So it’s 4:30 am and the phone rings. I figure it’s someone calling for the person who used to live in my room. I mean, I NEVER give my house number out. If you want to reach me, call my cell. I pay enough for the plan. Anyway, it rings again, so I get worried and I pick it up, but by then they’ve hung up.
Then, there’s a knock on my front door. Slightly annoyed and extremely discombobulated, I get up to answer the door because I think it’s my inebriated roommates who are rolling in at an ungodly hour without there keys.
Well, it wasn’t. It was some raspy-voiced pervert with a penchant for sexual harassment. Our obscene caller was able to figuratively force his way into the comfort of our apartment, ripping the secure feeling out of “Home Sweet Home.”
What is the deal with security? My friends were able to drive on and off campus six times, and were never stopped and asked for any form of identification when let back on to the campus at around one in the morning. Who are we letting onto campus? Are we really as safe as the administrations claims that we are?
Now I pose this question, with a security alert warning all female members on campus of a suspicious male lurking around, following and propositioning young co-eds into his car, and with the number of sexual assaults on the rise from one to eight, wouldn’t you think that security would have pedaled, I mean driven a tad faster down to my humble abode?
What about the two incidences last year, happening minutes apart from one another by the same perpetrator that we didn’t get warned about? The assailant was never prosecuted. Or what about the assault incident at the beach that was never reported in the Jeanne Clery report on campus crimes because it was technically not considered a campus property? Was that victim not a student?
Did I mention that this happened to two other apartments? Where is our security alert now?
Extremely freaked out because of the ultra vulgar nature of these harassments, I called security. Three times.
I bet if I called and reported underage drinking and a passed out person or two, security would have been here more swiftly. Or maybe if there was some illegal parking going on, you know, when a Quad designated car was parked in a Village Complex spot we would have gotten at least two security members on the case. I guess free handles and a parking ticket fee are much more glamorous than investigating some harassing phone calls. I think we know what the priorities on this campus are.
When a security officer finally did arrive at our apartment about 40 minutes later, the end result of his investigation was to tell us to synchronize our clocks so if we did get anymore calls, we would know the exact time that we received them at. Good job guys. Like we’re going to run to the suggested phone log and record the time that we got the call at 4:30 in the morning. That’s the first thing on my mind when someone tells me that they’re watching me and then spits out sexually explicit dialogue.
While I know that a few harassing phone calls are not exactly the most pressing of issues, security did get two other calls about this matter. Does this count as an emergency now? And what about the fact that this is a time of heightened awareness? If the timeliness of response by security is such a problem, then why not hire some more security personnel for the nighttime weekend shifts? I didn’t realize that a price tag could be put on the well being of campus residents.
Did I mention that these calls came from off-campus? None of my roommates gave out this number except to family members and a few select friends.
Silly me forgetting to note the time of these repeat phone calls. I forgot that I probably did something to warrant these frightening surprises in the night. I guess $32,000 doesn’t provide for my safety. I’ll just start carrying mace around in my bag and put a tracer on my phone. Then when I walk everywhere, I’ll stop at the security stations around campus and make sure that I have an officer escort me to the library so this way if anything does happen, I’ll know that at least I can’t be blamed because I am “protecting” myself.
So I guess that in the end it is my fault. My bad guys. I forgot that 18 full-time security officers are a copious amount. And the security booth at the entrance of campus is more than efficient. Keep up the good work. It really is a comfort to know that if there really was an emergency I would only have to wait forty minutes in terror or pain before security could get to me and then I guess it would really be a benefit to me so that I could build up my pain tolerance and learn to form a tough skin because nothing really could happen to me.
I felt such a comfort in knowing that our campus is taking such an active role in trying to alleviate the chance of any sexual assaults and harassments on campus. Now I wonder if this has to be reported in the Clery report next year…. Anyway, I’m sure the ever-efficient security department will find a way to justify the omission of that statistic as well.
As a female, I am concerned about the security on campus. Why should I be afraid to answer my phone or walk to the library? I came to Fairfield University because of the extremely low nature of sexual assaults. I looked for that security factor when I applied to colleges. Now that I am on this campus where the levels of sexual assaults are rising, I have to wonder how the administration is not taking more safety precautions to ensure the safety of its on-campus population. Aren’t these numbers disturbing to anyone else? How can I be assured that this is just an isolated incident? That these harassments will not occur to my roommates or for that matter anyone else? How can I be reassured that some action will be taken to try to deter an increase in the number of sexual assaults and harassments on campus?
Why should I worry about being the next victim? I pay $32,000 a year to be an intellectual, not the next possible statistic.
Do you have an opinion on this topic? E-mail the Commentary editor and tell us what you think.
Leave a Reply