I found the Air Force Academy's responses to accusations of rape to be truly shocking. For instance, if a woman cadet were to become intoxicated at a party and raped as she was incapacitated, the rapist might get discipline but the woman cadet surely would, for drinking. Etc etc etc.
Rape happens. Rape happens a lot. Especially on college campuses. Whenever I think about it I despair of ever being able to change it, because it's so frequent and everyone seems so used to it happening. But the institutional attitudes surely can be changed. So that when rapes happen the victims are protected and the rapists punished. Right?
It's the lack of discipline, the burying of the complaints that burns me up. If that had happened at any other organization, heads would roll, lawsuits would fly, and I bet various DAs would find ways to press criminal charges against the administration.
And yeah, maybe I do expect the students to be held to a higher regard. These kids will be holding the keys to fighter aircraft, bombers, and yes, weapons of mass destruction.
jerry |
08.30.03 - 12:31 am | #
The fact that the Air Force academy as an authority is more responsible for what happens within its organisation, and the downright unconscionable conduct in the way victims were treated, is why it gets more play than the general college figures. Harvard, Yale et. al don't oversee the mechanisms whereby women can report this sort of thing.
You'd be better off making a general indictment of social and government institutions when it comes to rape - my partner was raped in 12th grade (are figures for rape in high school similar to those in colleges?) and could not even make it as far as trial before she just wanted out of the process (this after being raped three times by the same student. His legal defence strategy was cross-questioning character demolition, and I doubt *any* woman who has been raped by a close acquaintance is in a frame of mind to start indulging in an adversarial courtroom proceeding where she is essentially blamed).
Melissa O is right, though - the base problems are institutional and social. I find that it turns my stomach when I hear Republican-types - so often those who trumpet personal responsibility - essentially acting as apologists for men who couldn't control their own behaviour. Becoming horny shouldn't make the word 'no' mean anything but.
Downunder |
08.30.03 - 1:16 am | #
BULLSHIT.
The AF Academy isn't fucking Yale. EVERY cadet is vetted by a member of Congress. These are supposed to be young men and women of sterling character. You can't buy your way in, you have to have the grades and a good reputation.
If AF cadets are raping women, they are not only criminals, but violating a public trust. They ARE to be held to a higher standard. They seek careers where they will make life and death judgments on an hourly basis. Yet, they are allowed to commit the most vile, unsoldierly behavior with a pass.
We pay for their educations. We expect, as a society, that they uphold the code of honor they swear to uphold. There is no exemption for rape.
These men and woman may well order people to their deaths to serve this country. The idea that the rape rates are the same at any college and that's OK is just fucking wrong. There should be a zero rate of rape at the AF Academy. Anyone who assaults another cadet should be in Levenworth.
Those standards, such as they are, are not there so they can look cute and neat. They want to be professional officers and have the responsibility for protecting the state and its citizens. ANY RAPE is a gross violation of the public trust we place in these people and should be punished severely.
steve_gilliard |
Homepage |
08.30.03 - 2:05 am | #
Must comment - nothing like a nice CBS poll to offset the Gallup over at Polling Report.
kath |
08.30.03 - 2:16 am | #
I applied to the AF Academy when I was in HS. I wanted to fly jets. I was vetted by a congressman, but it was pretty cursory. A ten minute appointment, no biggie. Though it sure felt good.
For me, some of the more undesirable aspects of the Academy were in some of the rules. It is extremely, exceedingly difficult to find a woman while at the Academy. It is illegal to fraternize with the women on campus. Only Seniors are allowed cars. Your day starts at 5:00 A.M. or so and lights out is at 10:00 P.M. You have the heavy load of an engineering student (all majors are some type of engineering) plus military classes plus a sport plus reveille/parade marching. Hazing is the rule, and endless pushups are the normal penalty for anything, although you might get K.P.
Additionally, it's not only the military (cocky, testosterone), its where you go to learn to fly (more cocky, more tes). Let's not forget, as well, that these are 18-22 year-olds. Life's rough.
I'm not condoning the rape, it's just that the situation is...challenging. I think you're right, Atrios, in a F&B sort of way.
BTW I didn't get in--they lost my dental records, didn't tell me, so my file never even got looked at. I got a form rejection letter. My Liasion Officer suggested I try again next year. I went to U.C. Santa Cruz instead.
Dex |
Homepage |
08.30.03 - 2:50 am | #
I distrust every survery that classifies everything from "inappropriate touching" to actual rape as "rape".
Then when you have two of those surveys, where the only matching characteristic being something classified as "rape" (not knowing if the classification criteria are even the same), I find it very difficult to draw any conclusions.
Felix Deutsch |
08.30.03 - 4:16 am | #
For those who think rape is rare:
ROTFL
Rape is common. What are you going to do about it?
Melanie |
08.30.03 - 4:35 am | #
One of my good friends in high school got an appointment to the Air Force Academy. She was near the top of her class, but not at the very top, and was not in the least athletic, but she pushed herself harder than anyone else in the school, met all the requirements, including the physical fitness, and got in. She left earlier for college than the rest of us for basic training or whatever, and I admired her accomplishment so much. She was the most determined person I had known to that point.
A month later she was back, she had quit, and she wouldn't be specific about why. I'm sure a fair number of people quit in this first few weeks, but I never really understood what happened.
Anyway, reading this thread brought to mind an unpleasant idea. Just as I said that it's easier to change institutional attitudes toward rape than it is to prevent rape, maybe these institutions figure that it's easier to prevent the report of rape than it is to prevent rape. After all, if the rape is not reported, and it never gets into the police logs, then the rape never happened, as far as the institution is concerned. An elite institution would rather have a situation where only the most cut-and-dried, open-and-shut cases are dealt with, the rest consigned to silence, than a situation where there is open, messy, and heated discussion about issues of rape and ambiguous cases. It's shirking its responsibility both to the greater community and to the institutional community, but I guess they figure that the problem is intractable.
steve_gilliard: I share your outrage. I mean, it's outrageous and it makes me angry, but at the same time I despair. It doesn't surprise me anymore. (And maybe at this point I think the energy is better spent helping victims.) Yeah, these guys are supposed to be vetted. So what? There IS NO demographic, no group above a certain size, that does not contain rapists. Are these guys vetted by Congress? There are probably rapists in Congress, too. There are left-wing activist rapists, feminist theory rapists, college professor rapists. Cardinal Law knows there are clergy rapists. Something like 99% of rapists are men, but there are woman rapists, too.
And nobody talks about it, nobody nobody nobody. Relatively speaking. Something like five out of six rapes go unreported.
And relatively speaking, the Air Force Academy's behavior was egregious. But the real egregiousness is that of the rapists, and how do we stop that? As noted, the rate of rape at the Academy is not especially high for a college campus. Multiply the seriousness by the prevalence and the problem is appalling. It ought to be a national crisis, 24/7.
But it isn't, and even if it were, it's very easy for me to imagine that nothing would change.
I don't mean to be defeatist. It's just very easy to feel like nothing makes a difference. Or like you'd have to rebuild the whole society from scratch. But even if you could, how would you rebuild it? I
Melissa O |
08.30.03 - 5:00 am | #
What I want to know is, why do women tend to be attracted to the worst men?
We all see it. Why does it happen?
KT |
08.30.03 - 5:08 am | #
Felix: This is a common complaint about these surveys. Go here:
It then asked the respondents if they considered the act to be rape. Instructively, about 50% of those raped (by the definition above) said yes. Of those who had unwanted sexual touching that was not rape, only 3% said yes.
People know the difference between persuasion, pressuring, and coercion.
Pressuring is still pretty scummy, even if it's not actually criminal. I've never understood that argument.
And I mean, even if someone in good faith consents to sex but then regrets it later, I don't see why their partner can't regret it too. You know? Why the defensiveness? Why can't they say, "I really wanted it to be good, but I guess it turned out bad for you, and I'm sorry it ever happened?" Not sorry as in culpable sorry, just, you know, sorry.
I mean, you hear people say, "She went along with it, it's not my fault she was upset later," and it's like, "No, it's not your fault, but why can't you show some decency and show some sympathy for someone who was hurt by something you were an intimate part of?"
Melissa O |
08.30.03 - 5:22 am | #
KT: I hope you're not saying that rape is a function of sexual attraction. Because, you know, it's not, kind of by definition.
If you're talking about things like domestic violence, well, generally speaking that's a complex psychological phenomenon.
If you're just talking about straight women being attracted to obnoxious men, well, our cultural ideals of men and women are the obnoxious, take-no-prisoners asshole adventurer and the vapid, helpless, busty bimbo. Those aren't the only ideals available. I don't think they're even the only masculine and feminine ideals available. But it's what we're stuck with for now.
Melissa O |
08.30.03 - 5:28 am | #
KT, Excuse me...but what the hell does that have to do with rape?
Pope St. Dr. Charlie |
08.30.03 - 5:28 am | #
No, rape is not a function of sexual attraction. It's a crime of violence.
What the hell does the question "why do women tend to be attracted to the worst men?" have to do with rape? Well, I think it has a hell of a lot to do with rape! When you acknowledge that most rapes occur between acquaintances (NOT stranger rapes) then the phenomenon of acquaintance is germane, no?
KT |
08.30.03 - 6:06 am | #
Uh, "Pope St. Dr. Charlie", you don't have any political or personal reasons for rejecting the question "why do women tend to be attracted to the worst men?" do you? I mean, you really care about finding solutions, and aren't about to reject certain ideas out-of-hand, are you?
KT |
08.30.03 - 6:08 am | #
KT: acquaintance rape can be lots of things. It can be bosses raping subordinates. It can be teachers raping students. It can be rape by friends whose advances have been rejected. It can be rape by friends of friends at parties. And yes, it can be rape that happens on a date.
I would suggest that because rape is so prevalent it seems likely that most rapists do not seem like rapists or "the worst men" at first.
Until they commit rape. Then any prior attraction disappears. Rendering your question utterly utterly moot.
Sure, some people find arrogance or "badness" attractive. Maybe those traits correlate with being a rapist. Who knows?
But I tell you this: no one, even those people who have rape fantasies, finds actual rape or a person's being a rapist attractive. You're more likely to find people who enjoy being tortured. No, seriously.
How do these kinds of slippages happen? "Attraction to the 'bad boy'" suddenly becomes "attraction to potential rapists"? What does that say? I mean, to me KT's question sounds like "Why do police officers like getting shot at?" They don't like getting shot at, on any level. It's just an occupational hazard. There's a sense in which rape is an occupational hazard of being a woman, especially one who dates men regularly.
Except that the odds of a woman's being raped are undoubtedly higher than the odds of a police officer's getting shot.
Melissa O |
08.30.03 - 6:40 am | #
Melissa- I don't think KT's saying women are attracted to rapists, for god's sake.
His confusion stems from this: We know damn well that the like 2% of guys that are narcissistic and objectify women are represented in the "actively-daters" category at a way, way higher percentage.
So color us not so shocked when the worst happens. It's likely that we just see them in a different light: what's arrogance to us is filtered so that when the psychopath is among women it just looks like self-confidence. A trait considered attractive.
And clearly they say things when they're "with the boys" that they sure don't in mixed situations.
doesn't matter |
08.30.03 - 8:32 am | #
Look at it this way. The ethos of every service academy is that these people are your brothers and sisters. The experience is supposed to create an ethos of absolute trust and honesty--show me many universities that even pay lip service to an honor code. Try and imagine the outcry if a homosexual mafia was committing rapes and getting a free pass--er, you don't have to.
BTW, anyone else notice the Air Force Colonel who wrote the latest Regnery screed about the Clenis was an administrator at the Academy?
Steve Paradis |
08.30.03 - 8:41 am | #
I had nooo Idea it was so common. I have no children, and this certainly was NOT my experience at college.
The service academies train OFFICERS. These people will have the power of life and death over enlisted men and women. It stands to reason that violent criminals are not officer material.
And to think Jody Powell got thrown out for cheating.
56k |
08.30.03 - 9:13 am | #
The military is about conquest. From time immemorial one of the rewards for the victorious army has been rape. I would look first to the military environment for problems of rape and am not the least surprised to find it present there. While people like to romanticize soldiers and soldiering, it should not be forgotten that soldiers are trained to meet their objectives by force.
zork |
08.30.03 - 9:34 am | #
A couple of things. First of all, are we really so naive? Clearly, despite the shiny veneer of academic achievement, the service academies do cultivate a certain kind of animalistic behavior - much like college and professional athletic programs do. (Athletes play a prominent role in the college-rape stories I've heard from friends and aquaintances.)
You might as well believe that cops are hired for their sensitivity.
Another point. It's struck me from what I've read that rape was COMMON among the female cadets - even that those who weren't raped or sexually harassed were a distinct minority. Anyone know anything more specific about that?
Susie |
Homepage |
08.30.03 - 10:15 am | #
dm: Why is KT bringing this idea up now, here, in this thread?
But anyway, all I was saying is that rape appears common enough that it is not just the domain of narcissitic jerks. That something more complicated than just being a psychopath is going on.
I also just don't like the "women are attracted to assholes" phrasing, as if straight women don't know any better.
But my point is that violence is something else. Narcissitic sexist jerks can be narcissistic, sexist jerks, but they're not necessarily always violent. Or maybe it is just two sides of the same coin. I can't even tell anymore.
When I reread my previous posts it kind of sounds like I mean "Well, there will always be rapists, so what different does it make if we do punish them?" I don't mean that at all. Like, it's a good thing we have the criminal justice system rather than the Melissa justice system, because I'd probably give them all death sentences.
I just feel like... I don't know, like, say you're in the trenches, fighting a war, and some green soldier is like, "oh my god! They're shooting at us!" and all you can think to say is "Of course they are! Now shoot back, dumbass!"
It's one thing to be incensed, right, but eventually the post will scroll off the bottom of Atrios' blog. But women, especially young women, will still be getting raped. They'll still be shooting at us. The only question I have is who's in the trenches shooting back?
Melissa O |
08.30.03 - 10:41 am | #
The solution to the problem is simple:
STAY THE HELL OUT OF THE MILITARY!
IT TEACHES RAPE!!!!
David Ehrenstein |
Homepage |
08.30.03 - 10:46 am | #
Perhaps the reason this is covered more in the press than the rape rate on other campuses, which may be higher, is the following: the military has a long history of covering up assaults on the women in its ranks. Remember Tailhook?
I think that the failure to punish this behavoir stems at least in part from the attitude of many in the upper levels of command that women don't belong in the military, and that anything that makes it a less attractive option for them is desirable. I actually heard several men say, after Tailhook, "well, if they hadn't been there, it wouldn't have happened." Well, sure - and if there hadn't been any Jews in Europe, Hitler wouldn't have murdered them.
I think the military has a built-in "blame the victim" mentality when it comes to any issue involving women - because so many in the command do not want us there in the first place.
Jennifer |
08.30.03 - 10:53 am | #
Susie: The New York Times story says that something like 70% of cadets were sexually harassed. A little research shows that sexual harassment is defined as "unwanted and uninvited sexual attention." This includes all kinds of things from lewd jokes to being cornered or pressured for sexual favors.
If that's the definition I'm surprised it's not 100%.
Here's the thing that gets me about the military aspect. They're supposed to be highly disciplined, able to take on extreme physical and psychological difficulty. But they can't be disciplined enough to control their sexual desires? No way. They just don't care to.
Melissa O |
08.30.03 - 10:53 am | #
Obviously the former Commander in Chief has given young men the idea that they can get away with rape.
richard |
08.30.03 - 10:55 am | #
Obviously young men have had that idea long before 1992.
Melissa O |
08.30.03 - 10:58 am | #
That was a typo, wasn't it - "discipline the victims" - ??
MaryLee |
08.30.03 - 11:16 am | #
MaryLee: I meant "the (male) cadets can't have enough discipline to avoid sexual harassment and sexual assault?"
Melissa O |
08.30.03 - 11:27 am | #
Melissa O,
Long terms of imprisonment works wonders on military personnel. If you knew you were facing 15 years in Levenworth displinary barracks for rape, you'd think twice.
They used to hang rapists in the military. Rape is neither new nor uncommon in the military. But the AF Academy seems to have developed a culture which devalued women to an amazing degree.
Oh, I know enough about college rape, having prevented a couple with friends.
But it seems like the AF officers at the Academy figured that their female recruits were free pussy and when they complained, they were punished.
How many women wound up putting out for their classmates just to get by. We're only talking about rape, but if rape was common, how often did female recruits agree to settle matters with a blowjob, or a quick supply closet fuck. Which while not technically rape, is insidious on its own.
We're talking about rape, where overt force was used, but not sexual coersion, where women are convinced that the only way to stay even is to be sexually available to their male classmates.
And if women are acutally being raped, many more are succuming before force is used and turned out. It happens in regular college and you can bet if women are being raped others are being coerced to put out just to survive the experience.
steve_gilliard |
Homepage |
08.30.03 - 11:30 am | #
is it the uniform?
pansypoo |
Homepage |
08.30.03 - 11:43 am | #
All of our greatest institutions are rotting from within. It is truly very sad.
E.E. |
08.30.03 - 1:10 pm | #
My aunt did 20 years in the USAF, but I'm not planning to ask her about this. I don't know if a high-ranking dad makes a difference, probably.
John Isbell |
08.30.03 - 2:35 pm | #
Oh - my brother-in-law writes about US military planes (Anthony Thornborough) and he confirms that US pilots have been on uppers for years if not decades.
Rumsfeld said this about the rape charges when the story broke: "We look forward to an Air Force Academy where such charges are never made again" (more or less). Then he grinned. Note the double entendre.
Sorry about the family detail overload.
John Isbell |
08.30.03 - 2:40 pm | #
The comparison of the surveys -- the DOJ Survey to the AF Academy Survey --is not entirely enlightening.
The NYT piece appears to refer to rapes physically occurring at the AF Academy. The hed is "Rate of Rape at Academy Is Put at 12% in Survey." And the article states: "the survey, given to women in May 2003, appeared to confirm the claims of the half-dozen or so former cadets who initially came forward earlier this year, revealing a problem of sexual assault at the academy that they described as widespread and the product of a culture hostile toward women." However, other parts of the article don't clearly state that the survey was limited to on-campus assaults.
The DOJ survey of college women clearly is not limited to on-campus assualts. Exhibit 9 to the survey states that 2/3rds of the completed rapes and 54 percent of the attempted rapes took place off-campus. Per Exhibit 8, only 35 percent of the completed rapes and 43 percent of the attempted rapes were by a classmate.
Thus, the DOJ report does not appear to establish what percentage of rapes are related to the colleges, either by physical location or an affiliation between the school and the rapist.
In other words, to the extent we can tell, the two surveys appear to measure two different things.
I think the most that can be said is that we don't know from the two reports (the NYT article and DOJ report) whether there are a greater percentage of rapes at colleges other than the AF Academy. The information is too incomplete to make such a judgment.
(To be clear, I'm not suggesting that anyone has made the faulty comparison. I'm just saying it would be wrong to jump to the conclusion that rape is more prevalent [or even as prevalent] on campuses other than the AF Academy by comparing 12 percent to the "nearly 20 percent" figure.)
Roger Ailes |
Homepage |
08.30.03 - 2:45 pm | #
I feel compelled to step into a discussion composed of people whose opinions I care about.
Tailhook. I never attended but was in on the investigation.
Every year, one floor of a hotel was designated for hookers and those personnel, male and female, wishing to participate in "grab ass" antics. Juvenile - yes. Officer and "gentlemanly" - obviously not.
The complainee, after checking with no less than two of her superiors, carefully confirming which floor was involved, deliberately (by her own admission), proceeded to such floor with witnesses.
When the inevitable happened, after filing a report, her complaint was perhaps not handled in an official manner as most knew she deliberately set-up the complaint.
She got traction by going outside the military.
As several senior officers were forced to retire, one of whom was not even there and many junior officers will never make senior because of that incident, I'm not really sure who raped who.......
USAFA. No excuses, just some observations.
I too, am concerned about the apparent cover-up.
The male to female ratio is quite different there than at most colleges, giving me concern to the large percent who have felt threatened. Combining raging teenage hormones with learning about leadership control issues makes things rather, um, volatile. Pecking orders, both formal and informal, are established, broken down and re-established all the time. Social signals are sent, understood and misunderstood. Personalities are constantly changing. Mental and physical control issues (including rape), unintentional and intentional, to almost every degree, happen quite a bit, even before women were there. (Yes, there has been at least one male-on-male rape, that I know).
I cannot be certain, but believe the constant physical and mental pressure is quite different from that of a non-military school.
It is a challenging management scenario. People fail all the time, for all sorts of reasons, cadet and executive officer alike.
The fact that the affair has become public is good, in my mind. I only hope substantive progress to eliminate such abuses as rape can occur.
To E.E., I can only say that institutions can only rot if society is not willing to expose and excise the rot in the open.
Skygod |
08.30.03 - 3:27 pm | #
Melissa O, you rock.
If rape (and sexual assault, andsexual harassment) isn't condemned in a government-sponsored institution, how can we ever hope to eliminate it in the rest of society?
The result is that women are devalued and made afraid. This SUCKS.
I hate the whole fucking world today.
Hestia |
08.30.03 - 4:09 pm | #
Can't help wondering about all those troops you have in Iraq now...
a Phoenician in a time of Roma |
08.30.03 - 4:39 pm | #
I agree that the Air Force Academy should be held to higher standards than your run-of-the-mill university, but I think the Academy also has to take a good look at the type of environment they create at the place.
You could get kicked out for drinking, having sex, even masturbating for Christ's sake. The sexual frustration bubbling at that place must be unbelievably high. Obviously that doesn't excuse sexual assault, but the military has got to rethink its whole hardcore no-sex-at-all policies for the new millenium.
fishbulb |
08.30.03 - 5:26 pm | #
I agree that the Air Force Academy should be held to higher standards than your run-of-the-mill university, but I think the Academy also has to take a good look at the type of environment they create at the place.
You could get kicked out for drinking, having sex, even masturbating for Christ's sake. The sexual frustration bubbling at that place must be unbelievably high. Obviously that doesn't excuse sexual assault, but the military has got to rethink its whole hardcore no-sex-at-all policies for the new millenium.
fishbulb |
08.30.03 - 5:42 pm | #
fishbulb,
< You could get kicked out for drinking, having sex, even masturbating for Christ's sake>
Never heard of anyone getting the boot for any one or combination of the above.
Lying, cheating, stealing or tolerating such, yes. Masturbating for the sake of Christ, definitely, no.
Skygod |
08.30.03 - 6:04 pm | #
Well, that's the "threat" at least, that you can get kicked out for any of those. Maybe it's just there to scare the cadets. I have a friend who went there, so I'm just repeating what he's told me.
fishbulb |
08.30.03 - 7:11 pm | #
Roger Ailes: If you read the actual draft report that you can find on MSNBC, it is clear that rapes that occur "off the installation" and by non-affiliated personnel are included in the statistics. There aren't many, though. 89.8% were by cadets. 27.7% occurred off the installation.
Some people seem to be interested in the question of whether male cadets should be unusually good and are actually unusually bad. I think it's an interesting question, but I care far more about the question as to whether the woman cadets are getting unusually hurt.
I think the high rate of rapes by other students reported by the study could indicate the kind of environment that steve_gilliard describes, where you fear for your safety walking down the hall.
But I still think it's sobering to think that the average college student's chance of getting is higher than the average cadet's chance of getting raped, even if the Academy is a very self-contained, intense environment.
steve_gilliard is addressing me by name, and I can't tell what it is I'm saying that he takes issue with. As far as I can tell, we agree. It doesn't seem like the chances of being raped at the Air Force Academy are all that much higher than those at other colleges, but that doesn't mean we should say oh well, nothing to see here, unless we think the status quo is acceptable. I absolutely do not think so, but I bet some people do. But I guess the other thing is that if the Air Force Academy is unusually bad about these things, then what I don't want is for it to become like other colleges, because the situation at other colleges is also unacceptably bad.
That's why I don't want to focus on the institutional flaws at the Air Force Academy, because after a while it sounds like the violation of the hallowed halls of the military, and the public trust or blah blah blah is more important that the way way way too common victimization of women in our society.
Melissa O |
08.30.03 - 8:30 pm | #
I wonder why KT seems to want to drag this down to some personal level with me. Never mind, I don't really want to know.
If I reject his question, is it simply because I do not see that his assumption, "women tend to be attracted to the worst men," has any basis in objective reality. Many women seem capable of identifying and avoiding "the worst men." The assumption seems, to me, insulting to women, and upon reflection, a subtle twist on the "blame the victim" line.
Pope St. Dr. Charlie |
08.30.03 - 9:25 pm | #
Mellissa o
Obviously you believe that rape is OK if the rapist is a liberal, pro-choice Democrat like Clinton.
richard |
08.30.03 - 9:34 pm | #
I was an officer in the Air Force for over 11 years, and this scandal burns me up. As a minimum, a rapist should be expelled and given a dishonorable discharge. These officers that covered it up should also hit the road with no retirement.
One other thing: jerry says: These kids will be holding the keys to fighter aircraft, bombers, and yes, weapons of mass destruction.
You don't need keys for aircraft, you just have to know what switches to throw. Nukes are different, obviously.
Unterhausen |
08.30.03 - 10:11 pm | #
You actually bought the Juanita Story?
That aside, why are we evin bringing up the Clenis?
Assamite |
08.30.03 - 10:21 pm | #
And Melissa will KILL YOU for accusing her of saying that ANY kind of rape is okay.
Assamite |
08.30.03 - 10:22 pm | #
It is the women who have left the
Academy. Nothing is done to make up to them for the misdeeds of the men (who usually stay and graduate and become officers).
The fact that there are so many more men than women at the Academy just sets up a bad situation.
I hate to think that these rapists are now officers.
Sam |
08.30.03 - 10:27 pm | #
In some ways rape is worse than taking a life because there's such a thing as justifiable homicide, self-defense, etc. There's never a good reason for raping someone.
So I have absolutely zero tolerance for rape.
I found theme rape allegations against Clinton to be extremely disturbing. I don't know Clinton or the alleged victim, so it's hard for me to form a personal judgment. Given my experience of Ivy League politicos, I would not be surprised if more than one president has committed rape, as well as not a few congressmen and a whole bunch of assorted beltway insiders. Given my experience with the issue of rape, I'm disinclined to think that people make up rape charges for fun or profit. As best as I can tell, no one was ever able to refute Clinton's accuser, but no one was ever able to corroborate her accusations, either. The fact that she changed her story doesn't help her, but to my mind it doesn't completely discredit her. It's not hard to imagine people who would stop at nothing to stop Clinton finding someone to be their avatar, but it's also not hard to imagine a powerful man known for womanizing committing rape.
If other lefties think I'm missing something, I'd love to hear what it might be.
If the charges are genuine, and not cooked up by some right-wing spin machine, I'm glad they were debated, and I hope the victim one day gets her day in court. And I'm glad that, in the absence of irrefutable proof, Clinton was not toppled. Because if all it takes to topple a government is allegations, our democracy is in big trouble.
That sort of brings up another problem with regard to rape, one I haven't figured out: the reasonable doubt standard as currently implemented doesn't seem to be very good at catching acquaintance rape. How should it be changed while avoiding the terror of abuse of state power? Is it just a matter of jury attitudes? I don't know. If anyone has a good idea, I'd like to hear it.
Melissa O |
08.31.03 - 1:14 am | #
Too bad vaginas don't come equipped with retactable steel blades. Oops sorry did I say that????
Fair and Balanced Anonymous |
08.31.03 - 9:23 pm | #
I hate to disagree with both Atrios and Dave Cullens, but I'm pretty sure Dave's mistaken - he's comparing apples to oranges, statistically. The Air Force used an old-fashioned survey methodology which badly underestimates actual rape prevalence. If you adjust to account for that, it turns out that there's a lot more rape at the Air Force Academy than at an average US college. I've posted about this in more detail on my blog.
Ampersand |
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09.01.03 - 3:31 pm | #