If there are two things about which there is nothing funny at all, they are College Humor and sexual assault. And yet College Humor today served up a series of dead-serious tweets about rape, along with an allegedly humorous video starring Jake Johnson and a bear.
What If Bears Killed One In Five People? https://t.co/BY4TNoM8J0 Guys, this angry, hungry bear in our house is a big problem.
— CollegeHumor (@CollegeHumor) November 5, 2015
Don’t bother rushing to YouTube to argue the premise of the video with College Humor; comments have been disabled for some reason.
What If Bears Killed 1 In 5 People? https://t.co/LzYWSdAf6t We partnered w/@ItsOnUs in a vid starring @MrJakeJohnson pic.twitter.com/37xK2avjxE
— CollegeHumor (@CollegeHumor) November 5, 2015
We knew that the #ItsOnUs campaign came from the White House and was targeted toward men specifically, but we’d completely forgotten last fall’s celebrity studded video introducing yet another initiative relying on the power of hashtag.
#ItsOnUs to realize we all have a role to play in stopping sexual assault. Take the pledge at http://t.co/7aGUmPQNTW http://t.co/jXgykjLwlc
— White House Archived (@ObamaWhiteHouse) September 19, 2014
We’re not sure who decided it was time to resurrect the #ItsOnUs campaign, but the timing wasn’t ideal. Between last year’s video and this year’s, reports issued by Harvard University and the University of Miami determined that the 1-in-5 statistic was “unfounded.”
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The bear attack movie also comes directly on the heels of news that NHL star Patrick Kane, accused of sexual assault, won’t face rape charges after all.
Yet another high-profile rape accusation falls apart: https://t.co/4Oa6NPs4Ke
— Ashe Schow (@AsheSchow) November 6, 2015
Rape culture is so rampant that journalists have to keep apologizing for it not happeninghttps://t.co/7rw3sqS2dD pic.twitter.com/SlnQXW6uy1
— Stephen Miller (@redsteeze) November 5, 2015
If the White House does want to tackle sexual assault, it’s on them to get the statistics right or risk casting further doubt on a very serious subject.
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