Content Warning: We acknowledge the recent reporting on Jane Doe’s experience has unearthed deeply painful memories for other survivors of SA and urge folks experiencing this agony to protect your inner peace, seek comfort in community, and lean on friends, family, and resources you trust.

Jane Doe’s story is not unique. The details — names and faces; the texts and rumors; the particular players that enabled these heinous acts — may look different, but her experience is painfully ordinary. Doe’s bravery is commendable, especially in light of how she was failed repeatedly by those who were meant to keep her safe. From the Jane, J., and John Does that couldn’t come forward, we are proud of you, relentlessly support you, and stand in solidarity with you and all other survivors of sexual violence.

We believe you.

What Jane Doe suffered is atrocious, full stop. The men responsible for these monstrous acts need to be held fully accountable, but they are merely cogs in a machine that continues to prey upon vulnerable populations like women, racial minorities, poor people, Indigenous communities, disabled communities, queer communities and others. This becomes abundantly clear when we examine the implication of Cornell University, Cornell University Police Department (CUPD), the Tompkins County District Attorney, and Cornell’s Title IX office.

These systems continue to protect wealth & male supremacy, at the expense of community safety and justice, and Jane Doe is merely our most recent and local personification.

This is glaringly obvious when we look at the “crimes” Cornell has historically decided to forcefully execute its power in enforcing.

The same year Jane Doe was violently assaulted, Cornell turned its attention to non-violent protests against Palestinian genocide — going so far as forcing students to self-deport for their own safety.

The next year, Cornell sacrificed its academic autonomy, student safety, and national respect by making deals with the Trump administration, while paying the administration $30M plus another $30M in Trump “friendly” research. All this to protect a net $190M in federal funding that was illegally withheld.

Cornell consistently prioritizes their own interests and forces their distorted version of justice onto others; it’s no surprise they have enabled an environment where sexual violence is so common and are utterly incapable of supporting survivors.

This pattern trickles down to the smallest actors — to the Moonie’s business owner willing to sacrifice patron safety in favor of liquor sales; to the Title IX officers more interested in protecting university reputation than victims of assault; to the DA willing to take the word of campus police rather than fully investigate a crime that will forever change the survivor.

These systems continue to fail us while protecting wealth we will never see.

Jane Doe, you did not ask to be a hero, but you are. You did not ask to represent countless survivors in lawsuits that never happened, but you do. You don’t deserve to represent the centuries of oppression by the capitalist system, but you do. You didn’t ask for that pressure and you don’t deserve it.

But we are grateful and we stand with you.

Solidarity forever.

We acknowledge there are several lists of demands circulating that originated with different groups at Cornell. We are committed to following the lead from these groups and to helping find unity among them, so we are supporting the demands most frequently endorsed by student groups. During times of glaring oppression, we believe we will only succeed via a unified front, and all demands in support of Jane Doe and other survivors of sexual assault are just and reasonable considering the atrocities committed against them.

The opinions of the author do not necessarily reflect the positions of the CPUSA.

Images: Sam Scott / Ithaca CPUSA.