EDITORS' CORNER
OPINION
Calling a gender-confused male “he” could get someone accused of “sexual harassment” at Michigan State University.
The public university in Lansing recently released the results of its “Know More” survey that asks students and staff about sexual assault, sexual harassment, and host of other issues about their experiences. After reading the results, people actually know less, however.
During the 2024-25 school year, a whopping 69 percent of “transgender and/or Nonbinary” undergraduate students said they were the victim of sexual harassment.
“The most common forms of sexual harassment were ‘someone referring to people of your gender in insulting or offensive terms’ and someone making ‘sexual remarks, jokes, or stories,’” the report explains.
The survey suffers from other problems, which leads to a likely inflated number of reports of sexual assault.
RTI International and Chris Krebs oversaw the survey. Krebs is behind the original 2014 Department of Justice study that is used by activists to claim 1 in 5 women are victims of sexual assault on college campuses.
Though he himself has disavowed the general applicability of that statement, the survey he oversaw for MSU engages in some creative accounting to reach a similar conclusion.
‘Lifetime’ sexual assault rate came out of thin air
During the 2024-25 school year, six percent of undergraduate women said they were the victims of sexual assault.
The survey then reports that 17.5 percent of women have been victims of sexual assault since enrolling at the school, and then 22 percent reported victimization prior to enrollment. Through a little magic and special ingredients, the survey then comes up with a “lifetime” rate of 29.5 percent.
That is not a typo. I know what you’re thinking – shouldn’t it be 39.5 percent?
Yes, but here’s the explanation.
“Sexual assault in lifetime will not equal the sum of sexual assault prior to enrolling at MSU and sexual assault since entering MSU because some students reported both before and since enrolling,” the report says.
Makes sense if you don’t think about it.
The survey even explains that the data do not match up with Clery crime reports because “estimates included in this report are based on data that students provided about their sexual assault experiences through a confidential survey, whereas data reported under the Clery Act are based on official reports and are limited to incidents that were formally reported to school officials.”
“Given the extreme underreporting of sexual assault, Clery Act data are expected to be much lower than estimates obtained from a self-reported, confidential survey,” the study authors state, using circular logic to justify their position. (How do we know there is underreporting? Because we got higher numbers than official law enforcement reports!).
Of course even if the numbers did add up, they are virtually meaningless because the definitions of sexual assault do not correspond with how law enforcement defines the term.
Consider the statistics of reported rape when it comes to real women (as opposed to “transgender” women, who are actually men).
More than half of the reported incidents involved either a “current or ex” friend, roommate, or boyfriend/girlfriend.
In about 50 percent of the cases, the alleged perpetrator reportedly used drugs or alcohol, as did the alleged victim.
Undergraduate women gave a variety of reasons for why they did not report the rape, with some indicating wrongdoing occured, and others suggesting the alleged victim did not think they were actually a victim.
More than half said they “did not think the incident was serious enough” while about 25 percent said they “did not want [the] perpetrator to get in trouble.” Around the same amount did say they had concerns about being “treated poorly” or the information not remaining confidential.
The survey suffers from other faults. Numerous responses are considered not “statistically reliable” due to a low response rate. Meanwhile, biased categories and questions are repeated throughout for all categories, tainting the data.
The results provide little in the way of actionable data. Instead of knowing more, the school is left knowing even less about what is happening on and off campus.
MORE: Campus sexual violence rate closer to 1%, study suggests
