Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., used a flawed — and at this point, discredited — statistic to claim that one in five women will be sexually assaulted while in college.
She used this statistic during her questioning of acting Education Secretary Dr. John B. King during his Senate confirmation hearing, which quickly became a slobbering lovefest for the department’s current actions on combatting sexual assault.
“Dr. King, I’ve been really impressed with this administration’s work over the years to protect civil rights — including promoting education opportunities for students of color, women and girls, students with disabilities, LGBT students — and I look forward to continuing to work with you on those issues, but I wanted to raise one specific issue with you today: campus sexual assault and violence,” Murray said.
She didn’t follow this up with any kind of critical question, instead devoting time to suggest that 20 percent of women are sexually assaulted in college.
“It’s a growing national crisis and depending on the survey, we know that at least one in five women are being sexually assaulted on our college campuses. That’s stunning. One in five of our daughters, granddaughters, sisters, loved ones are being sexually assaulted while in college,” Murray said. “That is by the way the lowest of the estimates out there, which is really appalling and unacceptable.”
First, it’s not a “growing national crisis” because it’s not a national crisis at all. Rape and sexual assault are terrible when they happen, but they are not occurring at the levels believers like Murray claim. The studies cited by Murray and others are self-reported surveys, possibly the least reliable method of studying something.
Also, the surveys use broad definitions of sexual assault to punch up the numbers, including everything from a stolen kiss to rape. They also have low response rates, are not nationally representative and can’t be applied to the population at large.
The biggest problem with the surveys, however, is the fact that those labeled as victims by the researchers don’t even see themselves as such. When asked why they didn’t report, more than 70 percent of respondents say it was because they didn’t think the situation was serious. So it’s often researchers and activists claiming women are victims, not even the women themselves.
It is also not the lowest estimate out there. The lowest estimate out there comes from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, which collects actual data on this subject. They found that just 6.1 out of every 1,000 female students were raped or sexually assaulted each year, amounting to, at worst, 2.4 percent of women over a four-year period. Obviously still terrible, but nowhere near 20 percent. We also don’t know the results of those reports, because some could have been false.
Murray continued by saying she hears from professors, students and survivor groups talking about the importance of the issue. Then she finally got to her “question.”
“The Office for Civil Rights has taken some critical action to make sure that our college campuses do have the tools and resources necessary to comply with Title IX and keep our campuses safe and I applaud their work but I want to ask you, can you talk with us about the importance of having safe campuses and your department’s commitment to addressing that?” Murray asked.
Real tough questions, senator.
King, like he did during Wednesday’s hearing, mentioned the importance of protecting male and female students from sexual assault. He again referred to the office’s “Dear Colleague” letters as mere “guidance,” even though they carry the weight of law by threatening schools with a loss of federal funding if they did not adopt new procedures (that didn’t go through the lawfully required notice-and-comment period) to address sexual assault. He also said the guidance has been “very helpful” to colleges and universities.
On Thursday, however, King provided lip service to “protecting due process rights” for students. His department’s policies currently do nothing to protect the due process rights of students, and in fact incentivize schools to ignore the truth and expel anyone accused without a proper chance to defend themselves.
Ashe Schow is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
