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Journalistic failures in Rolling Stone article hurt rape survivors’ reputations, not just the magazine’s

I remember hitting the share button on my Facebook in November for the Rolling Stone article "A Rape on Campus." As an aspiring journalist myself, going through Sabrina Rubin Erdely's brilliant, detailed writing that was shining the national spotlight on an important issue through the harsh reality of Jackie's account, I was stunned in amazement thinking to myself "she got it right." When the story went under investigation a few days later, I went into denial because I wanted the story to be right. Instead, she got it very wrong.

On April 5, Rolling Stone released the investigation of how they could have gotten the story wrong, conducted by Steve Coll from the Columbia School of Journalism. I cannot explain every important detail of the over 330-page report, so I encourage everyone to read about its findings to understand the story.

In summary, Coll stated that Rolling Stone's story was a "failure of journalism" and one that never should have happened.

It saddens me to hear those words and to agree with them. Rolling Stone failed and now the wrong people are suffering the consequences.

After reading the investigation report, it is clear that Erdely and the editors of Rolling Stone made the mistake of neglecting the basic rules of reporting. It is valid to say that it is Jackie's fault for giving false information to be published to begin with, but the bigger fault was on Rolling Stone because if they looked, they would have seen the problems with the story.

For example, if Ederly asked actual questions to the Phi Kappa Psi chapter with details of the attack rather than simply asking "Do you have a comment?", she would have found out the chapter did not receive pledges in the fall.

Or, if Rolling Stone followed up with Jackie's three friends that found her that night, instead of giving them pseudonyms, Erdely would have discovered that the conversation of their social lives being on the line never came up, showing a lie in Jackie's story.

Their excuse was protecting Jackie. They did not want to risk losing Jackie's cooperation, so they did not go digging into her story. They mostly avoided trying to find people who could verify the things Jackie said, regardless of whether she asked them to refrain or not. The editors saw that holes in the story weren't closing and some facts were not lining up, but they chose to ignore it.

If it were my newsroom, I would have dropped Jackie's story when questions were not getting answered and red flags started to rise. It was clear that Jackie was their only source of information, and they knew they needed more to take the piece from a chilling narrative to a verifiable news story.

When Jackie didn't want to give the name of the lifeguard who orchestrated her attack, and when she stopped answering phone calls when Erdely told her she needed the name, I would have gone looking for another narrative to tell. I would have laid out the rules to the new source: I would need to know everything and talk to anyone she mentioned. Even if I was under a time crunch, and the story was not as dramatic as Jackie's, at least I would have the cooperation I needed to get it right.

But Rolling Stone thought the more dramatic account would have a bigger impact, and it did in the worst way possible.

Rolling Stone's original hope was to alarm people about sexual assault on college campuses and to challenge universities to do better job of punishing perpetrators. The story they published was gripping, but in all honesty, it was just another story about sexual assault - it did not have a call to action like it needed.

But call to action or no, "A Rape on Campus" painted a picture of rape accusations that is detrimental to the efforts they were initially attempting to support. Rolling Stone has created a mess, sending a message that women lie about rape. Social scientists that analyze crime reports show that two to eight percent of rape allegations end up being false. Hardly a drop in the bucket, magnified to the extreme with this story.

Because this is about sexual assault, a crime that is more "he said/she said" than others, there is now a preconceived notion to not believe sexual assault survivors. Now there is a shadow on the efforts universities are putting forth to try and create a safe environment for sexual assault survivors, and it will keep growing.

I admire Rolling Stone for wanting to contribute to the fight against sexual assault, but then they should have followed journalistic practices by the book and not have dismissed gaps in the story out of concern for Jackie. By trying to protect one victim, Rolling Stone has hurt many more.

Abby Kelly

kellyaa4@miamioh.edu