March Aims to End Violence

It happened during Orientation Week. It happened in a bar on Amsterdam Avenue. It happened when she was seven. It happened when he was in high school.

About three percent of women and men nationally experience a completed or attempted rape every academic year. The participants of Thursday night's march are not okay with that.

Heightened media attention and an increased police presence colored the 20th annual Take Back the Night march held last night. The event, in which participants demonstrate against sexual violence of men and women, drew more than 600 people, a Barnard security officer estimated.

Following the rape and torture of a student in Columbia's Graduate School of Journalism last weekend, participants were especially cognizant of the reality of rape both on campus and in the surrounding city.

"I'm here in support of the girl that was recently raped. I thought she was mugged," said Zoe, BC '10, who declined to give her last name. "When I found out what really happened, I was disgusted."

Some participants mentioned that their friends decided not to come at the last minute because this week's event frightened them.

Marchers spoke angrily against the numerous media outlets in attendance, which included ABC and CBS. Many participants said the cameramen and photographers were aggressive and disrespectful, including one who allegedly taunted participants who did not wish to be recorded while walking. Before the march, members of the press were told not to interview during the march or take photographs or video that would identify individuals.

"It is ridiculous. ... There are girls literally breaking down and they're trying to get interviews during the march," Mary Shodiya, BC '08, said. "Given this last week, we also just need to understand that this didn't just happen to one girl by one guy. They need to respect that."

Attendees met in front of Barnard Hall to being the march, which traversed the areas between 110th and 120th Streets from Riverside Drive to Morningside Avenue.

When marchers walked through Frat Row, they were met with huge banners outside brownstones and cheering fraternity brothers.

Blowing whistles and shouting chants like "University silence perpetuates the violence" and "Rape is a felony, even with CUID," participants said they felt a sense of power and release. Immediately following the march, a speak-out took place in lower-level McIntosh Hall, where students shared tearful stories and grievances with a microphone behind a screen. Counseling services were available until 4 a.m.

"Sometimes I think about what happened to me, and I get really disillusioned with this place," said an anonymous marcher who said she was raped this year. "Events like these really make me feel better about my peers."

Due to the nature of rape as an under-reported crime, there is no hard number for how many Columbia men and women are victims of sexual violence each year. In the 2004 National College Health Assessment, 1375 undergraduate respondents said they had experienced some form of sexual violence, ranging from verbal threats for sex to abusive relationships to non-consensual sex. Graduate respondents who experienced these acts totaled 1640.

Columbia Men Against Violence co-sponsored the march. Men traditionally do not march in the first part of the walk, participating in a discussion about sexual violence before joining. Men could not participate until 1996.

"The violence starts and stops with us," a few men repeated. CMAV spoke out on behalf of male survivors, who report incidents of sexual assault much less frequently than women.

Controversy has always followed the event. Some students this week expressed discomfort at the idea of shouting and marching for an issue so personal. At the first march in 1988, Spectator reported that students tore down advertising posters preceding the event. That march was organized after a woman was attacked in the Butler Library stacks that year.

Take Back the Night takes place in multiple communities around the world. The event began in London in 1877 as a protest against the fear women felt when walking the streets at night.

Participation at Columbia has soared through the years, reaching as high as 1,500. The size of the event has sometimes swelled in reaction to events on campus, such as when the University's Sexual Misconduct Policy was first being revised.

In addition to Thursday night's demonstrations, on April 25, Take Back the Night will host Sexhibition, a fair at Barnard which organizers say complements the march by promoting consensual sex.