Campus sexual assault has become the third rail of journalism, and yet seemingly impossible for reporters to leave alone. Rolling Stone was hit with a multi-million dollar defamation lawsuit after the magazine’s “A Rape on Campus” was thoroughly debunked, with writer Sabrina Rubin Erdely named in the suit as “a wanton journalist who was more concerned with writing an article that fulfilled her preconceived narrative about the victimization of women on American college campuses.”
Further, a male Columbia student has sued the school for standing by silently, after both school and law enforcement authorities had rejected the case of his rape accuser, as “Mattress Girl” Emma Sulkowicz gained worldwide publicity dragging her dormitory mattress around campus and across the stage at graduation “as an artistic expression of the personal trauma I’ve experienced at Columbia.” Columbia even granted Sulkowicz college credit for the stunt, which was reportedly part of her senior thesis.
Now, Washington Examiner opinion writer Ashe Schow says that the Washington Post is taking its crack at covering the overwhelming epidemic of campus sexual assault. She tweeted yesterday:
The @washingtonpost is holding a symposium tomorrow on campus sexual assault and didn’t invite ONE person to advocate for due process.
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 16, 2015
https://twitter.com/AbuNudnik/status/610933305119215616
@AbuNudnik @instapundit @washingtonpost the Feds of course
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 16, 2015
@AbuNudnik @instapundit @washingtonpost look up the 2011 Dear Colleague Letter and Title IX
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 16, 2015
https://twitter.com/Dolski28/status/610933862647078912
@Dolski28 @washingtonpost @seanmdav of course not. Rights? We don't need no stinking rights on college campuses!
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 16, 2015
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@AsheSchow @washingtonpost I don't understand why they want to turn all men into rapists. No one @washingtonpost has Sons?
— #ByeVAWA (@VAWAIsNoMore) June 16, 2015
@AsheSchow @washingtonpost Advocate for victim's rights? YES!
Advocate for a reasonable defense of the accused? Never!— ?Matt Brooks??? (@MattB_Radio) June 16, 2015
@AsheSchow @CHSommers @washingtonpost But it's going to be a "thought provoking" discussion!
— KC Johnson (@kcjohnson9) June 16, 2015
@AsheSchow Is this the same @washingtonpost that employs Zerlina "we should always believe" Maxwell?
Due process is so 20th century…— A Laughing Scoundrel (@wizardofcause) June 16, 2015
The lawyer who wrote the piece, “No matter what Jackie [from the debunked Rolling Stone piece] said, we should automatically believe rape claims”? Yes, that’s her.
@AsheSchow @SohlerSarah @washingtonpost Pfftt! Due process?!?! That's just the reactionary response of the cisgendered hetero-patriarchy!
— First Lord of the Space Force Admiralty (@Noah_Pology) June 16, 2015
The Weekly Standard also has taken notice of the Washington Post’s risky editorial decision to assume the crusade against campus rape.
Now the Washington Post has joined a race to the bottom among the legacy media, in a June 12 package of two very long front-page articles and a third inside the paper that includes both the results of a Post-Kaiser Family Foundation poll and detailed interviews of some respondents. The main headline: “1 in 5 women say they were violated.” The articles and the poll purport to confirm claims by the administration, its congressional supporters, most of the media, and campus activists that around 20 percent of female college students are sexually assaulted while at school. In this portrayal, the nation’s campuses are hotbeds of violent crime.
But like many other advocacy polls on sexual assault, the Post-Kaiser poll misleads readers—most of whom surely will assume that “sexual assault” means criminal sexual assault—by using that criminally charged phrase for shock value in the articles while deliberately avoiding it in the survey questions. As detailed below, those questions are so broad as to invite survey respondents to complain about virtually any encounter that they later regretted, including many that were not sexual assault or rape as defined by law.
…
Virtually none of these students went to the police, nor did most report any incident to their colleges, whose adjudication procedures are all but designed to find the accused student guilty. Instead, the Post reporters simply assumed the truth of most of their sources’ claims and thus the guilt of the accused.
The Washington Examiner also questioned the Post-Kaiser Family Foundation poll.
No, @washingtonpost didn’t just prove 1 in 5 women will be sexually assaulted in college —> http://t.co/i7I10dwrpn
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 16, 2015
@AsheSchow They've been pushing these numbers for 30 years & they're going to make them come true come Hell or high water. @washingtonpost
— Starless (@starless941) June 16, 2015
Questions about the 1-in-5 statistic and how the Washington Post arrived there were enough to motivate the Post’s Glenn Kessler to publish a follow-up article.
WaPo pollsters respond to criticism of poll that found 1 in 5 women believe they were sexually assaulted in college. http://t.co/toXObMTP7i
— Glenn Kessler (@GlennKesslerWP) June 16, 2015
@GlennKesslerWP What I don't get: if you're passed out, asleep or incapacitated, how can you be "certain" that you were "assaulted"?
— FloridaDame (@Fantine21) June 16, 2015
@GlennKesslerWP @washingtonpost More left-wing nonsense. What now? Campus rape leads to global warming?
— Peace and Love (@maui2322) June 16, 2015
And the Washington Post continues its fight against campus sexual assault today, devoting its Grade Point education blog to tips for “survivors.”
The best thing parents can do to help prevent sexual assault? Talk about it http://t.co/Qi7FK30WUk
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) June 16, 2015
Sen. Karen Gillibrand, a true believer who invited “Mattress Girl” to be her guest at January’s State of the Union Address and was caught on video saying she hoped rape hoaxes were “putting more of a spotlight on the problem” of campus assault, is hard at work on her campus sexual assault bill.
Kirsten Gillibrand claims her campus sexual assault bill gives equal rights to accusers and accused, but it doesn't: http://t.co/vCS5miRasy
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 17, 2015
.@SenGillibrand still trying to brand Columbia University student found "not responsible" as a serial rapist: http://t.co/vCS5mizz3Y
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 17, 2015
.@AsheSchow I wonder how much @SenGillibrand would enjoy being branded a rapist and abuser forever, with no evidence or due process.
— Robert Novak (@gallifreyan) June 17, 2015
@AsheSchow @SenGillibrand Truths are beyond her, apparently.
— Pradheep J. Shanker (@Neoavatara) June 17, 2015
Up next? Amherst College.
Megyn Kelly lashes out at Amherst College again – http://t.co/VnykLZIIZJ
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 17, 2015
"This cannot stand. It cannot stand.” – Megan Kelly on current “guilty until proven innocent” campus mentality: http://t.co/nU2twMIdOh
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 16, 2015
.@BritHume: “I always thought the hookup culture would end badly, and maybe this is how it ends.” #KellyFile
— Megyn Kelly (@megynkelly) June 17, 2015
She was pissed. https://t.co/aUurKyJw8e
— LaurieAnn ??♂️? (@mooshakins) June 17, 2015
@AsheSchow If a crime is committed, we can't undo it; we MUST, however, be sure as we pursue justice, we don't compound one crime w/another.
— goroke (@goroke_mi) June 17, 2015
Brit Hume blasts Amherst College after expelling innocent student, calls case a "travesty" – http://t.co/VnykLZIIZJ
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) June 17, 2015
https://twitter.com/Userlich/status/611253938990379009
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