Content warning: This piece discusses sexual violence and the public response to an ongoing sexual assault case, including victim-blaming. Please take care while reading.
Every few years, a college campus makes national headlines for sexual violence. Right now, it’s Cornell University.
I’m glad people are paying attention. I’m glad students are speaking up and demanding accountability. These conversations matter, and they’re long overdue. But as a survivor and public health researcher, I’ve also found myself frustrated and saddened by how some of these conversations are unfolding. Because while we say we care about survivors, we continue to place so much responsibility on them. We expect survivors to immediately understand what happened to them, report to prevent future violence, share their stories to educate others, and recount painful experiences for journalists. And when they come forward, we question their credibility if they don’t fit our idea of a “perfect victim.”
The public’s response to the Cornell case illustrates this. After Jane Doe’s text messages became public, including messages she sent to some of the accused men afterward that may come off as “friendly,” some people questioned her credibility because her behavior didn’t fit their perceived expectations of a survivor. But when we comb through a survivor’s texts looking for reasons to doubt her, we’re asking the wrong questions. The harder ones belong to the people who reportedly shared a message in a fraternity group chat that night suggesting she was available for sex, along with a photo of her. Others attempted to expose her identity, leading to harassment of women mistakenly identified as her. We tell survivors to come forward, but what happens when they do? Their lives become subjects of public debate, their decisions are picked apart, and their trauma becomes something for others to consume.
Through my work with Survivors + Allies, a survivor-led research and advocacy organization in California, I’ve studied how college students experience sexual violence and navigate institutional responses. In our statewide research, we found that 68% of student survivors experienced sexual violence before or outside their current institution. Nearly half never sought support from anyone, and many felt what happened to them wasn’t serious enough to warrant reaching out.
Although ours and others’ research shows that survivors often take substantial time – even years – to process and understand what happened to them, societal conversations quickly turn to questioning, “Why didn’t they report sooner?” People suggest that coming forward could have prevented future violence, as though survivors are responsible for protecting others from the people who hurt them. Survivors are placed in the impossible position of needing to report immediately, not only to prove their own credibility but also to hold the perpetrator accountable and protect other potential victims. We cannot expect survivors to be everything. They cannot be a victim, an advocate, a pursuer of justice, and a protector simultaneously.
But reporting can be incredibly difficult. Survivors may have to recount painful experiences repeatedly, navigate complicated procedures, and face scrutiny about their credibility. And after all that, there’s no guarantee of accountability or justice. In a separate study my S+A colleagues and I published this year, hundreds of student survivors described weighing these costs and risks, a process we call the “Survivors’ Calculus,” in which institutional systems place the burden of healing on survivors themselves. Survivors deserve to make these decisions for themselves without being held responsible for someone else’s violence.
I’m also troubled by how survivors are treated by people who claim to want to amplify their voices. I and other members of S+A have been approached by journalists seeking interviews about sexual violence, or to comment on the Cornell case, sometimes on tight deadlines. I’ve also experienced reporters pushing for more personal details after I’ve communicated what I’m comfortable sharing, explaining that their editors need more information. But why should I have to disclose the most painful details of my life for my experience to be taken seriously? For your piece to be published? Why isn’t saying I’m a survivor enough?
Journalists have important stories to tell, but survivors are people, not just sources of compelling stories. We shouldn’t have to sacrifice our emotional well-being to make an article more powerful. That care should extend to how stories are published, including providing content warnings when discussing violence.
These experiences may seem different from victim-blaming and pressure to report, but I see them as part of the same larger problem. We continue to prioritize what we want from survivors over what survivors actually need. We ask them to prove their experiences, justify their decisions, and share painful details, often without considering the harm we may be causing.
This is how rape culture persists. It’s not just about sexual violence itself, but also the everyday attitudes and behaviors that normalize, minimize, and excuse it. It’s the inappropriate joke nobody challenges. The friend who excuses harmful behavior because someone is actually a “good person” or “boys will be boys.” The questions about what someone was wearing or drinking rather than why someone else chose to cause harm.
And when harm does occur, we need accountability that responds to survivors’ needs, including confidential support and meaningful options for seeking justice. But prevention cannot begin only after someone has already been harmed.
Why aren’t we doing more to teach boys and young men about consent, boundaries, and respect? Why aren’t we challenging friends who behave inappropriately, or holding people accountable? Because it makes us uncomfortable?
Preventing sexual violence is everyone’s responsibility. It means teaching consent, respecting boundaries, intervening when we witness harmful behavior, and refusing to excuse it.
The attention surrounding Cornell University gives us an opportunity to have these conversations. But we cannot keep waiting for another high-profile case to remind us that sexual violence is happening everywhere. Survivors deserve to heal, to be heard when they choose to speak, and to live their lives without being expected to turn their trauma into a public service. If we really care about survivors, it’s time we start asking more of everyone else.
