Let me start this with a caveat: A long time ago, I was a member of the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity at Butler University.
It’s been so long, in fact, that it took me a second to recognize the Greek letters in this illustration from Rolling Stone‘s story on an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia:
I won’t go into detail about the alleged assault, but it’s grueling to read. And it happened, if it did happen, at the Phi Psi house.
I say “if” because some serious questions have arisen about the story. Here’s Richard Bradley, a magazine editor who once had the unfortunate experience of working with Stephen “Shattered” Glass:
The article alleges a truly horrifying gang rape at a UVA fraternity, and it has understandably shocked the campus and everyone who’s read it. The consequences have been pretty much instantaneous: The fraternity involved has voluntarily suspended its operations (without admitting that the incident happened); UVA’s president is promising an investigation and has since suspended all fraternity charters on campus; the alumni are in an uproar; the governor of Virginia has spoken out; students, particularly female students, are furious, and the concept of “rape culture” is further established. Federal intervention is sure to follow.
The only thing is…I’m not sure that I believe it. I’m not convinced that this gang rape actually happened. Something about this story doesn’t feel right.
Here’s why.
Read the whole thing. Bradley goes on to explain why the story raised a lot of red flags with him. He’s not saying it didn’t happen. He’s not saying it did happen. He’s saying that the story, as presented, needs more scrutiny.
Paul Fahri at the Washington Post raises another issue:
The writer of a blockbuster Rolling Stone magazine story about an alleged gang rape at a University of Virginia fraternity has said that she was unable to contact or interview the men who supposedly perpetrated the crime.
In interviews with The Washington Post and Slate.com last week, writer Sabrina Rubin Erdely declined to answer repeated questions about the men’s response to an allegation by a female student named Jackie that they had sexually assaulted her at a U-Va. fraternity party in 2012.
However, in a podcast interview with Slate, Erdely indicated that she was unable to locate the fraternity brothers in the course of her reporting to get their side of the story.
How does a national magazine publish a story about an alleged gang rape without even talking to the alleged rapists? If what the accuser says is true, they’ve just undermined her credibility. If it’s not, they’ve undermined their own. Either way, it’s completely irresponsible.
If this really happened, these guys need to go to jail for a long time. If it didn’t, Rolling Stone needs to explain why this story was published as-is.
So far, neither of those things has happened. One of the two should happen. Otherwise, this story just exists in a sort of limbo: A series of allegations with no proof, hanging over the heads of everyone involved. That includes the Phi Psi house and everybody else at UVA.
Already, some defenders of the story have insisted that the details are unimportant, that it doesn’t matter if this actually happened, because it raises important issues about campus rape. But at the same time, these defenders are operating under the underlying assumption that the story is true, and that anybody who questions it is a “rape apologist.” That’s just doublethink.
Facts matter. The truth matters. Not in spite of the emotions a story like this evokes, but because of them. The angrier this makes you, the more important it is to find out whether it’s true.
Just ask the Duke lacrosse team.
I don’t know what happened at UVA, neither do you, and neither does anyone else except this woman and the men she claims attacked her. So far, we’ve only heard from one of them.
If you treat an accusation as its own proof, you’re just part of a lynch mob.