UMass is a city unto itself with its own PD (but not FD)
Rape is not only an under reported crime but those that are officially reported to authorities almost never make it into local news. And if a tree falls in the forest without someone posting it to social media, it does not make a sound.
My friends in the professional bricks and mortar media covered yesterday's annual release of the Clery Crime Report with optimistic headlines about the decrease in alcohol and drug arrests from the previous year at our beloved flagship, UMass/AMHERST.
But they barely mentioned the shocking number of rapes that occurred (17). Or cover the even more shocking number at Hampshire College (15) or Amherst College (12).
Only the Mass Daily Collegian seemed to get it
I say shocking because they all went pretty much unreported all year long and we are only now being given the information. Sort of.
As a father of two daughters I am far more concerned with a school's incidence of rape than I am with alcohol/drug violations, although my guess is they are somewhat related.
Back in 2012 I broke the story of the gang rape at UMass and within 12 hours dozens of media outlets converged on UMass for a hasty press conference. But I can only think of one or two rapes that has been reported by the media in the past few years.
The first step in solving a problem is to admit there is a problem. And when our little college town had 58 rapes last year I would call that a problem. Yes, I said 58. (In 2014 the sad total was 48).
According to APD they had 14 reported rapes in 2015, but the University and Colleges are there own separate little fiefdoms.
UMass had 17, Hampshire College 15 and Amherst College 12 or a total between all four agencies of 58. Or out of a population of 38,000 a much higher than average of 1.53/1,000, where federal Department of Justice statistics show nationwide an average of 1.3/1,000.
Whenever I live tweet a potential threat at UMass be it a wandering bear, guy with a machete or Creepy Clown, it gets tremendous attention. And I hope that puts the kids on guard, as well it should (with everything except clowns).
Note to college aged women: be on guard!
28 comments:
58/38000 = .001526, which is 1.53/1000, not 1.75/1000. That's not to downplay the problem, of course. We still have so much more work to do to educate people on this issue and I think it's good that you are bringing attention to it.
Yeah I originally had a slightly higher number for # or rapes in Amherst reported to APD, and I made the correction on everything except that.
Plus I suck at complicated math and I figured you would proof read it for me.
These numbers are disappointing but part of this might be because victims are speaking up more than they used to. Colleges and universities have done a lot of work to provide resources to victims, so they feel more empowered to speak up. Essentially hammering home they can get help, not shame for making their assaults known.
What's interesting here is the number of reported rapes among these schools relative to population. The number of cases are close, population certainly is not. As far as recognizing the problem, theres no doubt the schools have. Schools across the country have. There's a lot of work to do.
Now, I don't think a Presidential candidate bragging about sexual assault is going to help any of this, but that's an entire separate topic...
I don't know if it's still happening, but there used to be a great deal of multiple counting because multiple agencies are involved. If a student at one college is raped on the campus of another, I believe both colleges count it. Likewise, the support agencies (UHS) do not share names with the police (or didn't, Pre-ACT) and hence the same incident would be counted twice, thrice if Housing was involved.
And then if a rape occurs downtown, the APD count it as does the victim's college. If the perp is identified and is attending a different college, it can get counted one more time.
Hence you really have to be careful with this tabulation. Cleary didn't consider three colleges in the same town...
Yeah, I checked that.
Larry, how are you calculating your population figure? And how do you know that victims aren't counted twice?
That said, the AC & HC figures are kinda shocking.
Larry, 7 (of the 17) UMass rapes occurred Off Campus and hence you are counting them twice.
Also, who says all the victims are female?
No, and I'm guessing the vast majority are female.
Alcohol or drug-pot- inspired abuse is never a good thing-it leads people to do stupid-criminal things that hurt and destroy lives.Probably many rapes go un-reported due to clique peer pressure-but probably many get inspired by "Activism" at NELCWIT or Umass Every Womens Center type place-abuse exist when rape is falsely reported by women who don't want to own up to poor lifestyle choices with substance abuse..you DO have to watch out for these two disparate competing agendas complicating the storyline..
As a parent, keep in mind it is the poor performance of your peers in raising these monsters, mostly MA parents. The blame falls with these loosers, not the media for reporting.
Plus you cannot change that rape is almost always he said she said, so by nature, hard to solve or show proof.
Perhaps if we did not let the government absorb all the increases in productivity in the last 50 years...and then some...parents would have time to do their jobs of being parents..but ironically we will make this worse. It should take less labor to support a family vs. 50 years ago, not over 2x as much...thw difference are your endless govt programs....you literally traded them for good people.
Hampshire parents especially...they have something like 10 to 20x the rapes...oh wait it is not Hampshire....that is just a college..it is all Amherst..and after parents are done...it is All the Amherst police....not some school.
So why do the Amherst law enforcers tolerate so much rape? Perhaps because it is really only stopable by good parents, once they are here, it is too late.
"A Touchy Subject"
Now folks, THAT is a sense of humor...for those of you with none left.
I don't think having had a rapist as President 1992-2000 helps either. My God the hipocrisy on the left.
The president's actions are his own, perhaps having to do with his parenting...not the responsibility of his party or the members, no matter how violent or wacked out they are as liberals.
Jesum Crow, the hipicrisy of the ignorant.
I get the sense from other posts that beating the average is the benchmark...when I thought the benchmark was zero. Perhaps that explains part of why rape is so accepted and often ignored.
Of course President Clinton's sexual predation is his own. Who else's Would it be? But the left-biased media turns a blind eye. "Oh, that sex stuff is a Private matter." Yes, except when these hipocrites want to call out someone on the other side of the aisle. At which point all hell is heaped upon the person.
The real tragedy is that when substance abuse leads to other bodily abuses -rape - DWI injury and death - gun or altercation crime - so few people will raise objection-because it is "Un--P.C" to be a " Party pooper" and rain on any abusers parade ...
OMG, we are all screwed if people actually think Republicans and Democrats are different. Both these stupid team sports style groups feel that everything needs to be decided collectively and agreed upon, both of these groups feel that all your income is theirs and that you should not be making decisions on your own.
Then there is liberty, adult decisions and more. But that does not fall in the R/D spectrum of socialistic compliance and universal right and wrong, right down to getting approved bathroom sinks or asking government permission to practice your profession.
In a spectrum of 100 options, we pick one, tyranny, and then we give it two brands (R and D) so that the ignorant can debate something that actually cannot change. For the enlightened, we see 99 more options that sound like Chinese to those hanging out in the REAL 1%.
Stop it with Bill Clintons private life, we need to hear from the tramps in Donald Trumps public life.
Second note to college age men: Be careful of women who will entice you, have sex with you then claim rape. 1 in 4 rape accusations at college age are false.
To 9:08 PM, what is your source for that statistic?
Amherst continues to win the race to the bottom. The high school girls volleyball teams boycotts national anthem. Poor girls are so oppressed. Hope the nice Syrian boys coming to the area, teach them their views of women and lesbians.
Ahh sharia law coming to Amherst,now that is called diversity.
cathy Young has a good piece here:
http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2014/09/false_rape_accusations_why_must_be_pretend_they_never_happen.html
Why don't these people stand up during the anthem to show their support for what is good in their country? The country doesn't oppress. People do. Please remember girls, the government is not the country. The government is run by leftist idealogues.
Thank you for reporting on this and for your coverage of so many other important local stories.
Rape is good. Haven't you heard? President Bill Clinton did it, and we're thinking of sending him and his lying, execrable, rape-supportive wife back into the White House.
Oh that's funny! Clinton's predatory behavior is "private." Nothing to see here. Move along.
Based upon your published numbers, it would appear that Hampshire with only 1200 students has a very high rate and that Mass has a very low rate with Amherst College toward the higher end. What does this mean? My guess is that the actual rate is much higher than generally reported, probably because there is significant underreporting at UMass. National survey data shows that 1 in 4 women have been raped in their lifetime.
Based upon your published numbers, it would appear that Hampshire with only 1200 students has a very high rate and that Mass has a very low rate with Amherst College toward the higher end. What does this mean? My guess is that the actual rate is much higher than generally reported, probably because there is significant underreporting at UMass. National survey data shows that 1 in 4 women have been raped in their lifetime.
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