Campus Correspondence : College Administrators Need to Raise Their Rape Consciousness

The unwillingness of Brigham Young University officials to even consider the possibility of rape on campus persuaded some women students that the only way to draw attention to the problem was to take radical action: Impose a curfew on men.

Provo is not the kind of place people associate with fear and violence. But like many other parts of the country, this college town has experienced a significant increase in violence against women. There were 62 rapes reported in the first half of 1991, twice as many as occurred here in all 1990.

Despite this alarming increase in rape, university administrators have behaved patronizingly toward women, arguing that rape is not a problem at Brigham Young. They say there hasn’t been a reported rape on campus in the past seven years. They refuse to permit a rape-awareness advocate to speak on campus because the subject was deemed too controversial. Presumably, the administrators are confident that the church-endorsed campus code of conduct--no coffee, tea or alcohol--and dress regulations--the no-bra look is forbidden, though shorts are permitted--are sufficient to ensure proper behavior.

One of the worst examples of this kind of attitude toward rape occurred when the Daily Universe, BYU’s campus paper, ran the front-page headline “Women, Don’t Ever Walk Alone” after a man attacked a woman on campus. Articles following the incident focused on how women should change their behavior to protect themselves against rape. A letter to the editor, responding to a column on rape, went so far as to say that a woman’s appearance encouraged rape. Sixteen students signed the letter.

Frustrated with this blame-the-victim approach, we urged BYU students to imagine another solution to rape: All men must stay indoors after dark.

In early November, the university’s Committee to Promote the Status of Women, also known as VIOCE, plastered the campus with flyers announcing the male curfew. The flyer read: “Due to the increase in violence against women on the Brigham Young University campus, a new curfew has been instituted. Men will no longer be allowed to walk alone, or in all-male groups, from 10 p.m. until 6 a.m. Men who must travel on or through campus during curfew hours must be accompanied by two women in order to demonstrate that they are not threatening.”

Reporters and television crews soon appeared on campus to record BYU officials removing the flyers. A crowd of as many as 200 students and professors formed, which is huge by BYU standards. A spontaneous rally in support of our cause followed. Astonishingly, our attempt at consciousness-raising captured national attention.

Was our protest absurd?

Exactly.

“First off,” one man explained to us, “most rapes are date rapes, so what good would a curfew do, anyway?”

That is the precisely the kind of rebellion women should have displayed when it was suggested that they renounce some freedoms to guard against rape.

The only long-term solution to rape is to stop rewarding men for violent and aggressive behavior. There is not, as one male student told us, “a fine line between sex and rape.” This kind of attitude reflects the commonly held, though misguided, assumption that sexual intimacy is inherently male-oriented. We must stop sending men messages that sexual aggression against a woman’s will is normal. It’s not normal. It’s rape.

We never intended for the university to enforce the curfew. We realized that it would be impossible (and probably unconstitutional) to implement. But we did ask BYU to stop accepting male violence as an inevitable fact of life and to stop placing the responsibility for rape prevention on women.

Toward that end, we proposed that the campus establish required workshops and seminars for entering students to educate them about rape; that a women’s resource center, where women can go for information, peer counseling and other support, be established; that safe transportation be provided for students, and that BYU needs to gather and release statistics on rape and other sexual abuse involving students.

Indeed, all colleges and universities should be as rape-sensitive.