Earlier this week we were upset to hear an 18-year-old woman at Hofstra University on Long Island had allegedly been gang-raped by five men in a dorm bathroom. Each day, we read increasingly troubling newspaper reports describing how the student had gone back to a dorm room with one of the alleged rapists who took her phone at a frat party. There, she said, five men took her to a stall in the men’s bathroom, tied her up with rope and gang-raped her.

But guess what? Apparently, it’s not true. Today the District Attorney for Nassau County on Long Island reported that the accuser, whom she called “very troubled,” told police the sex was consensual. When the young woman was told the incident may have been caught on video tape, she admitted she’d lied.

Ew, this is every woman’s worst nightmare happening in real life: a creepy man dubbed “The Georgetown Cuddler” is going around D.C. college campuses, breaking into dorm rooms, and climbing on top of sleeping women. Last week, a female Georgetown student woke up at 4 a.m. to find a stranger in her home touching her inappropriately, just two days after another student woke up with a man believed to be the Cuddler lying next to her on the couch and covering her face. Apparently, this creep also likes to take a blanket from the victim’s bedroom, lay it on top of her, and then he lies on top of the blanket, too. Oh, and occasionally he tries to rape his victims “with varying success.” The Sexist blog, based in D.C., suggested more appropriate names for this creep could be “The Georgetown Entry-Gainer,” “The Georgetown Blanketlayer” or “The Georgetown Rapist.” Gross. Hopefully, some girl bonks this guy on the head with her vibe so police can catch the perv.

Alas, I know exactly how freaky this is, because the weirdo-in-my-bed thing actually happened to me once. Not with the Georgetown Cuddler, though. More, after the jump…

Finally, some good news to come out of this sad story: Phoenix police will pursue felony child abuse charges for the parents, Liberian refugees, who abandoned their eight-year-old daughter in July—after she was allegedly gang-raped by four boys—because they were ashamed.

The boys, ages 10 to 14, who are also Liberian refugees, allegedly lured the eight-year-old girl to a storage shed, by promising her chewing gum, where the alleged assault took place. When the parents learned their daughter had been raped, they apparently told police they did not want her to return home. She has been living in protective custody since the incident.

Ditching their kid is not the main reason police are pursuing abuse charges, however. According to the Associated Press, the young girl and her family have been referred to Child Protective Services in Phoenix five times since the girl was four years old. Altogether, past reports (including several times the young girl was found by neighbors or police to be wandering around the neighborhood by herself stealing or begging for food) could comprise felony child abuse. [Fox News]

Normally, I’m not big on low-budget documentaries. But this new video called “Our Hidden Culture” really got me thinking. It argues that we in the United States live in a “rape culture”—where unwanted sexual attention is constantly lavished on women (hello, cat callers), where sexual violence is constantly portrayed in music and on film (that’s you, Eminem), and where women are always expected to be sexual creatures (thanks, Victoria’s Secret). When these behaviors are accepted as the norm, of course we see sexual harassment, verbal abuse, discrimination and, yes, rape. The idea here is that sexual violence is as much of a social problem as a personal one. These little things become so commonplace that we may not even notice them, but it’s these very attitudes that lead to violence.

• The Marriott Hotel & Spa in Stamford, CT, changed its legal claim that a 40-year-old mom of two who was raped at gunpoint in their parking garage was not to blame for her own rape. In a lawsuit against the hotel, the victim had claimed that the hotel did not adequately protect her from her attacker, who she said had been seen acting suspiciously in the parking garage before the incident. In response, Marriott said the victim had “failed to exercise due care for her own safety and the safety of her children and proper use of her senses and facilities.” [AP] — We’re really thrilled that the Marriott dropped the blame-the-victim hooey they were trying to pull.

• After a 40-year-old woman was sexually assaulted at gunpoint in the hotel’s parking garage in front of her two kids, Marriott Hotel & Spa in Stamford, CT, has responded to a lawsuit by the victim by saying she “failed to exercise due care for her own safety and the safety of her children and proper use of her senses and facilities.” The victim claimed her attacker, Gary Fricker, 56, had acted suspiciously in the hotel and garage for days prior to the attack, but the hotel says they had not been warned about any suspicious behavior by the man. [Greenwich Time]—This is an all-too-familiar story.

Congo has a new problem to add to the ever-growing list of atrocities racking the country. According to an article in The New York Times, it is now popular for men to rape other men in an effort to force Congolese communities into submission. Officials from Oxfam, Human Rights Watch, the United Nations, and several Congolese aid organizations say the number of male-on-male rapes has risen sharply as a result of rebel groups seeking revenge for the joint Congo-Rwanda military operations. These armed rebels seek to make civilians do what they want by demoralizing and humiliating them.

If there’s one thing Mad Men fans know about the show, it is that nothing happens by accident. So I’m sure creator Matt Weiner intended Joan Holloway‘s rape at the hands of her douche-y doctor fiancé to make a point: in the 1960s, the concept of “date rape” did not exist and people scarcely spoke openly about rape.

But even though it’s 2009 now, Christina Hendricks, the actress who plays Joan, has noticed the point still appears to be lost on people. Hendricks told New York magazine:

“What’s astounding is when people say things like, ‘Well, you know that episode where Joan sort of got raped?’ Or they say rape and use quotation marks with their fingers. ‘I’m like, ‘What is that you are doing? Joan got raped!’ It illustrates how similar people are today, because we’re still questioning whether it’s a rape. It’s almost like, ‘Why didn’t you just say bad date?’ ”

“Sort of got raped”? How does one “sort of” get raped? Is that like being a little pregnant?

In South Africa, lesbians have it tough. There’s a whole category of heinous crimes there known as “corrective rape,” where power trippin’ men who rape lesbians to turn them straight or just to punish them for their preferences. Corrective rapes happen all the time, yet only 31 cases have been reported since 1998. Why? Because women don’t trust the system and don’t want to out themselves. Of those 31 reported cases, two have made it to trial and there has been just one measly conviction. But hopefully, that sad number is about to double. On Wednesday, three a-holes who raped openly gay football sportswoman, Eudy Simelane, will go to trial and the outcome of the case will send a very strong message—hopefully in the right direction.

This is a sad story. If you are looking for something uplifting to start your weekend, stop reading right now.

Police in Phoenix, AZ, went out to investigate reports of hysterical screaming. They found four boys, all under age 15, and a partially clothed 8-year-old girl running from an empty shed. The boys, ages 9 to 14, now face charges ranging from sexual assault to kidnapping. Investigators say they lured the girl to the shed by offering her gum. Then, they held her down and took turns raping her for about 10 to 15 minutes.

One of the first things you learn about alt-girl favorite Tori Amos is that she was raped when she was younger. Anyone who listens to her chilling song, “Me And A Gun,” off her Little Earthquakes album knows that and Amos has been honest about her assault for years.

Recently, Amos bravely opened up to London’s Guardian newspaper for their “What I Know About Men,” feature, in which a famous woman shares her secrets about the opposite sex. But Amos’ heartbreaking piece may as well have been titled “How Being Raped Affected My Life.” It was only after giving birth to her daughter that she “claimed [her] body back” and through the love of her husband that she could have a healthy relationship with men.

Ah, horror films. If you found the corpse of a dead woman in a mental institution basement, you’d totes have sex with it, right? Then chop up the body parts…until she comes alive and eats you.

Such is the plot of “Deadgirl”, a new horror flick, whose movie poster even looks vaginal! Looks like conservatives and feminists can finally find some common ground…to freak the f**k out.

Alas, “Deadgirl” leaves us horror-film loving feminists grappling with many serious questions. Is having sex with a zombie necrophilia? Or is it rape, because she’s actually partially alive? Can necrophilia also be rape?

And also, what the hell is wrong with people?

Joseph Brooks, the guy who wrote “You Light Up My Life” and won an Oscar for it, is facing 82 counts of rape-related charges against 11 different women since 2005. He lured these young gals into his apartment by dangling the fame carrot in front of them—he’d have them sit on his “casting couch” and tell them to drink a lot of wine, because the part they were auditioning for was a wine-swilling prostitute. If they refused he’d whip out his…Oscar. Eventually, this nasty dude allegedly attacked and raped them. Not surprisingly, he picked up most of his victims via Craigslist, with an ad that claimed an Oscar-winner was looking for someone he could turn into a star. [NY Post]

Geez, what’s with all these guys using Craigslist for nefarious purposes? First, it was the Craigslist killer. Then there was that guy who posted on CL to find someone to rape his wife while he watched. Now this? Here are some tips for making sure you’re not responding to some twisted guy’s ad. Obviously, there are no guarantees. But, hey, it’s a start.

Shudder. Double X has a creepy tale penned by Anna Balkrishna about how her mother married her prison pen pal. Oh, and why was he in jail in the first place? Rape, it turned out. After 22 years of marriage, Balkrishna’s parents divorced. Not long after, Balkrishna’s mother happened to get a random, out-of-state, collect phone call from a man incarcerated at a New Mexico prison. (Apparently, this is one way guys in jail meet women.) For whatever reason, she accepted the charges, and there began their relationship. Then, they got married. After that, her mother found out that he had not been convicted of vehicular manslaughter, as he had told her, but rape. Balkrishna’s mother had been raped in college, but this revelation didn’t deter her. Eventually, it came to light that there were other rape charges—and a mistress. In 2006, the mother’s husband was released. He cheated on her and began using drugs again. These days, he’s back in prison for assaulting his first wife. Today, her mother doesn’t regret the relationship: “‘I chose that life myself,’ she says.” Would you date a guy who had a criminal past? [Double X]

An article on CNN yesterday turned me on to Zimababwe native Betty Makoni, CNN hero of the week. She is a teacher, a volunteer, and the executive director of her organization, Girl Child Network (GCN), which boasts 30,000 members in Zimbabwe alone. She was also raped when she was 6 years old.

OK, we know the following characterization is NOT 100 percent representative of all fraternities in this country.

But still, the stats about sexual assault and tales of misogynistic behavior in the essay, “Bros Before Hos,” published by history and gender studies professor Nicholas L. Syrett on the National Sexuality Resource Center’s web site, are beyond scary.

You’ll have to read the essay yourself for his particularly eloquent argument about how the closeness of men in frats fosters misogynistic behavior and a fear of homosexuality—it’s worth a read for anyone who has known or loved a frat boy. Synett’s certainly not arguing frat boys are worse than other men, but they do live in a unique environment that has an affect on them. Frat boys don’t sound like they’ve ever not had a weird relationship with sex, masculinity and power.

Six scary things we learned about frat boys from reading his essay, after the jump…

I am definitely a big fan of Craigslist—it’s helped me get rid of a bunch of old crap and even led me to the cute couch that’s now sitting in my teeny apartment. But it’s another bad PR day for the site. A man in North Carolina posted an ad on Craigslist to find someone to rape his wife. This is already wrong in so many ways, but the worst part is, someone responded. He came to the man’s house armed with a knife and assaulted the wife, while the husband watched and their two children slept in another room. The attacker was arrested Sunday—and the husband was led out in handcuffs on Wednesday. Hopefully his wife will be okay. And will instantly file for divorce.

All I have to say is, people, please stop using Craigslist for evil.

On yesterday’s episode of “The View,” Elisabeth Hasselbeck responded to the Playboy.com article written by Guy Cimbalo that listed her as one of the conservative women he’d like to “hate f**k.” I don’t blame her for being offended—I would pitch a fit if, say, Rush Limbaugh said he wanted to hate f**k me—but her annoyance that the National Organization for Women didn’t immediately respond (in fact, they didn’t know) is misplaced. After all, they have bigger fish to fry right now, like the murder of doctors like Dr. George Tiller.