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What rapists intend is not what I was hoping to highlight, but instead the
problem of how we prove what they intended if we make intent relevant to the
definition of the offense. The concerns you raise are more properly
addressed in the sanction, not the definition of the offense, in my
opinion. So as not to create a male-dominated debate on intent and
sociopaths, I'm not going to go there, but will leave it to others to do so if
they choose. Instead, I'll just say this. Once you've offended on a
college campus, I think the burden should shift to the offender to show he is
safe to stay or return, rather than the college trying to read tea leaves on
what an offender might or might not do in the future. The safest
assumption has to be that you can't be here unless you can prove it is safe for
you to be.
Regards,
Brett A.
Sokolow
Brett A. Sokolow,
J.D.
Attorney-At-Law
"Best Practices for Campus Health and
Safety"
Managing Partner
The National Center for Higher
Education Risk Management, Ltd.
(a not-for-profit
corporation)
20 Callery Way
Malvern, PA
19355-2969
Tel. (610) 993-0229
Fax (610) 993-0228
Brett Blogs! at
www.ncherm.org
Executive Director,
The National Behavioral Intervention Team Association
(www.nabita.org)
NCHERM serves as counsel/advisor to 14 campuses,
including:
Special Counsel to the Dean of Students, Dominican
University (IL)
Special Counsel for Student Conduct Issues, Warren Wilson
College
Special Advisor to the University of Texas, San Antonio
Special
Counsel, Concordia University (TX)
Special Counsel, Northern Virginia
Community College
Special Counsel, Southwestern Michigan College
Special
Counsel, the Community College of Allegheny County
Special Advisor, Vassar
College
Special Advisor, Henry Ford Community College
In a message dated 12/23/2010 3:32:30 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
writes:
I wanted to comment and challenge us on a couple of the assumption that
have been made in the responses to these questions about two tier policies.
These assumptions are that very few perpetrators are unintentional and that
most rapists are sociopaths. Lisak's research is often pointed to validate
this perspective.
I think Lisak's research is very well done and very helpful, but his
findings are often misunderstood out to validate some of our own assumptions:
to help us villainize perpetrators who we are understandably angry at and hurt
by and so that we don't have to collectively take responsibility. Lisak uses
the term "serial rapists" to indicate perpetrators that repeatedly engage in
the behavior. I know many of us connect the terms "serial rapists" with
"serial killers" - who I would agree are often (probably always) sociopaths.
But just because one does something bad repeatedly doesn't mean one knows what
he is doing is bad and doesn't care (sociopath). It could also mean that he
has been taught by the culture that has surrounded him that what he is doing
is not bad, that it is normal, and that it is expected of him.
We live in a rape culture that mis-educates us about what is sex and what
is rape throughout our lives. Extreme examples of the rape culture are often
shared on this list with calls for activism to confront them. But we often
become oblivious to the more subtle aspects of rape culture that surround us
everyday - even those of us who do this work everyday. The reason we don't see
the rape culture is not because it is not there, but because it is everywhere.
The rape culture encourages, condones, and teaches men to rape women, only it
doesn't call it that. It calls it hooking up, getting laid, and having sex. As
a result of this rape culture men in particular are taught that the way you
hook-up and have sex includes pressure, coercion, using alcohol to ply invalid
consent, etc. Only we don't call it that. We call it "having game," "being a
sweet talker," "knowing how to butter her up," or "finding a cheap date."
Pardon the heterosexist examples - but heterosexism and homophobia are also a
part of the rape culture. Most men who have engaged in behavior that meets the
legal definition of rape and the definition of rape in college policies don't
define what they have done as rape (84% according to Koss). I would think that
makes them rapists but perhaps rapists who didn't intend to hurt, violate,
dominate, coerce, or control their victims - although I am sure their lack of
intent to do so does much to change that the victims of their perpetration
feel exactly that. Nor should it.
Now, let me be clear, this does not excuse, condone, or mitigate the
perpetrators responsibility in anyway shape or form. This is why I don't think
separating intention with unintentional in terms of policy or sanctioning
should be done. I would argue instead this implicates the rest of us, who
contribute to the rape culture ourselves despite our best of intentions.
If we are going to be effective in preventing sexual assaults, we have to
really understand who the perpetrators are (as hard as that might be -
especially for those who do this work who are survivors) so that we can be
most effective in reaching them. If we hold sessions telling college men that
rape is bad - it is a tremendous waste of our time and theirs. The sociopaths
(who I would argue are limited but clearly dangerous) aren't going to care.
And the nice, well-meaning, well-intentioned rapist (who I would argue data
suggest are the vast majority) will agree with you wholeheartedly and then
continue hooking up the way they have been taught their whole lives and
engaging in behavior that does indeed meet legal and campus definitions of
rape. In fact, they may perpetrate repeatedly (becoming a serial rapist) not
because they are sociopaths but because they are doing what they have been
taught is expected of them. The problem is with how we have been taught to
hook up our whole lives.
This is why we must challenge the rape culture by clearly defining
consent, clearly defining informed consent, and beginning to unpack the ways
the rape culture has and continues to mis-educates us so that there are fewer
perpetrators and so that we can begin to challenge, confront, and dismantle
the rape culture that continues to mis-educate others.
--Keith E. Edwards, PhD
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