CA NOW Responds to LA Times

VP Young Feminist, Lindsey Horvath responds to February 24 Op-Ed article by Heather MacDonald. 

At midnight after my graduation from the University of Notre Dame in 2004, I received a call from a local hospital.  A young woman was requesting the help of an advocate, and the nurse on duty asked me to come to the hospital immediately.  As a sexual assault crisis center first responder and advocate, I was astounded to note the number of calls that I received regarding local university students, or were reports of women under the age of 30 suffering from the effects of domestic violence, sexual assault, and rape in my community.  I received calls in the middle of the night with requests for my presence at a hospital or time on the phone to talk through the psychological and emotional effects of violence from the past.  I witnessed first-hand the trauma that these women experienced physically, emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually.

I am outraged and disappointed to read a suggestion that the current campus rape crisis is a theory invented by “feminist researchers,” and actually “doesn’t exist.”  I serve in various capacities working to end violence against women and girls because there IS, in fact, a crisis.  Recently, the US Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women has commemorated National Teen Dating Violence Awareness and Prevention Week, created by Senate Resolution 388 supported by Senator Hillary Clinton, due to this current epidemic.  The lack of awareness is NOT because the problem does not exist; rather, it is because feared outcomes of reporting their experiences keeps survivors silent – fear that nothing will be done; fear that their abusers will find out and escalate the violence; fear of reliving the experience; fear of the way they will be perceived by family, friends, and others in their communities. 

Dr. Kathie Mathis, Director of Domestic Violence at the Glendale YWCA, has said, “When communities aren’t hearing about cases of domestic violence or sexual assault, it makes me nervous because it means that they aren’t being reported, and that those who need the help aren’t receiving it.”

And articles like those by MacDonald only exacerbate the problem.

The Cities of West Hollywood and Los Angeles are currently working to innovate the ways we are addressing the communities’ responses to violence.  Each city has cited specific demographics – same-sex couples, immigrant families, non-English speaking communities – whose experiences of sexual violence need to be addressed and remedied in more complex ways, which create a need for additional funding and resources.  Just because certain resources exist does not mean that they are appropriate for all survivors of sexual violence, or that these resources are 100% effective in solving the problem.  The specialized needs of these and other demographics were realized when researchers – many of whom were/are feminists – began asking new questions and approaching this real problem from new angles to get a better understanding of the causes. 

The question by Mary Koss that MacDonald references captures the main issue [emphasis mine] - “Have you had sexual intercourse WHEN YOU DIDN’T WANT TO because a man gave you alcohol or drugs?”  The issue of consent is the main question.  (The later studies on the effects of alcohol and drugs on willingness to participate in sexual activity uncovered even more ways that the right to consent had been compromised, and many states including California, Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Missouri have established laws related to sexual assault clarifying inability to consent when under the influence of such substances as a result of these findings.)  The reason victims of sexual violence sometimes do not identify it as such is because the definition of rape is misunderstood, and there is a failure to properly educate a community about the issues surrounding consent, sexual assault, and rape – clearly evidenced by many uneducated claims in MacDonald’s article. 

A lack of education or information influences how women perceive their own experiences; when women learn – socially or otherwise – that they ought to be sexual objects, they will often not characterize criminal behavior as “serious enough to report” because it is so prevalent and commonplace in our culture.  MacDonald’s commendation of one student’s opinion – that “the way they dress and the way they act” are reasons to blame someone for her/his being raped – is the same hands-off, victim-blaming approach that has created a culture of fear among female victims.  In fact, opinions like this one influence teenage and college-aged women who are defining themselves as individuals to be less inclined to report incidents of sexual violence based on resulting mischaracterizations of character.  Yet another factor:  many colleges that have created their own internal systems of addressing student misconduct – sometimes with the intention of swaying students from choosing to pursue a public, legal route to justice and exposing such campus misbehavior – tamper the legal process, causing a disinclination to prosecute.  So despite the implications from MacDonald’s article, there are many factors that influence and legitimately account for the disparity in incidents, reports, and prosecution.

It is unreasonable and heterosexist to suggest that this crisis would require “banning male students entirely” from admission to college.  However, it IS reasonable to suggest that ALL colleges and students – not just female undergrads – need “to take the most stringent safety precautions” available to pro-actively address this problem.  One way California NOW is addressing this problem is through launching the I Heart Consensual Sex Campaign, which originated in Minnesota and was successful on the San Diego State University campus.  Designed to promote conversation about sexual violence, sexual health, and sex education, the Campaign uses a sex-positive message to educate communities about the issues surrounding the issue of consent.   OBJECT is hosting a luncheon conversation at the California NOW State Conference on April 19th in West Hollywood to discuss the question, “What is consent?”  Prior to the Conference, the Hollywood Chapter of NOW is hosting a self-defense class for women who are looking to get educated on physically protecting themselves from violence.  The work of these organizations is CRITICAL to ending violence against women, and to dismiss such efforts is to ignore the problem altogether in our society, and thus reinforce the social message to women that they are “getting what they deserve” when they are just too sexy.

It seems MacDonald’s suggested goal is to reinforce college as “a place for learning.”  However, if she truly is advocating for education, a comprehensive understanding of the causes – historical, psychological, cultural, medical, physiological, and sociological – of sexual violence, as well as healthy sexual practices, is a good start. 

Lindsey Horvath

President, Hollywood Chapter of NOW
Vice President Young Feminism, California NOW
Co-Founder, OBJECT
3rd Vice President, Glendale YWCA Board
Producer & Organizer, VDAY Hollywood
Member, City of West Hollywood Women’s Advisory Board