Shiny Chandravel, Assistant Opinions & Humor Editor
When I was 10, I knocked on my neighbor’s front door to play outside. Her brother opened the door and pulled up my shirt to look at my chest.
When I was 13, I downloaded Snapchat for the first time. A boy from school sent explicit images to my phone.
When I was 15, a man groped teenage girls in my high school parking lot.
When I was 18, a student at VCU slapped my behind. When I turned to face him, he was grinning.
Growing up, I was taught that girls biologically mature faster than boys — but I do not think we are given a choice.
Now I am 20, the same age that a former Cornell University student states she was allegedly drugged and gang-raped by seven members of the Chi Phi fraternity in Oct. 2024, according to BBC News.
The alleged assault was reported to campus police in Nov. 2024. Now, almost two years later, the nation is solemnly observing how one of our country’s most respected institutions, an Ivy League university, reacted to reported sexual violence.
Tragically, that reaction was far from appropriate.
Two expulsions. This was the most severe action taken by Cornell’s administration and interim president, Michael Kotlikoff, on only two of the seven students accused of participating in the assault.
According to a CNN report, the woman’s attorney stated the rest of the accused students received smaller punishments, including temporary suspensions, workshops or written essays to mitigate their conduct.
They say false allegations can ruin lives. It appears even legitimate ones rarely do.
Universities are not meant to replace a judicial system, but that does not absolve them from the responsibility to, in Cornell’s own words, “preserve a higher education community and residential campus where ‘any person’ in the community can pursue their education in a secure and nourishing environment.”
If the woman in this case had not filed a lawsuit against the university on Sept. 14 as reported by CBS News, if Cornell’s student journalism staff had not followed her story or if the allegations did not catch social media’s attention, the identities of Matthew Ingalls, Jonathan Newell, Winston Lee, Gillio Lopes, Diego Sarabia, Scott Norris and Scott Kretzschmar would have successfully been concealed. For almost two years, they were.
That is not something that happens by chance but by design.
According to the Cornell Daily Sun, a student who allegedly cheats on a test receives a written notice. They are given three business days to request a hearing, followed by a resolution within two weeks as outlined in Cornell’s Code of Academic Integrity.
Cornell’s administration has the capacity to enact swift and organized justice on violators of their code of conduct. It is their choice when they do not.
Its administration designed “punishments” that would permit the alleged assaulters to return to the college campus with no published reason.
Its administration decided not to disclose the findings of their Title IX investigation to the victim, as reported by the Cornell Daily Sun.
According to the New York Times, Cornell’s campus police chose to exclude portions of the woman’s statement to the district attorney’s office.
According to CNN, Cornell chose not to report the incident to the Ithaca Police Department.
The reported actions of the Cornell seven men are gruesome, but it is inactions like these from everyone else that scare me most.
For instance, there were other people in the group chat where the alleged perpetrators invited others to participate in the assault, according to NBC News. Yet it appears not a single one of them stood up for her — not during, not after, not ever. It is this deafening silence that leaves the rest of us grappling with the possibility that this is not the first cover-up by the Chi Phi fraternity — and it may not be the last.
We wonder why so many celebrities, businessmen and politicians remain in positions of power despite histories of inciting sexual assault and violence. It is because when the incidents occur, no one reacts.
As a VCU student and a woman, I am told that I will be safe as long as I avoid the shady parts of Richmond and refrain from taking nighttime strolls. However, sexual assaulters do not only exist in dark shadows on isolated streets or in fraternity houses in the dead of night.
They can be powerful lawyers, wealthy businessmen and influential doctors — just as the Cornell seven were likely studying to become. Am I to avoid courtrooms, business meetings and hospitals as well?
You cannot open your arms to alleged rapists and expect women to feel welcome in those spaces too.
After news of the case unfolded, the public court of opinion took it upon itself to determine whether or not the alleged rape truly occurred. People online are analyzing the district attorney’s report, the screenshots of messages and statements from the university to decide for themselves what happened that night.
Unfortunately, much of this energy is entirely misplaced. Whether the woman was telling the truth was never the point. Even if she was lying, no one at Cornell cared to find out. They had already moved on.
Whether willingly or not, I have learned from a young age how to curate my choices to best avoid unwanted advances and violent behavior from men. I walk in groups. I carry my pepper spray. I share my location before I go out.
I have done my part, but does that matter if no one else will do theirs?