It’s been nearly five months since an anonymous source leaked emails between members of the unofficial fraternity Epsilon Iota. In the time that has passed since these emails were released, AU has made significant and extensive changes to its sexual assault policies.
Many students felt the leaked correspondences were indicative of a larger presence of rape culture on campus. The emails contained not only crass, offensive language, but also extended discussions of plans to sexually assault young women who attended the group’s parties. They created a rightful uproar on campus and a call for stricter regulation of Greek life, as well as more intensive education on rape culture for the AU community.
In response to students’ complaints, the administration opened a position for another sexual assault prevention coordinator and victim advocate in addition to Daniel Rappaport, thoroughly investigated every claim made in the documents, added a new program to the Welcome Week curriculum called Stand Up AU and kept the entire AU community updated through emails from Vice President of Campus Life Gail Hanson.
“But change does not stop with policy.”
The Eagle feels that each of these emails has done a tremendous job of informing students, parents and faculty of the administration’s work over the summer to ensure that the contents of the emails would not go unpunished.
But change does not stop with policy. It is up to students, particularly upperclassmen, to take the next steps. We must educate all students at AU about the specifics of consent and safe sex. We need to teach our peers how to gain the confidence to stop a sexual assault from occurring, whether it is in a bar or a dorm.
Because most assaults take place off campus, the administration is limited by its jurisdiction. This leaves a huge gap in responsibility that falls on the students that attend the parties where these attacks occur. As a student body, we need to begin to focus on changing the behavior of older students who have already been ingrained with the sexual assault culture sometimes present on campus.
Now that some of these harmful attitudes have been addressed on paper, we have to bring this change into action. Without a campus-wide conversation about the importance of consent and bystander intervention, any progress made over the summer will be wasted. -E
