Rape and Sexual Assault on College Campuses: the Factors that Lead to this Growing Social Problem and how we as a Society Combat Against it Introduction
Emma Sulkowicz, a senior at Columbia University, carried her mattress around her campus, from class to class, all of last year as a form of protest against her rapist who was not expelled from school, reported by Time Magazine. This story made news all across the country, leaving many wondering how this could possibly happen, and why it continues to happen. This is just one of the highly publicized cases of rape on college campuses, which also illuminates how often time administrators fail to bring justice to the victim. It seems as if of lately that rape and sexual assault on college campuses …show more content…
If anything, the data reflects that this is a problem that is nowhere near reaching a solution. A survey conducted in 2015 found the disturbing results that 1 in 6 women in their first year of college were attempted to be raped or had been raped(Carey, Durney, Shepardson, & Carey 2015). Rape has physical, emotional, and psychological consequences, so the fact that it can happen to this many college women over the course of a year is very concerning, and must allow us to look at our society as a whole and see what we are doing wrong. If one looks at college women as a collective group, the statistics shows that 1 in 4 girls will be sexually assaulted during their time at school. This is personally very scary and concerning to me, because it would be like hanging out with three friends and knowing that the odds are one of us will likely be sexually assaulted. Women should be focusing on furthering their education, making friends, and exploring their passions during this time, not facing the risk of sexual assault and all the horrible things that go along with it. The even more disheartening fact about trying to gather data about college rapes or sexual assault, is that many women don’t even report their incident to the administration or police. This is because of the fact they feel
Emma Sulkowicz, a senior at Columbia University, carried her mattress around her campus, from class to class, all of last year as a form of protest against her rapist who was not expelled from school, reported by Time Magazine. This story made news all across the country, leaving many wondering how this could possibly happen, and why it continues to happen. This is just one of the highly publicized cases of rape on college campuses, which also illuminates how often time administrators fail to bring justice to the victim. It seems as if of lately that rape and sexual assault on college campuses …show more content…
If anything, the data reflects that this is a problem that is nowhere near reaching a solution. A survey conducted in 2015 found the disturbing results that 1 in 6 women in their first year of college were attempted to be raped or had been raped(Carey, Durney, Shepardson, & Carey 2015). Rape has physical, emotional, and psychological consequences, so the fact that it can happen to this many college women over the course of a year is very concerning, and must allow us to look at our society as a whole and see what we are doing wrong. If one looks at college women as a collective group, the statistics shows that 1 in 4 girls will be sexually assaulted during their time at school. This is personally very scary and concerning to me, because it would be like hanging out with three friends and knowing that the odds are one of us will likely be sexually assaulted. Women should be focusing on furthering their education, making friends, and exploring their passions during this time, not facing the risk of sexual assault and all the horrible things that go along with it. The even more disheartening fact about trying to gather data about college rapes or sexual assault, is that many women don’t even report their incident to the administration or police. This is because of the fact they feel