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NEWS & LETTERS, July 2004School ignores rapesThanks to a disgusting decision at the end of May by University of Colorado President Elizabeth Hoffman, no one will lose their jobs--including herself--nor be penalized or charged in a sordid scandal dating back to 1997, involving the sexual abuse of women. Women’s groups were outraged by her inaction, and the commission investigating the charges--also in question because of some members’ close ties to the school--expressed dismay that their mildly-censuring report was disregarded. "If this is how they choose to clean up the program," said Peggy Lamm, commission co-chair, "I think they need a better broom." The situation came to light in 1997 when a high school student reported that she was raped by an athletic recruit. By 1998, Boulder, Colo. prosecutor Mary Keenan put the school "on notice" to stop using women and alcohol in recruiting. Visits by recruits to the school regularly included "escorts" and strip clubs. But the only action the university took was to firm up what some called a cozy relationship between local police and the football program "benefiting" athletes that ran afoul of the law. The lid started to blow off this can of worms in February 2004--four years after Hoffman was named university president--when three women filed federal lawsuits saying they had been raped at a recruiting party in 2001. This brought to nine the number of women who had made public that they were raped by football players or recruits. Football coach Gary Barnett took the opportunity at a press conference to verbally attack one of the raped women, Katie Hnida, a former team place kicker, calling her a "girl" whose athletic ability was "awful." Barnett was suspended WITH pay for what were called "insensitive" remarks. Some alumni criticized Hoffman for not firing Barnett immediately. Her true feelings came out when questioned about the nine rape accusations. She said: "Some go back seven years and no charges have ever been filed. So I don’t know who to believe." More bizarre was her reaction when, in a federal court case deposition, she was asked about the harassment of Hnida by football players who called her a vile word for female genitalia. Hoffman said, "I’ve actually heard it used as a term of endearment," supposedly by Chaucer in the 14th century’s THE CANTERBURY TALES! Hoffman’s attempts to correct problems in the athletic department are reminiscent of more foxes guarding the henhouse. She said: "The department will be placed under stricter oversight by the university"--the same university that had already done nothing even though put "on notice" by the prosecutor six years ago. The Women’s Liberation Movement fought a system that denied women our rights and persecuted us even when we were victims. Yet, we cannot assume that women will act more humanely. The revolutionary goal of the women’s movement--to replace this system with a truly new human society where all are free--must be regained if we are to keep what is going on in Colorado from ever happening again. --Mary Jo Grey |
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