In the
beginning of September, I attended a speech titled “Mindset
of a Rapist: Understanding and Avoiding Sexual Crimes.” The
speaker, Sabrina Garcia, police chief at the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill, was very informative and entertaining.
She presented a new way of looking at sex crimes: through the eyes
of the offender. Through her research she has been able to study
the ways offenders think.
According to a survey conducted by the Committee
for Integrity at Appalachian (CIA) last spring, one in 18 women
on this campus have been raped since enrolling.
In the beginning of September, I attended a speech titled “Mindset
of a Rapist: Understanding and Avoiding Sexual Crimes.” The
speaker, Sabrina Garcia, police chief at the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill, was very informative and entertaining.
She presented a new way of looking at sex crimes: through the eyes
of the offender. Through her research she has been able to study
the ways offenders think.
According to a survey conducted by the Committee for Integrity at
Appalachian (CIA) last spring, one in 18 women on this campus have
been raped since enrolling.
As a female student on this campus, and obviously one who is not
looking to be sexually assaulted, I thought “Mindset”
was an important speech to attend. Any bit of education about the
subject has the potential to prevent a rape or sexual assault.
I will admit that even though I was interested in attending the
speech when I first heard about it, the final thrust to go came
from my introduction to criminal justice class, in which we were
required to participate in the Walk for Awareness or the “Mindset”
speech. To be fair, if the speech had not been required, there is
always the chance I might have decided I wanted to watch television
or catch up on sleep instead.
However, since I did end up going, I planned to get the most out
of it. The event took place in Farthing Auditorium. When I walked
in, I noticed that most students were seated in the back half of
the auditorium, and looking rather bored. I could understand that
most of them were probably there for a class, and many, especially
any freshmen and/or male students, didn’t really see the point
in going at all.
As Garcia put it, rape is a crime that “happens to other people.”
We don’t like to think about it. Events such as the Walk for
Awareness are great, but like the “Mindset” speech, many
of those in attendance were there because they had to be.
Garcia went on to say, “This auditorium should be packed tonight.”
But it wasn’t. Only around 150 people attended.
And many of those couldn’t even be bothered to stay for the
entire presentation.
Garcia was scheduled to speak from 7:30 p.m. until 8:30 p.m. She
started a couple of minutes late, and then went about five minutes
over. About 10 minutes before she finished, people in the back began
to “sneak” out.
Unfortunately, the doors in Farthing Auditorium slam rather loudly,
so it was blatantly obvious how many people thought their time was
being wasted. It wasn’t as if this was a Thursday or Friday
night and there were parties to get to. It was on a Wednesday.
The apathy amazed me. It wasn’t even mostly males leaving either,
because I could almost understand that; the speech was mostly directed
to females.
I don’t know if the females that left had something better
to do, or if they really don’t think rape is an issue.
I commend the students that stuck out the entire speech, especially
the males, but I shouldn’t even have to say that. There wasn’t
anything so bad about the speech that people should have been too
bored to stay.
I implore any students that left to become more involved on campus,
and if you already are involved, give assignments like this one
a break; teachers send you there for a reason. You might just learn
something. |
Rebecca DiVerniero