Stanford University deletes informative ‘alcohol safety page’ after some claim it’s sexist

Stanford University deletes informative ‘alcohol safety page’ after some claim it’s sexist

Cut off your nose to spite your face much?

In an act of political correctness gone awry, Stanford University has deleted a page from its website warning women about the dangers of alcohol after critics complained that the page was sexist and patronizing, and constituted “victim-blaming” because it linked drinking to sexual assault.

An archived version of the page, titled “Female Bodies and Alcohol,” can still be read. It is mostly a straightforward description of the effects alcohol has on women, and in particular, how the effects differ from those alcohol has on men.

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“A woman will get drunk faster than a man consuming the same amount of alcohol,” the guide warns. The rate of inebriation holds true even at the same body weight, it notes, because men have a higher amount of water in their bodies (which dilutes alcohol more) and have higher levels of the enzyme that metabolizes alcohol. The guide also says that women develop alcohol-related organ damage (such as cirrhosis of the liver) more easily than men.

The guide goes to length about the often-unfortunate role alcohol can play in sexual encounters.

“By some accounts, alcohol is involved in as many as 75% of sexual assaults on a college campus,” the guide says, adding:

Research tells us that women who are seen drinking alcohol are perceived to be more sexually available than they may actually be. Therefore, women can be targeted with unwanted attentions due to that misperception.… It’s important to take action to protect friends and others from potential assault or other regretted behavior as a result of drinking.

The advice clearly means well, but critics at the school claimed the entire page was actually troubling and sexist. Sasha Perigo, a student, tweeted that the article was “patronizing” and “victim-blaming.”

Professor Michele Dauber expressed a similar view that the school was “blaming women for getting drunk” as a way to avoid confronting sexual assault itself.

The university moved rapidly to mitigate the outrage. Initially, the page was just edited to remove the content related to sex, but soon after the page was deleted entirely. Now, in place of the useful information is gender-neutral information about how alcohol is metabolized by the body. At the top, Stanford includes an apology for the first article.

We would like to apologize for an outdated and insensitive article on women and alcohol that was here. The content of the article did not reflect the values of our office. We are sorry for the harm that the article may have caused people who read it.

What about an apology to the women the “outdated and insensitive” might have helped?

This report, by Blake Neff, was cross-posted by arrangement with the Daily Caller News Foundation.

LU Staff

LU Staff

Promoting and defending liberty, as defined by the nation’s founders, requires both facts and philosophical thought, transcending all elements of our culture, from partisan politics to social issues, the workings of government, and entertainment and off-duty interests. Liberty Unyielding is committed to bringing together voices that will fuel the flame of liberty, with a dialogue that is lively and informative.

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