"Ask Amy" Follows Up on Rape Advice, Misses the Mark Again

By Karl Klockars in News on Dec 14, 2009 9:40PM

Everyone makes mistakes. The Tribune's "Ask Amy" Dickinson made a big'un when she advised a rape victim that the blame started with her, and that she should ask the guy in question whether or not he raped her. Since then, she's written an explanation of her initial advice. When confronted with an error, some people would simply say "my bad" and not let it happen again, but Dickinson is doing the equivalent of plugging her ears and saying "no I didn't no I didn't no I didn't."

We'll allow the fine people at The Sexist (once again) give you their blow-by-blow of the "update" but suffice to say that the essence of the response to the letters, blog posts and comments that she received can be summed up with one quote:

I told her that the perpetrator should be confronted by authorities at school because he might have done this before and might do it again unless he is stopped.

No, you didn't. Amy, we didn't just throw away the paper with your column in it. It is preserved on the Internet in all its original glory. We can go back to the original article and see that you specifically did not say that. Instead, you said:

You must involve the guy in question in order to determine what happened and because he absolutely must take responsibility and face the consequences for his actions, just as you are prepared to do.

There's a tremendous leap to "have a counselor or an authority do it" from "you must involve the guy," and frankly, it's hard to imagine someone that could make that leap would be employed to give advice to the public.