Sexual Assault in Georgetown Has Similarities To Previous Crimes
The Georgetown University Department of Public Safety received a report from the Metropolitan Police Department on Sunday about a woman who was sexually assaulted in her home on the 3800 block of S Street NW. Though the victim is not a Georgetown student, the crime has the same M.O. as a series of similar crimes which have taken place on the campus and around the university -- a man breaking into a residence, assaulting a woman, then fleeing the scene.
Of course, what this means is we get to play another round of "Just How Inappropriate is it to Dub The Perpetrator of a Sex Crime A 'Cuddler'?"
The Post's report on the crime, written by Martin Weil, did not mention the catch-all "Georgetown Cuddler," the mysterious figure to whom the media has attributed most of these assaults over the last few years. It's understandable why people want to pile these crimes into one neat little pile -- after all, they are really similar. The descriptions of the suspect in most of the crimes are barely distinguishable -- medium build, middle-aged, white or Hispanic, and the crimes are taking place within a centralized location. Plus there's the fact that this is happening at a university, which boasts no shortage of individuals who tend to glamorize the juvenile. (Of course, someone thought it a hilarious idea to create a Twitter account, @thegtowncuddler, with a location of "In your dorm room, tonight." Classy. You can Google it yourself, if you really need to see it.)
But most of all, lumping all the crimes together as the work of one man serves to slightly dull the frightening realization that there's someone out there busting into women's homes with the intent to assault them.
But the issues with the moniker -- but two of which were wisely outlined by Amanda Hess in this post -- endure. To his credit, Weil's report was even-handed, especially considering previous efforts by the paper, including this off-the-cuff Breaking News Blog entry in January 2010 -- which wasn't even about Georgetown -- that featured the line "Looks like the District has another "cuddler" on the loose." Weil managed to describe the previous history of the area's issues with these crimes by using words that didn't trivialize the act of breaking into a house and violating someone sexually. But shouldn't that be the norm, instead of the exception?
To summarize, at the risk of editorializing this post into the next galaxy: yes, calling these crimes the work of a "Cuddler" is still totally inappropriate. Okay? Okay.