Fox's Megyn Kelly, Brit Hume discuss college sex contracts
Fox News host Megyn Kelly again discussed the issue of campus sexual assault on her program Tuesday, noting how activists are now passing out "consent contracts" to college students.
Kelly began the segment by reporting that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed into law the notorious "yes means yes" policies for all colleges and universities (even private ones) in the state.
Kelly then brought on Fox News senior correspondent Brit Hume to discuss the consent contracts, which were reported on by the Washington Examiner earlier in the day.
"Everyone wants to diminish sexual assault on college campuses," Kelly said. "But it has gotten to the point of ridiculousness. Where now, they want verbal consent every step of the way — so it's like, you start the kissing and then it progresses and there should still be a 'yes' and a 'yes' and a 'yes' and a 'yes' and a 'yes.' "
Hume suggested such "new plans" for sex are being written by people "who have never had any sex."
"It was the culmination of the deregulation of sex," Hume said. "Now what we're seeing is that, those people don't particularly like some of the results of that — or what they see as the results of that — and they're trying to re-regulate it, and that's where we are."
Kelly then discussed the current campus culture in which accused students are treated as guilty from the start and severely limited in their defense. In some cases, accused students are forbidden from discussing the accusation with anyone, making it impossible to bring forward witnesses on their behalf. The accuser, meanwhile, can get someone expelled based solely on an accusation, as the "preponderance of evidence" standard means an adjudication board has to be just 50.01 percent sure she's credible.
"There's a presumption of non-consent," Kelly said. "And if you are a young man who gets accused, it's your burden to go in there and prove consent. And we're getting to the point now where you have to have a contract, and if you don't, you're going to be a presumed rapist."
Kelly didn't even mention that often times accusations are lodged months or years after an encounter, meaning the accused must try to recall specific details about an event he might not remember.
Kelly then scolded the Obama administration for providing only lip service to due process rights for accused students.
"Schools must ensure that the steps taken to afford those due process rights to the alleged perpetrator do not restrict or unnecessarily delay the protections for the complainant," Kelly paraphrased from the 2011 "Dear Colleague" letter written by the Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights.
"It's all about the complainant. Which, okay, but there are other rights," Kelly added. "And there's a question about whether these universities should be engaged in the business of adjudicating these disputes at all, as we've seen in the Duke case, in that Columbia University case and others — have serious questions attached to them."
Proponents of new campus sexual assault policies — particularly media outlets on the left — were predictably upset by the segment. The liberal Media Matters posted video of the segment under the headline "Fox's Brit Hume blames 'the deregulation of sex' for campus sexual assaults," but provided no additional commentary.
RawStory's Arturo Garcia ran a story about the segment with the headline "Megyn Kelly freaks out over NY affirmative consent law: What about men's rights?"
Forget the very real consequences of these policies and their empowerment of false accusers, the narrative remains that women never lie about rape and that therefore schools should expel anyone accused, evidence be damned.
