“The Hunting Ground” is terrifying. And real.

“The Hunting Ground” is terrifying. And real. March 1, 2015

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Poster for The Hunting Ground, thehuntinggroundfilm.com

A web cam catches the whole emotional scene. A series of high school girls with bright, rosy faces nervously open the official emails that hold their fate:  letters from their dream colleges telling them whether or not they got in. A life-long career of tireless academic excellence, leadership in extra-curriculars, sports and community service — no shortage of blood, sweat and tears — have brought them to this critical moment. With mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters watching anxiously over their shoulders, each young woman pants with sick nerves and then screams with pure joy at learning of their acceptance. There is effusive weeping, ecstatic dances, group hugs, high fives, and triumphant, fist-pumping exclamations. Their hard work paid off. Their dreams have come true.

But it won’t come without a shocking cost for at least one in five of them. You may have heard in the news that our country is slowly realizing we have long had a shameful epidemic of sexual assault on our college campuses. If you are not sure whether you believe it, go see the THE HUNTING GROUND, which opened in theaters this weekend in New York City, and in major cities and well-known college towns around the U.S. The documentary film tracks the up-close  and personal realities of the widespread campus rape culture with startling, detailed clarity and the fearlessness required to confront the desperate, twisted cover-ups by the institutions and law enforcement authorities.

The film comes from Writer/Director  Kirby Dick and Producer Amy Ziering, the Academy Award-nominated team who made THE INVISIBLE WAR, the gut-punching investigation into the sweeping problem of rape in the U.S. military and the threatening and expulsion of victims, who were expected to report the crimes to the very groups of people who committed the crimes, or who protected the often high-ranking perpetrators. The film was nominated for an Oscar, won an Emmy for Best Documentary and Outstanding Investigative Journalism, prompted Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta to announce policy changes, and spurred Senator Kirsten Gillibrand to coauthor and push the passage of the Military Justice Improvement Act, leading to the passing of 35 additional Congressional reforms. I have no doubt this gripping, revealing and downright terrifying film will inspire similar action.

THE HUNTING GROUND centers around Annie Clark and Andrea Pino, two brave young women at the University of North Carolina who were assaulted and raped, hit roadblocks to help and resources, were strictly discouraged from reporting, and yet pressed on for the sake of other potential victims despite post-traumatic stress and depression and graphic death threats.

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Andrea & Annie, www.wm.edu/news/stories/2015/hunting-ground-continued-campus-conversation-on-preventing-sexual-assault.php

Instead of doing all the typical carefree college things kids do, they spent the rest of their college careers learning Title IX inside and out, listening to podcasts of legal briefings and court cases, and establishing a network to assist victims around the country in filing Title IX complaints against numerous schools which dismissed reports of attempted and completed sexual assaults.

It started when Annie was attacked in 2007, went to an employee in the administration to ask for help, and was told that “rape is like a football game”, and she needed to look back at the “game” and decide what she could have done differently. This disturbing, sexist victim-blaming (and denial of lurking danger to others) led her to create an anonymous reporting box, which Andrea later dropped her name into after being dragged into a bathroom, thrown to the floor and raped. Andrea was the first in her family to attend college, but her pride quickly turned into shame.

When Andrea realized Annie had established the reporting box, they met. The more they talked with young women and men around campus, they were hit with how extraordinarily common such assaults were. Many were not reporting because of trauma, fear of retribution, and knowledge of how demeaning and utterly futile working with campus administration or security and local police would be. [Estimated 80% of victims do not report.] Those who were bold enough to report often ended up being humiliated, black-balled, threatened, or driven out of school. Concerned parents and families of victims felt helpless.

As word spread, the team began to field thousands of calls from campuses around the country, and traveling to meet with students. It became more than a full-time job while juggling a full-time class schedule, but they powered on, completely covering their dorm walls with enormous U.S. maps of reports, relevant examples of case law, and facts and figures. As Andrea said, “I would have given anything to have someone believe me and support me” [when it happened to me]. There was no call she would not take.

The film interviews numerous young women and two young men about their harrowing experiences with sexual assault on campus, providing a panoramic view of the problem and how various schools reacted against the victim. It investigates the problem of institutional denial to ensure fundraising of billion-dollar endowments and to falsely keep assault numbers low or nonexistent so that trusting parents will continue to pay outrageous tuitions to send their children into to their “care and guidance”.

The film looks at the dark side of fraternity culture that encourages pledges to photograph and publicly mark their number of “conquests” and passes down the recipes for hunch punch that makes girls pass out after one drink. One clip of cell phone video shows a swarming group of Yale frat boys surrounding the freshman girls’ dorm and chanting at the top of their lungs: “No means yes! Yes means anal!” over and over. Many college women will tell you this type of  campus harassment, while not usually as openly blatant, is not surprising.

The film also addresses the college sports culture that deifies athletes, letting them get away with assault and rape under the strenuous protection of coaches, administrators, boosters, and local police precincts. It addresses the age-old formula used by perpetrators in the rare cases they are called out, in which they take advantage of gender-biased social myths and patriarchal socialization and preemptively go to great lengths to discredit their victim. The film addresses the ridiculous obsession with false rape claims, which are estimated at 2%-5%. Most are never truly proved to be actually false, but can be retractions due to threats or attributed as false due to a natural inability to put the story facts back together after the intense trauma.

www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/02/27/the-hunting-ground-subjects-defend-title-ix-campaign
www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/02/27/the-hunting-ground-subjects-defend-title-ix-campaign

The film ends with a dose of hope at the progress of Annie and Andrea and the movement they started, which got the attention of the White House and has led to the federal investigation of 95 schools. Director Kirby Dick noted that it is a sad statement that 18, 19, and 20 year old women are having to stand up and take care of this themselves, after all the trauma and pain. The young women admit how scary it has been in many cases to be in effect a lone teenager standing up to a beloved, trusted, powerful 200-year old institution. hunting_ground

Their courage will be worth it. I too was once a confused, frightened 19-year-old college girl who would have “given anything to have someone believe me and support me” after I was raped by a fellow student I trusted, who knew well my evangelical commitment for waiting to have sex until marriage. I suffered severe post-traumatic stress and debilitating depression silently and alone, while shouldering ridiculous levels of pressure to be a “perfectly” successful Christian girl in academics, sorority, extra-curriculars, competitions, and community activities. I couldn’t breathe a word, because women in my religious environment were blamed for anything that happened to them…I had heard that hateful message all my life and seen it go down in my community. And when I finally told select people 10 years later, I was indeed blamed and shamed for ‘getting in a situation’ to be overpowered and raped. I can tell you honestly today, bearing the horrible weight of it at a young age, I barely made it out of college alive.

I’m only recently getting to the point of gathering enough courage to speak about it publicly…a couple of decades later…bolstered by the young people today who refuse to be silenced. I’ve already been berated and have had people say horrendously evil and ignorant things to my face…notably people in law and enforcement fields. But victims speaking out — revealing our sheer numbers — is the key to making society come to hear and believe the girls and guys who have been suffering. We must sadly teach especially young girls from childhood to be brave enough to report and get rape kits, offer true support and resources, pressure police to actually test hundreds of thousands of backlogged rape kits, and develop new policies and legal procedures in order to end the still largely silent epidemic.

It is the worst kind of hell imaginable, to have to tell that story. But it is also the one way to finally climb out of the hell, and to keep others from being victims. The more we do it and support one another, the more quickly the ignorance and malice will be seen clearly for what it is, making room for real hope, sensible and intelligent conversations, new policies, and ultimate justice.

See thehuntinggroundfilm.com for theaters and more info. Check out Lady Gaga’s son “TIL IT HAPPENS TO YOU”, recorded for the film. https://youtube.com/watch?v=TgJzuEHOE3g%22+width%3D%22420%22+height%3D%22315%22+frameborder%3D%220%22+allowfullscreen%3D%22allowfullscreen%22%3E%3C


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