sexual assault and rape damage the lives of too many people, male and female, old and young.
Claire Kaplan
Sexual Assault Education Coordinator
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