Letter to the editor: Can you hear me now? A survivor responds to the chair of the board of trustees
April 16, 2015
Editor’s Note: Due to the private and personal nature of this letter’s content, the author asked that their name be withheld. Though the general protocol of The S&B is to not publish letters anonymously, after discussing this matter, the editors decided that the author’s concerns were legitimate. The S&B’s publishing of this letter does not imply an endorsement of the author’s views, but instead a desire to continue this discussion without disrupting the author’s personal and professional life.
Last week on April 10, The S&B published a letter written by Clint Korver ’89 in response to Cid Standifer ’07’s call for the resignation of President Raynard Kington in her April 3 letter to The S&B. In his letter, Korver tries to negate Standifer’s arguments, allotting the most space and attention to a meeting Kington had with a student in the spring of 2012. I am that student, and I would like to set the record straight.
The sequence of events as outlined by Korver is not in dispute. But Korver and I have drawn from it dramatically different conclusions. Korver writes in his letter: “The facts shows [sic] that President Kington responded to a difficult situation appropriately, while expressing compassion for students who were clearly angry and in emotional pain. Consistent with his role as the president of an educational institution, he viewed it as his responsibility to educate students and model for them how to initiate discussions on difficult topics.”
After those meetings, the last of which took place on May 9, 2012, a friend advised me to write down what I remembered of the meeting in case my memory of it should ever be questioned. Now, three years later, my account of those meetings is being publicly dismissed by the trustees. I wrote my recollections only a few hours after the second meeting, when Kington’s words were still echoing in my ears. A full copy of that account is available in the online version of this article. Printed here are the most relevant passages. For privacy purposes, all names throughout the account have been changed except those already offered by Korver in his letter. Where written, “I” refers to my own perspective and actions, unless noted as Survivor XXX, as Korver identifies me in his letter. Survivors A and B refer to the other survivors in the room during the first meeting on May 8, 2012. This is my own recollection and interpretation of the events.
Survivor’s Account of Second Meeting Between Survivor XXX, President Kington and Angela Voos
“This morning [May 9th, 2012] I arrived at [Kington’s] office at 10 a.m. and was asked to take a seat in the lobby. A few minutes later I was approached by a woman who asked if I was Survivor XXX and shook my hand. As I entered Kington’s office with her, I greeted him “Good afternoon … or good morning rather I should say.” He responded, “Yes, afternoon.” The president then identified the woman as Angela Voos, Special Assistant to the president, and said that he had asked her be present today. Once I had been seated the president spoke saying that he had considered not having this meeting at all but finally decided he must. He said that he did not wish to hear me speak and would not listen if I felt I needed to respond. He then said that in his two years at Grinnell College he had never felt more insulted by a student. He said that he was disgusted that I had reached my senior year at Grinnell without ever learning how to speak to authority figures with respect. He then told me that if I ever spoke to him or entered his office again he would throw me out and I would be finished at Grinnell. He then told me he was done speaking with me and I should get out. I then picked up my belongings and left without saying a word. I went directly to the office of [a trusted adult mentor] and waited until [they] returned. The meeting had lasted fewer than 10 minutes.”
When I first began working towards a safer Grinnell for survivors in the fall of 2011, I did so believing in the good of the Grinnell community. I was confident that once we exposed the problems, change would be swift and just, in keeping with Grinnell’s ethos. But during my final semester at Grinnell, I came to fear social justice was just a slogan and real change was just as difficult at Grinnell as anywhere else. Nonetheless, when the four of us went to Kington’s office on May 8, we did so with a renewed hope that the president could help us—and the whole community—find justice and safety.
But, instead of “respond[ing] to a difficult situation appropriately, while expressing compassion for students who were clearly angry and in emotional pain,” as Korver writes, I felt that Kington became defensive and angry. When I told him I lived in terror on campus, was too scared to attend social events and couldn’t even step foot in the dining hall without risking running into my assailants, he accused me of holding him accountable for sexual assault on campus and of putting words in his mouth. He responded to a group of survivors looking for solutions by intimidating them in both word and tone.
Korver also writes that, “Consistent with his role as the president of an educational institution, he viewed it as his responsibility to educate students and model for them how to initiate discussions on difficult topics.” I can only assume that this is in reference to our second meeting on May 9, the one requested by President Kington. Korver’s letter says I did not respond to Kington’s lecture, but that I “made it clear that [I] was not interested in listening to his perspective.” This was because Kington’s first order after I greeted him was to tell me not to speak. My awareness of being silenced, not just metaphorically but literally, has never left me. As far as I could tell, the sole purpose of the meeting was for him to assert his power and authority over me. His power to speak, while I must remain silent. His power to threaten my future at Grinnell while I sat terrified, taken off guard by two adults in positions of authority, ganging up on a young woman alone. And his privilege to ignore sexual assault while creating the illusion of action, using his office as president to congratulate himself on supposed improvements in institutional policy while personally belittling victims.
The fact that the head of the board of trustees parroted Kington’s account, admitting that he lectured me on manners and respect when all I did was stand up for sexual assault victims, is symptomatic of Grinnell College’s attitude towards sexual assault and survivors in general. Grinnell puts on a charade of change while focusing its time and resources on protecting itself from criticism. Kington is a brand manager, not an activist, and this is imminently clear in every decision he makes. Kington’s treatment of me is just a symptom. This is just one of the many, many accounts I have heard where the administrators’ responses to survivors have been defensive and angry, rather than, in Korver’s words, “compassionate.” The College, both its direct leadership and other lower level administrators, has a history of negating, invalidating, targeting and silencing survivors on campus. I entered this discussion in the fall of 2011, and since then the school has repeatedly made it clear that it does not want to hear survivors speak. The College again tried to shut down discussion by minimizing survivor’s concerns before the March 3, 2015 Huffington Post article was published. Korver’s vitriolic response to Standifer’s letter is simply one more data point.
Dr. Kington, I hope you hear me loud and clear right now: I love my alma mater, but I love my fellow survivors and the pursuit of justice for all those who have suffered sexual assault at Grinnell under your leadership far, far more. It is now time for you to be quiet. It is time for you to listen.
—Written by Survivor XXX, Survivor A and Survivor B with the hope for a safer Grinnell
Truth • Apr 20, 2015 at 2:32 pm
Grinnell parent: wow, really, the racist card?
Kington is the college prez. That he is male, black, bald, tall, gay, father, married, whatever has no bearing (good or bad) on what he does as president. It is offensive you would pull the race card to taint the waters of fair and reasonable evaluation of his job as president.
Sadly, the events of the “meetings” in question seem doomed to she/he said…an absolutely accurate accounting of what transpired is likely impossible.
A view emerging to me is a bit of “thou doth protest too loudly/much”!
I don’t believe the BOT chair wrote the letter to the S&B; he’s a busy guy and a trustee should be removed enough from the college day-to-day to know those detailed facts; which leads me to conclude college staff wrote the letter — or Kington himself.
Of all the college priorities, the top choice two weeks ago was for Kington to endorse (and possibly seek out and write) a letter attacking a then student and coming to his own defense?
Someone in the right doesn’t need that kind of firepower. Someone in the right views a call for resignation from a single alum in the campus paper as a typical day on the job.
And, “Parent”, for what it’s worth I hear tell that there isn’t a VP on campus and some of their staff who hasn’t had the full-throttle reprisal from a crossed Kington. He has a temper and he isn’t afraid to use it — behind the safety of doors closed to public scrutiny.
That’s his M.O. And that he is male, black, bald, tall, gay, father, married, whatever has no bearing on that.
Survivor XXX • Apr 19, 2015 at 5:54 pm
Alysia, I have never met you. I would not know you if I saw you in a picture. I don’t even know how to properly pronounce your first name, much less tell professors you are a “rapist supporter.” I don’t know what threats you received or other experiences you had in 2012 that made you feel delegitimized in your experiences, although I’m sorry that they happened to you. However I am quite certain it did not come from me, as you falsely assert.
You have raised a question which I would like to address. You have articulated your confusion on this matter as lying “in wanting an explanation for what their goal is..why they are continuing to bring up these cases.” My goal, as stated in my meeting with President Kington in 2012 and again in the letter to the editor above, is to be heard on the issue of sexual assault at Grinnell. Like you, I too have felt that my experiences have been treated as illegitimate and have been invalidated to the point that they were figuratively and literally silenced. You state that we (the authors of the letter), “should be working with the title IX committee and other sexual assault groups to review the new policies to look for areas of improvement.” I, like you, have also graduated. To the extent possible, I have continued to be involved in any way I could with title IX improvements at Grinnell. However, given the fact that Grinnell’s top most administrator personally silenced me on the issue three weeks before my graduation, involvement has been, admittedly, limited. You also assert that we have been “invited to multiple different meetings [to help make changes]” that we did not attend because we were “ stuck on [our] own cases.” I do not know what invitation you are referencing. Mine must have been lost in the mail. I have not been invited to any meetings, virtual or in person. Therefore any absences have nothing to do with being “stuck” in my own case, as you repeatedly accuse me of.
Which brings me to my next point: the details of my case are mine and mine alone to share. How you think you know anything about my case, or what relevance said knowledge might have to this discussion, is what eludes me. In fact, your alleged knowledge is only further evidence that the college’s procedures and practices continue to need revision. At no point in the letter above do I make any mention my case, as you assert several times. My letter above is not about my experience as a victim of assault, it is about my experiences as a survivor on Grinnell’s campus. Specifically, it is about the deafening silence about sexual assault that consumed campus when I was a student, and my individual experience of trying to break that silence, albeit unsuccessfully. Finally, and perhaps not explicitly enough, it is about my burning to desire to see change come to Grinnell in this category. You and I agree on one thing: “Change can’t happen without moving forward.” However to move forward we need to establish open and honest communication between the administration and the students. When I graduated, this goal had not yet been achieved. After reading Clint Korver’s letter to the editor last week, it became clear to me that honest and open communication was still not a consistent occurrence between the school and its students. As I am the only other witness to the meeting that he spoke to in his letter, I felt obligated to share another perspective on that event. Furthermore, as one commenter above pointed out, Korver and I closely agree on the events from that spring and Kington’s involvement. It is in the interpretation and conclusions about said events that we differ. I am certainly very glad that “the policies the college had in place when the spring of 2012 cases went through have since changed,” but it would seem open communication and transparency are still tremendous issues at Grinnell. I would now add privacy to that list, as you have made it clear that you are privy to personal and confidential information and are willing to share it despite knowing “what kind of threats and retaliation” an individual could face.
Alysia, I think your voice certainly adds to the conversation, and I am confident that you have many progressive ideas and thoughts to contribute. However, your ad hominem attacks on the other authors of this letter and myself, as illustrated throughout my response, are not progressive in any way. Attacking someone’s integrity and casting doubt on their character is not the same as refuting their argument. We believe that there is still work to be done towards improving the college’s treatment of survivors on campus. My story is only one point of reference to illustrate that. If you disagree with that belief, then we can have a meaningful conversation. But if you also think there is room for improvement at Grinnell, then we are of the same perspective. Please stop attacking me and the other authors of this letter, and instead speak to the argument at hand: Grinnell could be a safer place for survivors.
Grinnell parent • Apr 19, 2015 at 2:45 pm
So anonymously accusing the African-American president of the college of berating a sexual assault victim is fine and doesn’t raise any red flags, but an on the record account challenging whether the assault even happened is censored. That makes perfect sense.
David Draper, Alum • Apr 19, 2015 at 12:24 pm
Perhaps the people who should really be considering stepping down are the editors of the S&B. If they have relationships with one advocates on one side of this story, have no problems crossing ethical, professional and possibly legal boundaries when it is convenient and in support of their perspective but quick to hide behind vague and unverified claims of legal consequences when someone offers conflicting perspectives, there are problems. Is this a student newspaper for Grinnell or someone’s blog? Do the editors know the difference? Does journalism mean anything to the people running the S&B?
I assume the S&B is still student run, and not governed by the administration. Perhaps some other students on campus, such as editors of other on campus publications, can act as editors or appoint other provisional editors who are not personally connected to this story to make decisions about all content related to this issue. This is a train wreck.
Alysia Horcher • Apr 19, 2015 at 8:49 am
Cid Standifer – you certainly have a lot of opinions on this matter for someone that was not involved in any way. I was not “smearing” just one person… My comment was about the three women (who identify themselves/signed the article as survivor xxx, survivor a and survivor b in the article) and how they threatened me, verbally delegitimized my experiences and compromised the education I could have received (by telling professors I was a rapist supporter). To give myself credibility, I felt the need to explain how I was involved and affected by the situation. Had I just said “I testified against one of the women making a sexual assault allegation,” many incorrect assumptions could have been made about my character and the motives behind testifying.
Also, you mentioned comments on yik yak. Although I have seen screenshots of the comments on their, you will notice I am named as “alumna AH”. I graduated and left Grinnell already. While I occasionally return, I was not anywhere near Grinnell when the posts were made on yik yak, so those are not my doing. Plus, it’s pretty obvious I don’t care if my identify is known. I’m not trying to hide. It took a lot of courage to post my name with these comments because I know what kind of threats and retaliation I faced last time. However, sharing the truth is more important to me than protecting myself.
I want to make it clear- I had no issues with any of the 3 women who wrote the article or met with President Kington, in fact one was a friend. I just refused to stand by and allow someone to make false allegations. Because I did not support her, I was attacked by all 3 women from this article. I shared my story because it gives some insight into how these women act when they feel like they aren’t being supported and why President Kington may have felt he needed to be on the defensive. In addition, I had several meetings with student affairs, security and other administration during this time. No one was particularly friendly or supportive (and they explained from the beginning they were trying to stay neutral while gathering all the facts). Maybe it is just me, but I appreciated the fact that they were not acting all compassionate, supportive and fake because I believed they actually wanted to get to the bottom of things. The administration and other faculty were doing their best to stay neutral and unbiased while dealing with very controversial cases.
I will express again (from my previous comment) my lack of understanding as to why these women continue to bring up these events. Some of them (such as the author of this article) did not file a report, so their cases were never investigated or handled as sexual assault incidents. Other women “won” their cases (by the standards of the college jud-co board) and were able to choose the punishment for their attacker. My confusion lies in wanting an explanation for what their goal is..why they are continuing to bring up these cases. If they really want to change campus to make it safer and make the process better for new victims of sexual assault, they need to be progressive. They should be working with the title IX committee and other sexual assault groups to review the new policies to look for areas of improvement. (They were invited to multiple different meetings but as you can see from the comment above, they were not attending to help make changes. They were stuck on their own cases). Change can’t happen without moving forward. The policies the college had in place when the spring of 2012 cases went through have since changed, so continuing to go back to them is not going to get them to the end result they are stating they want (the safer campus and more victim-friendly process).
Cid Standifer • Apr 18, 2015 at 6:01 pm
You simply cannot imagine how disappointed I am with the entire Grinnell community right now.
Cid Standifer • Apr 18, 2015 at 6:00 pm
The person being smeared by Horcher and on Yik Yak isn’t even the person who wrote this letter. How is this even relevant?
Alysia Horcher • Apr 18, 2015 at 5:12 pm
Haha…revise my comment? Yes, I suppose that is how the editors of the S&B worded it. So I revised the part they had issue with (the way I stated my connection gave too much information that could allow someone to identify one of the women with some research), but as you have probably noticed, my revision was not posted. After a back and forth email correspondence, it became clear that the student editor is not going to allow my comment to be posted (I offered to make multiple revisions but there was a new reason it couldn’t be posted every time). They said it puts the S&B at risk for legal action because my comment involved one of the women that attended the meeting described above, however it was not about the women that wrote the piece.
I do not agree with the student S&B editors for deleting my comment (and question whether it really is because of the possibility of legal action or more influenced by their friendships), but I am not going to repost it. If anyone is interested in hearing my side of the story, contact me directly and we can have a personal conversation about it where the S&B is not at risk for legal action.
admin • Apr 18, 2015 at 5:00 pm
Hello all. To clarify: the allegedly censored comment was removed because it revealed information about a case that is currently undergoing investigation. We do not wish to silence any side of this story and hope everyone feels free to share their narrative. This being said, the S&B does need to keep in mind legal ramifications when we publish accounts. We were contacted by an individual who told us legal action may be taken if the comment remained online. We contacted the original poster and told her that she could revise with this knowledge. Unfortunately, this did mean cutting out a large portion of her narrative.
We published a counter argument to this op-ed piece last week, written by the chair of The Board of Trustees. If you would like to read that it is easy to find in our opinions section. The S&B does not discriminate between who can write letters to the editor.
People with concerns or question should feel free to contact us at newspapr@grinnell.edu
GC student • Apr 18, 2015 at 2:05 am
“the school has repeatedly made it clear that it does not want to hear survivors speak.The College again tried to shut down discussion and minimize survivors concerns before the March 3rd, 2015 Huffington Post Article.”
The administration provided ample opportunity for survivors to speak and voice their opinions and concerns. DV was able to speak with the title IX committee on multiple occasions however it was entirely evident that the student members of DV were in no state to help the college move forward from past issues, but we’re stuck in a non productive state of anger and were seeking retribution for former cases and against certain current GC students
Survivor XXX • Apr 17, 2015 at 9:55 pm
It seems as though many people think I am a current student and have taken to Yik Yak and other social media to allege who I am. Perhaps my letter to the editor was not clear: I am no longer a Grinnell College student and have not been for some time.
Alysia Horcher • Apr 17, 2015 at 7:11 pm
My original comment was removed because describe my connection to one of the women in the meeting with President Kington apperantly gave away too much information that would allow someone to do research and figure out who I was referencing. Editors of the S&B have told me I can revise that section and repost my comment, which is what I am going to do. I will put the revised section in brackets so it’s clear what has been changed.
This is what I said:
Despite the multiple accounts of your meeting with Kington, meetings with student affairs and thoughts on how the school reacts to victims, I have noticed one huge piece of the story is missing; what was causing not only the president of the college, but also other students, to (continue to) not back you women up.
I also wrote down my accounts of everything that was going on in May of 2012.
To give you some background on how I was involved and affected by the situation: I was the roommate of one of the “survivors” that attended that meeting. And I testified against her. (Before you chastise me for putting survivor in quotations or for “not supporting a victim” – I am one. I was raped in high school. I went through the legal system with my case. Guess what? Rape is difficult to prove – even when you have cuts and bruises – because it is such a he said/she said thing. And despite everything, I still had to sit in class with my attacker EVERY DAY until I graduated high school.)
I testified against my roommate in the jud-co hearing because what she experienced was not rape. For months, every description she offered of the night in question was simply that she wanted to be in a relationship with her attacker. In fact, a few weeks after she was “raped,” she went back to her “attacker’s” room (both were completely sober this time as well) and slept with him again. It was only after he refused to be in an exclusive and commited relationship with her that her story changed to “he raped me”.
The women that met with president Kington because they wanted to create a “safe” environment for survivors are the same women that were threatening me and verbally delegitimizing my experience. The same women that caused the RLCs and security to move me rooms during hell week because “they feared for my safety.” The same women that dropped my name to professors in the education and GWSS departments as a “rapist supporter” (and causing said professors to tell me to not bother wasting my time registering for their classes). The same women that would not allow me to be a part of the advocate group. The “rapist” I was “supporting”…he was not a friend of mine. I knew him as an acquaintance, but I was not supporting him. In fact, I testified against my roommate because I had a serious problem with what she was doing. Rape is a very real thing that is extremely traumatizing. Claiming it happened to you when things don’t go your way delegitimizes it for actual victims. I don’t understand the argument of “we want all survivors to feel safe and supported” when they went out of their way to make things the exact opposite for me.
While I do not know if it pertains to all of the women that attended the meeting with President Kington, I know at least my roommate and another one made the statement “all male athletes are rapists and all of them need to be kicked out of Grinnell.” Hopefully I am not the only one that finds such a statement very problematic. Aside from stereotyping and labeling a significant percentage of the students and alumni, the women were targeting specific “attackers” in their demands for expulsion. In addition, another women (who was friends with the women that met with President Kington) brought a case to judco, had the alleged attacker expelled and told me a few days later “I asked him to do it, but that’s one more gone.” In the data I have read through, there has not been any evidence that says the athletes are more likely to be rapists than any other male on campus. Over a matter of a few weeks, these women managed to completely divide campus.
The last point I would like to bring up is my lack of understanding on why these women are bringing up all of these cases/the way the college handled them now, 3 years later. The college has made tremendous strides to improve the way it handles sexual assault. The system is completely different than it was in spring of 2012. Instead of continuing to attack the administration for how things were handled years ago, it might be a better idea to examine the new policies in an effort to find any areas that could use further improvement. This is what I said:
Despite the multiple accounts of your meeting with Kington, meetings with student affairs and thoughts on how the school reacts to victims, I have noticed one huge piece of the story is missing; what was causing not only the president of the college, but also other students, to (continue to) not back you women up.
I also wrote down my accounts of everything that was going on in May of 2012.
To give you some background on how I was involved and affected by the situation: [I lived in the same part of campus as one of the “survivors” that attended that meeting. She was one of the first people I befriended at Grinnell and throughout the first semester and a half of our time at Grinnell, we were close. She confided in me very often and often came to me for advice. Despite her being my friend, I testified against her during her sexual assault jud-co hearing.]. (Before you chastise me for putting survivor in quotations or for “not supporting a victim” – I am one. I was raped in high school. I went through the legal system with my case. Guess what? Rape is difficult to prove – even when you have cuts and bruises – because it is such a he said/she said thing. And despite everything, I still had to sit in class with my attacker EVERY DAY until I graduated high school.)
I testified against my roommate in the jud-co hearing because what she experienced was not rape. For months, every description she offered of the night in question was simply that she wanted to be in a relationship with her attacker. In fact, a few weeks after she was “raped,” she went back to her “attacker’s” room (both were completely sober this time as well) and slept with him again. It was only after he refused to be in an exclusive and commited relationship with her that her story changed to “he raped me”.
The women that met with president Kington because they wanted to create a “safe” environment for survivors are the same women that were threatening me and verbally delegitimizing my experience. The same women that caused the RLCs and security to move me rooms during hell week because “they feared for my safety.” The same women that dropped my name to professors in the education and GWSS departments as a “rapist supporter” (and causing said professors to tell me to not bother wasting my time registering for their classes). The same women that would not allow me to be a part of the advocate group. The “rapist” I was “supporting”…he was not a friend of mine. I knew him as an acquaintance, but I was not supporting him. In fact, I testified against my roommate because I had a serious problem with what she was doing. Rape is a very real thing that is extremely traumatizing. Claiming it happened to you when things don’t go your way delegitimizes it for actual victims. I don’t understand the argument of “we want all survivors to feel safe and supported” when they went out of their way to make things the exact opposite for me.
While I do not know if it pertains to all of the women that attended the meeting with President Kington, I know at least my roommate and another one made the statement “all male athletes are rapists and all of them need to be kicked out of Grinnell.” Hopefully I am not the only one that finds such a statement very problematic. Aside from stereotyping and labeling a significant percentage of the students and alumni, the women were targeting specific “attackers” in their demands for expulsion. In addition, another women (who was friends with the women that met with President Kington) brought a case to judco, had the alleged attacker expelled and told me a few days later “I asked him to do it, but that’s one more gone.” In the data I have read through, there has not been any evidence that says the athletes are more likely to be rapists than any other male on campus. Over a matter of a few weeks, these women managed to completely divide campus.
The last point I would like to bring up is my lack of understanding on why these women are bringing up all of these cases/the way the college handled them now, 3 years later. The college has made tremendous strides to improve the way it handles sexual assault. The system is completely different than it was in spring of 2012. Instead of continuing to attack the administration for how things were handled years ago, it might be a better idea to examine the new policies in an effort to find any areas that could use further improvement.
David Draper • Apr 17, 2015 at 6:54 pm
Admin- the sheer amount of anonymous postings, unproven allegations and now at least one deleted of posting in this ongoing situation are calling the accountability of the S&B and its editors into question. The hard working students at the S&B may benefit from having an outside journalism ethics expert assist in determining how to proceed with this story, as future employers (especially those in the field of journalism) may be concerned by how this is being handled. Given the perception that the S&B editors strongly back one side of this story and are engaging in the practice of allowing anonymous contributions that support that side, as well as reports of deleting stories from other perspectives that do not support that perspective, there are significant questions of journalistic and organizational ethics at stake.
DD
Grin alum • Apr 17, 2015 at 4:31 pm
Dear Editors,
I have no knowledge at all about any of what happened. But the specific details in the comment you published and later chose to censor calls into question on several levels the very serious allegations in the original anonymous letter (not least as to motive). It is odd that anonymously made accusations are considered fine for publication, but an account by someone willing to go on the record that fundamentally challenges that narrative is verboten. I’ve been a journalist for thirty years and that is not how it’s done. This is beginning to read like a text book case of j-school class.
Cid Standifer • Apr 17, 2015 at 3:20 pm
Excuse me, I meant “saw the victim afterward.”
Cid Standifer • Apr 17, 2015 at 3:19 pm
Grin Alum, I have in fact read the Columbia Journalism School’s report on the Rolling Stone article. The major failings in that case were A) the journalist never reached out to the alleged assailant, and didn’t even know his name, and B) the journalist never contacted the three witnesses who saw the assailant afterward.
I have personally emailed Kington, and he had a chance to respond to my accusation via Korver’s letter. That letter substantially agrees with Survivor XXX’s account. I have also been in contact with two of the survivors at the first meeting, and they corroborate Survivor XXX’s account. I have reached out to people who were on the SPARC committee at the time of the GUM firing, and other people who would have knowledge of the meeting with Kington to see if they’ll talk to me. They have either explicitly declined or just never responded. In journo lingo, I have “reported this out.” I have done all of this while trying to respect Survivor XXX’s needs. She has been stunningly cooperative in my attempts to corroborate her account. I am amazed by her courage.
Keeping sexual assault victims anonymous is standard practice in journalism. That doesn’t mean they have to be silent. Both the S&B opinion editor and myself have done our homework. Unlike Rolling Stone, we are not “papering over holes in the reporting.” We are respecting that survivors are at risk of harassment and retaliation. I’ve already seen Survivor XXX called a “villain” on Yik Yak. One survivor at Grinnell is now terrified for her physical safety. The threat is real. The problem is real. We can’t stay silent.
Grin alum • Apr 17, 2015 at 2:42 pm
There was an extremely detailed comment to this article that you published with specific allegations. It was NOT written anonymously. It was from a former student who gave her name (I believe it was Alysia Horcher), and it challenged the accusations in the letter above. It appears to have disappeared from the web site. Once a counter-factual is published by someone who gives her name to then delete it and pretend it was never published calls for an explanation.
admin • Apr 17, 2015 at 3:43 pm
Hi alum,
The comment you are referencing included specific and personal details related to an ongoing investigation and therefore should not have been published on our site. This is why the comment was removed.
– The Editors
Ally • Apr 17, 2015 at 12:53 pm
Forget about asking the president to resign. It is time to ask for the Board of Trustees to resign.
The recent letter from the Board opens by trying to discredit Cid Standifer’s previous letter. But it then spends six paragraphs acknowledging the basic facts as described by Standifer and detailed on [GrinnellPlans]. So there is in fact a lot of agreement about the events of Spring 2012, and President Kington’s participation in those events.
Here is what we now know according to both sides. A student was sexually assaulted. Together with several other students, she went to the president’s office to complain about the way the college had handled cases of sexual assault. In that meeting, she raised her voice. For that crime, the president summoned her to meet, alone, with him and his assistant. In that meeting, he berated the student for speaking “disrespectfully” to him. He also warned her that if she did so again she would be asked to leave. The student did not speak and left the room.
Only at this point are there gaps in interpretation. According to the Board of Trustees version, “She [the student] did not respond, but made it clear that she was not interested in listening to his perspective.” Also according to the Board account, the student, now alumna, understood that when the president said that “he would ask her to leave,” he was threatening to have her dismissed from the College. Apparently, the student then reported this threat to others and word got back to the president. He thereupon wrote a clarifying email which the Board account reproduces verbatim. The generous interpretation is that this part of the exchange was simply an unpleasant misunderstanding. The less generous view, and arguably the more obvious one, is that the president realized he had overstepped his authority–and accepted norms of compassion–and tried after the fact to climb down from his boorish behavior.
But let’s assume the more generous interpretation here is correct, and stick only to the points of agreement between both accounts. One still has to ask, why would the president of a liberal arts college even think that the appropriate course of action would ever be to summon a rape victim to his office, on her own, and scold her for being “rude”? More importantly, however, one has to wonder why the Board of Trustees not only approves of such action, but why it has authorized the chair to state that, “this is the kind of conduct my colleagues and I expect from our President.” Really? This is what they want their president to be doing? And why is there not a single note acknowledging that the student was actually in the right in terms of the basic facts at the time? Even the administration has conceded that the procedures used to investigate sexual assault in 2011 and 2012 were flawed and did not conform to basic standards demanded by Title IX. Why can’t the Board come straight out and say to this student, “You were right; the college screwed up your case”?
The Trustees claim that in that session the president was educating the student and modeling for her “how to initiate discussions on difficult topics.” If that is so, this is a rather dystopian vision of a Grinnell education. The only possible lesson than could be imparted by such behavior is that the institution values one-sided discussions dictated by power and intimidation. Perhaps the Board should then consider an appropriate advertising tagline to go with the new, approved pedagogy: “Grinnell College, where we learn our girls to lie back and shut up.” That would be an eloquent epitaph for “No Limits!”
Anonymous-for-fear-of-retaliation
Grin alum • Apr 17, 2015 at 12:51 pm
The S&B is publishing anonymous attacks of the most serious nature against Mr. Kington without attempting to determine the veracity of the accusations. That is shameful. If you don’t understand why this is wrong, I would recommend you read the Columbia Journalism Schools’ recent report on the fabricated story in Rolling Stone.
David Draper • Apr 17, 2015 at 10:56 am
What an awful situation. Because it is impossible to know exactly what happened, those of us that were not in attendance of the events discussed can only speculate over how accurate and complete the differing accounts are.
However, I am troubled by the two dimensional portrayal of Dr. Kington and other members of the administration and trustees by some members of the discussion. (something that seems to be a bit of a tradition for Grinnell students toward the president and other administrators since I was a student there in the late 90’s and early 2000’s, and probably before.) It is very hard for me to believe that Dr. Kington, with his history and achievements would actually be “a brand manager, not an activist, and this is imminently clear in every decision he makes.” This is speculation, as I do not know him, but I would bet Dr. Kington could probably give a master class in systems of privilege and oppression. I suspect he probably has a lifetime of very very useful personal and scholarly advice for anyone wanting to learn how to deal with systems stacked against them and make positive, just change in the world if Dr. Kington had the interest to discuss it and others had the interest to learn from him. It is really too bad that so many people seem to be painting him personally as a problem instead of identifying him as a resource and potential ally in this struggle.
I understand that several parties are unhappy with the current process at Grinnell. But such simplistic, condescending attacks toward someone they disagree with hurts their case and at first glance, make them less credible. This is too bad. They may actually have very accurate and complete description of the various events that happened. But if they do, their way of presenting their ideas as beyond questioning, demonizing those that don’t completely agree and support them and their choices, and showing an utter unwillingness to consider any other views seems narrow. Like a sign that there are other issues in play that they are not acknowledging. I wonder about their judgment. And most importantly, I wonder if this approach is hurting their cause.
Alysia Horcher • Apr 17, 2015 at 8:52 am
Despite the multiple accounts of your meeting with Kington, meetings with student affairs and thoughts on how the school reacts to victims, I have noticed one huge piece of the story is missing; what was causing not only the president of the college, but also other students, to (continue to) not back you women up.
I also wrote down my accounts of everything that was going on in May of 2012.
To give you some background on how I was involved and affected by the situation: I was the roommate of one of the “survivors” that attended that meeting. And I testified against her. (Before you chastise me for putting survivor in quotations or for “not supporting a victim” – I am one. I was raped in high school. I went through the legal system with my case. Guess what? Rape is difficult to prove – even when you have cuts and bruises – because it is such a he said/she said thing. And despite everything, I still had to sit in class with my attacker EVERY DAY until I graduated high school.)
I testified against my roommate in the jud-co hearing because what she experienced was not rape. For months, every description she offered of the night in question was simply that she wanted to be in a relationship with her attacker. In fact, a few weeks after she was “raped,” she went back to her “attacker’s” room (both were completely sober this time as well) and slept with him again. It was only after he refused to be in an exclusive and commited relationship with her that her story changed to “he raped me”.
The women that met with president Kington because they wanted to create a “safe” environment for survivors are the same women that were threatening me and verbally delegitimizing my experience. The same women that caused the RLCs and security to move me rooms during hell week because “they feared for my safety.” The same women that dropped my name to professors in the education and GWSS departments as a “rapist supporter” (and causing said professors to tell me to not bother wasting my time registering for their classes). The same women that would not allow me to be a part of the advocate group. The “rapist” I was “supporting”…he was not a friend of mine. I knew him as an acquaintance, but I was not supporting him. In fact, I testified against my roommate because I had a serious problem with what she was doing. Rape is a very real thing that is extremely traumatizing. Claiming it happened to you when things don’t go your way delegitimizes it for actual victims. I don’t understand the argument of “we want all survivors to feel safe and supported” when they went out of their way to make things the exact opposite for me.
While I do not know if it pertains to all of the women that attended the meeting with President Kington, I know at least my roommate and another one made the statement “all male athletes are rapists and all of them need to be kicked out of Grinnell.” Hopefully I am not the only one that finds such a statement very problematic. Aside from stereotyping and labeling a significant percentage of the students and alumni, the women were targeting specific “attackers” in their demands for expulsion. In addition, another women (who was friends with the women that met with President Kington) brought a case to judco, had the alleged attacker expelled and told me a few days later “I asked him to do it, but that’s one more gone.” In the data I have read through, there has not been any evidence that says the athletes are more likely to be rapists than any other male on campus. Over a matter of a few weeks, these women managed to completely divide campus.
The last point I would like to bring up is my lack of understanding on why these women are bringing up all of these cases/the way the college handled them now, 3 years later. The college has made tremendous strides to improve the way it handles sexual assault. The system is completely different than it was in spring of 2012. Instead of continuing to attack the administration for how things were handled years ago, it might be a better idea to examine the new policies in an effort to find any areas that could use further improvement.