When it comes to sexual assault allegations, is it ever a good idea to name names?
That question arose this week when a group claiming to be current and former University of Chicago students created and then deleted an anonymous Tumblr account listing the names of six male students and alumni who allegedly have perpetrated “gender-based violence” against other students. The Tumblr blog, which was followed by fliers with the names taped around campus, stated that the effort is a response to the shortcomings of the university’s sexual assault policy, which is under federal investigation.
The Tumblr page, dubbed “The Hyde Park List,” was posted sometime Sunday, according to a cached version of the site. It was deleted Monday, restored Tuesday and deleted again by Wednesday. Still, the Tumblr page and fliers sparked a firestorm among the student body just days before classes begin Monday.
By Wednesday night, the controversy had grown to include a hacked student website, an online campaign targeting a sexual assault survivor, a campus rally and warnings from university officials that the anonymous posters could face disciplinary action.
While some students criticized the list for damaging the reputations of men who have not been proven to be perpetrators of sexual violence, the Tumblr page’s creator or creators wrote on the page that it was designed to put a spotlight on a troubling issue at a time when new students are most vulnerable.
In an apparent response to the allegations on the Tumblr page, a group of hackers claiming to be students appeared to have hacked the student-run MODAChicago.com website, re-titling it “The Real Hyde Park List.” There, the hackers posted an attack against a student sexual assault activist and threatened to “rape harder” in response to the campus outcry over the sexual violence accusations.
“The point of our list is a little different,” the hacked site read. “Its mission is to keep the Hyde Park community safe from people who publicly accuse other people of committing varying levels of gender-based violence.”
MODAChicago.com, which belongs to a student fashion show, was inaccessible Thursday morning.
The university is working with law enforcement authorities to address the hacking of MODAChicago.com, according to university spokesman Jeremy Manier. University officials also said in a statement that they do not condone any of the anonymous accusations.
On Wednesday night, scores of students rallied on the university’s Hyde Park campus to show support for survivors of sexual assault and other types of violence. At least one carried a sign that read, “Threats won’t break our strength,” according to reports.
“The Hyde Park List” is not the first example of college students using social media or the anonymity of stealthily publishing names around campus to send a message about sexual violence. In May, Columbia University’s New York City campus was rocked by a similar list—scrawled on the walls of bathroom stalls—intended to warn community members about male students accused of sexual assault. In April, an Internet campaign to have a Yale University professor investigated for sexual misconduct erupted after a female graduate student anonymously wrote an essay for Thought Catalog about having sex with him.
To some observers, the actions are a long overdue response to inadequate policies and a larger culture that blames and silences victims. To others, the effort represents a kind of campus vigilantism that could do more harm than good—and could be grounds for defamation lawsuits.
Colby Bruno, senior legal counsel for the Boston-based Victim Rights Law Center, said it is not uncommon for victims of sexual assault or harassment to turn to social media to seek redress, particularly when they belong to a tight-knit community with its own structures for leadership and discipline, such as a college campus, a religious sect or the military.
“All of these are very insular communities. Everyone knows the perpetrator, and that’s what makes the tool of naming the perpetrator so powerful,” she said.
Survivors who choose to publicly name their violators often have similar goals in mind, Bruno said.
“A lot of victims want to report someone, but they don’t want anything done about it. They just want to report that it happened and most of them say it’s just in case it happens to someone else,” she said. “They want to be sure that they are doing their part in protecting their community. Many of them know that their perpetrator has likely perpetrated other assaults.”
But some students who saw the postings said it could do more harm than good.
“This [Tumblr] list was not the answer, and posed way more problems than it solved,” said second-year student Murphy Spence in an email. “Anybody could wind up on the list, and its potential for abuse was basically limitless. False accusations of rape, in a university community that so strongly condemns it, could have ridiculous blowback on those anonymously named on some vigilante social justice warrior’s [T]umblr.”
Also, publicly accusing someone of sexual assault outside the format of the criminal justice system or a university disciplinary system could be considered defamation—a civil offense. It’s a problem that is likely to grow as social media supplants other forms of communication, particularly among Millennials, according to Andrew Miltenberg, a New York-based attorney who is handling several Title IX cases.
“Having not gotten relief either from the police or a disciplinary panel, people are turning to social media,” he said. “To me, it feels like a form of vigilante justice. You can find yourself assassinated online, so to speak, without having been found responsible for anything.”
In the case of “The Hyde Park List,” Miltenberg said, the vagueness of the posts, which readers have criticized online, could be an attempt to skirt liability for defamation.
“I viewed that as a very thinly veiled attempt to dance around defamation,” he said.
While some examples of defamation are clear-cut, such as saying someone has been convicted of rape when they have not been—an outright lie—others are not, he added. For the men named in “The Hyde Park List,” it is likely they would need to demonstrate how their reputations have been damaged by the post in the period of time before it was taken down.
“It could have a negative impact from a potential employer, a negative impact socially. So I think there’s an argument to be made that it is still defamatory and the writer would be liable for it,” Miltenberg said. “But it is a gray area.”
To Bruno, survivors are likely to continue turning to social media for support until other, more formal avenues for recording their stories open up.
“As soon as people start fixing the systems that victims can go through, then I think many victims will seek redress either through the criminal or the civil justice systems or the disciplinary process,” she said. “But until then, victims have to make sure that their fellow women are safe, and that’s how they do it.”
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