A Florida fraternity chapter has been suspended over a recording where members can be heard using language degrading women and chanting about rape, highlighting the normalcy of rape culture on university campuses.
Sigma Nu fraternity members of the University of Central Florida can be heard saying "let's rape some b*tches," "we're raping some b*tches" and "we're gonna rape 'em, who cares," in a video obtained by Knight News. A racial slur against black people can also be heard in the recording.
The recording was handed to the university by a woman who accused the fraternity of sexual assualt in October. She said she woke up naked and in pain next to a condom and condom wrapper in the bathroom of the frat house, according to Knight News.
A woman who doesn’t attend the university, filmed the scene and gave the video to the sexual assault victim to aid her case.
The controversial video comes as a study published earlier this year by Brown University found that “sexual violence on campus has reached epidemic levels.”
Researchers found that 28 percent of the women they surveyed had already experienced an attempted or completed rape before starting university. This increased to 37 percent by their second year of college.
University students have long attempted to bring awareness to the normalization of rape culture on college campuses.
In 2011, 16 former and current Yale students filed a complaint to the U.S. Office of Civil Rights, claiming that the university has a culture that tolerates rape, sexual assault, and sexual harassment.
A Columbia University student, who carried her dorm room mattress on her back across campus and into classes to protest the school’s failure to expel her alleged rapist, became an international symbol for women’s rights last year.
The video exposing Florida’s fraternity members has resulted in the interim suspension of the fraternity for sexual misconduct until a student conduct hearing scheduled for Aug. 20 takes place, the Huffington Post reported.
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