| Feminist scholars, rape,; and lessons Duke missed | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Nov 7 2010, 09:33 AM (224 Views) | |
| Quasimodo | Nov 7 2010, 09:33 AM Post #1 |
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Background: the mindset of the Group of 88? :
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| Quasimodo | Nov 7 2010, 09:40 AM Post #2 |
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http://durhamwonderland.blogspot.com/2008/09/new-case-scholarship.html MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 08, 2008 New Case "Scholarship" The latest academic publication on the case has appeared, courtesy of Barbara Barnett, who earned her M.A. degree from Duke’s Group of 88-topheavy English Department. The University of Kansas professor produced an article in Communication, Culture & Critique, in which she advances the all-but-incredible thesis that Duke’s official response to the case was overly concerned with such issues as due process and right to a fair trial. Oblivious to how much of the media, most Duke faculty, and the Brodhead administration itself initially approached the case, Barnett contends that the University’s actions insufficiently employed the race/class/gender framework. (snip) While critical of what she terms Duke’s “victimization strategy”—the University’s alleged focus on the anguish of the falsely accused players and the harm to its reputation—Barnett argues that Duke did need to show sympathy for one person: the false accuser. University “materials,” writes Barnett, “failed to acknowledge that [Crystal Mangum] might be going through some anguish.” Why should Duke have done more for Mangum? Because “Duke was being bombarded by challenges that it may not have protected the safety of an [sic] North Carolina Central student.” That these “challenges” were based on a false premise seems of little concern to Barnett. The Kansas professor criticizes Brodhead’s April 2007 post-exoneration statement for not having “considered whether the lacrosse players and the woman who leveled the accusations of attack were both victims of a zealous prosecutor.” In the world according to Barbara Barnett, it seems, Mangum deserved sympathy from Duke because Nifong was unethical enough to believe her lies. This standard is quite extraordinary. (snip) But overall, she laments, while “Duke public relations materials stressed that rape was indefensible, they also explained that the university had an interest in protecting(!!) the accused students.” How did she reach this startling conclusion? According to Barnett, 27 percent of Duke’s statements addressed the evils of rape, but a comparable 21 percent stressed the importance of due process. (snip) Duke’s rhetoric mirrored the discourse of Enlightenment philosophers—there is an objective and universal foundation of knowledge, knowledge acquired from the right use of reason will be “true,” and grounding arguments in reason will abate conflicts among knowledge, truth, and power. Duke’s frame of reason encouraged its publics to be thoughtful and careful in their judgments; to believe in the integrity of authorities—the university, the police, and the legal system; and to assume that justice would prevail. Underlying Duke’s arguments was the incorrect assumption that justice will necessarily emerge from a police investigation and courtroom trial; it is an ideal but not always a reality. Additionally, Duke’s framing of its response as calm and logical could be read as a reinforcement of Western patriarchal norms, which equate reason with the disciplined male mind and emotion with illogical female thinking. From the perspective of Duke’s administrators, an emotional response was an undesirable one; however, this point of view ignores the fact that it can be difficult to talk about rape and violence against women in a sterile, dispassionate way. This thesis leads to a remarkable interpretation of how Duke handled the case. “The University,” she writes, “failed to speak in depth about the larger issues in the case, including sexual objectification of women, the risks of sexual violence on college campuses, and the perceptions of privilege in U.S. college athletics. In a case that involved allegations of rape, there was surprising little discussion on the issue of rape itself . . . Rape seemed to be a secondary issue in Duke’s public relations materials. Information about Sexual Assault Prevention Week and campus services for victims of sexual assault came from a statement by Student Government leaders, not university administrators . . . Duke did not suggest education about rape and sexual assault . . . The university might have moved beyond defending itself and tried to educate its staff and its publics about sexual violence, including the notion of rape cultures, the relationship between alcohol abuse and sexual coercion, and the effects of hypermasculine cultures that privilege violence and abuse of women . . . Sexual violence is a serious matter, and organizations that find themselves confronting such charges, even charges they suspect may not be true, need to speak clearly and strongly to the issue of rape itself.” To reiterate: no rape occurred in this case. Overwhelming evidence appeared in the public domain almost from the start to suggest that no rape occurred in this case. But, again, guilt or innocence appears not to matter to Barnett: the fact that a mentally disturbed woman made a false allegation against a University’s students was enough, in and of itself, for the University to try to reprogram its students’ behavior according to an extremist agenda championed by the fringe of the academy. And parents could get all this for only $50,000 a year in tuition and fees. Apply Barnett’s standard to the mirror image of 2006-7 events in Durham—the Scottsboro Boys case. In the Barnett framework, institutions of higher learning should focus not on the dangers of race-based injustice, or the need for due process, or the importance of facts, and not passion, dictating judgments. Instead, when universities recall the Scottsboro Boys case, they should speak about the “sexual objectification of women”; ensure that rape is not “a secondary issue”; increase “education about rape and sexual assault” and “sexual violence, including the notion of rape cultures, the relationship between alcohol abuse and sexual coercion, and the effects of hypermasculine cultures that privilege violence and abuse of women,” so as “to speak clearly and strongly to the issue of rape itself.” After all, the Scottsboro Boys case accusers made a claim of rape. (snip) What more should Duke have done? Echoing an earlier complaint of Wahneema Lubiano, Barnett chastises Duke for not seeking out additional guidance from “feminist scholars on its faculty or staff.” Of course. |
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9:14 AM Jul 11