ONE-IN-EIGHTEEN-THOUSAND
the item is a joke; the stat is a
fact.
A few months ago, my friend and colleague over at
the Carbolic Smoke Ball, the Honorable Rufus Peckham, Esq., J.D., Q.E.D.,
borrowed a post of mine -- something about a boy mayor and a bunch of grapes, if
I remember
correctly -- and cross-posted it because he absolutely loved it,
because he wanted more people to read it, and because (let's face it) he was
probably too lazy to come up with another post of his own. I've been meaning to
return the favor and the honor for my favorite His Honor ever since, and Lord
knows I could have done it any number of times -- the guy is, in addition to
being a jurist and a webmaster and a star advice columnist for the Pittsburgh
Tribune-Review, a bona fide comedic genius -- but I've been waiting for just
the right one to come along.
Yesterday, it came.
Now the Judge, being the incredibly nice and humble guy that he is, likes to give credit where it is due and sometimes even where it is not. He credits me and my campus rape myth post for much of the inspiration for this piece, and, while it is true that I suggested the giveaway item when he ran the idea across my inbox, it is also true that, were I (or anyone else, for that matter) to have spent six weeks on this concept, I (or anyone else, for that matter) could not have come up with such a damned fine and delicate balance of laugh-out-loud comedy and spot-on social commentary:
PITT TO GIVE AWAY iPOD FOR EVERY SEXUAL ASSAULT COMPLAINT
IN EFFORT TO INCREASE 'EMBARRASSINGLY LOW' STATS
PITTSBURGH - Velveeta Swayne-Lugosi, coordinator of the University of Pittsburgh's Office of Sexual Assault Services, announced that starting immediately the University will give away a free iPod to every female on campus who reports a sexual assault. "It is our hope that women subjected to brutal rapes will be able to enjoy their iPod Classic, with up to 160 GB of storage, throughout the entire medical, judicial, and recovery ordeal."
The giveaway is designed to increase Pitt's historically low sexual assault numbers. "There is a campus rape epidemic in America, except that the victims themselves don't know about it," explained Ms. Swayne-Lugosi. In 2006, of all the crimes reported to Pitt's campus police, there was just one report of an on-campus sexual assault of any kind, compared to 32 burglaries and 120 liquor law violations. "One would think with so many liquor law violations, we would have far more sexual assaults, but sadly that's not the case," said Ms. Swayne-Lugosi.
Ms. Swayne-Lugosi chronicled the chilling facts about campus rape. "Rape is the most underreported of all crimes. We know it's underreported because no one is reporting all these rapes that must be occurring. Which proves, of course, that rape is rampant on campus. We think the free iPod will encourage those women who like to listen to good music and who have been brutally raped, usually by a formerly trusted and loyal male friend or classmate, to come forward."
Ms. Swayne-Lugosi discounted the concerns of male students that the giveaway might encourage false accusations. "That's the whole idea, Einstein," she said. After a short pause she added, "Please don't print that."
And what if free iPods don't get the numbers up? "Well, given the number of burglaries on campus, maybe we'll have to think about changing the feminist mantra from 'All men are rapists' to 'All men are burglars.'"
Once you've stopped laughing, here's a note to make you cry -- and to prove Tuesday's point all the more: that number of sexual assault reports for the University of Pittsburgh in 2006 is not a joke. It's a fact. One sexual assault report, in an entire year, from a campus of roughly 18,000 young women.
If one-in-four were correct, young women at Pitt should have suffered roughly 4,500 sexual assaults in 2006. (And most of those should have taken place between August and Thanksgiving. Right?) Even if you cut that number by one-fourth again, figuring that the numbers should correspond not to the whole campus but to a single class moving through a four-year cycle, young women at Pitt should have suffered roughly 1,125 sexual assaults in 2006. And yet they reported 1. Which means, of course, that if we are to believe that absurd, discredited, yet still oft-cited, oft-repeated, oft-mutated one-in-four statistic, sexual assaults at the University of Pittsburgh were, in 2006, under-reported by 99.98%. Or at least by 99.91%.
No wonder they're giving away the iPods.
Yesterday, it came.
Now the Judge, being the incredibly nice and humble guy that he is, likes to give credit where it is due and sometimes even where it is not. He credits me and my campus rape myth post for much of the inspiration for this piece, and, while it is true that I suggested the giveaway item when he ran the idea across my inbox, it is also true that, were I (or anyone else, for that matter) to have spent six weeks on this concept, I (or anyone else, for that matter) could not have come up with such a damned fine and delicate balance of laugh-out-loud comedy and spot-on social commentary:
PITT TO GIVE AWAY iPOD FOR EVERY SEXUAL ASSAULT COMPLAINT
IN EFFORT TO INCREASE 'EMBARRASSINGLY LOW' STATS
PITTSBURGH - Velveeta Swayne-Lugosi, coordinator of the University of Pittsburgh's Office of Sexual Assault Services, announced that starting immediately the University will give away a free iPod to every female on campus who reports a sexual assault. "It is our hope that women subjected to brutal rapes will be able to enjoy their iPod Classic, with up to 160 GB of storage, throughout the entire medical, judicial, and recovery ordeal."
The giveaway is designed to increase Pitt's historically low sexual assault numbers. "There is a campus rape epidemic in America, except that the victims themselves don't know about it," explained Ms. Swayne-Lugosi. In 2006, of all the crimes reported to Pitt's campus police, there was just one report of an on-campus sexual assault of any kind, compared to 32 burglaries and 120 liquor law violations. "One would think with so many liquor law violations, we would have far more sexual assaults, but sadly that's not the case," said Ms. Swayne-Lugosi.
Ms. Swayne-Lugosi chronicled the chilling facts about campus rape. "Rape is the most underreported of all crimes. We know it's underreported because no one is reporting all these rapes that must be occurring. Which proves, of course, that rape is rampant on campus. We think the free iPod will encourage those women who like to listen to good music and who have been brutally raped, usually by a formerly trusted and loyal male friend or classmate, to come forward."
Ms. Swayne-Lugosi discounted the concerns of male students that the giveaway might encourage false accusations. "That's the whole idea, Einstein," she said. After a short pause she added, "Please don't print that."
And what if free iPods don't get the numbers up? "Well, given the number of burglaries on campus, maybe we'll have to think about changing the feminist mantra from 'All men are rapists' to 'All men are burglars.'"
Once you've stopped laughing, here's a note to make you cry -- and to prove Tuesday's point all the more: that number of sexual assault reports for the University of Pittsburgh in 2006 is not a joke. It's a fact. One sexual assault report, in an entire year, from a campus of roughly 18,000 young women.
If one-in-four were correct, young women at Pitt should have suffered roughly 4,500 sexual assaults in 2006. (And most of those should have taken place between August and Thanksgiving. Right?) Even if you cut that number by one-fourth again, figuring that the numbers should correspond not to the whole campus but to a single class moving through a four-year cycle, young women at Pitt should have suffered roughly 1,125 sexual assaults in 2006. And yet they reported 1. Which means, of course, that if we are to believe that absurd, discredited, yet still oft-cited, oft-repeated, oft-mutated one-in-four statistic, sexual assaults at the University of Pittsburgh were, in 2006, under-reported by 99.98%. Or at least by 99.91%.
No wonder they're giving away the iPods.
Posted: Sat - March 1, 2008 at 01:32 PM
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