The Cornell rape case is the story of the century of the week. As I write, the first six stories on nytimes.com are about the case — it has pushed a possible 9/11 redux well below the fold. Mainstream media and social media agree that the Cornell case is the most urgent matter facing the nation. It is arguably crowding out more important stories, such as the five-way pissing match between crazy people at a small town lesbian bar.
Many of us know some details about the Cornell case; virtually none of us know all the details. Yet passionate opinions exist among people who were nowhere near events that were either disgusting (illegal) or disgusting (hot). Determining the presence or absence of consent can be difficult even with a comprehensive account of who consumed what substances in what quantities when and with what prompting, and who placed which body part betwixt what other body part when and at the behest of whom. Without such an account, determining consent is impossible. Yet many people see fit to reach conclusions, often based on second-to-fifth-hand recountings of events filtered through the triple-distorting factors of drugs, alcohol, and youth.
Expansive media coverage is being justified on the grounds that the nation is having an important conversation about sexual assault. But I’d like to offer an alternate theory: Maybe we are not having an important conversation about sexual assault. Maybe we’re having an uninformed, wreckless, and not-so-subtly horny conversation. And maybe we’re using young people as pawns to advance political narratives, and we’re also titillated by sordid tales of freaky college sex. And maybe — just maybe — it would be better if guilt or innocence was determined by people whose job is to collect and consider all relevant information, and not social media vigilanties ready to posse up after reading half a Facebook post from one of their moronic friends.
