Hate crime hoaxes in American colleges

Good news for college liberals everywhere. There has been a recent spree of hate speech and hate crime hoaxes, leading experts to think that the figures for hate crimes in the past few years in colleges around America are exaggerated, sometimes greatly. Here's a few amusing incidents:

• In the midst of an antirape rally in the University of Massachusetts, a woman cut herself with a knife, tossed it under a car, and claimed to have been sexually assaulted. After a month of bluffing, she admitted she was making the whole thing up.
• In the same school, one female student claimed to have fought off three male attackers after being hit with a pepper-like substance. Doubts about her ability to run after being hit by mace forced her to confess. It was the fourth incident that year. What do you expect out of Massachusetts?
• In the University of Iowa, for three weeks black students were "terrorized" by bomb threats, emails, and piles of red noodles left at their doors, suggesting that those were the "brains" of the blacks. After a bit of investigation, a black female, one Tarsha Michelle Claiborne, was arrested.
• Two weeks after the murder of Matthew Sheppard (a horrible tragedy, I admit), a lesbian in the University of Minnesota claimed that she was assaulted by two anti-gay men. The outraged students raised rewards (around $12,000) for their arrests, but it turned out she faked it. Similar fakes were reported around the country, including New Mexico.
• In North Carolina's Guilford College, the president of the student senate, one Molly Martin, claimed that she was assaulted and then had "nigger lover" scrawled on her chest. She then immediately demanded that the school install a full-time African-American Affairs director. The police dropped the case, because she was a "reluctant" witness, in addition to refusing to disclose to them the details of the "attack". She then dropped out, apologizing for "inappropriate acts", but refusing to explain what they were. Not that it mattered, the school installed the position.

There are plenty more. While it seems to be a new trend, college authorities were denying this. In addition, convictions are extremely rare. Two black students, accused of posting KKK fliers in the University of Ohio, despite having had their fingerprints on 42 of the 55 posters, were acquitted by "insufficent evidence".

Even more amusing was the dismissive attitude the administrapo and the faculty had towards these hoaxes. Most common excuses was "it doesn't matter if they were true or not, the discrimination is very true and occurs regularly". They also praised the liars, for bringing attention to the racist and sexist issues in American colleges. Good job for encouraging the trend they don't claim to exist.

I wonder if the Cornell Progressive newspaper would choose to print this article. I doubt it. Oh well. If I want to publish it, I would go to the Cornell Review, which is, in all facets, a superior piece of journalism.

Or perhaps it isn't such a new trend. See Cornell '69 : Liberalism and the Crisis of the American University. You might find it interesting because it was a true event.

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Bah! I can't even crack a joke on the overwhelmingly liberal population of Massachusetts? While it's OK to bash China day and night, over whatever issue that comes to the minds of the liberal media? Fine. I'll make fun of NYC next time. Or perhaps California. OK?

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Editor's note: Reference: Gose, Ben. (1999) Hate-Crime Hoaxes Unsettle Campuses , Chronicle of Higher Education, v45 n18 pA55-A56 (ISBN 0009-5982) Link to article

"What do you expect out of Massachusetts?"

Honestly, what the hell does that mean? DMan, that entire node was well written and informative, but why take a cheap shot at Massachusetts? Surely you could have filled that bullet with some other text.

Really, what about Massachusetts causes you to expect its residents to falsify hate crimes? Is there a history of the state's citizens falsifying hate crimes? Any more so, than, say, New York, or Texas, or Florida? Hey, if that's true, node the evidence and I'll vote for it. Otherwise, it's just a cheap shot at the Bay State.

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On another note, this is just one segment of a larger problem in America. And that's that even though you're innocent until proven guilty, the media will portray you as guilty until proven innocent. And for that reason, people will make up whatever crap they want, to get money, or to raise awareness of a cause, or to get their fifteen minutes in the spotlight. And the media falls for them hook, line, and sinker.

Take for example Ray Lewis of the Baltimore Ravens. Most of the sports media (but, proving why they're number one, not ESPN) made it seem as though Lewis was guilty beyond a shadow of a doubt. Guess what? Prosecution cut a deal, because there was no chance of a conviction. But hey, he's a football player accused of murder. He must have done it.

And remember when a Dallas woman accused Michael Irvin or tying her up, forcing her to do drugs, and then raping her? Why were the charges dropped? Because she admitted that she made it up, and only used Irvin's name because she had heard of his legal problems on the news and thought she could get a quick out-of-court settlement from a man not willing to risk further embarassment.