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UVA Rape Story Collapses; Duke Lacrosse Redux
Topic Started: Dec 5 2014, 01:45 PM (60,499 Views)
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http://www.campusreform.org/?ID=6124

Rolling Stone retracts horrific UVA gang rape story
Kaitlyn Schallhorn Reporter @K_Schallhorn Today at 4:38 PM EDT

In November, Rolling Stone published a graphic story recounting the alleged gang rape of a UVA student at a fraternity party.
The author of the piece did not contact any of the accused.
Rolling Stone has since issued an apology and has retracted its piece after “discrepancies” in the student’s story began to surface.

Almost a month after Rolling Stone published a harrowing piece on an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia, the pop culture magazine has issued an apology and appears to backtrack its support of the article.

In a note to readers Friday afternoon, Rolling Stone blamed the UVA student, Jackie, for “discrepancies” in her story.

"I don’t know what to think. Do we write off Jackie’s story now? It just made everything so much worse for people who have and are going to experience similar ordeals." Tweet This

“In the face of new information, there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie's account, and we have come to the conclusion that our trust in her was misplaced,” Will Dana, Managing Editor of Rolling Stone, said in the note. “We were trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after a sexual assault and now regret the decision to not contact the alleged assaulters to get their account. We are taking this seriously and apologize to anyone who was affected by the story.”

However, Sabrina Rubin Erdely, author of the piece for Rolling Stone, has admitted to not questioning the student’s account of the fraternity men who allegedly raped her, and honored her request to not contact any of the men. Rolling Stone also said on Friday that Sean Woods, the editor of the piece, will remain with publication.

“Because of the sensitive nature of Jackie's story, we decided to honor her request not to contact the man she claimed orchestrated the attack on her nor any of the men she claimed participated in the attack for fear of retaliation against her,” Rolling Stone said.

Students at UVA told Campus Reform Friday afternoon that the original Rolling Stone piece “sent shockwaves” through the campus.

“It’s such irresponsible journalism,” Arrianne Talma, a fourth-year global development studies major, told Campus Reform. “I don’t know what to think. Do we write off Jackie’s story now? It just made everything so much worse for people who have and are going to experience similar ordeals.”

Members of Phi Kappa Psi, the fraternity that those accused of gang raping Jackie allegedly belonged to, refuted the claim in their own statement on Friday. UVA shuttered its Greek life after the Rolling Stone article was published, and President Teresa Sullivan pledged to work harder to eliminate sexual assault on campus.

“It’s a very unfortunate situation and one that will be to the detriment of sexual assault survivors,” Talma told Campus Reform. “There is already so much fear and anxiety in coming forward after a sexual assault takes place, and something like this will only make it harder. In light of the Rolling Stone article and retraction, survivors will now be even more afraid to come forward because their credibility will be questioned.”

According to the Washington Post, Jackie, whose full name has not been published, stands by her story. Jackie alleges that after she went on a date with a Phi Kappa Psi member, she was gang raped at the fraternity’s party by seven men while two others watched.

“What bothers me is that so many people act like it didn’t happen,” Jackie told the Washington Post. “It’s my life. I have had to live with the fact that it happened every day for the last two years.”

Prior to Rolling Stone’s retraction, other news outlets that dared to question the credibility of the story faced intense scrutiny. Now those outlets, such as Jezebel, have had to issue apologies today as well.

UVA has four reported forcible sexual assaults on-campus in 2012, according to the university’s latest security report. In 2011 and 2010, there were five reported forcible sexual assaults on campus.

Follow the author of this article on Twitter: @K_Schallhorn
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http://smartremarks.lancasteronline.com/2014/12/05/rape-and-rolling-stone-serious-problems/


Rape and Rolling Stone: Serious problems
Posted on December 5, 2014 by Gil Smart


Big news today is Rolling Stone magazine backing away from its blockbuster and controversial piece on rape at the University of Virginia. The magazine initially defended the piece and the reporting of author Sabrina Rubin Erdely; but today, in a statement on the RS web site, we get this:

In the face of new information, there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie’s account, and we have come to the conclusion that our trust in her was misplaced. We were trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after a sexual assault and now regret the decision to not contact the alleged assaulters to get their account. We are taking this seriously and apologize to anyone who was affected by the story.

That’s pretty heavy duty. No publication is going to go that far unless the doubts are really, really significant.

Fraternity behavior is the subject of the print edition this weekend; as previously mentioned, I was a member/president of a fraternity when in school. Wouldn’t trade that experience, or the people I befriended, for anything; I met and become very good friends with guys who were very different from what I’d been used to in high school. There were many valuable aspects to the experience, but there was also recklessness. In the wake of Rolling Stone’s story, but even long before it came out, fraternities are under more scrutiny for bad behavior than ever before.

I hope the guys in fraternities, who value the experience, understand that – and tamp down on the recklessness accordingly.

But maybe it’s that history of or notoriety for recklessness that made the Rolling Stone story so easy to believe. More than that – the current crusade against sexual assault and for “affirmative consent” laws on campus made people want to believe the story. Not that they wanted to think bad things happened to “Jackie,” the woman whose alleged attack is profiled in the piece, but it proved the point. Here was a stark, terrifying example of the “rape culture” in action; here was proof that colleges don’t take sexual assaults seriously, here was proof that fraternities are sewers of misogyny and violence against women.

All those things may yet be true. But now, even Rolling Stone is saying this story may not be “proof.”

None of this is to say that sexual assaults don’t happen and aren’t a problem at UVA and other schools; none of it is to say that scenes like the one described in the report don’t happen and aren’t terrifying and traumatizing.

But if this supposed victim lied about some or all of her story, it reinforces another narrative: That which says the crusade to end campus sexual assault can itself be reckless. People who say they were raped should be taken very seriously, and they haven’t always been. But this doesn’t mean that all allegations are true.

To mention this in the wake of the Rolling Stone story was to invite sneers and more. How DARE anyone question this victim’s version of events!

Well, the reporter, Erderly – at least – should have dared.

When I read that Erdely reportedly told the victim “Jackie” that, it’s OK, you don’t have to identify the people who raped you – that is, you’re accusing several men/students of a felony, but no, I don’t have to know who they are and I won’t call them and say, look, this story’s going in the magazine, I wanted to give you a chance to comment – that seemed really, really shady.

But here we get to the part about rape being so traumatic, and the need for support so great, that to press a victim for details serves as a “trigger.” Victims need support; the most supportive thing you can do is believe them.

I get that. But what if the story isn’t true?

Erdely needed to say to Jackie: What happened to you sounds terrible. I want to tell your story. But I have a responsibility to at least try to contact the people you are accusing of this crime, the people you are saying are skating because of this inequitable system. I can’t – and I can’t allow you, in my article – to accuse someone of something without giving them a chance to have a say, even if that say is “no comment.”

From the journalistic side, that’s how it has to work, regardless of how sensitive the subject, how traumatic it may be for the person leveling the allegations.

From the activist side, Fredrik DeBoer suggests that everyone legitimately concerned about sexual assault on campus ought to welcome the questions:

I think something similar has taken hold of almost the entire contemporary left when it comes to rape and our efforts to fight it, and the controversy about the Rolling Stone article on the University of Virginia is a perfect example: we have the rise of people on the left who are so utterly convinced of the fairness and accuracy of the reporting that they feel it should never be questioned at all. And that doesn’t make any sense.

On my Facebook this morning, someone shared this Erik Wemple piece criticizing Rolling Stone‘s reporter, Sabrina Erdely, for not attempting to interview the accused rapists in the case in question. The response was immediate and angry; commenters on the link demanded to know why the person who shared it would do such a thing, arguing that Wemple’s criticism amounts to rape denial and that no one who cares about fighting rape would take these criticisms seriously. …

(snip)

Pause and contemplate where we’ve gotten to, here. Not only is asking for discretion and care in how we talk about rape accusations now sufficient to cast yourself as a rape denier, but sharing a piece by a media critic asking why standard journalistic practice wasn’t followed in an article about a rape accusation is, too. Saying that Erdely failed to engage in ethical journalistic behavior by failing to interview the accused rapists is not, by any stretch, denying even that the specific incident in that reporting is untrue, let alone a broader denial of campus rape writ large. In the broader sense: what does this attitude say about the people who hold it, and their conviction about campus rape and the need to fight it? If the reporting in the story is accurate and fair, then it can withstand basic media criticism. And even if the story has deeper problems, it wouldn’t change the fact that we have a terrible problem with rapes on campus and in our Greek system and a clear need to fight that problem. So the question is, why are people so resistant to giving these stories a rigorous and skeptical review, the way we should do with any reporting? What are you so afraid of?

He answers his own question:

The standard response is that countenancing questions about reports of rape helps denialists, who will seize on problems with reporting and use them to agitate against anti-rape efforts in general. But that doesn’t make any sense, to me. In order for that argument to hold water, you’ve got to prove that preventing these questions from being asked actually defuses rape denialism. That seems to be literally the opposite of the case; denialists are emboldened by such refusal. …

(snip)

When Cathy Young writes a piece pointing out that we know for a fact of rare but real incidents where women made false accusations of rape, and people excoriate her despite the fact that she explicitly calls those false accusations rare, it demonstrates that those people think our moral case against rape is so weak it cannot withstand exposure to the facts. When people react to the phrase “due process” as though it in and of itself amounts to rape denial, they don’t send the message that the case for arresting and prosecuting rapists is strong. They act as though it is so terribly weak it cannot survive in a world of basic liberal values and fairness.

I think we are compelled to recognize that rape is a terrible and prevalent crime, and compelled to combat it, and I am so certain of this, I do not fear those who would subject individual accusations to the typical standards associated with any accusation of a crime. Our moral duty to end rape can survive due process. It can survive fair questions. It can survive rigorous reporting.

It has to, otherwise it’s less a moral crusade than an ideological one.
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http://reason.com/blog/2014/12/05/rolling-stones-botched-account-of-a-uva


Rolling Stone’s Botched Account of a UVA Gang Rape Does a Disservice to Rape Victims

Peter Suderman|Dec. 5, 2014 4:49 pm

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Wikimedia/UVAWikimedia/UVABy failing to make basic efforts to check the facts of its attention-grabbing story about an alleged gang rape at a University of Virginia fraternity house, Rolling Stone has done a tremendous disservice to rape victims.

Now, when victims tell their stories, and when journalists or advocates report on those stories or share them publicly in any way, those inclined to disbelief will have a prominent example of a shocking, horrific story that was reported as if true, and that was initially defended by its reporter and editor even when significant questions were raised about the strength of the reporting.

Reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely’s piece, "A Rape on Campus: A Brutal Assault and Struggle for Justice at UVA," opens with a detailed, ugly account of the alleged gang rape of a young women named Jackie at a date function at UVA’s Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house in the fall of 2012. In the story, Jackie is lured into a dark room by her date, then pushed to the ground, through a glass table, and raped for hours by multiple men, including one who uses a glass bottle. The story is told without any journalistic distance. It’s presented not as what allegedly happened, but what did.

Since the story was published, the magazine repeatedly offered assurances that the story had been thoroughly reported and verified before publication. "Through our extensive reporting and fact-checking, we found Jackie to be entirely credible and courageous and we are proud to have given her disturbing story the attention it deserves," a statement sent to The Washington Post declared earlier this week. In response to a separate set of questions from another reporter at the Post, Erdely insisted that she found the story credible. "I think I did my due diligence in reporting this story; RS’s excellent editors, fact-checkers, and lawyers all agreed," she said in an email. Story editor Sean Woods also vouched for the story.

What the follow-up investigation published by The Washington Post this afternoon makes clear is that very basic steps to corroborate details surrounding the central event in the story—the alleged gang rape of a young student named Jackie—were not taken at all. And in the course of defending the story against critics, Erdely and Woods were cagey and arguably misrepresented what they actually knew and had confirmed about the story's most prominent event.

Erdely, for example, told Slate that she had attempted to contact the accused. On a podcast with several of Slate’s editorial staffers, she was asked, "Did you try and call them? Was there any communication between you and them?" She responded, "Yeah, I reached out to them in multiple ways," and then said "they were kind of hard to get in touch with because their contact page was pretty outdated." Erdely was asked multiple questions about whether she contacted "the boys" and "the actual boys" involved, but responded only that she ended up speaking to two national figures involved in the fraternity.

It's now clear that Erdely did not reach out to the individuals accused of perpetrating the attack. She agreed not to as part of a deal with Jackie. According to Rolling Stone’s own statement today, "We decided to honor her request not to contact the man she claimed orchestrated the attack on her nor any of the men she claimed participated in the attack for fear of retaliation against her."

Indeed, it appears that not only did Erdely not contact the accused, the follow-up in the Post indicates that she did not know the full name of the alleged primary assailant. "Earlier this week," the report says, "Jackie revealed to friends for the first time the full name of her alleged attacker, a name she had never disclosed to anyone." Emphasis on anyone. Unless the Post’s follow-up report is mistaken, then that includes Erdely and the fact-checkers at Rolling Stone.

Yet that is not what Woods, the editor on Erdely’s story, told The Washington Post earlier this week. "We verified their existence," he said to the Post, indicating that the magazine had checked with Jackie’s friends. "I’m satisfied that these guys exist and are real. We knew who they were." If Jackie had truly never revealed the name of the attacker to anyone, then what Woods said cannot have been true.

In fact, according to the Post, the individual Jackie named this week isn’t even a member of Phi Kappa Psi, the fraternity at the center of the story. The Post appears to have been unable to definitively identify an individual who matches every one of the details Jackie gave in the story.

Erdely also apparently failed to corroborate other basic details from Jackie’s story. Her Rolling Stone report says that the rape happened during fraternity rush, at a date event on September 28, 2012, and that the primary assailant worked as a lifeguard with Jackie on campus. Erdely did check that Jackie was a lifeguard. But no corroboration was provided for the other details, and an official statement from the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity this afternoon disputes all of them: There was no social function of any kind the week of September 28, 2012, rush—the frat's pledging period—takes place in the spring rather than the fall, and no Phi Kappa Psi member appears on the aquatic centers employee roster for 2012, the statement says.

These details cannot have been impossible to check; in less than a week, The Washington Post managed to investigate many of them. We don’t have a complete accounting of Erdely’s reporting methods, but what seems likely is that Erdely’s confirmations of Jackie's story came entirely from people who had heard Jackie tell the same story that she told to Erdely; essentially, the entire account originated from a single source.

But even Jackie’s friends in the sexual assault awareness advocacy community at UVA, people who have no interest in her story being untrue, have now "come to doubt her account," according to the Post’s follow-up today. They believe that something traumatic happened to Jackie, but they too have tried to check her story, and found inconsistencies and details that cannot be proven or verified.

Advocates for rape victims and sexual assault awareness understandably tend to prioritize support, communication, and community building; they do not have a great responsibility to doubt, to verify, and to rigorously check all the minute details of the accounts they hear or share. But journalists do. To be sure, this sort of checking is almost always difficult, time-consuming, and stressful. Inevitably, some mistakes will be made (I’ve certainly made a few regretful errors of my own). There are tradeoffs between time and accuracy. But the more sensational the story, the more shocking and potentially consequential its allegations, the more that effort is necessary—especially with a long-form account that is not under the pressures and deadlines of daily journalism, and especially when the subject and major source of the story tries to back out, as Jackie apparently did.

The Post’s damning follow-up story today makes it clear that, despite its claims to diligence, Erdely and Rolling Stone simply didn’t make much effort at all. And by failing so thoroughly to corroborate so many essential details of Jackie’s account—and by insisting, even after reasonable questions were raised, that the story had been verified to be true, they have made life much harder for the same victims of assault and advocates of awareness that a story like this ought to help.
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MikeZPU

Quasimodo
Dec 5 2014, 02:59 PM
Since the police are now investigating, perhaps that means Jackie can be charged with making false statements, at the least (even if she
did not herself complain to the police).

I would think she needs to repay the police for however many hours they spent on this case.

Yes, that's one thing that got me mad about the response from UVA's police dept.

I assumed they talked with "Jackie" before starting their investigation.

I assume they didn't commence a full blown investigation without first talking to "Jackie."

Actually, I didn't like the tone of the UVA police person's response at all.
Edited by MikeZPU, Dec 5 2014, 05:07 PM.
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http://twitchy.com/2014/12/05/brit-hume-credits-the-power-of-new-media-for-uncovering-holes-in-rolling-stone-story/

Brit Hume credits the ‘power of new media’ for uncovering holes in Rolling Stone story
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http://www.npr.org/2014/12/05/368768514/defining-narrative-questioned-in-rolling-stone-uva-rape-story


Defining Narrative Questioned In 'Rolling Stone' UVA Rape Story
December 05, 2014 5:09 PM ET
David Folkenflik - Square
David Folkenflik
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Audio for this story from All Things Considered will be available at approximately 7:00 p.m. ET.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/12/05/uva-rape-rolling-stone-editor-tweets/19967283/

'Rolling Stone' editor: Failure's on us, not victim
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chatham
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Dec 5 2014, 05:22 PM
what does "VICTIM" mean

should be "LIAR"
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chatham
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The fact remains…there was no party the night she said their was and she never denied the lies that were presented as truth in the Rolling Stoner. She should be heading to jail after a trial and the rolling stone should go out of business.
Edited by chatham, Dec 5 2014, 05:26 PM.
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MikeZPU

Quote fron foxnews story:

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/12/05/rape-story-unravels-rollng-stone-says-trust-in-uva-source-misplaced/

"The magazine said Erdely and fact-checkers spent months working on the story and found Jackie to be credible."

Who does that sound like? William Cohan!
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http://jezebel.com/heres-what-uva-students-are-saying-about-rolling-stone-1667456799

Here's What UVA Students Are Saying About Rolling Stone on YikYak
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http://www.mediaite.com/tv/fox-host-goes-off-on-rolling-stone-reporter-left-wing-assassin-with-agenda/


Fox Host Goes Off on Rolling Stone Reporter: ‘Left-Wing Assassin’ with Agenda
by Josh Feldman | 5:34 pm, December 5th, 2014 video

Rolling Stone retracted its story about an alleged rape at the University of Virginia today, and an onslaught of criticism followed. On Fox News, Jesse Watters accused the reporter in question of being a “left-wing assassin” who was trying to push an agenda with a story like that.

The reporter in question, Sabrina Rubin Erdely, has not yet publicly commented on the many issues raised today by her story, including the Washington Post report saying she did not speak to the men being accused of this gang rape.

Watters engaged in some pretty bold speculation, accusing Erdely of basically pursuing this story to serve some sort of agenda:

“I think this woman who wrote this story is a left-wing assassin, and she went in there looking for a narrative. I think she shopped the story around a few Ivy League universities, didn’t find any evidence there, focused on UVa, found some––it was ripe there–– and so she latched onto it, ignored her source. Her source at one point didn’t even want to be put into the article.”

Eric Bolling granted that even if all that’s true, the fault lies with Rolling Stone for not making sure the facts were unimpeachable before running with it.

Watch the video below, via Fox News:
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Joan Foster

0 0 0 0
University of Virginia President Teresa A. Sullivan today issued the following statement Friday afternoon:

The University of Virginia is aware of today’s reports from the Washington Post and the statement from Rolling Stone magazine.

The University remains first and foremost concerned with the care and support of our students and, especially, any survivor of sexual assault. Our students, their safety, and their wellbeing, remain our top priority.

Over the past two weeks, our community has been more focused than ever on one of the most difficult and critical issues facing higher education today: sexual violence on college campuses. Today’s news must not alter this focus.

We will continue to take a hard look at our practices, policies and procedures, and continue to dedicate ourselves to becoming a model institution in our educational programming, in the character of our student culture, and in our care for those who are victims.

We are a learning community, and we will continue our community-wide discussions and actions on these important issues in the weeks and months ahead. We remain committed to taking action as necessary to bring about meaningful cultural change in our University community.

- See more at: http://wina.com/news/064460-uva-president-speaks-out-on-doubts-raised-over-rolling-stone-article/#sthash.HbBMwuHs.dpuf
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Joan Foster

Notice this Left wing Hag has no concern for her students that have borne the burden of being falsely accused.
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http://college.usatoday.com/2014/12/05/voices-uva-community-shaken-by-rolling-stone-story-backtrack/



VOICES
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VOICES FROM CAMPUS
Voices: UVA community shaken by 'Rolling Stone' story backtrack

By: The Odyssey December 5, 2014 5:36 pm
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A University of Virginia student looks over postings on the door of Peabody Hall related to the Phi Kappa Psi gang rape allegations at the school in Charlottesville, Va., on Nov. 24, 2014.(Photo: Steve Helber, AP)

A University of Virginia student looks over postings on the door of Peabody Hall related to the Phi Kappa Psi gang rape allegations at the school in Charlottesville, Va., on Nov. 24, 2014.(Photo: Steve Helber, AP)

For the past few weeks, the University of Virginia has been shaken. We have been shaken by attacks on our university, on our home and on our community of trust. And it’s not over yet.

Today, Rolling Stone published a statement retracting some of the claims made in their original article, “A Rape on Campus” by Sabrina Rubin Erdely.

Managing Editor Will Dana wrote, “In the face of new information, there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie’s [which is how Rolling Stone referred to the victim] account, and we have come to the conclusion that our trust in her was misplaced.”

The Virginia chapter of Phi Kappa Psi also released a statement, one providing some of their responses to the allegations of gang rape.

Additionally, The Washington Post published an article investigating the inconsistencies within the Rolling Stone story.

And there are reports that Jackie has obtained legal counsel.

An investigation is currently underway with the Charlottesville Police Department about the alleged attack.

Rolling Stone wrote that “We are taking this seriously and apologize to anyone who was affected by the story.”

A lot of people were affected by this story.

An entire University community was deeply affected. We have been hurting. We have been questioning what we believe in and what we love, and we have been searching for ways to ensure that no one is ever faced with such horrible atrocities again.

It is unclear exactly what happened that night, and it is unclear what exactly to believe.

The initial Rolling Stone report contained a lot of irresponsible journalism. The reporter should have checked some of the facts and gotten a response from those accused. There was information misrepresented, and there were names and details that maybe should not have been included.

Nevertheless, none of this changes the fact that sexual assault is still a major problem, and it is still a major problem at the University of Virginia.

Over the past few weeks, there has been such great momentum around the issue. People are discussing and debating and paying attention to this issue, and real change and real solutions are definitely becoming possible.

Regardless of what may or may not have happened with this specific case, we still need to be discussing and debating and working towards a solution to the problem of sexual assault.

This is not a justification to stall our efforts or to doubt the importance of this issue.

It is important to find the facts, but it is also important to maintain our momentum and to still work to find a way to solve the real problem at hand.
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