No, Huffington Post, 1 in 5 Women are NOT raped in College

Hey do you want to watch something that will make you want to put a nail through your skull? Okay, then go ahead and watch this newest video from the Huffington Post:

If you didn't watch it, a summary is that girls are excited to get letters of "unacceptance" from colleges that detail that they are going to get raped in college. The girls in the video act so happy and surprised like you would to a normal acceptance letter, which is what really makes this video absolute horse turds. While it was probably intentional, the whole tone of the video is, "YAY! Rape!", and, "YOU'RE GONNA GET RAPED!"

Holy. Sh*t. Let's take a step back and actually evaluate some of those statistics.

So 1 in 5 women are raped in college (supposedly) and 1 in 16 men as well. That's a lot if that's true. To put this in perspective, there are currently 10 million enrolled in higher level education in the United States. So if that statistic is true, that means 2 million of those women are raped. If that were true we would have a legit serious rape epidemic. Rapes wouldn't even be given coverage in the news warn citizens of what was going on, there would just be a little tally box that said, "Number of rapes yesterday: X,XXX".

The problem is, this statistic comes from a survey that counted many non-rape things (like having pity sex or sex while buzzed) as rape. There's a glaring difference between hooking up with someone you wish you hadn't and being violently forced against your will to do sexual acts. It also had a very small sample size that included only two universities and a high non-response population. I could go into more specifics but authors at the USA Today and Time have already done so.

Point is, rape is a heinous crime. And who keeps track of heinous crimes? The US Department of Justice.

According to the US Department of Justice, the rate of rape and sexual assault for college students that are women ages 18-24 is 4.3/1000 in 2013. That's 0.43% of college attending women.

"But hold up", you might say, "most rapes aren't reported to the police". That's true. According to the same survey, about 80% of college women do not report their assaults to the police. So that 0.43% should be adjusted to 1.72%.

Now the point is that is STILL too high, but 1.72% is nearly 12 times less than the commonly stated statistic.

However, there is a silver lining to all of this: Students are less likely to be raped and the number of rapes is declining.

No Huffington Post, 1 in 5 women are NOT raped in college.
No, Huffington Post, 1 in 5 Women are NOT raped in College

While there are still too many victims out there, and we need to bring these statistics down to zero, it shows that things are getting better. Even if the Huffington Post wants to use scare tactics to say they aren't.

So how about instead of treating humans like some statistic and purposely inflating them to make headlines, we start helping victims more and progress more as a society to not accept violence, whether sexual or not, against human beings.

Oh yeah, and one more thing, F**K YOU HP for doing this kind of sh*t:

No, Huffington Post, 1 in 5 Women are NOT raped in College
No, Huffington Post, 1 in 5 Women are NOT raped in College
No, Huffington Post, 1 in 5 Women are NOT raped in College

2 0

Most Helpful Girl

  • While I do agree with this take, I think it's dangerous to say things like "being violently forced against your will to do sexual acts". Because many people get that notion engrained into their minds that only "rough, violent rape" is "actual" rape. But that's not the case, every person reacts differently. Some are threatened by their aggressors just lie there because they are afraid for their lives. Others go into shock. Some are beaten or unconscious/semi conscious to the point they can't fight their aggressor off.

    Otherwise, good take and I agree.

    • I agree with you, he shoulda just said "Sex that you didn't consent to"

    • @SweetHomicidalQueen thank you. Many people don't realize that "rough beat them up" isn't the only form of rape

    • Yea I know.

    • Show All

Most Helpful Guy

  • You're smart enough to know that reading the HuffPo is a waste of time.

    Anyway, you're probably right, but this is one subject I just stay away from. It's too risky to oppose rape statistics; vocalizing an opinion that common statistics are inflated would somehow get distorted into "he's pro-rape."

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What Girls & Guys Said

2 6
  • Are you sure you checked the distinction between rape and sexual assault in all the studies you used? I'm not saying any statistics are true or false, but just because a statistic is shocking doesn't make it false.

    • I believe that 1 in 5 women have had some sort of harassing sexual encounter yes, but rape? That's my problem with it. Sites like the Huffington post are saying RAPE not harassment. There's a bit of difference in severity and definition between the two.

    • Is figure 2 from the HP?

    • Because if so it literally says in the title rape OR harassment, that may be why the numbers are so high?

  • I agree that they inflate the numbers to fear monger but I think anon guy is right, its better to just avoid this topic. It's just not worth the drama of trying to discuss this with people who have already jumped on the bandwagon.

  • I always thought it was stupid to think that going to college increases the likelihood of rape. Isn't college supposed to make a person more educated to carry mace, not walk home alone or simply buy a gun?
    A woman with a.45 in her purse isn't gonna get raped.

  • Always on point with your stats @front2back. Nicely done.

  • I have a Math degree, but I've always hated statistics - at least as used in popular culture. There is so much that is just pure BS. "You're 600 times more likely to get hit by lightning than be bit by a shark". Yeah, like the odds of both are the same for an Iowa farmer and a Monterey surfer.

  • weird. I thot it was a UK chav paper. It's murrican.

  • Its great to see a MyTake from someone who understands research and statistics (and how they can be skewed by media) :)

  • 1 in 5 woman in their lifetime are sexually assaulted in one way or another. Not sure where this stat began of 1 in 5 women in college.